Coffee Tawlk With Young Writers

"All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know."

--Ernest Hemingway

I love getting to talk with other writers. There's a kinship in what writers do; we all have little habits, tricks, and more than a few phobias around our work. If it's journalism, it's about facts, and investigating and keeping people informed. If you're someone who can write fiction, then you live in a world of characters, their story arcs, and their imaginary relationships. You lose your mind trying to figure out how to punctuate dialogue in these pretend worlds, but crafting a story is like breathing life into a world you create in your head, it's miraculous. Poets are a most amazing kind of writer because their words are so carefully chosen. They fit together in intricate patterns, sometimes rhyming, but always meant to hit you right in the feels.

This week, I was lucky enough to sit down with an entire room full of authors. Oh, and there were juice boxes, cups of tea, and mini muffins too. My friend Lisa Quillen, a gifted educator, teaches first grade at Glover School. She asked me to come to visit her class for their author's breakfast. Breakfast is the most important meal of the day you know, and who doesn't want to have a coffee klatch with writers? Do you know what's even more impressive than a really good writer? A room full of really good writers who can explain Fortnite, illustrate their stories, and play a mean game of kickball at recess. These kids are 6 and seven years old. When I was 6, I couldn't tie my shoes. I could barely tell time, and I stunk at math. These wunderkinder are writing books, and they can likely tell time and tie their shoes too.

Kids at this age are quite something. There is a lot they don't know yet. Even if they can't understand higher level math, or how to change the oil in the lawnmower, and tie a necktie, they know so much else. Did any of you know that Gertrude Ederle was the first woman to swim across the English Channel, and they called her the "Queen of the Waves?" Despite being a trivia buff, I didn't know that. Also, it's not trivial, and isn't it great that more women's accomplishments are showing up in the classroom? In the space of a school year that began with some of the kids still struggling with pencil skills and spelling, this group of young authors wrote books. They wrote short stories, they wrote science reports, and book reviews and so much more. They had portfolios of their work. I wrote a book, there's another on the way, and I'm a newspaper columnist. My "portfolio" is a Trapper Keeper of some clippings and Post-It notes. I am going to need to up my game; the next crop of writers is a pretty sharp bunch.

Sometimes, in the classroom, the focus becomes about the tools, the equipment, the facilities.  All of that is vital to the task of giving our kids the best education possible. The teachers matter too, of course. What I realized in the short time I sat with these word masters and their fearless leader Mrs. Quillen, is that it's a particular combination that is needed, much like a poem, a book or a short story. The right words, strung together in a carefully crafted way, literally can change the world. We've all seen it happen in politics and history; It's no different in the classroom. We are so lucky to have the raw materials of eager kids who want to learn. So, we add buildings and books. We find professionals that genuinely love what they do. Toss in a few bits of tech and then, on a sunny morning in June, a bunch of little kids, after just 180 days, are reading poetry to you and talking about first drafts. Oh, and in the same year, they also learned who Gertrude Ederle was, how to add and subtract, read a map, and spell most of their words correctly.

 

When the chance came up to talk to this class, someone told me, "They will love hearing from a real author." Not so much. They did seem to enjoy it, but they schooled me. They were the ones answering the questions and making suggestions. If you ever get the chance to spend time with writers who might not have penmanship fully down yet but have tons of ideas and imagination? Do it. Thank you, Mrs. Quillen and your gang of pencil-wielding pundits for letting me join you for a morning of words and wisdom. Keep writing!