More than Myself

I felt very fearful for a number of reasons last year when I started my piece on “Joining the Multiliteracy Frontier.”  (I will probably change the name of this piece–it isn’t done.)   Why was I fearful?  I had gotten off the “publishing train” after being pulled in too many directions after receiving tenure.  I had gotten to the point where I was wondering if I had anything useful to contribute to the educational community and had no “warm” papers for potential publication…they were all cold….practically fully dead. I also felt I had no business writing about technology, since playing with gadgets and sitting in front of a computer were not at all, as Mary Poppins might say, my cup of tea. I started the piece by forcing myself to write a paragraph, and it was an anguishing experience. I also read a few books and articles on technology that is a good practice BUT has the problem of filling my head with too much information that I feel compelled to try to share.

The biggest problem I faced was that I was not sure what publication I would be sending this article to, and I also was not sure what my overall point was. I forced myself to actually send it–partially unfinished–to English Journal last November after re-shaping it to fit their theme of “moral imperatives.” Not surprisingly, the article was rejected BUT some very kind reviewer send me his/her comments that helped me revise it. (These comments made even more sense to me once I had a long period of distance from the piece…so I felt like I was reading the piece for the first time and understood what the reviewer was saying perfectly.)

I’m still not finished with the piece, and I haven’t yet shared it with my writing group, but I feel like I kno know