Book: Developing Young Writers in the Classroom – I’ve got something to say

Gail Loane with Sally Muir (2017)

Chapter 6: Memoir: The polished lens of memory

Pg 101 A memoir is not what happens, but the person to whom things happen. Virginia Woolf (circa 1920)

Pg 104 … a memoir, which is that memory developed into a personal narrative concerned with more than a moment.

In a memoir, the writer provides some background for the reader, enabling us to begin our relationship with the narrator as we imagine the setting, enough details for us to form sensory images, a sense of sequence that is easy to follow, and most importantly we will be able to see why the experience mattered to the writer.

Pg 105 As our students mature, and our expectations include their being able to extend a personal memory into a rich narrative, I would begin to immerse them in effective memoirs. I would read to them and pose questions that would get them searching through texts. I would tell my own stories and invite them to tell stories of their own. As we search for meaning and sigh, cringe and laugh together, we find new meanings in our own stories.

Memoir poetry

Pg 107

While memoirs are written as a narrative, the essence of them – that reflective recalling of moments passed – can be captured in poetry. A memoir poem can reveal remembered scenes or events in fewer words, where the images might be fragmentary.

Pg 11

A narrative poem will require more than a ‘picture in words’ – it will tell a story, allowing the reader to follow the sequence of events.

Developing a memoir

The writer has something to say: a story to tell

Pg 12

If we are going to ask them to reach into their own minds, their own memories, we need to guide their recalling, to avoid their getting lost among the myriad of experiences, events and feelings within those memories. Sometimes this can be done very simply, such as ‘Think of a time when …’, when we are certain that the time we are asking they recall is a universal experience (see Chapter 5 – Universal Experiences).

Many memories will be triggered by another story: a shared anecdote from the teacher of another child, a story read and shared.

The writer recognises why this story has been remembered and has a sense of its significance

Pg 114

As we acknowledge that each child has settled upon a particular time from their own lives, we need to question, to lead their recall into a multi-sensory image.

This involves questions around the sights seen, and sounds heard, along with the other senses, but the important questioning will be around ‘So how was that for you? What were you feeling at that time? What were you thinking?’

The writer knows how to hook the reader in with a beginning that engages

Pg 115

Mini lessons can focus on beginnings that engage. A simple research of published books can be undertaken in the school library or classroom bookshelf. Each child can be directed to read the opening sentence of picture books, short stories, novels. Each opening sentence can be responded to – with the expectation that we recognise what the writer has done, and what invites us to want to read on. In traditional narrative, we are introduced to the main character very early – very often in the opening sentence.

As authors introduce their protagonist, the relationship between the reader and that character begins. If the character is introduced in an engaging way, which often includes a situation or problem being faced, the reader is likely to want to develop the relationship further, as they come to know and care about the character. In memoirs – first person narrative – writers often begin the same way, by introducing themselves.

For example:
When I close the gate behind me …
(from A Land of Two Halves by Joe Bennett 2005)
Sometimes other characters that are central to the story:

Dad just hates carrots …

Sometimes it is direct speech that gives us the first clue to the characters we are about to get to know.

‘Dad.’
This was my older son Lois, then aged eleven.
‘Yes?’

(from Experience by Martin Amis 2000)
The other most common opening for a narrative is to reveal the setting before introducing us to characters:

Winter sun falls in slanted rectangles …

(from ‘From the Back Corner’ by Margo Baars 2000)

Writers select the best words to say what they mean – they do not waste words

Pg 116

The difference between saying out loud what we have to say and recording our message in writing is that we can, and often do, change what was first written.

Writers, from the earliest stage of learning, need to know that they are in control, and, as their vocabulary increases, decisions about what to include and what to leave out are vital.

There is satisfying closure and a sense of wholeness about the piece

Pg 116

Just as writers control the words to best say what they mean, they also have control over the structure of a piece as a whole. They learn about beginnings that engage, and they learn about endings that satisfy. They learn about ways in which writers make connections and links, as a remembered time is recorded. Endings have posed problems for learner-writers as they sense the need to ‘round things off’, and exploring how published authors manage it is the simplest way to develop understanding.

