Reorganizing

productivity View Comments
Nov 302006

While reading Knowing Knowledge this week, I decided at one point that I actually want to try to give tagging a serious try. Two things immediately came to mind, both on my mental to-do lists for things that need to be worked on anyway: EverNote and del.icio.us.

I’ve been wanting to revamp my EverNote files into a series of articles and bullet lists for a couple of months now, but time and energy have been sorely lacking. Reading Knowing Knowledge, it occurred to me that what I most want to do is remove all labels from my current notes, combine and shore up everything (which is what I’ve been planning to do), and then reorganize everything into labels (which are, in a way, tags).

I want to be able to go into EverNote, run a search for a term, and have it spit back usable copy that I can then pass on to other people. As I tend to get hit up for advice, this would make my life so much easier! (It would also help me prepare articles for my websites and material for books that I’m slowly working on.)

And then there’s del.icio.us, where I have made some sort of attempt at tagging, but even I know it’s rather pathetic. I have a 30% shot at finding whatever I’m looking for unless I’m going to play a game. (Oddly enough, two of my favorite places to play online aren’t even in there!) So I need to pull all of my tags there, and then methodically comb through each link. I need to make sure each link goes where it should, that I still find it useful, and then to define a more appropriate set of tags for it if I haven’t deleted it.

If I can’t make sense of my own link library, how can I expect anyone else to find it useful?

And because I obviously have too much free time on my hands, I am planning out what I’m calling “Phase 2? of my other website. My tech guru and I are secretly developing and testing out this technological terror (Sorry, I was watching Star Wars the other night!), and I’ve got a million ideas I want to distill into the site’s re-launch and growth plans! I’m actually really excited and nervous about it!

All of this reorganizing should keep me nice and busy clear through to next spring, and hopefully, it will keep me motivated because I’ll be stuck in projects and will want to see them finished and public!

Posted by Rebecca at 10:41 am

Beat the writing blues

writing View Comments
Nov 302006

This post started when I found some tips for beating the blogging blues, but quickly morphed into a general writing post when I found this post just minutes later.

Like anything else, writing is a craft that has to be practiced routinely. And like most things you practice, the more you follow a routine, the more likely you are going to be to improve at that craft. That said, set a routine for yourself, but don’t be afraid to shake it up once you find that routine no longer works for you.

Get into a practice of brainstorming, or doing timed writes. It often helps you loosen up and settle into your serious writing. Plus it has this added benefit of material to draw from if you find yourself stumped.

Set yourself a daily goal to force yourself to write on those hard days, a weekly goal to help you feel accomplished, and long-term goals so you know how to break down your smaller goals.

Write in the method most comfortable for you. For me, that’s the small army of notebooks spread throughout my living space and my bags. For my father, that’s the computer. My writing students are much the same way. Some of them think better on paper. Some think better staring at a computer screen. Find your preferred method, but forgive yourself on those days when you work better with the other medium.

Write about what you want. Watch the trends change in your writing over time. (This one is actually pretty fun, and has been a question in every single interview I’ve ever given!) Sometimes, you can draw on an old tangent to revitalize your writing.

Whatever you do, just get out there and write.

Posted by Rebecca at 12:26 am

Working with strong-willed students

teaching View Comments
Nov 292006

I work with a number of students who fit some definition of “troublemaker”, “challenging”, or “at-risk”. These are students who don’t see the point in doing their work because they’re convinced they’re stupid and won’t get anywhere. When you try to reason with them to get them started on their work, they argue as a means to keep them from having to do their work.

I’ve tried to use my questioning strategy to short-circuit that behavior, but I’ve never been able to ask just the right sequence of questions. I think I’ve finally found the answer, though. By continually reframing my questions, I think I might actually be able to get students to be more cooperative.

Sometime, what these kids need most is someone who will honestly just listen to them and acknowledge how they feel. They want someone to believe in them, and they want to know that they matter, regardless of their grades.

Posted by Rebecca at 11:19 am

Motivation: Nature vs. Nurture

motivation View Comments
Nov 292006

In light of my own flagging motivation, I’ve been trying to read up on ways to motivate. It seems like such a simple prospect, you find what motivates you and use that to pull yourself through whatever you’re working on.

