Viewing 13-19 Results Of 19
Apply Filters Clear Filters
Stepping Off the Stage

Early in the writing process, performing is my worst enemy. The cursor keeps blinking while I keep staring. The problem in these moments is that I’ve leapfrogged over writing, straight to publishing, and to what I think the audience wants from the final draft. And then … I’m frozen.

READ MORE more about Stepping Off the Stage
Finding the Fish in the Dots

A student of mine once wrote about an art assignment that involved a blank canvas, paint, and a salt shaker. These were his tools. His purpose: to let process dictate a subject — what would he see by experimenting with these materials?

READ MORE more about Finding the Fish in the Dots
Leave the Story Open (and the Window Closed)

The first thing she saw was the open kitchen cupboards. Then she heard a crunch underfoot. She looked up and saw the window — which opened onto a fire escape — ajar. And she knew, with a shiver, that she had a problem.

READ MORE more about Leave the Story Open (and the Window Closed)
Give Yourself Away

As a young writer, I often felt I needed to write about something beyond myself — something accessible only to writers older, more intelligent, more talented than I was. This pressure often resulted in stagnant, dreadful writing, full of clichés.

READ MORE more about Give Yourself Away
Picking the Locks

The fall of my senior year, I spent a very long time not writing my Big College Essay. It was a project I was already supposed to know how to do — two pages with just one job: to capture, in entirety, who I was.

READ MORE more about Picking the Locks
The Comedian and The College Applicant | Part Two

Every joke depends on sentence design. Just as a stand-up onstage is alert to the structure and style of delivery, I listen with students to their original ten sentences.

READ MORE more about The Comedian and The College Applicant | Part Two
The Comedian and the College Applicant | Part One

After learning of the delight I take in exploring the evolution of a good sentence, a friend sent me “A Stand-Up Joke is Born" from the New York Times. I didn't expect to see so many parallels between the way comedians work on a joke and the process I've developed at Hillside.

READ MORE more about The Comedian and the College Applicant | Part One