In personal memoir, the writer is able to end a piece with some resolution or evaluative comment that assures the reader the moment or events described have been reflected upon, and the significance understood.

The background information that a reader needs is woven into the story – the ‘who, where, what, when, why, how’ are embedded in the narrative

Pg 117

We often see examples of students’ attempts at writing a personal account where they have included all the essential ingredients in the opening sentence. Last Saturday (when) me and my brother (who) went to the park (where) to play rugby (what).

While this provides the reader with all we need to make sense of the piece, it will often result in a less than engaging beginning, which requires skilful linking to personal comment and elaboration. Memoirs that work will provide us with the information we need, but given to us as it is required – not all in the opening sentence or even the introductory paragraph.

The reader can see, hear and feel the experience because the writer has included sensory details

Empathising with an experience that belongs to someone else becomes much easier when the writer appeals to our senses. We need to feel and hear, smell or taste an experience, as well as to see it, through the sensory details and our corresponding emotions.

The writer ‘puts the reader there’ – makes him/her believe

Through the inclusion of specific details, sensory images, comments and carefully selected words, a writer re-lives an experience, with all its components. The writer needs also to become aware of how readers respond to writing through being able to live the experience alongside the author. In a memoir, truthfulness and sincerity are noticed by the reader. We feel we can believe what the writer is telling us
and identify with the recollection of something human.

Many learner-writers move from action to action without any indication of how they feel about the experience. They leave no time or clues for the reader to form a picture in the mind. Readers lose interest when a mere chain of events is recorded.

The piece asks something of the reader – it causes things to happen for the reader as they happened for the writer

Pg 118 When we know how the experience affected the writer, we are able to align ourselves much more closely with the events described. And, as we align ourselves, we find our response matches the sincerity of the writer. If the writer has been moved to include thoughts and reflections, comments and observations, we as readers are more likely to respond on a similar level.

Building the writer’s toolbox

Pg 118 If we believe that it is human to recall and share events and moments remembered,we need to support our students primarily through responding as humans – showing them that their memories are precious and worth recording.

If we believe that it is human to recall and share events and moments remembered, we need to support our students primarily through responding as humans – showing them that their memories are precious and worth recording.

pg 119 As with other purposes for writing, memoirs can be an end in themselves. But as students are on their way to independence as writers, they should become increasingly confident in transferring what they know about writing across a range of purposes and forms. The rigour required in crafting an effective memoir will stand them in good stead when they are developing an expository essay. Even though the purposes of these two types of writing are very different, what students are learning about conveying significance in a personal memoir, about clarity,economy, sentence structure – the control and manipulation of language for effect – can be applied in just the same way when faced with choosing how best to structure an essay. A child who writes a ‘thin’, loose narrative will most likely also write an ineffectual persuasive essay.

The writer’s ‘toolbox’ that students are building up will have the tools they need for every writing task they are faced with – but teachers of writing will need to help them to make the connections.

pg 121

Features of a memoir

The memoir often tries to capture certain highlights or meaningful moments in one’s past, often including a contemplation of the meaning of that event at the time of writing. It is usually written in familiar style from the first-person point of view.

• The writer has something to say.
• The reader is able to sense the significance (of the event) for the writer, the ‘So what?’
• There is an engaging beginning; the reader gets ‘hooked’ right at the start through such devices as: direct speech, monologue, dialogue, question, command, scene-setting by showing not telling, problem outline, tension.
• Background information that the reader needs is woven in – the ‘who, what, where, when … is embedded in the narrative.
• There are thoughts, feelings, reflections, comments and observations. The reader knows what the writer thinks.
• The pace is appropriate – it helps the event unfold, bringing the reader along with it and also gives the reader time to reflect, visualise and respond.
• The reader can see, hear and feel the experience because the writer includes concrete, sensory details and descriptions.
• There is dialogue when appropriate, to show something about the people involved in the memory.
• The language is carefully selected for the purpose – it says exactly what the author wants it to say: specific nouns, strong verbs, etc.
• There is a satisfying closure.
• There is a sense of wholeness in the piece as a ‘stand-alone’.
• The reader is aware of credibility and sincerity from the writer – ‘This is how I remember this time; this is how it was for me.’

