http://nnwp.edublogs.org/2008/09/10/on-writing-by-stephen-king-robert/ The official (we)blog for the Northern Nevada Writing Project Fri, 12 Sep 2008 02:04:14 -0400 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.2 hourly 1 http://nnwp.edublogs.org/2008/09/10/on-writing-by-stephen-king-robert/comment-page-1/#comment-136 carolinehatcher Fri, 12 Sep 2008 02:04:14 +0000 http://nnwp.edublogs.org/?p=20#comment-136 Hi Robert! Well, I think I have some suggestions for some of your questions. I admit I have the book at home myself, and haven't read it, although I have now talked to many who have and feel like I know the book :> So, to start off- I asked the same question about structured writing and what I have learned from various people is that there will always be some who work well with the structure and can use it and others who get completely off-course by it. Take for example, 75% of my juniors had not passed the writing proficiency last year, so we did this in-depth structured writing week-long course, where I focused on, above all, pre-writing, because they never thought about what they would write; They all passed (seriosuly tons of teachers to thank for that) but many of them came to me and thanked me for giving them some type of structure to take on the exam. What I like to do is when I get writing samples from students, I try to hone in on one thing they seem to do really well, and focus and praise on that, telling them that I look forward to reading more of that in their papers- it works well and usually gets us off on the right foot. I, myself, did use structured pre-writing up until my middle years of college when I finally felt like I knew what I was doing while I wrote- but then again, I may be one of those who gained something from it. Hi Robert!
Well, I think I have some suggestions for some of your questions. I admit I have the book at home myself, and haven’t read it, although I have now talked to many who have and feel like I know the book :>
So, to start off- I asked the same question about structured writing and what I have learned from various people is that there will always be some who work well with the structure and can use it and others who get completely off-course by it. Take for example, 75% of my juniors had not passed the writing proficiency last year, so we did this in-depth structured writing week-long course, where I focused on, above all, pre-writing, because they never thought about what they would write; They all passed (seriosuly tons of teachers to thank for that) but many of them came to me and thanked me for giving them some type of structure to take on the exam.
What I like to do is when I get writing samples from students, I try to hone in on one thing they seem to do really well, and focus and praise on that, telling them that I look forward to reading more of that in their papers- it works well and usually gets us off on the right foot.
I, myself, did use structured pre-writing up until my middle years of college when I finally felt like I knew what I was doing while I wrote- but then again, I may be one of those who gained something from it.

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