Lately, that hasn’t really helped me out.

My background being education, I’ve tried intrinsic motivators and extrinsic motivators. I’ve tried a punishment and reward system. Everything seems to be falling apart, and I’m so used to being highly motivated that it’s really bringing me down.

Combing through the Carnival of the Capitalists this morning, I read an article that really made me start thinking. There will always be education’s view on intrinsic and extrinsic motivation…but what if the nature vs. nurture argument for intelligence and temperament spilled over into the motivation arena.

It really doesn’t resolve my problem because I happen to have a motivated parent and a life history of being overly motivated at times, but what if motivation was a habit that could be defined as a by-product of your inborn traits or your environment? Think about it- You could theoretically train yourself to be more motivated. Does this defy the intrinsic vs. extrinsic fight, or does it perhaps build on it? The idea is that you start a child with extrinsic motivators and gradually move them to intrinsic motivators. It should work for adults, too.

This doesn’t even begin to consider the concept of internal vs external pressure, which I suspect would play a large part in the situation, too.

I may have to think on this one for a bit…

Posted by Rebecca at 9:50 am

Lines convey interpretation

graphic design, web design View Comments
Nov 282006

I’m reading an e-book this week that’s got me thinking, not as much about the content as the organization of the content. This was one of the aims of the book, so it’s successful in that!

It’s filled with flowcharts to help give the concepts in the book a visual element. The book is seeking to show how much the topic defies organization by trying to impose organization. When the book is merely illustrating the book’s own structure, the lines in the flowchart are straight. When it is trying to demonstrate the nebulous nature of the the topic, the lines are curved.

Now, many studies have been done on straight lines vs. curved, or organic, lines, but this e-book really uses the lines well to help convey the intended meaning of the flowchart.

It’s almost inspirational from a design standpoint.

Posted by Rebecca at 12:40 pm Tagged with:

Scouting out fresh talent

writing View Comments
Nov 282006

I’ve been reading a lot of agents’ blogs lately. Not because I’ve suddenly changed my mind and decided to go the traditional publishing route, but because they’re interesting to read.

One thing I’ve noticed, though, is that in each case, the agent is asked (repeatedly…learn to search a site, people) if anyone in the editing business surfs around blogs, websites, and online writing groups looking for fresh talent. Every single time, the answer is that it’s not worth an agent, editor, or publisher’s time to swim through all the people who need to retake high school English to find one potential gem.

Okay, like everyone else, this group of people is very busy and would rather spend their time in other ways they view more productive. I can respect that.

Until I start thinking about other fields.

Scouts scour the country looking for the next great sports star. They take in a play, making sure to note and potentially contact someone who really stood out to them. They approach that one kid who always sings the solo for his church choir. They’re looking for fresh talent.

I’m pretty sure they have pretty busy schedules, too.

So if sports and entertainment can take a little time out of their schedule to check for potential up-and-comers, why can’t publishing? What makes them different? Is it a matter of tradition? Fear that people won’t want to approach writing, instead sitting around hoping for their big break? Fear that it’s giving up one more hallmark that will eventually unravel the publishing industry as a whole?

I suppose it might be a question to be posed to the agents I read. The worst that could happen is that one of them will dub me a nitwit, but seriously, that’s small potatoes after being told repeatedly by students that they hate me (even if they never mean it).

Posted by Rebecca at 12:20 pm

Outlining as a tool

writing View Comments
Nov 272006

I’m currently less than 250 words from finishing my NaNovel, and thanks to a snow day, I’ll be finishing my novel later this morning.

It’s unsurprising. I always finish in odd years. (This is my fifth NaNoWriMo attempt.) This year, though, I think I had a helper.

My second NaNo attempt was premeditated. I had a fairly clear idea what i wanted to write about. I laid out my characters and settings thoroughly. I wrote a bare bones outline, assuming I’d fill in the blanks simply enough.

I finally wrapped up that first draft last month, and it’s going to take an ungodly amount of editing to make it readable.

