As an aspiring English teacher, I must have always loved reading and writing? Wrong. I hated English class; every assignment, every journal, every class discussion. I felt trapped in a box with millions of eyes locked on me and my ideas. Whenever I was forced to participate, I fumbled around with a cookie cutter answer that would please my teacher. Of course, pleasing my teacher was always my ultimate goal. I would spend the entire year pinning down their personality so I knew exactly how to impress them. Their favorite books, TV shows, brand of pens--I wanted to know it ALL. For what reason? An "A" in their class.
My compulsive tendencies never failed me until I entered Mrs. Mary Ann Ellis's Writer's Workshop. I walked in, took a seat by some friends, and waited for all the clues--How could I impress this one?
"Hi, my name is Mrs. Ellis. We'll be writing a journal in the first few minutes of each class. They won't be graded for content, so don't look so overwhelmed. Today, I want you all to just write what you're thinking. Don't worry about punctuation or capitalization. Just write without stopping for ten minutes."
WHAT? No grade? Write about what I'M thinking? The smirk fell off my face and I started looking around the classroom for a translator. Can somebody tell me what she wants? Everyone sat in silence because they were in the same boat as me--USS Clueless. After staring at a blank page for 30 seconds, I heard Mrs. Ellis declare, "I want every pen moving." I stared, scribbled, erased, scribbled, furiously erased. I looked at the clock and counted down the seconds until the timer finally buzzed. What could be worse than this, I thought.
"Okay, who wants to share?"
I walked out of the room. Okay no, I didn't walk out of the room, but I wanted to as I looked at my two poorly constructed sentences laughing and pointing at my misery. A few brave Seniors shared their masterpieces proudly and then when the room was silent, Mrs. Ellis called my name. My eyes darted across the room, looking for the other Megan. There had to be another one; there always was--except this time. After a few moments of silence, I found my voice and read my two mediocre lines. No one laughed or complained or even rolled their eyes, and all Mrs. Ellis said was "Great, I wish there was more."
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Mrs. Ellis gave us freedom to express our ideas.
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