Mistakes vs. Incompetence

As some of you know, I'm entering a transition in the day job. This involves a lot of interviews, some where I'm the interviewee and some where I'm on the panel of interviewers. It makes for an interesting dual perspective.

My current school includes something extra in the interview process—candidates have to teach a brief mock-lesson. For me, that's the make-or-break portion of the interview. I can forgive a few weak answers on the standard interview questions, but if the math teaching isn't up to snuff, I'm not recommending.

Since we're nearing the end of the school year, I'm also leading my classes through reviews to prepare for their final exams. This includes going through problems we haven't discussed in-depth since last fall. Most of the time, it's fine. But a couple of times last week (in calculus, naturally), I had some ridiculous cerebral failures.

That's fine, too. I make a point of emphasizing to my students early on that I can make mistakes, and if they catch me at it, good for them. Seeing me make mistakes without falling apart seems to help them be more willing to take risks even though they might be wrong.

I got to thinking about the two situations. Where's the line between "Oops, the teacher's human and makes mistakes" and, "No, this interviewee doesn't have what it takes"?

My guess is that the line is in awareness. When I screwed up in calculus, I either knew right away or within moments. I immediately 'fessed up to the students and set about figuring out what I'd done wrong. With interviewees who aren't cutting it, they generally seem to think what they're doing is fine. Top interviewees often have more to criticize about themselves. There's a question in the interview about what they think they need to work on most. It's always interesting to correlate their answer to this question with their performance in the mock-lesson.

So, everyone, let's aspire to make mistakes. Own them, learn from them. But never let it cross into incompetence. If we are incompetent in an area, let's be aware of it, and work to correct it.

Write What You Know, Pt 2: Diversity Edition

Last month, I posted about writing what you know, or more specifically, knowing vs. experiencing and the necessary levels of each. With the situation I had in mind at the time, I have to believe it's possible to write authentically without experiencing firsthand. (If not, I've got problems.)

Today, I'm thinking about a different situation. In this case, I still think it's possible to write it well without firsthand experience, but the closer you can get to the source in your "research," the better.

The situation is writing from an ethnic or cultural perspective that is not your own.

Clearly it can't be necessary for us to share backgrounds with our protagonists. If it were, women could only write female protagonists. No one could write from the POV of anyone older than they were. Way too limiting, to the point of being ridiculous.

But how do we do the research to make sure our characters are culturally authentic?

As I mentioned in the other post, two of my novels have deaf characters. In the first, it's not the POV character, but the almost-as-important sister. Honestly, I didn't dare attempt a deaf POV at that point. I'd been teaching at a deaf school for three years at the time, but I didn't feel ready. (It turned out that I think my POV choice was the right one regardless, just with who the characters are and where the story needed to go, but that's another matter.)

For the second novel (which followers of the blog may notice has finally shown up among the tabs at the top), I got brave. My MC is hard-of-hearing, and there are a variety of deaf supporting characters. I felt like I was ready to take it on.

I'm not "in" Deaf culture, but I've been pretty well immersed in it for several years now. I've seen a lot of viewpoints within it, some of them completely contradictory to each other. I think witnessing and acknowledging the contradictions was the key.

No culture is homogenous any more than a society is homogenous. You can't say, "All Deaf people are like this," any more than you can say, "All Chinese people are like that."

That doesn't mean you can have a character say and do anything and have it be authentic, though.

Am I talking in circles yet? Feels like it.

Cultures are tricky things. Group history, personalities, individual experiences, family tradition, education ... all those things feed into the culture and influence how each person inside experiences it. Individual, unique, yet within certain bounds that offer sameness, that allow a person to say, "Yes, I belong."

Can you find that in a Google search?

Will you even know to look?

Be honest. How many of you are looking at me funny for capitalizing "Deaf" in some places? How many of you are getting question-mark-face at the way I'm discussing a physical disability alongside cultures like they're the same thing?

Surely anyone can write a deaf character. Just cut out the sound and add in sign language, right? I might have thought the same before I became acquainted with people on the inside, and learned that Deaf and deaf are two different things.

