"Pokinitis"

I went to Will's blog and read through the first one to pop up: Pokinitis. I couldn't help but think "This is what it's about": getting students' interests making them think, peaking their ideas. In fact, I loved this blog entry so much, I had to respond to Will. At the end of his post he wrote "You know what else?' I say. 'You could write it, draw the pictures for it, and then when it’s all done, we could make a movie of it with you reading it so other kids could even listen to it.' Oy, I think. Overload. The curse of being so invested in all of this. But she’s thinking about it." I disagreed that he overloaded her. He was right when he said he got her thinking though. When Tess said "we'll see," she wasn't disregarding the idea. Rather she was thinking about it, figuring out if it could work or if it couldn't. This is the important moment that Will should show his daughter that it can work. He talks about audio books, to which I briefly mentioned Bruce Coville's Full Cast Audio company; showing Tess this could spark her interest in creating he story about Pokinitis further.

It's all about giving students the idea, courage, and belief that they CAN do it. Once you have them thinking about it, you just have to help them follow through by showing them it's possible.