Entry 11: To new friends...

As I think back over the past couple months... I've come to the realization that I knew the genres, but I didn't really know the genres. I had a lot of the superficial details about them in my mind, but I didn't have a deep understanding or appreciation for them. They weren't real to me. The genres were something taught in high school, that I was expected to know, but never expected to really use.

Coming into this class, I felt comfortable with the narrative, personal, persuasive and expository genres. These guys were my friends, I interact with them often both in my personal and professional life. I came to learn them better though throughout this class, building a deeper appreciation for their different and specific characteristics. I found it similar to meeting my husbands family for the first time, where in I was able to have a greater appreciation for his idiosyncrasies now that I knew this whole new layer of information! I found different uses for the journal genre (simulated journals to be used in my science classes) and was reminded of how confusing the expository genre can be. While I'm perfectly comfortable with the expository genre's text structure (ie. compare/contrast, sequence, etc.) and text features (bold vocabulary words, headings and subheadings) I had somewhat forgotten how difficult this text can be for students who do not have a good understanding of this genre. I was happy to have this gentle reminder and will be sure to keep this in the forefront when teaching my students how to transact with expository text.

Upon walking through the doors, I had two enemies lurking about: Poetry and Biographical Writing. When Dr. Jones asked which of the genres we didn't want to learn about because we already had a good understanding, I was silently praying that the class would choose one if not both of the dreaded genres to cast aside. I had already learned how horrible they were once (or maybe a few dozen times throughout my school career) I did not want to learn about them again.Alas, they were not shunned and abandoned like I'd hoped...so I was forced to revisit them. That's a good thing too... or boy would I have been missing out! My blog entries nine and ten vividly show how my perspective on these particular genres has changed.

The genre that I didn't know much about was descriptive writing. Given this genre for my expert presentation was one of the biggest blessings. I not only learned about the descriptive genre, I embraced it. My blog entries after my expert genre presentation are starkly different from the entries prior. (Check it out... entry seven: A Fluke was published on March 25, only a few days after Nicole and I presented on the wonderful world of Descriptive Writing). This change was due to my new found love for the descriptive genre. My writing now has a strong, sometimes quirky, voice. It sounds like me. It is thoughtful, descriptive and interesting. It's fun - fun to read, but maybe more importantly (for me anyways) its fun to write.

So which of these genres am I still unsure of? Well it would have to be poetry and biographical writing. Even though I no longer despise them, I'm just not familiar with them. I believe I just need some time to develop a true friendship... and I'm going to actively try and do this. The one autobiography that kept catching my eye over the past year or so was Tina Fey's Bossy Pants. I think one, because I get a good vibe from Tina Fey, in whatever movie or show that she is in. And two, I like that she uses man arms on her front cover. How fun... especially in an age when many famous women are trying desperately to make themselves look like the "ideal image", here comes Tina Fey, miss bossypants.... with giant hairy man arms. I would like to get a beer with Tina and pick her mind. Since I can't, the next best thing seems to be able to read her book...  with a beer:) Which by the way... I just ordered via kindle and will start reading as soon as I have some free time!

About five years after high school, I got reacquainted with some classmates that I had never really talked to in high school. One gal because she was rude and one guy because he was kind of strange. I became friends with these people later in life because either my view on them had changed, they had changed... or maybe I had at one time misread them and my new perception was more accurate (they were actually pretty decent people). Either way, had I maintained my original idea of who they were, I would have missed out on some great friendships and good times. I find that I've had a similar experience with this class. I am extraordinarily pleased that I was able to get reacquainted with the genres. I feel like I've caught up with old misunderstood friends who I don't plan on losing touch with anytime soon!