Do we fall into the same trap with other cultural identities? Do we assume we can write a character from a particular background, when really we haven't dug deep enough yet to see the nuance and variety within that culture? The push and pull that come from being part of a smaller culture (or more than one) within the larger culture of a particular society?

This is definitely a post where I don't have answers—just questions. And it's gone on long enough. I'd love to hear your thoughts.

The Addict's Scorn

Since my students often borrow books from me (particularly books that the school library doesn't have), they also share their opinions on those books. Sometimes it's just a quick, "Yes, this was good!" or, "Eh, it was okay," when they return it. They know that if I haven't read it yet, I don't want to know details. If I have read it, we'll chat a little more about what they liked or didn't.

Yesterday, one of my students walked in and declared, "I hate this book!"

I spotted the bookmark. She's halfway through. And she's still reading.

If she really loathed it, she'd have quit earlier and traded for another book. They do that all the time. Since it's one I haven't gotten to yet, she didn't get specific. But from what I can gather, she's frustrated with something about the course of the plot. And/or it's not giving her what she wants when she wants it.

This particular book is part of a series. The same student has been very vocal in her opinions (both positive and negative) on earlier books in the series. Overall, she likes it. But that didn't stop her from passing through my room on the way to lunch and shouting, "I hate the book even more now!"

There's another series the same student has read. That one, she really hates for very particular reasons. But she's said, "Will they just finish the stupid series so I know how the stupid thing ends?"

She hates it, but she'll still finish it.

In both cases, the author has her hooked. She's addicted, and she can't let the stories go until she knows how they end. There's a difference, though.

When the author of Series 1 begins a new series, my student will probably buy in and get hooked on that one, too. With Series 2, I don't think my student will give that author more opportunities to torture her.

They have something in common—they're both addictive.

They're polar opposites—one makes you revel in the addiction while the other makes you curse the person who got you hooked.

I wish I could put my finger on the key to that addictive quality. I'd bottle it up and pour copious amounts on my manuscripts. My best guess is it's some bit of magic balancing characters that feel real and a compelling plot.

So where do the two series diverge? I think it's a matter of those qualities slipping away as the series goes on. The authenticity of characters is weakened when they make unrealistically stupid choices for the sake of plot. Consequently, the plot may start to feel obnoxious and contrived.

With Series 1, my student may not like some turns the characters and plot are taking, but those turns must still feel authentic. She still believes.

What do you think makes some novels so addictive? What pitfalls have you noted that make an initially addictive novel fall flat?

How Does Your World Measure Up?

World-building is a key component of writing fiction, particularly in the genres of sci-fi and fantasy. That means you have to have culture, history, and everything else that comes with a real world underlying your story.

Including ... measurement units?

Maybe not. Maybe your world is built enough off of ours that it makes sense to stick with the usual feet and inches, pounds and ounces. Or if your world is in a future where scientific reasonableness is king, so you're all metric.

But what if that won't work for your world?

My first novel was largely in an alternate dimension with some shared history, but mostly a huge divergence. And a very science-oriented society. In a particular situation, I needed to make a reference to a measurement of volts.

Volts were named for Alessandro Volta. A dude who didn't exist in that dimension.

First thought: Oh, crap.

Second thought: Okay, what made-up units would make sense in this word I've created?

I considered how the society was fairly practical and straightforward in other naming practices, and I thought about what voltage means. In the end, I came up with a fake unit that seemed to fit both needs.

Have you ever thought about how many units are named after a person? Fahrenheit and Celsius for temperature. Volts, amperes, coulombs, and ohms for various aspects of electricity and charge. Newtons for force, pascals for pressure.

If you don't need to worry about these things in your stories, you're a lucky one. For the rest of us, make sure you think about a natural way for units to evolve in your world.

Have you invented units/measurements for one or more of your stories? How did you go about it?

A Birthday Resolution

No, it's not my birthday. That was last month. Did you miss it? That's okay. I really don't mind.

Fact is, it's been years since I made a big deal of my birthday. I can't remember the last time it was a big deal. Well, three years ago I brought an amazing friend with me on a birthday visit to my family. She made cakes, and the experience was pretty memorable.

