Three things I’ve learnt from or with my students this past week

1. I have started really trying to celebrate and recognise when our students finish any creative writing piece. It can be much easier to work on the orientation of a story, focus on the complication and then get stuck in the series of events then to finish or conclude a story.

2. I read Chess by Stefan Zweig on the plane to KL on the weekend and it was really wonderful. It was so compact but still had enough space to reflect on its main ideas such as knowledge, obsession, time. Zweig sketched out the three main characters (the narrator, Mirko Czentovic and Dr B) and their relationships with amazing depth for a novel which was only 70 pages. One point I might emphasise to students that I learnt here is that an introduction can just be purely character building, and in writing so you can put the reader quickly in the centre of the story.

3. With some students it can be more helpful to focus on structure, then move to use of evidence, with other students start with use of evidence, and then structure. 

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Two quotes about writing

“All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know.”

― Ernest Hemingway

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“Cut out all these exclamation points. An exclamation point is like laughing at your own joke.”

― F. Scott Fitzgerald

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One suggestion to consider

If studying modern history, consider keeping a Word or Google Docs document recording the sources you use as you work on practice answers, or come across in class. Record primary and secondary sources separately and divide them either chronologically or thematically into primary and secondary sources. Then, when you come to exams or essays, you’ll already be on the front foot.

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Happy writing,

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Jaye Sergeant

Founder & Lead Tutor of Turtle and elephant

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