Advice on Rejection for Writers

Question: How should the rejected writer deal with it?

Answer/Quote: “Rejection, sad to say, goes hand in hand with writing. We all have to deal with it, and it smarts no matter how many times you’ve experienced it. No doubt you’ve heard these stories: Richard Bach’s best selling Jonathan Livingston Seagull was rejected more than 20 times before getting published.  Chicken Soup for the Soul, the first in the phenomenally successful Chicken Soup series, struck out more than 100 times before winning a contract. And, Pearl s. Buck received a rejection slip for a short story in the same week she learned about her Nobel Prize for literature.

“It’s hard not to take a rejection personally, but it’s important to remember that editors aren’t rejecting you—and they may not even be rejecting your work. In ‘How to cope with rejection’…writer and consultant Moira Allen suggests that the first thing to do when an editor says ‘no’ is to separate yourself from your work. ‘You may pour your heart and souls into your writing, but you must also establish boundaries between yourself and your creation. … Success will become impossible if you cannot bear failure.’ ” Jeff Reich, Editor, The Writer.

Comment: Part of teaching writing is helping students deal with rejection.  The problem of rejection is worth a good discussion on how to deal with it, whether it’s the teacher’s criticism or an editor’s. The Writer is a magazine by writers for writers and the theme of dealing with rejection is constant and uplifting. The Writer is also a source for articles on creative writing, whether poetry or fiction or nonfiction. The magazine is a good source for teachers who teach writing. RayS.

Title: “When Editors Say ‘No.’ ” Jeff Reich, Editor. The Writer (April 2011), p. 6.

"Good" Writing

Question: What is “good” professional writing?

Answer/Quote: “How do you define good writing? Do you know good writing when you see it? In Leah’s [Zuidema] professional writing course, college students investigate what ‘good writing’ looks like in their fields of study. They examine writing samples, and they interview professionals in medicine, business, social work, computer science, law, engineering,, education, and other fields.

“The students all ask a version of this question: ‘How, in your profession, do you know when your writing is successful?’ Without fail, at least a few interviewees answer like this: ‘There’s no such thing as a universal definition of ‘good’ writing. I can’t give you a checklist or a formula. The only way to know if your writing is good is to see how your audience reacts to it. If you get the response you’re looking for it’s good writing.’” P. 95.

Comment:  The authors throw into the discussion ethical considerations in writing. Frankly, I’ve never thought about ethics in writing. The example the authors give is in job-searching and résumés. I think the issue of ethics in writing goes well beyond the job-search although more than a few famous people have cheated on their résumés. Ethics in writing is worth thinking about.

For me, however, audience response is as good a definition as you’re apt to get in defining “good” writing. RayS.

Title: “Professional Writing in the English Classroom: Good Writing: The Problem of Ethics.” LA Zuidema and Jonathan Bush, Eds. English Journal (July 2011), 95-98.

Storyboards to Interpret Text

Question: How can storyboards help students to interpret texts?

Answer/Quote: “In using storyboards, students learn a strategy that allows them to closely read text.” P. 85.

 Quote: “I have offered a variety of ways to capitalize on students’ visualization of text and the capacity for students to interact with a passage in a nonprint mode. These three activities using storyboards—finding images in poetry, visualizing scenes from print texts, and analyzing a sequence from a film—are inviting ways to engage students with the visual aspects of reading texts.” P. 84.

Quote: “Most importantly, by providing a way for students to see how others read and understand texts, storyboarding helps students learn that interpretations are not fixed.” P. 85.

Comment: An interesting idea. You’ll need to try it out yourself first. RayS.

Title: “Framing the Text: Using Storyboards to Engage Students with Reading.” DL Bruce. English Journal (July 2011), 78-85.

War and Literature

Question: Why is everything we read in literature so depressing?

 Answer; The author’s answer to this question is that he hopes students will act on the impressions they gather from the literature of war.

Quote: “In the age of smart bombs, drones, and violent video games, there is perhaps no more pertinent issue than to remind students of the necessity to stop and consider the effects of our decisions on other human beings.” P. 61. [Comment: As I read this quote, Philadelphia is in the throes this summer of a rash of flash mobs of teenagers, some as young as 11 years of age, who beat their victims senseless, for no other reason than to enjoy the experience of turning others into victims. RayS.]

Quote: “I ask the students to simply respond to the question, ‘How do we redeem a culture torn by war?’ I ask them to go beyond the pat answers that would boil down to ‘Why can’t we all just get along?’” p. 62.

Quote: “We talk often about just how far we can take our ethics into the realm of action. Will we continue to simply talk, will we act enough to merely alleviate guilt, or will we stretch beyond comfort, sacrifice, and act for true and lasting change?” p. 63.

Comment: My belief is that literature does produce reflection on the part of individual readers. Who knows when or if that reflection will take the people who read it to act on it? RayS.

Title: “Reading the Literature of War: A Global Perspective on Ethics.” Kyle Vaughn. English Journal (July 2011), 60-67.

Plagiarism

Question: How can students use the Internet to help them detect what might be considered plagiarism?

Answer/Quote: http://www.PlagiarismDetect.com, a free online detection service, offers students the opportunity to submit papers before they turn them in. Instead of serving as a site for cheating, the purpose of the service is to help students identify plagiarism and deal with the issue before submitting an academic paper.” P. 55.

Comment: The service is not free. It’s $8.95 a month. RayS.

Title: “Classrooms That Discourage Plagiarism and Welcome Technology.” NG Pearson. English Journal (July 2011), 54-59.

Academic Dishonesty

Question: How should a teacher deal with problems of academic dishonesty?

Answer: Discuss openly with students what the teacher and the students believe are examples of academic dishonesty. Keep the emotion out of it.

Example: Student seemed to plagiarize an editorial in the New York Times. When questioned, the student said she did not read the New York Times. She had taken the offending passage from a blog which she did not know how to document.

Comment: It’s a good idea to discuss with students what, in the teacher’s opinion, is plagiarism and what is not. Try to clarify in the students’ minds what is plagiarism.

I’ll give you an example of what is likely to occur in such a discussion.  I remember an article, I think it was in The New Yorker, but I really don’t know. The article said in effect that much of what is in the daily newspaper is blatant, unattributed plagiarism. Have I just committed the sin of academic dishonesty? The idea is relevant. I admitted I did not know the identity of my source, and I said so. RayS.

Title: “An Ethical Dilemma: Talking about Plagiarism and Academic Integrity in the Digital Age.” EE Thomas and K Sassi. English Journal (July 2011), 47-53.

Assessment of small-Group Process

Question: What is the ideal group process and what is a problem with group work?

Answer/Quote: “In the best cases, groups present a respectable product and all group members gain significant learning from the experience. However, in other cases, group members who didn’t pull their weight may have received the same grade as the members who took more responsibility for the task.” P. 42.

Comment: The author suggests rubrics to help students evaluate the group process and urges teachers to have students evaluate the group experience. RayS.

Title: “Assessing Internal Group Process in Collaborative Assignments.” TJ Nelson. English Journal (July 20ll), 41-46.