RPS Content Literacies Writing Is…

“Who am I?” Developed by RHS English teacher Mary Ellen Dakin with activities from Writing Your Life by Mary Borg and The English Teacher’s Companion by Jim Burke Standards: W3 Narrative; W7 Development, organization, and style; W8 Planning and revision; W10 Writing routinely. L1-2 Conventions; L3 Meaning and style; L5 Figurative language.

In the next five lessons, I am going to ask you to think deeply about your life and find ways to write about it. Many of your chapters will take the form of narrative writing; some will be illustrations, charts, or maps. Being honest is very important, but you don’t have to address a topic if you don’t feel comfortable writing about it. However, be sure that anything you do write is honest. Tell the truth, as you see it. Select five chapter topics from the list below, focusing on one in each of the next five classes. Chapters are listed in increasing order of complexity, so try to start at the beginning of the list. No one else can write the story you are about to write. Chapter 1: People in My Life Chapter 2: Mapping the Past, Present, and Future Chapter 3: Rules for Life: The Do’s and Don’ts Chapter 4: Rules for Life Reflection Chapter 5: A Few Memorable Dates Chapter 6: The Life Graph Chapter 7: I Am the One Who… Chapter 8: Live and Learn Guidelines for Final Assembly and Publication Chapter 1: People in My Life “People are too complicated to have simple labels.” Philip Pullman You can collect the details that add up to the people in your life by making word-webs. Write a name in the center of the page, focus on it, and jot down any detail you can remember. Each detail can generate details of its own. Begin your autobiography by making word webs, using some of these subjects: • My mother • My father • Sisters • Brothers • Friends / a best friend • Grandparents • Teachers / coaches • Heroes / role models Each web that you complete becomes a page in your autobiography.

Chapter 2: Mapping the Past, Present, and Future “You’re off to Great Places! Today is your day! Your mountain is waiting. So get on your way!” Dr. Seuss A) List the names of the cities, states, and countries you have lived in. (Don’t feel bad if you have only lived in one place!) B) List the names of the places you have visited, even if it was just for a short time. (Think about family vacations, the homes of relatives, school trips, and athletic events.) C) According to Webster’s New World Dictionary, a landmark is “any prominent feature of the landscape,” either natural or man-made, “serving to identify a particular locality.” For example, the bandstand on Revere Beach is a man-made Revere landmark; so is Kelly’s Roast Beef! And Revere Beach itself is a natural landmark for our city. Think of the places you have lived in or visited, and list any landmarks you can recall. D) Name the schools you have attended. E) List any of your favorite places, such as a beach, playground, mall, theater, park, stadium, building, etc. F) List the places you have never been to but hope to visit someday: G) Name your destinations. Where do you hope to be in five years? In twenty years? Create a map that includes all these places. Your map does not have to be geographically perfect; it may, in fact, end up looking more like the map of a fantastical place, a place that can only be found in your imagination. Label the map with the names of each place. Think of ways to illustrate the map. Your map becomes a page in your autobiography. Chapter 3: “Rules for Life: The Do’s and Don’ts” “A proverb is a short sentence based on long experience.” Miguel deCervantes There are rules about the little things: “Don’t talk with your mouth full.” “Don’t hit your brother.” “Don’t slouch – stand up straight.” There are rules about the big things, too: “Do not kill.” “Do not steal.” There are rules that have to do with the way we choose to lead our lives, and the way we choose to treat other people. These are rules and messages that we often hear from older, more experienced people – from parents, teachers, and other adults. They are rules and messages that, over the years, can have an enormous impact on our daily lives.

Try to remember some of the rules and messages you have heard growing up. To get you started, I have written some of the ones that were sent to me when I was a child. My parents always said: “Do… 1. If you’re going to do something, do it right…

“Don’t… or don’t do it at all.

2. If at first you don’t succeed, try again.

Don’t give up.

3. 4. 5. Now think about other adults in your life, like My teachers said: “Do…

“Don’t…

1. Pay attention and stay focused on learning.

Don’t be distracted by social media.

2. 3. 4. Name another adult or adults whose voices you have heard, even if you didn’t know them personally: for example, musicians, artists, writers, athletes, advertisers. Identify these people by writing their names and profession, and then list their messages: said: “Do… 1. Apple says, “Think different.”

“Don’t… “Don’t think the same old things.”

2. 3. Each list of rules becomes a page in your autobiography. Chapter 4: Rules for Life REFLECTION Much of what we hear, especially when it comes to us in the form of rules, is like static – unpleasant noise that we just tune out. But sometimes, the rules sink in. What are the rules that have really gotten through to you? The messages that you have truly internalized and try to practice in your everyday life?

