Why do we write?

Pleased to say that InTuition, the quarterly magazine of the Institute for Learning, has run my response in its Ask the Experts feature. In the autumn edition a college art lecturer said students asked 'why do we draw?' And thinking of our own students I was moved to respond:

...my creative writing students don't ask 'why do we write?' except when groaning over procastination. But I know that they write for the same reason students draw. To draw, to write, to make, is to capture something. It is about process, not end product -- except for commercial art or copywriting or journalism.

This art-making may express some aspect of the inner self the artist didn't even know was there. The satisfaction is in the process of discovery. The result displays the maker's voice, a unique angle on the world.

Another reason people make art is to assuage the essential loneliness of being human -- if I reach out in paint or words and you respond to my work, we have shared something, we have communicated, even if we never meet. Maybe only the artists themselves know why they create, and that knowledge can't be put into words. Why do we draw? Never mind. If we are impelled, we just do it.

Thanks to IfL for airing my views. It is the organisation all FE teachers have to register with these days as part of required professionalization (word??!!) of our kind of teaching. See my other IfL blog entries (gov't tutor registration) for more info and links. The current query asks how 'value added' works...

If you're NOT in regular teaching...

(1) So far as I can gather from the IfL (Institute for Learning) website http://www.ifl.ac.uk if you are currently teaching in FE colleges (funded by LSC (Learning & Skills Council, ie government)) you must register with IfL by 31 March 2008 -- no fee to pay.

(2) But if you teach (train, assist-teach etc) in other LSC funded institutions (say prisons, community education etc) you have til 30 September 2008 -- no fee to pay.

(3) OR, if you do NOT CURRENTLY teach in LSC funded institutions -- but who knows, you might! -- you have until 31 March 2008 to register with no fee to pay. After that date, fee is £30.

I'm thinking of writers and creative types who teach occasional part-time creative writing adult classes... so this would be category 3 if you are not currently in a teaching gig. Most likely you'd register as an associate.

As to what this is all about, see my 15 Jan and 11 March blog entries, the comment from Lindsay on the 11 March blog, and the links under Gov't Now Requires in the column to the right -- the official sites.

Strange breaks with Easter so early this year, are you and your students confused?

Don't miss 31 March FE tutors' registration deadline

Save £30 by registering before end March on the government-required Institute for Learning (IfL) register. Read more about it on my 15 January blog, and/or see the links I give on the right here under 'Gov't Now Requires...'

It's all about improving the quality and standards of teaching in the over 16's sector -- you've got to be registered for any teaching that gets public funding. You can still register after 31 March, but then there will be a fee of £30. As writing-type teachers, even if not currently teaching, we can be associates, so go ahead now -- why spend if you don't have to!

Meanwhile spring/summer teaching is shaping up, my trip to Nepal and India still swirls in my mind and soul and my duties call as new editor of The Brief, newsletter of the British Haiku Society.

About new gov't tutor registration

Lovely attentive audience for my talk to Women Writers Network last night, and lots of interest in the new government requirement that all who want to teach over 16s must register and qualify. So, in the continuing development of this blogspot I've given a link section (on the right) to the two key sites.

Institute for Learning (IfL) is directly of interest to you as a creative writing tutor, pretty easy to understand. It is the site where you register -- FREE until 31 March 2008; after that £30. My understanding is that you don't have to be teaching right now, or qualified; you'd be an affiliate. Lifelong Learning UK (LLUK) is more overall, in-depth, gov't Skills Sector -speak.

Note: if you currently teach and are qualified, you still must register -- if your qualifications were ages ago that's okay, they're easing in the qualification stuff by allowing different categories.

A first qualification course, from this year, is called PTLLS ('petals') -- Preparation for Teaching in the Lifelong Learning Sector. It's 12 weeks, 3 hrs once a week. It's City & Guilds, kitemark for a good course. You can take it to get you ready to teach, if you want to learn before you plunge in; or, often, you can land yourself a creative writing teaching slot and take this course at the same time. See linklist for sources.

Be not afraid! If you don't plan to teach in publicly funded institutions (borough adult ed, libraries, colleges, prisons etc) then you don't have to worry about all this! But if you might someday, I'm just trying to save you having to pay £30 after 31 March 2008.