Linda Baie: I Carry Them Always

I’ve kept journals/diaries/writers notebooks/daybooks for nearly all my life. My writer’s notebooks  help capture moments in life, whether personal or professional.  I can pull out a notebook from years ago and the writing there will place me right back in that time, place, feeling.  It’s great to re-visit those good times with family and students.   In my classroom, I wanted to help my students create the habit of writing, and writers’ notebooks are how we began.

Students spent the first day of school with me mostly outdoors.  In addition to games, sharing silly and serious things about ourselves, working in groups or alone, we wrote.  I wanted them to know that writing was important in that capturing of thoughts, feelings, observations, and explorations. By the end of the year, they had filled a notebook (or more than one) to return to again and again for more ideas, to read previous thoughts compared to current thinking, and to enjoy all that they had recorded.

A first assignment began with a poem I shared that they could tape in their notebooks.  Here are a couple of photos sharing two poems used.

Click to enlarge images.

Here’s a sketch I did of students writing.

In addition to a current notebook, I keep a separate notebook that holds lessons I use for both writing and poetry.  One example is copied poems taped in as examples of figurative language.

As a teacher, I wrote with students, filling my notebooks with ideas for writing and I wrote rough drafts in them, too, just as I wanted students to do.  One idea that helped students find ideas was a “day in the life” assignment.  Our students at school also keep sketch journals, and I encouraged my students to sketch in their writers’ notebooks as well.  This “day in their lives” was to list, and occasionally sketch, the time from getting up in the morning, eating breakfast, looking out their bedroom windows, traveling to school, walking around school, going home (or to lessons or practice or friends’ houses), doing homework, watching TV, going to bed and reading, going to sleep. They created timelines in their notebooks and with each part, wrote more ideas that might be good ones for future writing-favorite foods, memories of bedtime rituals, riding in the car, watching out car windows.  I wanted them to know that everything in their lives was worth writing about.

I sketch often in my notebooks, to record ideas, to remember moments I might want to write about later.

I carry smaller notebooks with me wherever I go.  I found these at a local art store.

And now, as a literacy coach, I share notebooks or lessons about notebooks with those teachers with whom I work.

I have a new notebook begun this summer, and have been writing lots of poems.  I begin in this notebook with an idea, and mess around with it until some idea or other works, for me at least.  Lately I’ve been participating in a poetry swap and I have such beautiful flowers blooming in my garden,  I decided to write a flower poem.  I wrote many lines and nothing seemed to work.  I took pictures, sketched a little, tried to make the flowers “whisper” (I liked that line!), but I couldn’t seem to find any other “words” they might say.  I filled numerous pages with lines about flowers.

Finally, I thought I’d do some research, and looked up flower parts, thinking maybe they would help spark an idea.  I listed verbs showing actions by flowers, like “climbing, perfuming, opening” and still, nothing.  That seems to be the way of writing, sometimes ideas don’t work.  I put away my notebook until another day had passed, and did some more research.  There was a page full of common flower names, and some of them caught me!  They were names of animals, like ‘tiger lily’, and more!  I had my idea, and worked on it, moved some lines around, and wrote.

Here are some of the earlier pages I wrote.

While weeding

A special time with Black-eyed Susan, and Johnny Jump-Up too;
we held our Baby’s Breath until we arrived at the Garden Zoo!
The Dandelion roared and roared, as if he was on stage,
and next we saw Kangaroo Paw jumping around his cage.
Flying up above us was the Larkspur swift and bright
while the Dogwood barked, chasing Pussywillow down paths
                                                                              and out of sight!
Imagine our surprise when next we heard the howling of Wolfbane.
It sent a shiver down our backs; we’ll never be the same.
We ambled here and ambled there, ending our tour in love,
with the extraordinarily shapely look of quieter Foxglove.
Remember these were wildflowers at our Garden Zoo.
And we understood quite clearly, they wanted to be Freesia too.

© Linda Baie, All Rights Reserved

Sitting and messing about with words, doing research, finding new ideas is all part of using notebooks.  I carry them always, searching for new writing ideas.

I have a lot of empty notebooks, waiting to be filled.  I’ll send one of these to a winning commenter!  I’ll choose a special one, with lots of pages, ready for your own special writing!

Linda Baie is a long time teacher of middle school students at an independent school for the gifted in Denver, Colorado.  She has recently moved from the classroom and moved into the part-time position of literacy coach for the 8-14 year age group.  She has a son and son-in-law, a daughter and daughter-in-law, one grandson and two granddaughters.  Her husband is retired.  If there is any passion it is reading, writing and being outdoors.  For a long while, Linda rode horses, but has been lately too busy to take care of a horse so had to give it up.  Maybe someday she will return.  She blogs at TeacherDance.

Please comment with a way to reach you to be entered into Linda's notebook giveaway!  The winner will be announced in this space and on The Poem Farm Facebook page on Saturday, July 20.