This year, I didn’t really know what i was going to write until mid-October. It was an old story idea that had been hiding out in my writing notebook for a while. I dragged it out, dusted it off, and started planning. By the time I finished, My characters had just enough structure to make them intriguing. My settings had an interesting blend of details. But my plot was covered by an outline that was over 10,000 words long.

The rules for NaNoWriMo say that you can do all the prewriting you want, but you can’t write anything that will actually go in the novel. The outline was in third person and written rather passively. If you’ve kept an eye on my drafted chapters, you’ll note an active, first person perspective.

That means that from a 10,000-word outline has sprung a 50,000 word draft that has almost written itself. When I’ve stalled out, it hasn’t been due to not knowing what was coming next. In some cases, it was actually because I didn’t know how to phrase the next part.

It’s up to you. You can plot through index cards and shuffle them into an outline. You can just draw up an outline. The point is, they can be pretty helpful with in the writing process.

Do I have any ideas for next year? As a matter of fact, this year’s novel has three books that need to follow it, some of which has slowly started being mapped out.

Posted by Rebecca at 5:00 pm Tagged with:

(Not so) comic storyboarding

graphic design View Comments
Nov 272006

I’ve been reading up on storyboarding while working on a few projects around here, trying to get a feel for what it is and how to use it as a planning tool.

It started out just fine. I was reading. Articles were helpful. I bookmarked a handful. Life was going great.

And then last week, the trend slid into using storyboards to create comic-book style storyboards. This does not mean using storyboards the way comic book writers do. This means creating a storyboard that looks like a comic book. Instead of separating the concept and the art, the two are merged together without any attempt to describe the content beyond what’s available in the panel itself.

Realizing I’m still very new to storyboarding, I open the floor to those who are more experienced: Doesn’t this sort of defeat the purpose of storyboarding?

Posted by Rebecca at 12:25 am Tagged with:

Lessons learned from NGW

site news View Comments
Nov 262006

I knew that blogging to the theme of National Games Week would be challenging, but fun. It turns out it was well worth it! I now have a ton of ideas for ways to direct each section of the site over the next year as I work toward the next phase of this website. (There are rumors there will be working pages, tutorials, articles, and maybe even a bit more of a shop than the ever present CafePress shops!)

If there were ideas presented around the site during National Games Week that you really enjoyed, make sure to let me know so I can prioritize site growth!

Posted by Rebecca at 7:30 am

Children follow our example

education View Comments
Nov 252006

I feel like I’m coming a bit late to the party, but I’ve been rolling this around in my head, and very nearly gave up trying to figure out what I wanted to say. When I originally asked to contribute to this topic, I’d just discovered that I was working with students whose parents cared enough to send them to a tutoring center, but really didn’t care what happened beyond that. Sadly, the students reflected that attitude in their own self-confidence and work ethic.

I was angry. I’m not a parent. I have no plans to ever become one. But I am a teacher, and I’ve been one for a very long time. I understand that part of my job is to be the grown-up who cares, because my students may not have another one nearby. I had originally thought to write on that, but then something else happened.

A student caught in her father’s major life changes and the challenges of becoming a teenager suddenly started doing a lot better in her math class. We were all very, very proud of her. When I asked her what inspired the turn-around, she told me that she had started passing tests because she asked herself one question every time she got stuck: What would Rebecca ask?

As teachers and parents, we all hope that the children we’re helping to raise will come away a better reflection of who we are. We hope that they’ll follow our better examples and ignore our flaws. That’s exactly what happened with this student. She took my teaching strategy of asking questions and used it to help herself think through what she was doing. It allowed her to remember what she needed to do, to double check her work, and to finally raise her grades in math.

Children are incredible creatures. They learn by practicing what they see around them, and then they have the ability to build on what they see, be it for better or for worse. Luckily for us, most children figure out fairly quickly which behaviors should be emulated and which ones shouldn’t. When we’re lucky, they even actually choose to mimic the ones worth being picked up.

Originally posted at Talking Story

Posted by Rebecca at 10:47 am
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