Subject: English Language Arts, Writing

Grade Level: 7-12

Materials: Copies of Living Up the Street by Gary Soto, sections of Angela’s Ashes by Frank McCourt, printouts of teen memoirs from websites (see below), and computers with Internet access and Microsoft Word software

About: Using various models, including Gary Soto’s Living up the Street as a mentor text, students immerse themselves in memoirs. Reading examples by Soto, McCourt, and others, including teen memoirs published in print and online, provides examples that students can model while they write their own stories. As we examine the structure of the memoir, breaking it down into three distinct parts, students practice identifying each part while writing each section of their own. Lessons on incorporating sensory details, dialogue, and images into their writing (not included here) help students’ writing come alive. Technology is used to help students connect to their reading, collaborate during the writing and editing process, and enable struggling writers to create digital stories. Students use the Internet for more than online research—technology actively participates in their lives as readers and writers. Each student creates their own account and joins a “team blog” that serves as the class blog space. Here they record their thoughts, ideas, and responses to literature. This blog provides the forum to examine Soto’s childhood memoir, Living up the Street, and also facilitates reflection on their own lives. By writing about ten chapters from the book online, conversations are stimulated as students compare their personal experience to the book. Uploaded photos and other personal artifacts from their own “street” further solidify connections to literature. To improve writing, students use the Internet to create memory maps, adding notes to satellite images of their neighborhood to explain the setting of their memoir. These visual cues facilitate the writing of their own childhood memoir, spurring memories and triggering details about their childhood. The memory maps are created using Google Earth and are posted on the photo website Flickr.com. Once students have identified a memorable moment and written drafts of their memoir on paper, typed drafts are posted and revised using Google Docs (explained below). Finally, each memoir is published online to the eZine Writing Matters or submitted to another teen website. Students also have the opportunity to create a digital version of their memoir using images, voice recordings, and even video.

The students produce a digital reader’s response journal in the form of a blog that contains at least ten total responses to Gary Soto’s Living up the Street. They share their responses with classmates and make thoughtful comments to others’ responses. Students create a memory map that relates to their memoir. Using Google Earth, they locate the specific settings of their childhood memories, label each location, and add relevant text that explains the significance of these locations to their memoir. Finally, students use the Internet to facilitate the writing of their own childhood memoir and collaborate on their writing with the teacher and other students. Using Google Docs, they create several drafts of their work, incorporate suggestions from their instructor, and also peer edit their work. After the final revision, they publish their memoirs online to the eZine Writing Matters. As a culminating project, students use digital storytelling techniques to make a digital version of their memoir using images and narration.

The Internet is most effective in the classroom when it is used to create, collaborate, and connect, and this unit covers each of these aspects. Although many students may be familiar with blogs, they discover that they are a powerful and useful tool for responding to reading. Teachers may appreciate how fast they can respond – sometimes instantly – encouraging connections and engaging students in conversations that might not otherwise take place in the classroom. Another value of this unit is that it gives students a unique forum to write about something that they are an authority on – themselves. Students enjoy the chance to communicate ideas and share reading responses with each other online, motivating reluctant readers and writers to join in on the conversation. Many students value the ability to collaborate with their teacher as they are writing, so that they don’t do it “all wrong” and have to start over from scratch. The Internet can enable collaboration early and often, and students will feel more invested in their writing. By giving the option to create a written memoir or digital story (or both), assessment options are flexible enough to enable struggling writers to create a final project they can feel proud of. Students take greater pride in their work by submitting their work for publication on several online websites, including New York City’s Writing Matters. Posting online provides a larger audience for their work, and may give a chance for family and friends to learn more about them.

The best part about this unit is that it does not require any special training, software, or equipment. Sites like Blogger.com and Flickr.com are very user friendly and easy to start up, especially if you have an e-mail account at Yahoo! or Gmail. If you do not have an account already set up, take the time to preview both sites and learn their capabilities. Even if you are not a “digital native,” examples of blogs and memory maps are available to view online, and can be used as models in class. The team blog space can become overrun with responses, so be sure that you sign yourself in as an administrator. Create separate threads for each response to the book. To create a memory map, you may need to download Google Earth (free version) to your computer. Be aware that students write more informally when they chat, text, or e-mail on the Internet. While you may choose to allow students to write informally, they should still use most standard conventions of written English. This can provide a good opportunity for teachers to discuss formal vs. informal writing. But perhaps the best part of this unit is that it limits the lost papers and forgotten assignments, because almost everything is posted online. Assignments can be read and responded to any time, anywhere, using a laptop with an Internet connection and Google Docs.

Tom Burke

bronxlit@yahoo.com

West Bronx Academy for the Future
500 East Fordham Road
Bronx, NY 10458

Utilizing his background in book publishing and technology consulting, Thomas Burke teaches 8th grade reading and writing at West Bronx Academy for the Future, a small, technology-theme school in the Bronx, NY.