“Raise your hand if you like writing,” I said. Several hands went up. “Now, raise your hand if you don’t like writing. And be honest,” I added. Lots of hands went up.
The sixth graders came back on Wednesday, and by Thursday we had jumped right into The Legend of Sundiata, the West African tale that The Lion King is based on. My co-teacher and I took turns reading, then we began a character discussion: who are the main ones and what are their motivations?
By the end of class, I heard students putting away their writing materials while asking each other questions about the story. “Wait, did he die?”
Maybe some of the students don’t like writing, but they were all completely engaged in the story.
Which is, of course, what writing is: storytelling.