San Marcos Writing Project

"I, Sisyphus, the legendary King of Corinth, bring encouraging news from the mountain.
After several thousand years of constructive engagement with the boulder and every muscle in my posterior chain, I am pleased to report we are 95 percent of the way up the tenacious little hill here in Tartarus. Honestly, folks, we are so, so close. The summit is largely visible. It is nearly visible. There is a concept of visibility at play here that is impossible to ignore.
And, thank the gods, I am fairly certain the grade has leveled out a bit. Plus, the boulder, while historically uncooperative, has shown encouraging signs of understanding the need for upward movement and overall productive pushing activity.
The remaining 5 percent concerns only the final portion of the hill, the tendency of the boulder to inevitably roll back down to the very beginning, the eternal nature of my punishment, and the fact that Hades has not technically agreed to alter any terms.
Nevertheless, one must not be held captive by pessimism. For too long, observers have focused narrowly on the outcome. Did the boulder reach the top? Did it stay there? Did I immediately watch it thunder past me, flattening several shepherds, again and again? These are fair questions, but they miss the broader architecture of incremental progress. In diplomacy, as in divine mythological torment, is it not the momentum that truly matters?

I am told by several lesser gods that the boulder understands the seriousness of the moment, though I will grant that the stone has not said this to me directly. This giant, tenacious rock has said very little, owing to being solid granite. I get that. But there are ways to read between the striations when it comes to igneous silence. There are ways to interpret the weight of the moment, which is, admittedly, quite immense. There are ways to look at an object that has crushed your hopes every morning since the Bronze Age and say, “This time, things are going to be different.”
Negotiations with the boulder center on a few delicate but totally surmountable issues. It would like to return to the base of the hill for all eternity. I would like the finish line to become something tangible and achievable, especially now that I have done the whole up-and-down whoopsie-daisy thing about a trillion times. The gods, in their infinite wisdom, would like everyone to understand that no formal agreement exists until Mount Olympus announces one, though several nymphs familiar with the matter describe the atmosphere up there as productive.
This is why I reject those who say the process has stalled. A stalled process does not leave a man bent double under three tons of volcanic ambition. A stalled process does not produce this much sweat. A stalled process does not require both hands, the shoulder, firing the glutes, and an insatiable throb somewhere deep within the lower left calf.
No, what we have here is progress. Measurable, 95 percent progress. The kind you can feel in the tendons. The kind that produces a distinct grinding sound beneath the stone and between several failing joints at once. The kind that makes a person say, with total confidence, that the summit is definitely closer than the valley, provided no one asks where the boulder might be five minutes from now."

I, Sisyphus, Am Ninety-Five Percent of the Way There “The remaining 5 percent concerns only the final portion of the hill, the tendency of the boulder to inevitably roll back down to the very beginning, the ete...

"and why an essay by Marilynne Robinson was so meaningful to me
Midway through her essay “Grace and Beauty,” Marilynne Robinson shares her long-time affection towards a specific word: entelechy.
Robinson offers an initial definition for entelechy—“the active principle of wholeness or completion in an individual thing”—but then, after allowing herself to meander through anecdotes around Charles Dickens and Charles Darwin, she circles back to it in a moment of writerly expertise.
Like a seed expertly planted to be harvested in the moment of perfect ripeness.
Referring again to entelechy, she writes that “it is true of art generally that it occurs along a continuum between expectation fulfilled, however surprisingly, and expectation disrupted, however profoundly.” Appreciating the word for its teleological nature as she equates beauty to language, near the end of the essay Robinson offers one further elaboration: “…a denouement that seems prepared and inevitable, that seems to have approached, not simply to have eventuated, to have arisen within the arbitrary limits imposed by every good choice made in the course of its invention, not as a foreshadowing but as a reality still imminent. Entelechy.”
In reading this back over, again and again, one thought harbored itself in my mind:
This feeling of entelechy is what I want to be true for student writing in my classroom.
Meaningful Student Writing: Expectation Fulfilled
At the very beginning of the school year, I asked my junior English students what type of writer they had been up to this point in their K-12 journey.
The responses were about what you’d expect: many students expressed a lack of confidence, while others sort of shoulder-shrugged in their reflections. Specific skills were mentioned as needing growth, but my bigger takeaway reading through them was that it felt as if the vast majority defined “good writing” as the type of writing that would receive a good score.
Nothing more than that.
Above you can see part of our course vision for this past school year, including one part specifically dedicated to writing: in this course, students will become more intentional, versatile, and confident writers.
One of the many balancing acts of teaching AP Literature for me is trying to help students excel in their writing in a way that will help them earn a passing score on the AP Exam while also not allowing the constraints of that type of writing limit student’s vision of what their writing can be. What that writing can mean to them.
So while I do very much hold myself accountable to the obligation of preparing them for success on the exam—what many students and their families very much expect from the course—I also try to remind myself that this cannot be it.
There has to be something more."

