Kelly Barnhill is the author of four novels, including The Girl Who Drank the Moon (Bookshop|Amazon), which won the 2017 Newbery Medal for children’s literature. She’s also been helping neighborhood teens with their college essays, encouraging them to write about their own experiences in a voice that’s uniquely theirs. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Finding a Voice for College Essays by a Different Route”
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I’m Grant Barrett.
And I’m Martha Barnette.
Kelly Barnhill is the author of four novels, including The Girl Who Drank the Moon, which won the Newbery Medal for children’s literature.
On Twitter, she posted a long thread recently describing how she’s been helping neighborhood kids with their college admissions essays.
And she describes them as coming in absolutely dear in the headlights, you know, panicked because they just don’t understand this kind of writing or what it’s supposed to do. And so she makes them tea and she has them put their laptops away. And then she says, we talk a little bit about life or worries or the world. We talk about memories. I have them tell me stories. And then I hand them an old notebook and I start lobbing writing prompts at them. I tell them that they don’t have to worry about any of this. No one will see it. They just have to keep their pencil going for five minutes and then stop when the timer goes off. And then she tells them, write about a memory pretending that it’s happening right this very second. Write about a choice they had to make as though it’s happening right now. Write about food or work or the bus or the snow. I tell them to tell me a story about a time they broke the rules or tried something new or built something with their friends. And she describes how for them, it’s a really strange form of writing that most of them have never done anything like that, you know, writing in their own voice and writing about their own unique experiences with themselves at the center of this story. And then she says, invariably, there’s a moment they’ll have pages and pages of material, memories, moments, thoughts, arguments, explanations, seeing their point of view as something that belongs entirely to them.
And then they see it, an arc, a beginning, a middle, and end. Oh, they say. And Grant, I thought that was such a cool approach to writing one of those college application essays, you know, not thinking about what they want to hear, but really kind of doing a deep dive into yourself. I agree with that. And I have taken a different tactic with my son over the years when he’s had to write some personal thing for classwork where I interview him as if I’m the reporter. You and I both have reporter skills and he’s my subject. And I kind of make it formal. And he’s never been treated like that before where somebody is actually interested in him and quizzes him not as a father or even as a friend, but as a stranger, somebody with a distant business relationship, you know, or a distant kind of remove that he’s never encountered before. And I bet these kids not only have never had to look deep inside themselves, but have never had somebody of her professional skill work with them and use her professional tools on them. They’ve never encountered somebody so equipped and so qualified to extract from them the the gems that are inside.
Yeah, I really like your idea of interviewing the kid because I find so often, I mean, when I’ve interviewed adults a lot of times they’re so close to their own story they can’t even see it, you know, it’s completely out of focus because it’s right there in front of their face. And by leading them through some questions like that, they start to listen to themselves and realize, oh, I do have something to say. I am an expert on me and the way that I view the world. It’s a thread on Twitter that’s really worth reading. And some of the comments were really great, too. Somebody said, what a potentially life-changing gift you’re giving these kids, sort of like that rocket NASA launched into the asteroid, a little nudge that can alter a lifetime trajectory.
Oh, that’s so perfect. What an image. That’s exactly right.
Right.
So this thread, again, we’ll link to it on our website. It’s by, what is her name and what’s that book? Her name is Kelly Barnhill, and I want to recommend her website as well, kellybarnhill.com, because she’s very opinionated about writing and teaching and education, and it’s a very stimulating read. She’s the author of the Newbery-winning The Girl Who Drank the Moon.
Oh, that’s a lovely title as well. Like I said, we’ll link to that from our website. We love the stimulating conversation that you share with us. Call us toll free from the United States and Canada, 877-929-9673, or tell us your thoughts in email, words@waywordradio.org.