Write one or more of these rules, and beneath each rule, comment on its significance to you. This is a rule I learned for life from my parents: Rule 1: “If you’re going to do something, do it right, or don’t do it at all.” Both my mother and father taught me this lesson by their example as well as their words. They were both hard workers: my mother had seven children in about ten years, and I never remember her sitting still for very long. I don’t think she could. She might sit to have a cup of tea, but then a baby would cry or the phone would ring, or she would notice how dirty the kitchen floor was and jump up to sweep it. For someone who worked so hard herself, though, she hardly ever asked me to help, even though I was her oldest. I think she believed that children need time for play. I used to love to watch her sew our clothes on a shiny black Singer sewing machine, and when I got to be around seven or eight, she began to teach me how. I just remember one time, when my sewing project was going badly and I sloppily stitched a back to a front without pinning it first that she took the sewing out of my hands and said something like, “You can do better than this. If you’re going to do something, do it right.” I felt so bad that I picked it up again (it was a dress for my doll) and carefully pulled out all the stitches one by one with a thread cutter, then pinned it back together and made it better. I remember not wanting to do this, but even more not wanting to disappoint her. I showed her my corrections, and her smile felt like gold in my heart. Your reflection is a new page in your autobiography. Chapter 5: A Few Memorable Dates All of us are a part of history. National and world events affect our lives – sometimes directly, sometimes indirectly. Below are some dates in history that may have had an impact on people your age. Choose the events you can recall and write about their effects on you and people you know. Feel free to add other significant dates not listed. You may want to add memorable events that affected only your family – a birth, a death, a proud achievement, a family crisis. For every news event that you select as significant to you, write a brief personal reaction by responding to these questions: • • • •

Where were you on this date? What were you doing when this happened? How did you react to the news? How did you feel? How did the news affect your thinking or your view of the world?

January 1, 2000

The world celebrates the turn of the millennium

September 11, 2001

Two commercial airplanes are crashed into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in NYC; one plane is slammed into the Pentagon; one plane smashes into a Pennsylvania field. About 2,823 people die.

February 3, 2002

At Super Bowl XXXVI, the New England Patriots beat the St. Louis Rams 20-17 at the Superdome in New Orleans: MVP goes to quarterback Tom Brady.

February 1, 2003

Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrates during reentry into the Earth’s atmosphere, killing all seven astronauts aboard.

October 27, 2004

Red Sox win Game 7 of the World Series, reversing the 86-year-old Curse of the Bambino.

August 29, 2005

Hurricane Katrina makes its second landfall as a category 3 hurricane, devastating the US Gulf Coast from Louisiana to Florida. It kills more than 1,836 people and causes over $115 billion in damage.

January 11, 2007

Author J. K. Rowling finishes the 7th and final Harry Potter novel in Room 552 of the Balmoral Hotel in Edinburgh.

2007-2008

Global economic crisis and subsequent recession.

January 20, 2009

Barack Obama is inaugurated as the 44th President of the United States, becoming the first African-American president in American history.

May 2, 2011

Osama Bin Laden is killed by United States Navy SEALS.

December 14, 2012

At the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, 20 children and 6 adults are gunned down.

April 15, 2013

Two explosions at the finish line on Boylston Street, the first at 2:49 p.m. and the second 13 seconds later, result in 3 deaths and 282 injured at the 116th running of the Boston Marathon.

August 9, 2014

18-year-old Michael Brown, an unarmed black teen, is shot and killed by police in Ferguson, Missouri.

March 15, 2015

The National Weather Service announces that Boston Logan Airport received 108.6 inches of snow, officially making the 2014-15 season the all-time snowiest season in the city.

Consider including photographs of the memorable events that you write about. Your writing about at least one memorable event becomes a new page in your autobiography. Ch. 6: The Life Graph What are the major events of your life, and how would you graph them on a scale of 1 to 10? In the middle of a blank piece of paper, draw a horizontal line with notches for each of your years. Draw a vertical line in the lefthand margin, perpendicular to the “year” line, and make notches for the scale of 1 to 10. Using words and images, describe the important and memorable events of your life. This example was made by a high school student in California and published in her teacher’s book, The English Teacher’s Companion, by Jim Burke. Your life graph becomes a page in your autobiography.

