Best Practice/ Being a Writer

What is best practice?
Best practice in my opinion is the surveillance and upkeep of the education system. I use the term surveillance because best practice teaching, skims the traditional education system, keeping the good parts and repairing the bad. When I think of the best practice teaching system I like to relate it to an auto mechanic. The educational system could be described as a classic used car that needs that only a certified mechanic can fix. To the untrained eye the educational system today looks unfixable. To a trained mechanic, such as best practice teaching the solution is simple. Incorporate 7 tenants of teaching to be used in the classroom. Reading-as-thinking, representing-to-learn, small-group activities, classroom workshop, authentic experiences, reflective assessment and using integrative units are the 7 aspects of best practice teaching. Non-Best practice teaching in my opinion is teaching one dimensional. Learning requires more than a book, caulk, and an overhead projector. Of course these are tools to be used but not obsessively. They get the ball rolling but are not enough. Creating a 3-dimensional classroom environment that enables students to incorporate most of their senses while uplifting cognitive abilities is a goal that best practice teaching strives to accomplish. The area of best practice teaching I believe would be most effective in an English classroom is using authentic experiences aspect to allow students to link life experience with the literature. By using this aspect, students will be able to authenticate the literature with personal situations, which will enable them to retain the information more effectively.

What does it mean to be a writer?
From the article “crafting a life,” Murray gave me the impression that writing is all about the aspiring author. There is no real definition, or blueprint to a writer, it is whatever one person desires to be.
(Quote from article)-“The reason I continue to write is not so much for publication, for fame, for money, but for surprise. And in surprise, understanding; and, in understanding healing (15)”

This statement is exactly how I feel after accomplishing the task of writing a paper or writing project. The surprise element of writing always hits me immediately after completing the assignment. I say to myself, “I can’t believe I got it done.” I now realize that I am capable of writing more than what I thought I could. Not only that, I realize that my writing is better than what I believed it could be. When looking back on one’s own writing, confidence grows. A person who once may have doubted their abilities now embraces them. This chain reaction of surprise to understanding to healing is a process that every writer goes through. It takes strength to write but going through this process allows writers to continue to press on, knowing that understanding is coming. The healing part of the process is the long awaited exhale when a final period is placed on a piece. This gives one the satisfaction of knowing that something that has absorbed so much time and effort is now complete and finished. These are three stages that allow potential author’s/writers the time to reflect on their work through the element of surprise which transforms unto understanding and healing all geared towards making a person a better and more confident writer.