Tuesday, March 31, 2015

SOLSC 2015 #31: Do you make space?



Happy last day of the writing challenge!! Each day during March, I participated in the Two Writing Teachers Slice of Life Story Challenge (SOLSC). My slices are primarily about teaching preschoolers. Check out the Two Writing Teachers  website for lots more reflections on teaching.

Kudos to all the slicers this month! We did it! I have loved reading your blogs!

Thanks especially to Stacey, Tara, Anna, Beth, Dana, and Betsy for hosting this writing challenge!
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I apologize for the huge unevenness of this daily blogging. 


I realize now - 
the very habit of writing, 
leads not to perfection but to ease. 
This was my fourth year of this writing challenge, and all my butterflies were gone - 
I always knew there was something that I could write about, I knew I would post each day.
The habit of writing makes it easier to do.

While I am proud of some of my posts, 
many seemed anemic, dull, and perhaps even "stuck." 
I know my writing is far, far from perfect - 
I dared to share it with you blemishes and all. 

Here, at month's end, I am tired. But, I am not out of ideas. I feel myself still wrestling with some topics - how might I write about these?

This daily blogging has shown me the essentialness of making space to write. 

To celebrate day 31, 
let me share a moment about this very thing, 
the beauty of making space....




Each and every day, she slips over to the writing table, and works on her drawing and writing. 
As the days have slipped by, one after another, this school year,
I've watched her begin to form the letters of her name, 
to work with stencils and then move on to draw freehand, 
to make only simple shapes and soon begin adding so many more details, 
to use only a small portion of the page and now work steadily to fill it.

She knows instinctively how to be a writer.

What do I see?
patience,
steadfastness,
repetition,
imagination,
happiness,
glow,
expectance,
perseverance,
risk,
joy,
variety, 
solitude,
engagement,
dailyness,
inspiration,
tenacity,
habit.

For me, 
she is a muse. 


4 comments:

  1. This is beautiful. How wonderful that you have discovered the writer in you, and made space to form a new habit of mind. Write on, slice on!

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  2. Maureen, sometimes I haven't read your posts, but every time I do, it's a learning and a pleasure. That list at the end, need to put it into a poster-true it is!

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  3. I am looking forward to this summer, I plan to read more of your blog. Thanks for writing.

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  4. As w/ reading, kids start out loving writing, embracing the challenge of forming meaningful symbols--letters--w/ crayons and pencils. How does that change? Why do kids and adults claim they can't write and don't like writing? Again, you've given me lots to think about.

    Thanks so much for visiting my blog during my travels. I'm going to catch up on the posts here that I missed the last half of the month. And I'm looking forward to your Tuesday slices.

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