Cake with Gaping Flesh Wound

But really, we could have—and probably would have—done it without it being my birthday.

I'm not so different from a lot of other people. Birthdays remind me that I'm getting older. Then I delve into thoughts of, "Am I where I thought I'd be or wanted to be by this age?" In some ways, no. Cue disappointment, depression, and general malaise. In other ways, I've done some very positive things I never imagined five years ago.

Still. Birthdays. Meh.

At least, that's how I felt until something made me think about it the other night.

I have pretty awesome students. You might have heard me mention it before. Even the ones who drive me bonkers find ways to make me glad I work with them now and then. Earlier this week, I attended an award ceremony for top seniors around the city, including one of my students, whom I'd nominated.

I've taught this student for the past five years, from Algebra 1 all the way to Calculus. I've chatted with her mom several times, and did again this particular night. This student has a few health issues, no surprise there, but her mom mentioned something I didn't know before.

When she was born, no one expected her to make it. They came in and told her mom—a first-time mother—that her baby would not make it through the night.

As her mom says now, though, her daughter is a regular donkey with the stubbornness. And here we are, eighteen years later. Eighteen years longer than the doctors expected. Alive and lively.

I'm not going to gripe about my birthdays and getting older anymore.

Happy Birthday, Paige!

You Might Have a Bad Prologue If ...

If you lurk around writing/publishing sites or follow such people on Twitter, you'll see a couple (hundred) comments on the evils of prologues. And they can be evil. Quite often are, especially in unpublished manuscripts. I used to spend a lot of time on an online slushpile of a site. I've seen a lot of such manuscripts, and I think I only ever saw a couple of prologues where I said, "Oh, yeah. That works. That's a keeper."

People wiser than I have posted on the topic, but I never let that stop me. So here's a Jeff Foxworthy-style (but probably not as entertaining) list. Read it over, take a good look at your prologue, and try to be honest about whether it fits into any of these clues that

YOU MIGHT HAVE A BAD PROLOGUE IF ...

 

• ... you only wrote the prologue because EVERY book in your genre has one. Every single one. Not one out there that doesn't in the whole wide world. Well, except those over there. They don't count.

 

• ... you only wrote the prologue because you're completely enamored with the idea of prologues. You love them. The books you worship most and aspire to be like have them, so clearly you must have a prologue so your books can be just like the oh-so-awesome works of [fill in the blank].

• ... your reader feels like they were walking to an important appointment and got held up by a chatterbox in the hallway who won't let them go until they've heard all about the stapler that keeps disappearing from the copy room. In other words, they feel like they're being held up from the real story. (Even a prologue should feel like part of the 'real' story.)

• ... your reader feels compelled to take notes on all the names of characters, their vital stats, and how they interrelate, only to find out none of them will show up again in the next 80,000 words.

• ... your reader learns something through the prologue that the main character is ignorant of until the third-to-last page of the novel, and spends the whole novel screaming, "No, you idiot! He's your FATHER!" (Or equivalent.) Letting the reader be in the know when the MC isn't can be cool. It can also be seriously frustrating. Fine line to tread.

 

• ... your reader gets annoyed because they already have a long-winded, boring history teacher, and it's no fun in real life, so even worse during pleasure reading, thank you very much!

 

• ... you could avoid all of the above with three well-placed sentences rather than the prologue, but you can't see that because you're utterly certain that your novel REQUIRES a prologue to work.

This doesn't mean all prologues are evil and bad and smelly and gross. Plenty of published books have them. They got past an editor's desk that way for a reason. Are you sure you likewise qualify?

Really sure?

If so, go ahead. Just remember, every time you assume you're one of the exceptions, you're taking a risk.

Can anyone add to the You Might Have a Bad Prologue If... list? I'm sure there are things I missed.

The Makings of Mathematical Mistakes

In my years of teaching math, I've amused myself by taking note of the types of mistakes students make. (Yeah, okay. I'm easily amused.) You can pretty much figure out the type of mistake by watching my reaction.

