Confident about using the online library.Students did, however, report on acquiring citation skills, as well as newfound confidence conducting research in general: Citations are annoying but necessary requirements.I find professors grade citations differently.The burdensome and antiquated tradition of properly citing sources-the bane of every beginning researcher-came in for its share of abuse: Researching can be a little complicated.Other students wrote in a similar vein, frankly addressing the problems and sense of discouragement that all researchers have felt: That student, who also wrote that she was familiar with the six-word genre and had enjoyed writing in it before, was able to speak to a common experience of library users with heartening humor. That memoir cleverly adopts the idiom of an imperiled comic-book superhero to express important affective aspects of the research process: the student has obviously felt frustration in her use of the library, while persevering to achieve a research goal. I found myself literally laughing out loud and replying with heartfelt smiley-faces to six-word library memoirs such as: If the success of an assignment can be measured by the enjoyment the instructor derives from reading students’ submissions, then this assignment was a smash hit. I want to read six-word memoirs that reflect all types of library or reading or research experiences, not just the perfectly happy ones. So have fun, don’t feel like you have to spend a long time on this, and by all means, if you want to express frustration about using the library, I am completely open to that.
Everyone who writes a six-word library memoir will get the extra credit (your memoir doesn’t have to sound like it was written by Ernest Hemingway or anything). This is meant to be a fun, easy way to earn an extra point. Contented quiet hours among beautiful books.Never really finished anything except cake.įor your extra-credit assignment, write a six-word library memoir and post it in this discussion thread: convey in exactly six words a library or reading or research experience.
#My life in six words professional#
National Public Radio ran a story about it. The six-word memoir is a Web phenomenon and book publishing phenomenon. To introduce my students to the six-word memoir and convey my expectations for the extra-credit assignment, I posted the following in our online class: 5 That ice-breaking exercise builds a sense of community in the class while introducing students to the idea of writing within a genre and conducting peer review. “I know teachers all around the country, really, the world,” Smith has noted, “have used it all over, in grade schools, kindergarten, grad school.” 3 Community-college English professor John Yohe, for example, has his students create six-word memoirs and comment on them in small groups. The six-word memoir lends itself to classroom use. The genre was inspired by Hemingway’s ability to invoke an entire tragic tale in just six words: “For sale: baby shoes, never worn.” Subsequent six-word memoirs tend to be lighter, such as the signature six-worder of SMITH founder Larry Smith: “Big hair, big heart, big hurry.” The mini-memoir made the jump from online to print with a cottage industry of books by Smith and coauthor Rachel Fershleiser, including Not Quite What I Was Planning: Six-Word Memoirs by Writers Famous and Obscure 2 and I Can’t Keep My Own Secrets: Six-Word Memoirs by Teens Famous & Obscure. 1 The rules are simple: write about your life in six words. The six-word memoir became an Internet and publishing phenomenon at the SMITH Magazine Web site. Having undergone the educational rigors of the LIBS 150 information literacy boot camp-database selection, Boolean searching, source evaluation, formatting citations, and other research skills-students appreciate the chance to earn an extra point toward their course grade with a fun, fast assignment that helps them reflect on life as a library user and academic researcher. As an extra-credit assignment near the end of the seven-week class, I ask students to write a six-word memoir about their library, reading, or research experiences. At University of Maryland University College (UMUC), I teach LIBS 150, an online, required one-credit library skills course for undergraduates.
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