Alexandra Chakov
Assignments & Activities Archive
Activity Description
The purpose of this activity is to have students explore the ways their body is part of their writing process. Writing is not just a mental activity—it also involves the body. The body types out words or commands speech-to-text; the body feels anxiety as deadlines approach and feels joy when writing is praised. Our bodies exist in larger social, cultural, and political structures that inherently also play a role in our writing. This activity aims to have students begin to explore the relationship between their embodied experience and their writing. To do this, students will reflect on the five senses within the classroom space and share their findings with the class. By focusing on the classroom space, there is a level of familiarity to all students, which can allow comfort while learning a new skill and clearly expose the different bodily experiences. Then, students will use the details they have developed to write a paragraph describing the classroom to a specific audience. Finally, students will share their writing in small and large group discussions to begin to explore how an individual’s embodied experience and the rhetorical situation affect their writing. Ultimately, this embodied activity allows students to explore the ways their bodies are involved in the writing process, while also developing skills in writing with detail and beginning to understand rhetorical situations.