I started teaching creative writing this week. I was wicked nervous about the whole thing - new class, new students, no real idea about what I'm doing, and anxiety over whether or not they would actually be into writing.
Second block came on Wednesday and it basically made my entire week.
Why, you might be asking yourself, am I discussing this in a post for class? Well, pretty much everything I've done since the Maine Writing Project has prepared me for this class; for teaching this class. We wrote ourselves into the day, we read Write Here, Write Now by Annie Dillard, we talked about reading books, and then we wrote some more. And you know, even though there were 23 bodies in my little classroom, when we were writing it was Silent with a capital S. I could not have asked for a better group of students or for them to be more enthusiastic.
I looked at them and said, "When you are in this room, you are a writer. I'm here to sort of guide you, but I'm learning as well. I'm still finding ways to be a better writer. And, I hope we can all do that together." What I expected to see what I looked up were glazed over or rolling eyes. What I saw instead, were smiles and eyes sparkling. Holy!!!!! Those 80 minutes seriously got me pumped for the rest of the semester; now my anxieties are all about how to fit in everything I want to do.
When I had that class again on Friday, I asked them to write me a letter telling me what they hope to get out of creative writing. Here are a few of the things they said:
1. A better idea of what writers do
2. Practice so that I can be a better writer
3. I want to be creatively stimulated
4. I hope to find the fun in writing again
5. I want to be more confident sharing with people
As tall as those orders are, I'm pretty confident we can do that!
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