I thought they might work. After all, these folks didn't learn to write the way we teach now. They probably came out of English classes with 5 paragraph essays, literature anthologies, and grammar Nazis. Most of us did. So, perhaps many of the teaching strategies developed after 1970 would be liberating, doable, and most of all welcome.
So, I proposed the idea of teaching a writing class for older folks to the director of my local community center, As luck would have it, Portland Parks and Rec already had a "Writing From Memory" class on the books. It just hadn't been taught for a while. I interviewed. I developed some curriculum. I taught the class at one of the 5 week sessions. Slowly, it gained un popularity andI went from3students to 8. Perfect. With i hour sessions once a week, that is barely enough time to review something, teach a skill, and have the people read and get feedback for their work.
I met some real nice people. The median age was about 70, given the oldest student was 91. The course description in the catalogue said that participants needed to be at least 60. These were folks who had lived some life and were eager to tell their stories.
An Asian man wanted to write his memories for his children and their children. Others wanted to take advantage of this time of life when they actually have time to indulge themselves in reflecting other lives and then writing about it.
People get confused about writing their memories and writing their memoirs. The genre of memoir writing is often nothing more than a string of memories tied together. In my class, we began with writing vignettes. These short pieces are easily done and can serve as the basis of longer pieces or projects. Using models of writing from authors like Sandra Cisneros, Gay Talese, F Scott Fitzgerald, and Maxine Hong Kingston, we wrote variety of pieces based on our life experiences. The members of the class were respectful and encouraging, and helped me provide an environment that felt safe and productive for all.
One thing I often did as a classroom teacher was do the assignments myself. So that anything I asked my students to do, I did as well. I honestly think they enjoyed the fact that I shared my work with them. I saw this too in my work with older writers.
Sometimes, my older students would come to class with excuses or without completing a piece to share.
If they said, "I don't have my assignment today." I was quick to respond, "In this class, there are no assignments, there are only opportunities.
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