Ellen Raskin often remarked during her career that she wished she had known “where children’s books come from” while she was a young UW-Madison art student. She wanted to make it possible for future UW-Madison students to see something of the creative process of writing a manuscript, the editorial process and matters concerning page and jacket design, decisions concerning the selection of the typeface, and many other details about creating a children’s book.

Raskin knew that the very people she hoped her manuscript materials might inspire are in and out of the CCBC all the time: art students, student writers, teachers of writing and others interested in the creative process.

As of 1978 Raskin had made two earlier offers of selected archival materials to the CCBC. Her generous offers had been turned down, because manuscripts are not within the scope of CCBC collections.

In 1978 Raskin offered a manuscript to the CCBC for the third time. CCBC Director Ginny Moore Kruse reminded her once again that the CCBC is not equipped for preservation. Raskin made it clear that she wanted the manuscript materials to be used, commenting that it wouldn’t matter if they fell...

Author: Juanita Willingham

Summary: A teacher-writer shares her experience using “radical revision,” a strategy for taking one’s writing apart and reassembling it. In the process of illustrating the impact of trying out various revisions of a poignant poem she wrote and shared with a writing group, she includes five clear and useful strategies that encourage writers to experiment with changes in structure, genre, and point of view. Teacher-writers as well as classroom teachers and facilitators of writing-intensive workshops may appreciate this piece.

Original Date of Publication: 2004

Why do I put off telling the story?
It’s sitting here on my brain
begging to be told
and yet I don’t, I can’t, tell about you.

Sometimes, when I tell something, I forget about it.
Am I not letting the story come out, because if I tell, I’ll forget?
But don’t I want to forget?

Research Article | https://doi.org/10.1177/1074295617694406

Abstract

Research suggests that teachers often do not adequately prepare students with emotional and behavioral disorders (EBD) to utilize organizational structures and basic writing skills that are necessary to produce cohesive essays. Among the challenges of effectively teaching writing to secondary students with EBD is how to deliver culturally responsive instruction to students who come from a variety of different backgrounds.This article presents specific strategies for infusing culturally responsive practices into scaffolded instruction for teaching written expression to youth with EBD.Keywords culturally responsive instruction, writing instruction, emotional and behavioral disorders