The Writers Notebook

in College Composition

Travis Poling

Indiana Writing Project ISI 2015

Why Keep a Writers Notebook?

The act of writing is the only way to

become a better writer.

Pat Schneider, Writing Alone and with Others

My Own Practice

I've been practicing writing in

notebooks since early high school. As

long as I've been using a notebook to

collect my ideas and drafts, I've been

living the life of a writer.

Inquiry

How can I provide tools for writing that students can carry with them

throughout their college and professional careers?

Hypothesis

The writer's notebook may be the single most important tool for developing a

routine for writing, for writers of all genres and ages. As adults who have

completed high school, college students are expected to write often and write

meaningfully. The writers notebook can help these students develop deeper

thinking about their ideas and composing process in ways that are appropriate

to a college environment.

Highlights from Research

Fletcher, Portalupi, Harrison, Schneider, Goldberg

Low-Risk, High-Comfort

The writers notebook gets students

used to the activity of writing in a

low-risk, high-comfort place.

Ralph Fletcher & JoAnn Portalupi, Writing

Workshop: The Essential Guide

Live Like a Writer

A writers notebook gives you a place

to live like a writer, not just in school

during writing time, but wherever you

are, any time of day.

Ralph Fletcher, A Writers Notebook

A Writers Studio

The writers journal is the studio in

which we do the hard, consistent

work of practice of our craft, patient

with ourselves, but diligent toward the

accomplishment of improving and

realizing our craft.

Pat Schneider, Writing Alone and With Others

Gives Freedom & Permission

I am not writing anymore for a

teacher or for school. I am writing for

myself first and I don't have to stay

within my limits, not even margins.

This gives me psychological freedom

and permission.

Natalie Goldberg, Writing Down the Bones

From Observation to Writing

After developing a regular routine

writing in their notebooks, students

start to move through the world with

not just an observers eyes but a

writers eyes. Writers dont just

observe the world; they also bother to

write their observations down.

Corbett Harrison, Always Write

Useful for Any Genre

This writing practice [with notebooks] is

also a warm-up for anything else you

might want to write. It is the bottom line,

the most primitive, essential beginning of

writing. The trust you learn in your own

voice can be directed then into a business

letter, a novel, a Ph.D. dissertation, a play,

a memoir.

Natalie Goldberg, Writing Down the Bones

Introducing the Writers Notebook

A Mini Lesson

Whats in my Journal

Odd things, like a button drawer. Mean

things, fishhooks, barbs in your hand.

But marbles too. A genius for being agreeable.

Junkyard crucifixes, voluptuous

discards. Space for knickknacks, and for

Alaska. Evidence to hang me, or to beatify.

Clues that lead nowhere, that never connected

anyway. Deliberate obfuscation, the kind

that takes genius. Chasms in character.

Loud omissions. Mornings that yawn above

a new grave. Pages you know exist

but you can't find them. Someone's terribly

inevitable life story, maybe mine.

by William Stafford

Rules for Writers Notebooks

The writers notebook is a safe place to practice writing.

You dont have to share it with anyone.

It wont be collected or graded.

The writers notebook belongs completely to you.

Purchase your own inexpensive notebook, or create a new folder to save files in your computer.

Rules for Writers Notebooks

Set goals to use your writers notebook regularly.

But dont despair if you dont meet your goal.

Take your writers notebook with you wherever you go.

Take it to class, to work, on vacation, on walks.

Keep your writers notebooks, at least while youre in college.

Reviewing what you wrote in the past can give you ideas for writing and research projects.

Rules for Writers Notebooks

The writers notebook is optional.

Use the tool that works best for you.

There are no rules for the writers notebook.

You are free to use it however it best suits you.

Student Writing

As we read aloud the first page of Marcus persuasive essay,

listen for words that evoke emotion.

Have you ever been locked in a room for 23 hours a day and say how about 6 months for starters? Can you imagine what that does to peoples minds? Kind of like putting a beautiful rose in a dark place with no sunlight, eventually it will die out. For starters solitary confinement is Prison inside of Prison, when you are released from solitary back out into the prison which is called G.P. stands for general population. Feels like I was just released from jail. Freedom inside a locked door, sounds unreal, but so true. Isolation is abuse to discipline people with isolation. These are humans we are dealing with

Inside a room the size of a closet. One silver, metal toilet with a sink connected at the top with a circus funny mirror, which makes your face look funny. No window, a mat that has no cushion feels like cardboard when I lay on it. To the left of the mat is a desk connected to the wall and a chair that comes up from under the desk, both connected to the wall. To wash your hands or get a drink of water you have to walk over to the two in one sink/toilet and push in a button hot or cold. But it only runs for like 15 seconds so you have to keep pushing it to be able to really get a drink of water or thoroughly wash your hands. Bean dip hole is where you receive your food when they come around passing it out to everyone. Three times a day morning, afternoon, and evening. Than we get to take a 15 min shower and 1 hour of rec when we are under solitary confinement in prison.

