Relentless writing and the death of memory in elementary education

Abstract

This paper explores the relentless character of writing in elementary education. We begin with the reflections of a Grade Three teacher on incidents in her classroom regarding writing and the leaving of traces, followed with a consideration of the deep cultural investment we have in leaving such traces. A brief examination of the latest work by Lucy Calkins is followed by a discussion of the paradoxical relations between writing, remembering and forgetting and the forging of community as an “order of memories.” The issue of writing as the rendering of experience into cultural capital is followed by concluding remarks on the pleasures of “walking around unwritten.”