When I was in sixth grade learning seventh grade math, I found that the most annoying thing on earth was to graph plots on paper. Then in seventh grade, I discovered the miniplot.
If you don't know what a miniplot is, it is a extremely useful graph in sticky note form. Basically, it is a sticky note with a xy graph that goes from one to ten. It is perfect for homework in which you have to graph. you just stick a miniplot onto your notebook and graph.
When I first discovered the miniplot, I was shocked. I spent endless hours of my life drawing graphs when all I really needed was a one dollar set of 50 miniplots. Without any thought, I bought two sets. When I got home and started graphing with the miniplots for homework, I realized just how useful these plots can be. I saved almost 15 minutes by not having to graph, and the graphs were also a LOT more legible. From that point on, I was hooked.
Miniplots were the answer for my need for speed and neatness.
For now, I want you to move away from formal writing. You've had quite a bit of that over the summer. We'll leave the five paragraph essay and the formal analysis and introductions and conclusions for your 8th grade English teacher to handle.
ReplyDeleteWhat I want you to do is just write. Don't worry about form. Don't worry about being clear. Make your posts more intimate and personal. Don't make them essays. Start writing about what you think, and what your opinions are. Be full of angst! Your writing right now lacks emotion - you are at the point where you need to search for your own voice and find a human element in your writing.
Basically, start writing about daily life. Start using present tense. Write about whatever catches your fancy. Don't worry about making mistakes.
For example, I wrote this today while sitting in class, while observing the teacher and the students and the room:
"Room of natural sunlight but not quite, knuckles held under chin, carpet so rough as to be smooth underfoot worn flippity flop flops, tapping cyclically to the tune of thoughts humming overhead that are maybe overthought and stretched beyond their point of elasticity, the eyebrows dipping into a slight slope in response, thumbs rubbing desk impatiently for this particular misaimed voice to pass, pens curling across pages, then dropped, by a hand no longer there, its owner bending back into a rubber banded chair while reading about sentences as prison sentences so open as to open themselves up to any interpretation whatsoever though not to the detriment of the elegance of thought that left them imprinted on page if you know what I mean because I know what I mean even if you don’t though maybe you do, closely trailing the words like a monk hunched in a cloister keeping alive the idealism that obscurity is not created for its own sake, because is there a true truth of meaning or is it merely the author: “I don’t know man, I just thought it was cool,” then mixed with student voices uncut and unpolished thrown across the tables, sure in their intent but not their execution, hand brushing across the surface of a page with a quick flick of wrist, once and then twice and then folding it flat against the table with a thumb leaving it cracked open, the heads of all different coherences swiveled towards the somethings or nothings that hold their attention - like plants that swivel their heads towards sunlight, hoping for growth but in this case not of the practical variety but of the sort that revolves between the ears and leads to more knuckles held beneath bemused chins and more pens curling across pages in search of insights or at least the knowledge of the existence of insights in this room of sunlight that’s almost but not quite and almost but not quite."
Just go for whatever you feel like. Don't worry about proper form or being grammatically correct. Be inspired.