Here I go...

In struggling to figure out how to begin this blog, I found this quotation and it was perfect!

"You can approach the act of writing with nervousness, excitement, hopefulness, or even despair–the sense that you can never completely put on the page what’s in your mind and heart. You can come to the act with your fists clenched and your eyes narrowed, ready to kick ass and take down names. You can come to it because you want a girl to marry you or because you want to change the world. Come to it any way but lightly. Let me say it again: you must not come lightly to the blank page."

Stephen King, On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft, 2000
US horror novelist & screenwriter (1947 - )

So let the inquiry in to motivating students to write for social action begin!

The idea of social action for an inquiry project came to in a number of ways. During a car ride to the beach with my brother, my son and and husband, we talked about politics and the sate of the United States. I mentioned that my friend Kate was really sad about a bill that that was going to be passed in MN, amending the state constitution to ban gay marriage. My brother stated that while he had no opinion either way, he was curious so he did some research about it. He found that 29 states actually had an actual constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage or in other words marginalize a group of people. That blew my mind. How could I not care or pay attention if people I cared about or knew or that m y son cared about were affected by this?

Another aha for me occurred at my exchange student's talent show. As I sat in the dark theater and crowded theater (while my son rolled up and down the aisle:), I watched countless acts, beatboxing and krunking, guitar soloists and duets. Then, a particularly ( in my mind) different act came up. Two senior boys in their full ROTC military gear with training guns came on stage. "Don't worry, they are not real.", one of them stated. They went into an intricate routine/formation with their guns. You could hear a pin drop in this auditorium. As I watched the concentration on their faces, I wondered, What do these kids care about? What is important to them? What matters to them? What matters to me?