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Andrew Pudewa: I think we also see with the kids that come to our classes, they have this experience like ooh.

Andrew Pudewa: I added that cool L-Y word or oh i put in these dress ups and

Andrew Pudewa: that

Andrew Pudewa: feeling you've been able improve

Andrew Pudewa: on something.

Julie Walker: Hello!

Julie Walker: And welcome to The Arts of Language podcast with Andrew Poudouin Founder of Institute for Excellence in Writing Or as many would say, IEW.

Julie Walker: My name is Julie Walker marketing officer.

Julie Walker: Our goal is to equip teachers and teaching parents with methods of materials which will aid them in training their students.

Julie Walker: I'm reminded of the first time we ever did a podcast.

Julie Walker: Didn't want to burden people with having to go back.

Julie Walker: This is episode five hundred something.

00:01:48: It's way high up there and if you like what we're talking about great You wanna go back and listen in the beginning?

00:01:55: We will save you the trouble And say, you can actually go back to the beginning.

00:02:00: Just go back find some really cool

00:02:02: episodes.

00:02:02: your just a mini.

00:02:04: I am just a meanie

00:02:05: but we did start revisiting The theme.

00:02:08: yes the library of ideas is still pretty much available.

00:02:14: Exactly, exactly right!

00:02:16: So this episode is part of our Laying The Foundation series that we're doing in the year twenty-twenty six.

00:02:23: so every month We want to start out a podcast...so Every month..our first podcast for the month generally Is about THAT theme For This Month and THIS That Theme For This Year.

00:02:38: And THIS theme IS laying the foundation and we're specifically talking about source texts.

00:02:47: And of course, We use source text when we teach children to write!

00:02:52: When we teach anyone to write yeah...we start them with a source text.

00:02:56: and you know one of the interesting things About these podcasts that our listeners may not have ever known is I usually bring in a bunch of resources To refer too..and today i have Dr Webster's blended structure and style in composition.

00:03:12: This is his... Honestly, Andrew I was kind of paging through this going.

00:03:17: thank God for you Thank god that you have made this much more simple to use.

00:03:23: if That had been the book that we tried to sell and used to teach everybody i don't think We would Have had The level Of success yeah that we have Had.

00:03:33: i agree

00:03:34: yes

00:03:34: so it Is interesting because?

00:03:37: This idea Was not Clear to me until I don't know maybe three or four years ago when i started To include it in various explanations What what has to happen?

00:03:54: In order, to write something yep and And looking at that question because so many kids are kind of like dead in the water.

00:04:02: I Don't know what to do I can't think Of anything I don' t Know what to say.

00:04:06: That's very common.

00:04:10: I asked the question, well what has to happen for a child or anyone To write something?

00:04:17: Well.

00:04:17: The first thing that has to happened is there must be an idea.

00:04:21: Yep if there's no idea There is nothing to right.

00:04:25: yep.

00:04:26: and Then i started to look at it kind of categories And i said well you know theres two basic.

00:04:34: I mean there's a little overlap, but there are two basic categories of ideas.

00:04:39: Ideas that exist inside the memory and imagination... ...and ideas that're more immediate!

00:04:47: And i have used as an example to say well if ask you write about last trip with your friends or family.. ..I'm asking YOU go into your memory, imagination & reconstruct event sensory impressions thoughts you had conversation whatever and find that stuff inside your memory and imagination.

00:05:11: whereas if I said Write something about the room.

00:05:16: You're in right now That would be a very different thing because you could just look around the room Look at stuff, and say why is that there?

00:05:25: And how come not it's that way.

00:05:27: What is that thing and why do we have it, right?

00:05:30: And so you could access ideas more easily when they're immediate.

00:05:38: The second differentiation Is that ideas can primarily exist in sensory impressions.

00:05:48: So if your writing about being at the beach You're trying to remember, well what does it feel like?

00:05:54: To be at the beach.

00:05:55: What do you see?

00:05:55: Would he hear or would you taste?

00:05:56: but are you touch with your sense right and then attaching words to that?

00:06:03: Whereas if I said Just tell me your favorite Bible story is up fable fairy tale thing you read Or there was red to you?

00:06:13: That's different because it came to you in word.

00:06:16: It can't even work out.

00:06:17: so when we look at this Brilliant idea of source text and keyword outlines.

00:06:25: It's saying it's immediate.

00:06:28: You don't have to go in search around and get frustrated if you can't find things And it pre-exists in words.

00:06:35: therefore, you're not necessarily Limited to the words.

00:06:39: you can find an affix two things that That are less verbal right?

00:06:44: So it's the greatest place To start when you start Learning teaching learning writing.

00:06:51: I don't know the Webster ever had that figured out.

00:06:54: I doubt it.

00:06:55: like many Good ideas, yep There's a truth behind them.

00:07:01: Yep And i think thats kind of been exciting for me to understand A little more and more over The three decades i've Been doing this.

00:07:11: so

00:07:11: paging through This book?

00:07:12: I never found Any information That says why we use source text.

00:07:19: But,

00:07:21: I go to the next book.

00:07:24: This of course is our teaching writing structure and style.

