The Card Strategy was an engaging way for me to further develop my ability to think through the medium of writing (Kucer & Rhodes, 1986). When I brainstormed in the past, I would simply write a list or create a web of potential ideas. Both of these methods involved a single piece of typical 8.5 x 11 inch paper. Boring, right?
The Card Strategy was helpful as it expanded my ability to think flexibly while writing, particularly during the prewriting stage. With the lists and webs that I used to create, I would develop an outline and stick closely to that outline. I felt that if I strayed from my plan, my writing would lose its focus. I appreciated that the Card Strategy involved physical cards that could be moved around right in front of my eyes. I was not glued to any sort of order or structure, rather I could try out different orders before landing on one. Even when I began freewriting after deciding on an order, I found that the order changed as I continued to freewrite. This made me a bit uncomfortable at first because I felt that my writing was not organized. The little voice in my head reminded me, "It's a freewrite - it doesn't have to be super organized yet!" Sometimes I forget that writing is a process and a piece does not have to be completely perfect on the first try. In this moment I am led to wonder, is there even such a thing as a perfect writing piece? Isn't there always room to improve?
I find that having other eyes on my writing piece reminds me that none of my pieces are ever perfect. When peers or teachers read my writing, they always have suggestions as everyone interprets a text slightly differently based on their background knowledge, identities, and stance. With that said, it is not surprising that my absolute FAVORITE part of the Card Strategy was the peer involvement portion. When I am writing, I sometimes find that I get stuck in a one-track mindset. Hearing from peers pushes me to think flexibly and consider my writing in new ways. My peer created an entirely different order for my cards than I how the order may change for difference genres. We both concluded that the order of one another's cards would be dependent on the genre, audience, and purpose of our piece. Again, this demonstrated how my thinking became more flexible, and input from a peer was a big part of this.
Given the positive experience described above with the Card Strategy, I would definitely use this brainstorming strategy again. I hope that when I use this strategy again, I have another individual nearby who would be willing to look at the order of my ideas. I would even consider showing a peer all of my cards and see how they would group the subtopics. I imagine that there would be differences in the grouping of subtopics too. The collective sharing of knowledge and ideas during this activity led me to think of Muhammad's (2020) HRL Framework and her suggestion to incorporate more collaborative learning experiences rather than competitive, individualistic tasks. After completing this activity, I was more motivated to write, and I strongly feel that working with a peer and hearing her ideas played a large role. Needless to say, I will certainly use the Card Strategy in the future, and I aim to use it with students in the future too.
References
Kucer, S. B. & Rhodes, L. K (1986). Counterpart strategies: Fine tuning language with language. The Reading Teacher, 40(2), 186-193.
Muhammad, G. (2020). Cultivating genius: An equity framework for culturally and historically responsive literacy. Scholastic.
Maddie, this was a great reflection of how using this strategy helped you to fully embrace the brainstorming elements that Tompkins discussed. I couldn't help but wonder as I read this entry, did you see ways you were also being strategic as Tompkins described in Chapter 2?
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