For reasons I can’t reveal, I have created a significant number of writing prompts for original stories and essays. The complete list of these prompts will appear on class homework blogs this year, so that students can regularly use them to start a new piece of their own writing. Initially, I will likely limit the length, as a way to encourage the habit of writing and to enable more prompt comments. The list contains enough prompts that we could write one a week, and I may try to keep this pace at the start of this project.
I mention this project because I plan to participate. Maroonballoon will host my writings that can model the process for students. Students will have their own writing blogs, which will house their pieces from this project (for which we do not yet have a name), as well as regular reflections on the course readings.
The project and the student blogs are two more experiments. Like Whitman’s noiseless patient spider, we need to keep sending forth filament, filament, filament ’til a ductile anchor hold.
In my next post, I will start participating in this project–tentatively titled “growing writing” or “working the soil” or “regular writing.” The last one appeals to me, since it sets up student blogs for a complementary title, “reflective writing.” Or we could just say “prompts” and “reflections.” In any case, I will start with this prompt: Making things is harder than destroying them. Who do you know who is a successful builder? What does this person build or make—houses, clothes, food, friends or something else?
maroonballoon 