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Guided Writing Plan: The Town

Model text: ‘The Town’ by James K. Baxter

The town was usual enough; it had
A creek, a bridge, a beach, a sky
Over it, and even a small tin church
I never went to. My brother, my cousins and I
Did what boys do – dozed in the hot
Schoolroom, made bows and arrows, dodged the mad
Boatbuilder, crept like rabbits through the black
Under-runners with a weak torch,
Burnt dry rushes, wrestled or swam
Doing nothing important.

(‘The Town Under the Sea’ by James K. Baxter 2013)

Guided Writing Plan: ‘Making Huts’

Most of all though, we liked making huts. We made huts in the shed at home; we made huts in the willows along the creek; we made huts under the pine trees at school. There, we heaped up the needles into low walls. Each day the huts got bigger. We worked in groups of three or four adding more and more
rooms – vast roofless mansions spreading in every direction under the trees, until someone would shout,
‘Our hut’s bigger than yours!’
‘No it’s not!’
‘Yes it is!’
‘No it’s not!’
‘Yes it is!’
This would go on and on until someone ran forward and booted a hole in the wall of one of the huts. That would shut us all up. Then, quietly, the builders of the damaged hut would set about rebuilding the broken wall until Mr McLeod called us inside for afternoon school.
(from Piano Rock by Gavin Bishop 2008)

Purpose for the lesson:

• We are writing a memoir to record a moment in our lives.
• We will bring one of our personal stories to life with the use of direct speech and lists.

Resource

Text from ‘Piano Rock’ by Gavin Bishop
Chapter 11 Playmates and Pastimes P49 ‘Huts’

Learning focus

We are learning to know, and to use, the rules of dialogue in our memoir writing.
• speech marks – around what is spoken
• new line for each new speaker
• the place of an exclamation or question mark within speech
• we don’t need to say ‘who said what’
We may also explore:
• the use of a list in the text
• the use of a semi-colon in the list

The wider learning foci that we are keeping in mind

• We are learning to use literature to make connections with our own lives and to gather possible topics for writing
• We are learning to look closely at the choices an author has made in order to involve us in his story
• We are learning to notice how punctuation is used in a text and the effect it has on the meaning

Leading the learning What tasks will I need to design?
• Introduce book and excerpt
• Discuss the topic of making huts (and/or other playground games)

Connect student and teacher experiences.
• Teacher tells own story…
• Students have a copy of the passage and a highlighter and as aspects of language are discussed, students are directed to mark and highlight, eg
• Who is the ‘we’?
• What words provide the picture? Language use – explore 2nd sentence: a list of places (adverbial phrases
• Check the sort of huts we have made… indoor/outdoor… the sort of conversations we might have
• Ask students to bring up a memory of a time when they were building a hut with a friend
• Lead a visualisation (including the talk with friends about building the hut)
• Share with a partner
• Share one or two individual student images with whole class
• Prepare for writing by co-construction of criteria for success (what needs to be included)
• Write
• Guided revision in ‘The Helping Circle’
• Peer response for effectiveness, checking in with success criteria

Success criteria

(What am I looking for in my writing? How will I know that I am successful?)

Write to describe a time when you built a hut with friends – which includes at least two people speaking.
I will have
• included the words spoken/shouted
• included the speech marks
• started each speaker on a new line
I may have used
• adverbial phrases
• semi colons in a list

Challenges for writers

• To make decisions about what to include and what to leave out
• To be conscious of parts of the sentences as they write
• To think about the cohesion of the piece: linking ideas effectively with appropriate sentence structure and punctuation

Transfer to other writing

Link the sentence structures and punctuation used, to a wide range of texts and purposes.