Tuesday Flashback: Study skills

(above) Joanna’s scribbled notes on an index card

In seventh grade, I took a study skills class at Bay Trail Middle School, or as students called it, “Gay Jail.” I don’t remember my teacher’s name, but I have a vague memory of glasses, a long (possibly pleated?) skirt, and some “womp-womp-wahh-ing” like a Peanuts cartoon.

What I do remember was writing a short research paper on Jim Morrison, including what I’d learned (from an Encyclopedia, maybe?) about him getting arrested for “nudity,” as I put it. My teacher didn’t appreciate my including that detail, and I remember she gave me a “C.” Fine, so she wasn’t a fan of the Lizard King!

Jim Morrison aside, not until junior year in high school did I begin to figure out how to use “study skills” to organize my writing. At the time, my teenage self had no interest in making outlines or “writing as process.” I didn’t want anything imposed on me, and I didn’t want to impose anything on my writing. In short, I thought I was already a really great writer… Ah, youth!

I remember my 11th-grade English teacher passing out assignment sheets for our first research essays. He told us to include quotes in our essays, but first to write down each quote on an index card with the author’s name, publication name, and (most importantly) what we planned to say about the quote on the back of the card.

Index cards! So simple.

Yes, it’s old-school and ridiculously time-consuming, but this method (and waking up at 4 am every day to write) is still how I write today (and also how I started and finished my 33 1/3 series book).

This is not to say that using index cards makes me a perfect writer by any means. Most of my essays (especially early drafts and, I’m sure, these blog entries) are riddled with mistakes.

But mistakes prove we’re all still learning.

In an increasingly artificially “intelligent” world, simple tools like index cards, pens, and notebooks are becoming more and more obsolete. Mistakes are, too. So, make mistakes in your writing. Do it all the time. It never hurts to remind yourself that you’re only human.

-jms -