Writing My Way to My OLW 2020

I finally found my one little word, OLW, for 2020. It took some time and lots of processing, but I now can happily say I have it. I have had some inkling of an idea for about a month now, after seeing an email joking about the year 2020 being the year we would all have clear vision. It was then that I knew my one little word would be centered around vision. It churned around in my brain trying to make sense of it for a few weeks with no clear (no pun intended) progress. At the same time I picked up the challenge to notebook for 100 days. (See #100daysofnotebooking on Twitter with thanks to Michelle Haseltine)

The challenge began on January 1st. I used many of the first days of 2020 making lists of words that fit the bill. I explored words such as focus, clear, look, look-up, vision, and clarity. I even researched and wrote out quotes and definitions for the words. All of this writing was my way of processing the plethora of ideas that floated through my head. I know writing helps but my daily note booking truly allowed me to get to the heart of my word, FOCUS. I am left with a greater appreciation for the possibilities to use writing to approach problem solving.

With my success at using writing to process information, I have been churning around ideas to teach this skill set to my students. I realize I sometimes model this work when I brainstorming lists of ways we can solve a problem and use interactive writing to record the ideas. When we make a class pros and cons list I am guiding students to understand the use of writing to process a concern. Part of my process included drawing and sketching about the possibilities so why wouldn’t I encourage students to draw out their thoughts or feelings about a particular issue? I judge I could do more to model and use writing and drawing to help students process concerns, and problems. So I turn to this community. How have you, or your students used writing to process concerns or dilemmas?

I am joining the writing community over at Two Writing Teachers today and every Tuesday. Won’t you consider joining in?