A Bolder Vision For Student Writing In her essay “Grace and Beauty,” Marilynne Robinson expresses her long-time infatuation with a specific word: entelechy.

" Having high school students spend time reading books shows what research can be like without digital distractions—and many prefer it
When I introduce research in my high school social studies classes, I use a practice I learned in kindergarten: Drop Everything and Read (DEAR). I require my students to read a physical book during the research process and give them multiple class periods to do so. DEAR time shows students the value of learning from books and provides them with the opportunity to do the deep thinking that makes research gratifying.
I prepare for DEAR time by having students figure out what book they are going to use in advance. My wonderful school librarians make a book cart that I keep in my classroom. I also borrow books from the public library for my students to use. Students are often surprised to discover that there are books published on the exact topics that interest them.
When students find an e-book that they want to use, I print out the introduction and a chapter. While students often use laptops during the research process in my class, no screens are allowed during DEAR time—I want the entire class to experience the pleasure of reading books rather than having to combat the distractions inherent to technology.
ACKNOWLEDGING DISTRACTIONS
I start class by asking, “When is it easiest for you to focus for a long time? When is it easiest for you to focus on reading?” These questions open a discussion about the challenges of concentrating, and then I share excerpts from Johann Hari’s Stolen Focus. We discuss how scrolling through multiple sources online at once makes it hard to focus. I explain how Hari’s book taught me that the internet is intentionally designed to capture your attention in short bursts, whereas physical books are conducive to getting into a flow state. I talk about how much I love learning from books and hope they will too.
I normalize distraction as part of the reading process and explain that wandering thoughts can help you make connections to your research questions and own experiences. I tell them to notice when they feel distracted and suggest that they stretch, write down a note related to their book, or have some water if they need a brief break.
I tell them to take off smartwatches and put their phone in their backpack instead of their pocket. I also take my phone out of my pocket and put it in a desk drawer. I explain that I’ve noticed that when my phone is on my person, it is difficult for me to concentrate on reading, even if I’m interested in the topic. Modeling this practice has helped make it a routine in my classroom.
TEACHING STUDENTS HOW TO READ NONFICTION ACADEMIC TEXTS
I explain the structure of academic books:"

The Benefits of Teaching Students to Use Books for Research Having high school students spend time reading books shows what research can be like without digital distractions—and many prefer it.

