141 Ways to Play, Process, Stretch, Express, Disrupt Words and Form

Sarah J. Donovan, PhD (s/her) on November 13, 2020

For the past few years, educators from across the country have been coming together to write. What we have learned so far is that having a regular place to come to for ideas and audience is perhaps the most important aspect of nurturing a writing life (and, of course, to actually write something).

Writers seem to know where to go for inspiration — nature, art, photographs, books, poetry, authors, memory. But when a writer is faced with an empty page or a flashing cursor, a writer’s mind can go blank and, along with it, any sense of hope that the words will come.

Indeed, sometimes what a writer needs the most is another writer — for their inspiration, for their process, for their mentor text. And so, Ethical ELA offers teachers and socially-distanced students a collection of writers to keep writing lives loved during this time away from our classrooms.

The 141+ ways offered here are merely suggestions — not rules. In a writer’s world, a suggestion is an invitation to play with the idea, stretch into new ways of seeing the word and the world (Freire), express dormant emotions or silenced perspectives, and even disrupt standardized words, syntax, and form by inventing new words, fracturing expectations, and inventing forms. Sometimes rejecting a suggestion is just that sense of power a writer needs to tackle the waiting cursor.

You are welcome to write in this space, but you may wish to create your own — a technological oldie like a notebook will do just fine, but a Google classroom discussion or Google Site, Flipgrid read aloud, Kidblog, or even Instagram hashtag will work to offer the place and audience you and your students need to keep the writing love alive.