The "Fell Through the Cracks" Mistake

This usually happens in complex, multi-step problems. The student does all the hard stuff right but overlooks something. More often than not, it's losing a negative or mistyping something in the calculator.

R.C.'s Reaction: I just point wordlessly at the paper or calculator and wait while the student looks, ponders, then says, "Oh! Oops."

The "You Know Better" Mistake

Another "careless" variety of mistake. Can I tell you how many times I've asked what four-squared is only to hear, "Eight. No—wait! Sorry. Sixteen."

R.C.'s Reaction: Students often catch those without any help from me. When they don't, they get my 'Did you seriously just say that?' look. If that's not enough, they get a verbal, "Really?"

The "You're Still Learning" Mistake

This happens when students are mostly getting a new concept but aren't quite there yet. OR ... when they have to apply something they learned previously that hasn't quite solidified.

R.C.'s Reaction: Usually I ask them to explain their thinking first, then ask some follow-up questions until they see the wrong turn. Sometimes a neighboring student will try to tease the other about the mistake, at which point I remind them that they made the exact same mistake two minutes ago when I was helping them.

The "Someone in Your Past Failed Both of Us" Mistake

I teach high school math, which naturally relies on concepts learned over several years before arriving in my class. Sometimes we're working on some complicated algebraic thing and I realize some/all of the students have a problem with an underlying principle. (Fractions, anyone? Or measurement conversions?)

R.C.'s Reaction: What can I do? Go off to the side of our work and make up a simplified example (i.e., non-algebraic addition of fractions), quickly refresh the kids' memories on that, and parallel it to the problem at hand.

The "Back the Truck Up" Mistake

These mistakes on the part of the student tell me that I screwed something up as the teacher. Didn't explain clearly, allowed for a massive misconception to take root, etc. Sometimes I even did something just plain wrong.

R.C.'s Reaction: Confess to the class that I made a boo-boo, very clearly indicate where we went wrong, and emphasize the proper way to move forward.

Some people might say it's a teacher's job to eliminate mistakes and a student's job to avoid them. I don't agree with that. Mistakes are great! They're how we learn. (Well, so they're great as long as we learn from them.) And one thing to keep in mind is that I have extremely small classes, and I've taught most of my students for more than one year, some for up to five straight. My reactions to the "Fell Through the Cracks" and "You Know Better" varieties are done in an environment where the students and I are able to laugh off mistakes without embarrassment. (And where I'll accept "It's calculus on a Monday morning," as an excuse for the careless mistakes as long as they keep trying.)

I know some people who were always terrified to volunteer information in class, certain they'd make a mistake. I was one of them. Now, I'm okay with making mistakes in the classroom. Still working on being okay with it in the rest of my life.

What We Learned During MindyMania 2012

This week I've been discussing the weekend I spent with my critique partner, Mindy McGinnis. I've covered the wildlife and the writing, so today I'll just sum up a few things we learned.

Thing We Learned #1: Mindy and I really are twins separated at birth.

(And Mom was in labor for about three weeks.) We already suspected. Our birthdays are very close, down to the year. Our opinions and tastes are often the same. We complete each other's sentences. And now we know that we use the same shampoo.

Thing We Learned #2: Fast food employees can take the "twins" idea too far.

To the girl at Wendy's who thought Mindy was me after I'd already ordered—really? Okay, we were both wearing glasses and both tend toward the chalk-white end of "pale." But there's a seven- or eight-inch difference in height. My hair is mega-short; hers is long. Beyond that, the differences are what make things interesting. Mindy was ready and raring to go for the school presentations. I was freaking out about having to introduce her each time for about thirty seconds.

Thing We Learned #3: Handprint petroglyphs are the best.

I mentioned earlier in the week that we visited Petroglyph National Monument. It was very cool hiking around one of the canyons, and right on the edge of the city. All the petroglyphs were fascinating, and we had a lot of fun wondering about the meanings of different symbols, but I particularly liked this set we saw right at the end of the canyon. Strange thing, too—a few hikers had been ahead of us, and the hike is an out-and-back, not really a loop, but we never saw them coming back. Maybe the hands were warning us ... ?

"Turn back! Alien abductions beyond this point!"

