Content Area Writing...Though most literacy experts spend their time in conversation about such cerebral topics as syllabication, prosody and metacognition, there is something much more profound to all of this reading and writing chatter: giving kids a voice!
If we get right down to it, there is no reason to teach kids to read and write if not for giving them a voice.
We know reading and writing to be acts of expression and we know that all of us have plenty to say. Whether we are 3-years-old or 83-years-old, we all have something to say. It is part of the human existence. It separates us from the beasts.
Confucius tells us that “words are the voice of the heart.”
Said another way: Who cares if we are fluent if we don’t ever read and write anyway? Who cares if we picture things as we read them if we don’t have any original thoughts to begin with?
Count me as one who favors the human being over the beast, the art of teaching over the science. Count me as one who believes that hope always, always trumps fear.
And count me as one who favors the child.
I would like to think that I am an educator who favors giving our children a voice and trusting them (not us) to change the world. Why am I so certain? Because it’s the only thing that ever has.
I know that I pontificate and lollygag my way through most of my life and here I go again. Trust me, the teachers and students at my school tell me that all the time. “Get to the point, Evans!”
So let me be especially clear about what I am saying. If we view reading and writing as a collection of skills that lead to more reading and writing then maybe our students won’t see much value in it.
Instead, maybe we should view reading and writing as it was designed to be – as way of helping the next generation communicate, to gain their voice, to have their say.
That’s why I would like to see us do more to have kids always, always write for an audience, for publication, for debate or for other platforms that give reading and writing a purpose.
Trust me, the students at my school have much to say. They just don’t view reading and writing as a way of expressing themselves. I think we – not they -- are to blame for that.
At my school, we celebrated our students’ voices through a Poetry Slam event this year and I am certain that more events like that will provide students an opportunity to make their voices heard.
It might also provide them with a reason to read and write…making all that fluency and vocabulary stuff meaningful to them.
Let me close by providing you with Margaret Meade’s full quote: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”
Most people who have examined this famous quote have focused on the notion of a “small group” of citizens. Instead, let me turn your attention to the word “thoughtful.” I submit that if any group – if any individual – is not “thoughtful” then they are not citizens at all. In fact, they are not human.
We owe it to our kids to grow them into great citizens. Let me put it this way: It would be a great mistake to grow a generation of kids who know how to read and write but who – sadly -- never do.
