A Blog of Seattle Arts & Lectures
By Kelly Froh, WITS Writer-in-Residence I had an idea to engage my middle-schoolers with a series of curated exercises that would magically entwine, crossover, and accelerate their understanding of the comics form, and that these students would turn out incredible comic pages for a final printed project. It did not occur to me that some […]
By Alex Gallo-Brown, WITS Writer-in-Residence When I walked into Ms. Simmons-Rice’s class at Nathan Hale High School last month, I wasn’t sure what to expect. I had taught writing at the community college level, but never to high school students, and certainly not to high school freshman, a time I remember with regret and a […]
By Cody Pherigo, WITS Writer-in-Residence I’ve become semi-obsessed with checking the weather channel website several times a week for the last 3 months. It’s like Facebook without friends. I want it to tell me spring is here to stay, the sun exists, and temperatures will rise steadily to a glowing, saturated peak. But do I? […]
A Poem in the Voice of the Wind Like you, I can make the warmest of weather into a sick, shivering mess. Like you, I am angry, and whip at people’s hair and clothes, though you only do it in your imagination. Like you, I love to stir up the sand with my fingertips, but […]
By Anastacia-Renee Tolbert, WITS Writer-in-Residence Lately, I’ve been reading a host of fiction and nonfiction from writers who have come before me, thinking about my mortality and the current state of the world as a woman of color writing, teaching and mothering. So recently, I asked high school students to write editorial essays. To begin with, some […]
Falling Angel My father stands by my side listing rule after rule after rule. I roll my eyes and shun his words of caution as he straps on my wings. The wings are big and white. I secretly threaded a raven feather for luck. I look toward the blazing sun and spread my wings and […]
ON THE ROAD AGAIN by Ann Teplick, WITS Writer-in-Residence Oh, the hours I’ve spent behind the wheel of a Volkswagen bus, a Subaru, a Datsun, a Honda, from Seattle to Banff to San Francisco to Glacier National Park to D.C. to Montreal to Yellowstone to Austin to Philly. Oh, the hours with the windows rolled […]
By Kathleen Flenniken, WITS Writer-in-Residence A friend of a friend was looking for a poem her fifth-grade son could memorize for a class project. The question came to me and I made a couple of suggestions. The boy chose “Eating Poetry” by Mark Strand. His mother sent a photo of him studying the poem with […]
By Corinne Manning, WITS Writer-in-Residence The day after the election, I carried a tote-bag full of ferns, poetry by June Jordan, and a memoir in comics by Lynda Barry into the high school. To my students, I tried to introduce the idea of imagination, of finding ways to tap into their sensory experiences, even when the […]
By: Karen Finneyfrock, WITS Writer-in-Residence A few weeks ago, it snowed in Seattle! That’s a pretty exciting occurrence for inhabitants on the Puget Sound. Students got a snow day, followed by a late start. Since I was scheduled to teach in fourth grade classrooms at Lafayette Elementary, I knew I would need to work a […]