Chapter 7: I Am the One Who… Choose an event from your life graph and write a narrative poem about what happened and how it changed you by completing statements that begin with “I am the one who…” Each statement should include facts and vivid details; each statement should build toward the last line, which states the main event. This is one student’s work: I am the one who answered the telephone that night I am the one who will always remember the look on my mother’s face I am the one who my father clung to I am the one who notified relatives I am the one who answered the door when the neighbors came I am the one who ordered the flowers I am the one who read the scripture at the mass I am the one who found telltale signs in his room I am the one who should have tried harder to stop him I am the one whose brother died of an overdose Your narrative poem becomes a page in your autobiography. Chapter 8: Live and Learn “The unexpected tiny thing always makes or breaks a story.” Pam Houston Write the story of a specific incident that changed you in an unexpected way. What happened? Where and when did it happen? Who else besides you was there? What did you do? How did you change? What did you learn? Prewrite Think about the specific incident and answer these questions: 1) What happened, and what made this incident so memorable? 2) What led up to it? 3) What was unexpected about the incident? 4) What sensory details do you recall at that precise time? 5) Who was with you when it happened? 6) What did you think would change immediately after the event? 7) Did your feelings about the event alter with time? 8) Looking back on this incident now, how do you feel about it? 9) Looking back, what do you think this incident has taught you? Write Gather up all the details – the facts and the feelings – of this incident and tell the story. Be specific – name people and places. Be exact – describe the sights, sounds, smells, etc. of the moment. Write dialogue. Reflect. Finish by writing a good title. Look to these samples for inspiration: Broken Jar By Alice Walker I recall a scene when I was only three or so in which my father questioned me about a fruit jar I had accidentally broken. I felt he knew I had broken it, at the same time I couldn’t be sure. Apparently breaking it was, in any event, the wrong thing to have done. I could say Yes, I broke the jar, and risk a whipping for breaking something valuable, or No, I did not break it, and perhaps bluff my way through.

I’ve never forgotten my feeling that he really wanted me to tell the truth. And because he seemed to desire it -- and the moments during which he waited for my reply seemed quite out of time, so much so I can still feel them, and, as I said, I was only three -- I confessed. “I broke the jar,” I said. I think he hugged me. He probably didn’t, but I still feel as if he did, so embraced did I feel by the happy relief I noted on his face and by the fact that he didn’t punish me at all, but seemed, instead, pleased with me. I think it was at that moment that I resolved to take my chances with the truth, although as the years rolled on I was to break more serious things in his scheme of things than fruit jar. Sixteen By Mary Ellen Leyden On my sixteenth birthday my grandmother, my father’s mother, died. It was a hot Saturday, and my mother was not home. My father was in the cellar in his workshop. The phone rang, and I answered it. My great-aunt Alice, my grandmother’s sister, was sobbing into the phone and I barely heard what she said. But I understood. She told me to tell my father right away. She had many more phone calls to make, so she hung up. I remember placing my hand on the doorknob of the cellar door and trying to turn it, but I couldn’t. I just stood there, alone in the hallway, wishing my mother were home so she could tell him for me. I stood there for almost fifteen minutes trying to know how to tell him that his mother was dead. As if in a dream, I watched myself going down the cellar steps and turning the corner and tapping him on the shoulder and hugging him and telling him but I just couldn’t turn the doorknob, because we never hugged, and we hadn’t learned how to talk about real things yet, things that hurt. So I never told him. I went up to my room and waited. By the time my mother came home, my father was sitting at the kitchen table reading the newspaper when the phone rang again. This time it was my uncle calling from the funeral home and wondering why my father wasn’t there too. He left right away, and it wasn’t until much later that night that my mother came upstairs to ask me why I hadn’t told him. “I didn’t know how,” was all I could say. “Your father’s very hurt,” she whispered to me. “I’m sorry,” was all I could say. I was sorry for a long time, but in the awkward silence that followed, we both seemed to realize that it wasn’t just my failure. Years have passed since then, and my only comfort is in thinking that if that phone call came today, and if I could answer it a second time, I would be able to turn the doorknob and go down the stairs and tap him on the shoulder and hug him and tell him that his mother is dead. Your story of unexpected change becomes a new page in your autobiography.

Guidelines for Final Assembly and Publication Arrange and number your five chapters thoughtfully. Your arrangement might be chronological, with the earlier chapters focused on your past and the later chapters focused on your present life. Your chapter arrangement might be spatial, documenting your journey to Revere, Massachusetts from other cities, states, and countries. Your arrangement might be by order of importance, with each chapter building in intensity and complexity. If your autobiography chapters incorporate multimedia (art, photographs, video, music, symbols), conference with me about possible non-traditional autobiography formats. Design a cover that includes a title, your name, the submission date (month, day, and year), and an illustration that responds creatively to the essential question, “Who am I?”