Nesting Assignments

Nesting writing assignments might bring a bit of safety to writers in a developmental writing class. Think of the image of a nest with three Robin's eggs in perfect hue. Or nesting dolls bring this same image of being gathered in. There is something safe about watching a familiar piece of writing grow into expanded words and thinking.

Try this in the Classroom:

• Have the students write about writing in 100 words.
• Have the students write a journal about how they see themselves as a writer. What is their story, backward and forward?
• Have them take these two pieces of writing and use them as the foundations for a literacy narrative.
• An added bonus would be to have them read a narrative literacy so that they can evaluate the structure and language of a polished piece of writing. Karen S. Ueling from Boise State suggests that "reading a challenging nonfiction book is also critical because a text that forces a reader to stop, look, and think about language helps develop awareness of language and the kind of seeing required for effective editing" (Berstein 31).