Sleepovers

(Warning: This is not about math.)

Back when I was a classroom teacher, I once taught a girl we will call Claudia. Claudia was new to the school and was a member of my 1-2 class. She was shy and quiet, but she took school seriously and was quite eager to please.

Writing skills are of course a major part of the 1-2 curriculum. Most children try out different subjects and themes as they are learning to write. Not Claudia. Her first three pieces of writing were all essentially the same. Allowing for some variation in wording and the name of her host, they all read like this:

"I slept over my friend Kari's house. First we played. Then we ate dinner. After that we watched TV. Then we played some more. We went to bed. In the morning we had breakfast. Then we watched TV. We played. Then I went home."

At first, I simply worked with Claudia to improve her writing given this basic framework. Could she add some details? What show did she watch, what did she have for dinner? How about putting in some describing words? Was the bed hard or soft, was the TV show funny or scary? I offered some ideas for varying the sentence structure and helped her explore other ways to organize the information. "Conferencing," we call it (though I'm not sure we called it "conferencing" back in the day), and Claudia dutifully added the information I told her to include, and each of the first three stories wound up a little bit different in final form, though not, I must admit, a lot different.

Perhaps, for deep psychological reasons, it was very necessary for Claudia to tell this same story again and again, but where her writing was concerned the constant repetition seemed to be getting in her way. Ideas, after all, were important too. I decided that the "Claudia and the Sleepover" series, Vols 1-3, was borne less of emotional turmoil and more of being in a rut. So when it came time for her to start her next piece of writing, I called her aside.

"You've been writing a lot about your sleepovers," I told her. "I know you like writing those stories, but I think you're ready to write about something new. Let's try this. What's the weirdest, strangest, most unbelievable thing you can think of?"

Claudia thought for a moment. "You mean," she said slowly, "like, my stuffed animals came to life?"

This was a greater leap than I had expected--a highly imaginative response, and given almost immediately. YES!! I thought. "Sounds great," I said, smiling. "So, here's your first line: 'Last night my stuffed animals came to life!' Got it?"

Claudia nodded.

"Then go get 'em," I said, steering her back to her seat. She picked up her pencil and started writing. Excellent, I thought as I moved off to consult with the next child. I'd said the right thing at the right time. I'd handled Claudia well; I'd started her down the road toward more creativity and a greater interest in writing. This was why the school paid me the big bucks. (So to speak).

That warm glow lasted only ten minutes, however, because when I returned to check in with Claudia this is what she had written on her paper:

"Last night my stuffed animals came to life. And they had a sleepover. First, they played..."