Tag: writing

Writing: Still fun, still far from easy

aleciamLeave a comment

Today I was asked by the lovely folks at DML Commons to participate in a webinar about writing and collaboration, and it was so much fun to chat with several fantastic academic writers about their writing ideas and habits.grantwriting-tablescape

In short, I’d say that the major lesson was that (surprisingly or unsurprisingly!), writing
is hard for everyone. That, and we all are addicted to coffee.

Here’s my tablescape from yesterday’s grant writing. A nice window, coffee, tea, and knitting are just some of the ingredients in my successful writing sessions. I have to have caffeine and a distraction for my hands.

Sometimes, I don’t think that my students believe me when I tell them that I have a difficult time with writing, too. It’s tough to make the time to sit down and hash out what I mean. It’s even tougher when I show a messy draft to someone else and that person doesn’t understand what I’m trying to say.

Read More »

#walkmyworld: Identity

aleciamLeave a comment

For this past week’s #walkmyworld, I spent a long time thinking about various possibilities and events for sharing. I’ve been many different people over the course of becoming the professor I am today, but I’ve thought of myself as a teacher for many years. My first teaching gig was as a teenager, when I taught horseback riding. When I abandoned my original graduate school plans to study education policy — by writing an undergrad thesis, I had learned exactly how much I disliked reading and writing that kind of research — I went with something that felt plausible, comfortable, familiar. I decided to become an English teacher.

harvest-manipIt sounds too easy when I tell the story like that, though.

One thing I’ve found is that there’s very few people have easy, straightforward career stories. In the midst of this unrelenting winter, my methods students have been interviewing for their full-year certification internships. As they jump into planning their own careers as teachers, I can see the tension rising. They’re seniors, soon to be graduate students, and they want to know that their plans will resolve into solidity, too, eventually. So, I’ve been trying to talk through my own life more often. It’s complicated, even in hindsight, and I have to laugh at myself.Read More »