Submitted by: Heather Brubaker
On Feb 24, the English Department met with Eve Becker at Teachers College for a full day Writing Retreat. Here were some of the goals of the retreat, from my correspondence with Eve:
- Protecting substantial time during the day for individuals to write
- Designing the workshop to work for everyone, whether or not they perceive themselves as writers or have an ongoing writing practice
- Inviting work on whatever kind of writing feels meaningful: our own projects, writing about teaching, writing student models…
- Opening space for feedback or sharing that will be low stakes, supportive, voluntary (not the classic workshop / critique model)
- Emphasizing process and reflection
Eve ran a wonderful day that included some community writing in the morning, a “writing walk” through different spaces at TC, time for teachers to work on a writing project of their choices, a structured, voluntary share, and reflection at the end of the day. All of the exercises were “portable”; they were directly applicable and easily modified for use in a middle or high school classroom context. This was also a great community-building day, we learned about each other through our shared writing and thinking about writing. The department expressed a strong desire to continue working with Eve and to engage together as writers.