SO TELL ME, HOW ARE YOUR ZOMBIES DIFFERENT?

...AND OTHER QUESTIONS WRITING TEACHERS ASK.

This would be a great title for a book on writing with middle school kids -- something I have just finished.  For three Friday afternoons in April, I joined Writing Project teachers, college students, classroom teachers and 140 sixth, seventh and eighth graders in a project called WriteOn! at a local school.

It was the third year of WriteOn! and as is often the case now, the funds were cut for the grant.  But at this school, the PTA decided a writing enrichment series for all the middle schoolers was important and it provided the money for the writers and materials.  Good for them!

Our group had eight students covering all the grades.  Some are avid writers and used the prompts to create pages and pages of new stories.  Some hate writing. Some are very shy about sharing their work.  Different teachers wrote with us each week -- and when teachers + students write together, the energy shifts.  The power of words and ideas supplants the power of teacher over student, and we become one writing community.

One girl discovered Viking runes and made a series of coded sentences to decipher.  One reluctant writer used a photograph from WRITE WHAT YOU SEE (Hank Kellner, Cottonwood Press).  He wrote two pieces, one about his grandmother's dog named Baxter and one about dogs and babies and why people are drawn to them.

The Native American ledger drawings from the Hood Museum at Dartmouth College inspired seventh and eighth grade girls to write serious, detailed stories about a life on the plains and first encounters with white settlers.  Some moved to poetry and personal essays on loneliness and belonging.

Two friends write war-adventure-espionage stories.  This is where the zombies come into the writing.  They support each other's work and listen intently when the other reads new parts.

In our "quick writes", the teachers also wrote about dogs and babies, loneliness and "lost love", bullies and heroes.  I love how writing can be a great equalizer, a common ground for adults and young people to share.

Yesterday, we all were a bit sad to finish the WriteOn! series.  We knew something good had happened.  We had laughed together, shared thoughts through our writing and talking, and learned something new about each person, adults and young people.  We had taken risks and explored new things.

This is why I love teaching and writing...

Why I believe in the future...

 and in the young people who are its promise

and its heirs.

EARLY APRIL

Echo Lake - Franconia, New Hampshire

I have been obsessed with the politics and bad news of the day to the point where I get depressed, sick, dispirited.  It's not the way to live a life.  I have to get outside into the natural world.  Beauty.  Mountains topped with snow.  Cold, clear lakes.  Blue, blue skies.  The crisp definition of trees just before they leaf out.  

This early April morning is testament enough -- birds returning to nest, buds about to burst, life bravely embracing the next step in its cycle and me, alive again and grateful to be connected to the terrifying beauty and mystery around me.

It's a comfort in a strange way.

HOPE

Aung San Suu Kyi

Aung San Suu Kyi has inspired me for years -- through her house arrest and imprisonment.  Through her stolen election.  Through the years of broken promises and indignities.  But try as they might, the military junta could not silence her.

Two years ago, I wrote:  "Never give up hope" when thinking of her.  Five years ago, it seemed as if hope was a very small flame about to die.

Today, Aung San Suu Kyi has won a seat in the parliment.  Everywhere she travels in Burma, she is met with joy and huge crowds who, like me, now overflow with Hope.