Rosenfeld on Free Writing

Emmet Rosenfeld, NWP fellow and blogger for Teacher Magazine, wrote a nice little piece about the challenges and rewards of freewriting in the classroom. I know we all know freewriting like the pages of our marble composition books, but he raises some interesting questions/reminders/reflections.

...in fact, there are those who would argue that they tend to go through the motions even more than “regular” kids, so adept have our students become at the business of school.

Freewriting isn’t business. It isn’t about doing an assignment efficiently or for the grade. It’s really about letting go, losing yourself in a swirl of thoughts that may or may not go where you think it should. This is the creative ferment that leads to original ideas, in my experience, an absolutely essential stage along the path to more ordered, meaningful expression. I’ve explicitly taught it in a limited way, moreso implicitly by modeling and consistently having kids do it. Some get it, some don’t.

Read the whole post here...