Journaling in Education 498
Over the course of this semester, I will be asking you to write at least one journal entry about each book, poem,
play, or other piece of writing that you read for this class. The purpose and point of this exercise is to get you to
think about the reading you do in a more systematic way as a reader, writer, and teacher.
We will be using journals every day, so make sure that you bring them to class. I will often ask you to
freewrite in your journals in class, and you will also be doing work in them outside of class. As for what the
journal looks like, that’s up to you. It should be portable (like a binder or laptop computer), and it should
always be with you in class. Aside from that, I leave the choice up to you.
Over the course of the semester, I will give you prompts that will ask you to respond to writing in a variety of
ways. However, I will also encourage you to respond to literature in ways that interest you. I don’t view
journal responses as a set genre; to me they are a way of interacting with literature in a meaningful way.
With that in mind I want to introduce you to a standard form that you can use to respond to the readings in this
class. It involves citation, quotation, response, and reflection about teaching. An example is down below,
and it’s a selection from an electronic journal that I keep about my teaching and writing. My topic is the first
book we’re reading, The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton.
The Citation:
Hinton, S.E. The Outsiders. New York, Puffin Books: 1997.
The Quotation:
“Nothing gold can stay.” I was remembering a poem I’d read once.
“What?”
“Nature’s first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf’s a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.”
Johnny was staring at me. “Where’d you learn that? That was what I meant.”
The Response:
Every time I read this section of The Outsiders it gets to me. It got to me when I read it as a 14 year old on my own, and it still gets to me.
There’s something in this about youth (“gold”) and loss (“Nothing gold can stay”) that is poignant.
I think that when I was young, I was more caught up in what the poem came to mean by the end of the novel, but I’m more struck now by
the passing of youth. (Makes sense being in my 30s and all.) But there’s something really powerful about the simple dialogue (which Hinton does
so well) and the simple, yet complex, symbolic poem.
I love the way that Hinton comes back to this later with Johnny and Ponyboy. Then you can really see the symbol that Hinton is playing
with here. However, she does it in such a cool, non-intrusive way. The symbol is made and used later. Hinton quotes Frost, but she doesn’t sound
pretentious doing it. It’s a sort of everyday symbolism that is such a part of The Outsiders.
Reflection About Teaching
I remember that my students in eight grade loved The Outsiders. Something about the title just connects with the adolescent experience—
being outside of something.
In terms of the Frost poem, it provides a nice “way in” to a discussion of symbolism—particularly after folks have read the book and come
to the end. It also provides a way to talk about the characters of Johnny and Ponyboy—the two characters who really get this poem.
It might be interesting to have students bring in poems/song lyrics that they love and see if there can be some talk about the symbolism in
the work that they love and the symbolism at work in The Outsiders. Just a thought.
Now, as I said above, the above only shows you the three moves you have to make (citation, quotation,
response, reflection); it doesn’t dictate the form you need to use. You can write your own journal entries in one
long paragraph, as a poem, as a dialogue, or even as play. Form isn’t important, but reflection is.
I will generally expect that you’ll write about a page (about 200 words) per journal entry, and I will be looking
at your journals three times over the course of the semester. If for any reason you don’t want me to look at a
particular entry, feel free to staple it in half. When I read your journal, I’m simply looking to see that you
responded to the piece. If you do an adequate job (i.e. about 200 cogent words per entry and all the entries),
then you’ll get full points for the journal.
Ultimately, I hope that the journal will be useful for you as reader, writer, and teacher. It’s really for your
benefit as a reader, writer and teacher, so make use of it in ways that make sense to you.
Journal Due Dates:
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10/3/01
11/12/01
12/12/01