Creativity, Teaching, and Natural Inspiration

Auteur

When long-time outdoorsman, songwriter, and poet Mark Doherty decided he needed a stable profession for his day job in the 1990's, he began his career as a high school teacher. But Doherty never really left the outdoors and his music behind; he just incorporated them into his creative approach to teaching high school English and writing. After earning his BA in English and Writing from his home state of Colorado at Western State University, Doherty spent ten years working as a musician, backcountry guide, and freelance writer in Southern Utah. Later he earned a teaching degree from Westminster College in Salt Lake City and now teaches International Baccalaureate Senior English as well as 11th grade core English in Midvale, Utah, a suburb of Salt Lake City located at the foot of the Wasatch Mountain Range. He earned his Master's Degree in Writing Nonfiction from Southern New Hampshire University in November of 2016.

Texte du rabat

Creativity, Teaching, and Natural Inspiration follows the evolution of a high school English teacher as he develops a creative and innovative teaching style despite being juxtaposed against a public education system bent on didactic, normalizing regulations and political demands. Doherty crafts an engaging nonfiction story that utilizes memoir, anecdote, poetry, and dialogue to explore how mixing creativity and pedagogy can change the way budding students visualize creative writing: A chunk of firewood plunked on a classroom table becomes part of a sawmill, a mine timber, an Anasazi artifact...it also becomes a poem, a song, an essay, and a memoir. The long, slender feather of a Sandhill Crane evokes Muir, Thoreau, Audubon, Leopold, Carson...even parables of lore and magic. Creativity holds the stitches of this book together and runs throughout each chapter like fragrant woodsmoke.