Write To Learn Summary

Murray’s Write to Learn makes perfect sense to me. The concept that “writing produces writing” decribes my approach. If I sit at the computer long enough, I will come up with something. Frost said, “way leads to way” and I’ve founds that one sentence leads to the next. I find myself frustrated as a teacher when students repeatedly say that cannot think of anything to write on a topic. I may lack empathy because I do not have a great deal of experience with this struggle. Also, Murray describes his thinking process of relaxing with a blank mind and letting thoughts drift across until something inspires one to write (2). My students are interested in instant gratification. As digital natives, they have grown up in a world where google can come …show more content…
I really did not have a working definition for pedagogy myself, outside of the art of teaching. Frankly, I can’t recall hearing that word outside of in reference to one of the Praxis exams. As I was reading Saturday morning, I had to stop and message Roxanne as soon as I read a particular passage. Tate, et al. asserts, “Composition classes are usually smaller than those of other subjects - in part because of the grading load, but mostly because smaller classes help us to differentiate instruction according to the needs of heterogeneous writers" (7). In my school, English class sizes tend to hover around 30 students. I have always been a firm believer that our class sizes are too large. I truly believe we spend far more time on our grading than teachers of other subjects. However, Tate, et al. makes a solid point in the argument that English classes absolutely should be smaller than others because writing is a difficult area in which to meet the needs of the many different types of students. In many rural areas, as I live in, writing is one of the weakest areas. Sadly, I have found that in many cases, English classes are the only ones who are asking students to write on a regular basis. I am a firm advocate for writing across the