Easy Lessons from Teaching all Writers Will Benefit From

For twenty-five years, I have done the best job in the world. I am one of the lucky few who loves her main hustle as much as her side hustle because I get to spend all day with teenagers.

Many of you now think I am mad, but I love the age group. They have such a lust for life and a transparent black-and-white outlook that I would not want to do anything else.

Throughout the years, teaching has provided me with an endless amount of material for articles and many lessons. Lessons that not only work with teaching but also in writing. These are the lessons I think we can all improve from.

Mistakes are learning opportunities

This was a quote I heard as a mantra on a training course I was taking part in around behaviour. It has resonated with me ever since. We will all make mistakes whether we are fourteen-year-old students or writers.

When you make a mistake, be it lousy editing or not judging the market for your writing, don’t sit and worry about it. Instead, look at the lessons this mistake has taught you and ensure you don’t do the same thing again.

Even if we make mistakes, being brave enough to try helps us take the risks we need to succeed at anything we want.

Always have more work than you need

This tip has served me well in my twenty-five years of teaching. No matter how experienced you are as a teacher, there is always the student that finishes everything you set in a super quick time.

This is when the trouble starts because if students aren’t occupied, they start disrupting others. This is why I always have two lessons worth of work prepared. Then, when they finish, there is always something else for them to go onto.

So how has this helped me with writing? It is simple. I always write far more than I need for an article. I always on the first draft include as many details as I can. I also have more research than I need, so I have enough material.

Then when it comes to editing, I will cut large chunks that aren’t needed or are poorly written. With the excess material, I am happy to cut it rather than keep poorly written paragraphs in, to make up read time.

The worse start can have the best results

It is worth mentioning here that my career as a teacher has not been in traditional classrooms. Instead, I have taught in schools for excluded young people, schools for those with additional needs and prisons. So it is fair that most students come to me with a lousy start.

However, the most reluctant students often turn out to be the best. This is because they know they can succeed in something other than trouble when they get their lightbulb moment. This is the sole reason I work with this group; I have had better results than many secondary teachers with these students because they have something to prove.

This is the same with writing. I have written articles that I have struggled with for weeks. Finally, I finished editing and still thought they were awful, but I published them anyway. However, most of the time, these articles surprise me and do better than others.

No one knows what your readers want other than your readers. So sometimes, that article away from the norm you worry about can give you some of the best results.

A change of environment can do wonders

The main thing with teaching these unusual students is that some just hate school. It is a mistake many alternative schools make; they think that if they take a student out of one classroom and put them in another, they will learn.

Which is rubbish, I am sure you all see. The success of my teaching has been to take them to different environments and teach them there. If I am teaching angles to the students, there is nothing better than a snooker hall and a game of snooker to teach this.

As writers, we sit in front of the same screen every day, in the same office and wonder why our productivity falls and we start not to be bothered. If you are struggling with writer’s block, then the best thing is to try another environment.

Last month, during NaNoWriMo, I knew I would never reach the 50,000-word goal sat in my office, so I got up and went out. Most of the novel was written in libraries with the sound of the knitting club behind me. A change of environment can do us all good, not just stroppy teenagers.

If all else fails, play Uno

This one might sound like a bit of a joke and to be honest, you could change Uno to any game of choice. But, sometimes, when a student is having a bad day, nothing I can do or offer will make them want to learn.

To put this in context, if you have had no breakfast because your parents are broke, or you have had a row with your mum because she didn’t give you money for snacks, you are not going to learn.

Me sitting there trying to force it will breed anxiety and aggression, so we say sod it and play Uno. Strange thing, most teenagers love Uno. I have no idea why.

As writers, sometimes you will not write a cohesive sentence, no matter how long you sit at your computer. You might have money worries or an argument with a partner on your mind. My advice then is to quit for the day and play Uno. Tomorrow is another day.