Thinking about writing engagement

With Tony's activity got us thinking about writing in our classroom, where it was happening, who was doing it, and how it moved.  I've done an activity sort of like this before, and like the other instances when I repeat a writing related exercise, I tried to find a new angle.

The map I made of my classroom, though, looked pretty much like the last one I made. But then, when writing about this map, focusing on Tony's questions related to student engagement and writing, I started thinking more about what engagement looks like in writing.

To an outside observer watching my class, my students may look engaged if they are sitting quietly focused on the task in front of them.  Maybe engaging in a deep conversation with the class or in a small group.   I've seen these behaviors often during our class writing workshop.  But  I have also seen behaviors that don't fit in this conception of engagement.

engagement = talking
While at our conferencing table, for example, I approached two students who were just talking.  No writing in front of them.  Just talking and laughing.  This wasn't the engagement I envisioned for students in a writing conference.  But when I talked with them about what was happening, one student told me that he was telling the other the story that he planned on writing, to get his ideas worked out.  I hear that.  Been there before.  So, I stepped back, let the two finish, and was pretty impressed to watch, over the course of the next few days, a student engage in a sustained session of writing longer than any he had before.

engagement = staring
It's not uncommon for students to stare into space during writing workshop. I get that.  Actually, I would go so far to say that the occasional space out is a healthy stage in the writing process.  I noticed one student this year who was partaking in this step for an extended time.  Concerned he wasn't engaged, I approached him to find out what's up.  Five minutes later he was still talking about the problems he's trying to work through related to the names of his characters and how his plot was unfolding. He was thinking, no doubt. In his case engagement =staring,   And, not surprisingly, as he also managed to work out many of his problems by just talking to me, the engagement = talking proved helpful for him as a writer as well.

The last instance that is coming to my mind but there is another instance that comes to my mind from writing workshop this year where I noticed students two students who each had a Google Document up on their computers where they were working on writing pieces.  Both students were typing away furiously, but neither in the document.  They were conversing in the chat window of the document, which students often do in our workshop, but they were having a conversation completely unrelated to what either was writing.  I saw some mention of a boyfriend until the girl I was standing behind noticed me and closed the window.

I asked her why she and the other student were misusing their writing time.  She told me that their chat started as a conference, but wasn't going anywhere and the conversation changed direction.  I told them to redirect themselves, but now, particularly after reading Peter Elbow, I finding myself rethinking this interaction.

They were engaged, and even though they weren't engaged in the writing task at hand, they were engaged in writing.  Writing that was unrestrained and free flowing.  This is the type of writing that I do when I get stuck on a piece, and that is where these students were, right?

...unfinished...