How do we get students to “ache with caring” about their writing instead of mechanically stringing words together? The the question author Georgia Heard asks in her new book: Heart Maps:Helping Students Create and Craft Authentic Writing. She says we spend a lot of time teaching the craft of writing but we also need to devote time to helping students write with purpose and meaning. 

In today's podcast we speak with Georgia about what heart maps are and why they're so helpful for children as writers. Be sure to check out her website, www.georgiaheard.com.

Click here for more information on Heart Maps: Helping Students Create and Craft Authentic Writing by Georgia Heard

See transcript below:

Georgia :    Heart Maps are a concrete visual tool to help writers no matter what age discover and ultimately write about what they've stored in their hearts. People they love, memories, meaningful experiences. But it's not just a topic list where students make a list of topics that they then check off as they write. It's the experience and process of heart mapping that's really kind of magical and a little mysterious. When I first thought of heart maps years ago, I was amazed at what my students wrote. How open they were, how honest with their feelings and even the authentic conversations that happened around the heart maps. It's surprising that writing and drawing inside a little shape of a heart is such a powerful invitation for people to feel, to tell the truth, to write what they love.

    After my book, Awakening the Heart, was published where I first wrote about heart mapping, the idea went viral. There were over 8 million Google entries. They started appearing everywhere. Many classrooms around the country started their year with asking kids to heart map and that's because the process is so incredibly powerful. In this new book I introduce twenty different types of heart maps all with a different focus and I've also included writing ideas for digging deeper and mentor text ideas in multiple genres. I'm also so grateful that three of my wisest colleagues, Pam Allen, Nancy Atwell, and Penny Kittle, wrote essays in the book describing their incredible work with heart mapping. The main thing is that the book is filled with examples of the most breathtakingly beautiful heart maps created by kids all over the world.

Brett:    What do you feel are some of the barriers for children as writers or poets?

Georgia :    Well I think the way writing is sometimes taught is in a series of sequential steps. It's a formula, like the five paragraph essay. First you do this, then this, finally this, and poof you have a finished piece of writing. Mechanically stringing words, sentences, and paragraphs together doesn't necessarily make effective, powerful writing. My biggest question as a writing teacher is how to help kids ache with caring about their writing as Mem Fox says and I think heart mapping can help with this. One of the barriers for children's writing is engagement. How to help students care deeply about their words. If they don't care what they're writing about, why would they want to spend hours crafting, revising and editing which is really hard work? It's rewarding work if you truly care and know that your words matter.

Brett:    Who is heart mapping for and how is it most effectively used?

Georgia :    Heart mapping is for everyone from very young writers,