00:07:29: And you include in this book a little article about Benjamin Franklin.

00:07:36: Right yes from the autobiography Yes!

00:07:40: He talks how he determined that he wanted improve his writing.

00:07:47: In order He used a magazine called The Spectator and then he did what...he termed, take short hints of the sentiment of each sentence.

00:08:02: Keywords And then laid them by few days without looking at original tried to reconstruct ideas from those short hints.

00:08:13: So when I saw this it was kind obvious.

00:08:17: that is something that he figured out, but I doubt you've figured it so much as there was some tradition.

00:08:26: And think can go all the way back to ancient progymnasmata exercises for training of rhetoric.

00:08:37: and usually in most systems is retell a fable.

00:08:42: So they're working with existing content is in words and you're taking it, then putting it into word.

00:08:53: So It's a tight loop And that allows for A lot of safety and security.

00:09:03: You know what your doing?

00:09:05: Yep Then he talks about I compared mine with the original and discovered some faults and amended them But then says i had this feeling That In Some Small Way I had been able to improve on the original.

00:09:21: Yes, yes.

00:09:22: And so that i think we also see with the kids That come to our classes or you know do a video class?

00:09:30: Or take A class in school.

00:09:33: They they have this experience like oh i added that cool ly word.

00:09:37: or Oh i put In these dress-ups and i Think mine is better than The original.

00:09:44: Who knows if it Is there isn't right.

00:09:46: but feeling that you've been able to improve on something.

00:09:49: And there are other people who also use this in a way to practice and improve their writing skills, it goes back to a fundamental idea and that is imitation

00:10:03: right?

00:10:03: Exactly what I find so fascinating about This conversation and kind of what I Intuited by not finding Webster coming up with And this is why I use source text.

00:10:18: Is that just what you said, This has been going on a long time and yet i find it interesting That so many other writing programs Just expect the students to have A paintbrush and Dorothy Sayers talked about that in her Lost Tools of Learning where she talks About You.

00:10:37: don't just give a student a new tool and tell them To come up with something right but you need Something And I love that, I loved the idea.

00:10:46: Right and she wrote her little essay The Lost Tools of Learning...I think it was in nineteen forty-seven But It Was In A Way a Reaction to a Modernist Idea That Was Gradually Working Its Way And Was Firmly Entrenched By Late Nineteen Hundreds.

00:11:09: Which Was?

00:11:11: Writing Is About expressing yourself and creativity, you know?

00:11:19: Whereas actually writing is about expressing ideas.

00:11:25: And maybe if you're lucky when you live long enough You'll have some original ideas.

00:11:32: But so much of what we think in say-and talk about it comes from somewhere exactly.

00:11:39: So if we can acknowledge that and look at this more traditional way the The little story about keyword outlines.

00:11:46: Yes,

00:11:46: I'd love to hear it Yeah You know

00:11:48: is very interesting.

00:11:49: II spent quite a bit of time with dr.

00:11:52: Webster before he passed on.

00:11:55: I went too.

00:11:56: I went to visit him in Vancouver At least once usually twice a year for almost a decade.

00:12:04: And so I was you know collecting up little interesting bits about his life and the writing program, in his early years of teaching.

00:12:14: And so he once told me this story how keyword outlines came into being... Okay!

00:12:22: ...and I was just very amused by it.

00:12:26: So when he was teaching-I think it's middle school.

00:12:30: Before we got his PhD He taught almost every grade level for a while one room school house all the way up to high school, but in middle school he was telling me about how The School District had this new idea that He had to try which is collaborative writing.

00:12:53: Okay So he was supposed to stand at the chalkboard and write down sentences That various kids in the class would offer.

00:13:04: Okay?

00:13:05: And so it was, okay we're gonna write about this thing and We'll do it together.

00:13:10: So who's got an idea?

00:13:12: and then someone would say something and he would Write it down and then turn around.

00:13:17: and Who else has an Idea?

00:13:19: and they Would Say It and He Would Write This Down.

00:13:21: well the problem is when you're a teacher all teachers know this.

00:13:24: yes if You are Faced to A blackboard or white board you Are back To your students

00:13:33: And teachers don't have eyes on the back of their head?

00:13:35: Well,

00:13:36: it's funny because there is a composition in Webster's book Unit Seven about The Ideal Teacher.

00:13:44: Oh right!

00:13:44: and It Is This Concept Of.

00:13:48: They Have Eyes All Around Their Whole Head so they can see everything all at once.

00:13:52: but no But what he noticed was that with these long periods of time where his writing sentences are on the whiteboard.

00:14:01: kids are just doing whatever they do and passing notes, talking to each other in reading their comic books.

00:14:06: And throwing spit wads... I guess shooting spit wands would be better.

00:14:11: but so he realized that if he only wrote down a few words from the sentence that was given him by The Group He could quickly turn around and minimize the aberrant behaviors.

00:14:30: But then he noticed that when they went to rewrite it He got a much greater variety of ways Of saying things right because they didn't have a whole sentence To try and re-write.

00:14:46: I mean, it's kind of hard to rewrite a whole Sentence but if it was only two or three key words Then they would rewrite it and he would get higher levels of engagement.