Language Arts Student of the Year 2012
Many ninth graders here tonight have straight A’s in English, excellent reading and writing skills, and the willingness to meet any requirement that will maintain their 4.0; therefore, selecting the Language Arts Spotlight Award winner involves more than just seeing who met the requirements that can be quantified by percentages and test scores. Those requirements came naturally to this year’s spotlight winner, but she had one other very important quality that set her apart, and it was reflected in all the work she did this year: Whereas many ninth graders are good at writing essays and reading classical literature, few of them actually enjoy it; they can do it when they have to, but they don’t really want to. Let’s just say they don’t welcome the challenge. And even those who do are not likely to admit it in public. Not so with this year’s spotlight winner. In fact, her Honors English blog is authored under the pseudonym Writer Girl because, she says in the subheading, “I am a girl who loves to write.” And is she ever!
In our traditional English class, her notebook is what I wish all writing notebooks could be: neat, legible, and full of content worth reading! When scoring them, I would always pause over Writer Girl’s, hold it lovingly to my old, black heart, and weep a silent tear of joy that such students still exist. Whenever anyone questioned a score on a notebook, I’d show them hers and ask, “Is yours this complete? This thoughtful? This rich in voice? This grammatically precise? This interesting?”
One of the requirements for receiving Honors English credit at Fairfield is to complete a weekly blog entry. Writer Girl’s blog included thoughtful reflections on homework, the choir concerts in which she performed, her attitude of gratitude, the dangers of being judgmental, Halloween and her “utterly girly” princess costume, books, traditions, a poem every now and then, and (so far) the first 10 or 12 chapters of her novel. This late in the year, it is painfully clear which students have grown tired of this weekly grind. Their blogs begin to read like tortured obligations. Not Writer Girl’s! Her enthusiasm is only equaled by her eternally positive outlook.
I never have to worry that I will find angry margin notes in her notebook or a death list on her blog. And whereas many students tend to tirades about the classes and teachers they struggle with, minimal responses to literature discussion questions, and sarcastic teenage frustration, Writer Girl is unfailingly positive. She finds opportunity where others see overwhelming obstacles. She is grateful for what she has rather than upset about what she doesn’t. Her work reminds me that I ought to be a little more optimistic. (Okay, a LOT more optimistic.) Her attitude is apparent in a line from her Letters About Literature Competition entry – in which, by the way, she was a state runner-up. Discussing what the book meant to her, she wrote to Harper Lee, author of To Kill a Mockingbird, “People need to live better. Life gets a lot better when you actually care about someone else.”
So it is that for this attitude, for her enthusiasm for writing, for her love of literacy, and for ALWAYS going above and beyond just the requirements that this year’s Language Arts Spotlight Award goes to Writer Girl: Katie Frazier.
In our traditional English class, her notebook is what I wish all writing notebooks could be: neat, legible, and full of content worth reading! When scoring them, I would always pause over Writer Girl’s, hold it lovingly to my old, black heart, and weep a silent tear of joy that such students still exist. Whenever anyone questioned a score on a notebook, I’d show them hers and ask, “Is yours this complete? This thoughtful? This rich in voice? This grammatically precise? This interesting?”
One of the requirements for receiving Honors English credit at Fairfield is to complete a weekly blog entry. Writer Girl’s blog included thoughtful reflections on homework, the choir concerts in which she performed, her attitude of gratitude, the dangers of being judgmental, Halloween and her “utterly girly” princess costume, books, traditions, a poem every now and then, and (so far) the first 10 or 12 chapters of her novel. This late in the year, it is painfully clear which students have grown tired of this weekly grind. Their blogs begin to read like tortured obligations. Not Writer Girl’s! Her enthusiasm is only equaled by her eternally positive outlook.
I never have to worry that I will find angry margin notes in her notebook or a death list on her blog. And whereas many students tend to tirades about the classes and teachers they struggle with, minimal responses to literature discussion questions, and sarcastic teenage frustration, Writer Girl is unfailingly positive. She finds opportunity where others see overwhelming obstacles. She is grateful for what she has rather than upset about what she doesn’t. Her work reminds me that I ought to be a little more optimistic. (Okay, a LOT more optimistic.) Her attitude is apparent in a line from her Letters About Literature Competition entry – in which, by the way, she was a state runner-up. Discussing what the book meant to her, she wrote to Harper Lee, author of To Kill a Mockingbird, “People need to live better. Life gets a lot better when you actually care about someone else.”
So it is that for this attitude, for her enthusiasm for writing, for her love of literacy, and for ALWAYS going above and beyond just the requirements that this year’s Language Arts Spotlight Award goes to Writer Girl: Katie Frazier.
posted by MRT at 8:00 PM
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