Ch3-4 on the inclination towards mechanics

In these chapters of Mechanically Inclined, the author talks mostly about different workshops that he works with his students in and different tactics to get them to remember what they are learning. He begins by talking about how editing marks are the writing killer for many students and it is like “X’s over their souls, their desires” and also how by the time students reach middle school “they hate writing” (27). He goes into detail about pre-writing and then delves right into “Writers Notebooks” (29). The pro of a writer notebook is that it is a “place where writing won’t get marked up anyone except, perhaps, themselves. Everything in a writers notebook is in process all the time. It is a place to return-to mine and refine, polish and relish, reread and rewrite” (29). I found the writers notebook really interesting, I think that if I had had an outlet like a writers notebook when I was developing my writing, I would have learned to like writing more than just reading. Reading was easy, all you have to do is understand, something I feel like I have been able to do easily do at any time. I highlighted a lot more in these chapters, I agree with much of what the author has to say about his teaching style. The only thing that has come to really bother me about his style, or what he talks about is the same thing BJ said, he alludes to teaching in “inner-city” schools and how much success he has, like he is teaching the at-risk kids and making a Mr. Holland’s Opus impact on their lives, bringing them out of their unwanted, unneeded, never-can-learn outlook on life to a new view on learning, they just magically respond perfectly to everything he teaches them and asks them. Besides that though, I really do agree with what he has to say about getting students involved in their own writing.
I particularly liked the list of “The Writers Eye (I): Lists of Things I Can Write About” (35). It seems to be a very helpful list you could give to students to get them thinking about what they can write. One thing I did find slightly obnoxious also though, was the AAAWWUBBIS because it reminds me of middle school when we had to memorize all of the conjunctions, or the different “be am are is was were, being been, have has had, do did does, may might must..etc.” I have them memorized, but I can not for the life of me remember what they are, or why I memorized them.
The next chapter and his explanation of mechanics is also very helpful, his explanation that it is a “visual skill” and how they are “meant to serve the writer in meaning-making” (51), really helped me in beginning my thinking of what I want to teach my future students. Mainly I got the idea that I need to make sure I ask questions of my students of what they are learning, and to make sure they and I list dialogue conventions to refer back to later, another skill I would have liked to have learned earlier on in my life.