Thing We Learned #4: Going out of your way can really pay off.

I don't know if any of you watch the series Breaking Bad. I don't, but Mindy does. There's a particular restaurant that figures prominently in one season, apparently, and we went to check out the actual restaurant that provided the front for the show. Bonus: The lot next door is where we saw the emu I posted about Monday. Double Bonus: The food was awesome.

If not for the glare, you might see the ostrich out the window.

We learned several other things, but I'll save those for another time. :)

"The Writer's Voice" Contest Entry: Stitching Snow

For my regular readers, this is my entry for a contest I've entered. (See details here.) Feel free to peruse or ignore as you'd like. :)

Query:

Seventeen-year-old Essie knows how to stitch up robotic drones so the men in the mining settlement remember she’s worth keeping around. She knows how to use her fists to make sure they keep their hands off her. What she doesn’t know is how to deal with a boy who’s depending on her to get his crashed shuttle off the ground and out of orbit.

He’s polite, chivalrous, even a little charming, and he gives Essie the kind of attention she’s never had ... until he discovers her secret. She’s the missing princess of his people’s greatest enemy. One betrayal later, he’s taking her home whether she likes it or not, to exchange for prisoners of war. What he doesn’t know is she had damn good reasons for running away. His ‘leverage’ means her death.

STITCHING SNOW is 68,000 words of Snow White in space, if Snow were a cage-fighting tech-head with daddy issues.

First 250 Words:

It took seventeen seconds to decide Jarom Thacker’s reputation as the sharpest fighter on Thanda had been a minor exaggeration. At twice my size—and age—he was still quick, forcing me to move or risk getting pinned against the cage. Like everyone else who came through Mining Settlement Forty-Two, though, he aimed for my gut or back. Never the most obvious target.

Wouldn’t want to botch the pretty girl’s face, right? Idiot.

I blocked him on the left, but missed his swing on the right slamming into my ribs. Pain flared through my side. I let it fire me on and slipped Thacker’s grip when he tried to grab me.

Unlike him, I had no qualms about uglifying him further—not with the way he looked at me, the shudder it sent across my skin. The heel of my palm slammed into his nose with a satisfying crunch despite the cushioning of my shock-fiber handwraps. He ignored the blood and lunged blindly; I dodged with a knee to his groin. When he doubled over, I kicked his legs from under him. He went down and I followed, pinning him. He tried to raise himself up. Before he could throw me off, I grabbed a fistful of his hair and knocked his head against the floor.

“Three ... two ... one ... fight goes to Forty-Two’s own Essie.”

Telling Teens Reading Doesn't Suck ... Using Vomit

As mentioned previously (twice now), critique partner extraordinaire Mindy McGinnis joined me in the southwest for the weekend, including a set of presentations to my school.

The first two presentations were to younger students (grades 1-3 for the first, then 4-8 for the second). We broke the kids into three groups and had one come up with a character, one a setting, and one a "problem," plus each group had to offer one random word. Then Mindy had to pull all that together and make up a story on the spot.

Ninjas are very popular this year. And Mindy managed to turn our school's founder into a zombie ship captain on Mars.

The other presentation was a little more formal for the high school kids. Mindy talked about the idea of lots of stories having the same basic plot at their root, but weaving in specifics that make it interesting and new. She'd give several examples of a particular Big Idea, then offer a specific premise for the kids to guess.

For example, under "Boy and girl fall in love but can't be together because ______," she gave, "Pretty blonde with a perfect life falls for a Hispanic gang member from the wrong side of town." Several of my female students jumped right in with the answer: Perfect Chemistry by Simone Elkeles.

I think many of the kids came away with the point Mindy wanted to make. The "sameness" of many stories is a good thing, because if you find one you really like, you can find others you're likely to enjoy as well. (And librarians can help you with that!)

As writers, though, we need to remember the second part of that formula—bringing a fresh, new take to the same old story. Too often, we find ourselves just writing the same story with only superficial differences, and that's just boring.

Oh, and the vomit? Yes, Mindy totally has a story that makes vomit relevant to reading. But you'll have to hear her tell it sometime.