Writing is an art which, fortunately, can be learned and not acquired. Everybody of us has the potential of being a writer but only some succeed in being so. Some are occasional writers, others become writers only in the day of exam, but there is another category who write for a living. Whatever your purpose behind writing, knowing how to master this art is a must for the 21st century literates.
As teachers and educators, the responsibility is even way bigger because society looks at us as intellectuals but the fact that laymen could not grasp is that not every intellectual is a good writer.Even inside the classroom most of students do not like writing assignments and often times consider them boring. Yes I don't blame them for feeling that way because some teachers are still teaching writing traditionally, handing out blank papers and asking them to jump write into the topic.
There is an artistic approach to writing which renders it more exciting and engaging and drives all the boredom away from it. I have recently attended a workshop here in Canada on how to use art to teach writing and I was really amazed by the potential of art in getting students motivated to write. I will come back to this topic in a future post.
For now let me share with you a great read I came across in New York Times. This is an article that provides some awesome writing rules . If you have time I would definitely encourage you to read the whole article, it is not very long but you will enjoy it and you will also discover some useful tips for you and your students. You can even summarize it and share it with your students in the classroom. The 9 rules it covers are also accompanied by further links and activities.
Here is the list of the rules they included , please refer to the original article for more illustration on each rule.
Rule 1- Listen to the Voice Inside your Head
Rule 2- Learn from the Masters
Rule 3- Read Like Writers
Rule 4-Review the Rules
Rule 5-Study Sentence
Rule 6- Write with non Zombie Nouns ans Verbs
Rule 7- Punctuate that Thougt
Rule 8- Nobody's Perfect
Rule 9- Fail
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