I once HAD to have a blog. I kept up with it. I learned that I was not a good writer. That didn’t change the fact that I had to keep a steady blog going. Since then, I have decided that I like writing. Yet that doesn’t change the fact that I am not a good writer. I AM overconfident though, and think that I can learn to do anything. I have read a few books about writing. They all say to write more. I teach 8th grade English and Literature. I force them to write a lot because writers say that writing more makes you better. It seems I need to put my own teachings into practice. So I am writing.

I make my kids (my students are my children; all 50 of them) write in journals. I give them writing prompts that they absolutely despise and force them to write an entire page, which normally results in several hands falling off. It’s horrible. I’m horrible. Yet I press on. Occasionally I tell them to respond to things I have written to them in their journals, or tell them to write to me (this never works, considering only a handful of them would ever dare be friendly with the evil English teacher). One of my favorite games is 20 questions. Though I much prefer the number to be around 800. This week a few students decided to play this game with me in their journals. It was great. My hand fell off, just like theirs, while responding. One student asked this question…..

“Why and how can you actually like writing?”

I laughed. They truly hate writing. It was a great question. I liked my answer.

Writing transcends. It transcends time. It transcends distance. It transcends age and culture and language. It changes; yet stays the same.

Writing communicates. It communicates in ways that my mouth cannot.

Writing teaches.

It has many capabilities.

I like writing. Practice makes perfect.