Have you ever been locked in a room for 23 hours a day and say how about 6 months for starters? Can you imagine what that does to peoples minds? Kind of like putting a beautiful rose in a dark place with no sunlight, eventually it will die out. For starters solitary confinement is Prison inside of Prison, when you are released from solitary back out into the prison which is called G.P. stands for general population. Feels like I was just released from jail. Freedom inside a locked door, sounds unreal, but so true. Isolation is abuse to discipline people with isolation. These are humans we are dealing with

Inside a room the size of a closet. One silver, metal toilet with a sink connected at the top with a circus funny mirror, which makes your face look funny. No window, a mat that has no cushion feels like cardboard when I lay on it. To the left of the mat is a desk connected to the wall and a chair that comes up from under the desk, both connected to the wall. To wash your hands or get a drink of water you have to walk over to the two in one sink/toilet and push in a button hot or cold. But it only runs for like 15 seconds so you have to keep pushing it to be able to really get a drink of water or thoroughly wash your hands. Bean dip hole is where you receive your food when they come around passing it out to everyone. Three times a day morning, afternoon, and evening. Than we get to take a 15 min shower and 1 hour of rec when we are under solitary confinement in prison.

A Writers Notebook Exercise

Adding Emotion

to Research-Based Nonfiction

Adapted from Aimee Buckners

Nonfiction Notebooks

Consider & Share

What were your two I-Search topics?

Think for a moment: Do either of them bring up emotions for you about your own teaching or writing?

Freewrite

On a new page in your notebook, write about your feelings around one of your I-Search topics.

Freewrite

Read through what you just wrote.

Underline words that convey an emotion.

Freewrite

On a new page, list the words and phrases you underlined. You may add more words to the list that convey your feelings about your I-Search topic.

Freewrite

Share your list with your neighbor.

What words and phrases stand out to you from your neighbors list? What are the most compelling or interesting to you? Discuss.

Freewrite

Write for one more moment about one emotion that grabbed your neighbors attention in your own list:

Why do you think it stood out to them?

Does this emotion seem important in your own thinking about this topic?

How might you use this emotion in a persuasive essay about your I-Search topic?

Group Discussion

What was it like to write about your emotions regarding a research topic?

Did your neighbor shed any light on your reflections?

How did Marcus use emotion in his persuasive piece? Was it effective?

Can you see how emotions might work in a persuasive essay related to your I-Search topic?

What is the Writers Notebook?The writers notebook is like a camera that the writer holds up to a

mirror. The images that develop reveal the writer and their ideas in

order to be reviewed, revised, and made public if the occasion arises.

The writers notebook is also like the self portrait that the camera

creates in the hands of the photographer. It is an intimate examination

of the artist at work that can be viewed as a reflection of their desires

and aspirations.

For the college student, the writers notebook is a safe place to explore

the self and the composing process in greater depth that may not have

been previously encouraged through traditional methods of education.

Self portrait by the poet William Stafford

Questions?

Works Cited

Buckner, Aimee. Nonfiction Notebooks. Portland, ME: Stenhouse P, 2013. Print.

Fletcher, Ralph. A Writers Notebook. NewYork: HarperTrophy, 1996. Print.

--- and JoAnn Portalupi. Writing Workshop: The Essential Guide. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 2001. Print.

Goldberg, Natalie. Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within. Boston: Shambala, 2005. Print.

Goodreads. 2015. Web. 22 June 2015.

Harrison, Corbett. Writers Notebooks. Always Write. 2015. Web. 15 June 2015.

Photographs by Wiliam Stafford. Lewis & Clark Digital Collections. Lewis & Clark College. N.d. Web. 22 June 2015.

Schneider, Pat. Writing Alone and with Others. New York: Oxford UP, 2003. Print.

Stafford, William. Whats in My Journal. The Writers Almanac. American Public Media. 17 Jan. 2005. Web. 22 June 2015.