"This is the first in my summer series I’m calling Low Tech Learning. In today’s podcast and article, I explore the negative aspects of a tech-centric environment and the movement toward going low tech. I also want to provide some nuance and balance to set the tone for the rest of this summer series.
I know this might sound odd. I’m a professor of educational technology. I teach our ed tech course in the MAT program. I wrote a book about distance learning and another one on AI. But I also wrote Vintage Innovation and The Depth Advantageand I don’t see technology as good so much as powerful. My hope, then, is to offer a perspective that embraces nuance and complexity but is still clear and practical.
Sometimes Low-Tech Is the Answer
It’s an early morning in Phoenix and I’m having coffee with a former middle school student. She is currently teaching sixth grade and absolutely crushing it.
“Hey remember that really cool activity I did last year where I set up multiple AI avatars who could answer questions as if they were engineers?” she asks.
“Yeah, you told me about it,” I answer.
“Well, I abandoned that and I have mixed feeling about the results,” she says.
“Tell me more,” I say, taking a sip from my coffee.
“Okay, I brought in Ricardo. He’s an engineer and I thought it would be cool to talk to a real human who came from my neighborhood. I know there’s so much focus on girls and coding but I wanted them to see a young, Latino male in the field as well. Does that make sense?”
“It does,” I answer. I love Ricardo’s story and I can see how it would resonate in any classroom.
“I thought so too but then it was kind of a disaster at first,” she admits.
“What?” My eyebrows raise.
“He was so nervous. Like shaking. Sweating. Barely whispering when he presented at first,” she points out.
“What?!? He did theater. He’s a performer!” I practically shout in the fairly quiet coffee shop.
“Bro, can I call you bro?”
I nod.
“Well, bro, he was terrified. I told him that he was cooler than anyone there. None of them can drive, right?”
I smile.
“But then, he opened it up for questions and it got better,” she says.
“How so?”
She smiles. “God, he was so honest and vulnerable about being a first year college kid and doubting whether he belonged. He told stories and things were clicking and then it fell apart again.”
“Oh no!”
“Someone asked about math and he went on this super detailed tangent about vector calculus and they were so lost. Like kids whispering and fidgeting and whatnot.”
“Okay, that sounds like him,” I point out.
“Then one kid. This guy who always causes problems asked him if he was gay. Just straight up asked. Or gay up asked, I guess. But you get the idea.”
“No?!?” I gasp.
“Yeah. And before I told him he didn’t have to answer it, Ricardo was like, ‘I am. Proudly. And let me tell you what it’s like to be gay and an engineer in an environment with really cool le****ns and nice but clueless and sometimes accidentally mean straight guys.’ Then he did. Just honest. Told stories.”
“How’d that go?” I ask.
“It was so honest and human and . . . well . . . you know how authentic Ricardo can be.”
“I do,” I nod.
“Then he led them on this maker challenge and it went really well. But then he tried to lead a debriefing but they kept working while he was talking because he doesn’t know classroom management. How can he? The man’s an engineer.” She shrugs her shoulders.
“And next year?” I ask.
“For as messy as it was, I’m bringing Ricardo back if he’ll let me. Look, I know AI can mimic an engineer and you don’t have cringey moments where a kid asks it if its gay. Seriously, what was Francisco thinking? But also, it was so vulnerable and so human and so real. I still believe in the power of AI but this was a good reminder that human connection will always trump technology.”
I realize this is an isolated moment but it’s an example of a trend I’m seeing. After years of technology integration, many teachers are being deliberate about rejecting technology and choosing a more hands-on, human-centered approach.

The Issue Used to Be Access. Now It’s Overuse.
In 2003, Larry Cuban wrote Oversold and Underused, where he argued that schools were overestimating the transformative power of technology while underestimating the complexity of teaching and learning. He made a fascinating point about how technology ends up reinforcing existing instructional practices rather than fundamentally changing classrooms. This happens because teachers try to fit the technology into their pre-existing structures and thus fail to transform it. But it also happens because tech integration tends to be top-down and fails to respect teacher agency.
Over two decades later, this work still resonates. When I visit schools, I see 3D printers gathering dust. I notice high-end video production studios remaining largely empty. And a significant reason continues to be precisely what Cuban pointed out in his book. Technology implementation has been largely top-down with very little empathy toward students or input from teachers. Rather than focusing on agency and efficacy, trainings have largely focused on technology skills and fidelity to district plans.
But I also think a new challenge has emerged. For years, the issue was one of access and use. But now we’re actually seeing the problem of technology overuse in schools. I’ve watched districts spend millions of dollars on adaptive learning programs (think iReady) without any significant gains in student achievement. Coming out of COVID, many districts pushed for tech-based assignments that could easily work within Learning Management Systems that would integrate into grading portals where parental figures could have real-time access to their child’s scores.
Moreover, with the proliferation of Chromebooks, it has become easier to manage digital assignments. Copy machines are finicky. Besides, this technology often seems cheaper. Paper is expensive. Google Docs are cheap (on the surface). Expo markers cost a pretty penny (though technically we’re not using pennies anymore) but an interactive white board remains a simple, fixed cost. Meanwhile, so much of the training and implementation of AI has focused on how these tools can save districts money by limiting the need for paid curriculum while also saving teachers time and reducing stress.
It’s no wonder, then, that technology usage seems to be increasing in schools. After struggling to gain access to technology, schools have largely bridged the access and implementation gap. Teachers and students know how to use and often the tools seem faster, cheaper, and more efficient than their low-tech counterparts.
And yet . . .
We are collectively seeing a backlash to technology in schools. For all the promises of adaptive learning programs, we aren’t seeing improvements in reading and math. Meanwhile, many parental figures feel frustrated by the sheer amount of screentime their children experience in schools. So many of the teachers I work with seem frustrated as well. They’re tired of the constant cat-and-mouse game of distractions when students use iPads and Chromebooks. They feel hopeless with AI and cheating. But it’s more than that. So many of these teachers want something deeper and more human for their students, many of whom have been raised with a screen in their hands going all the way back to toddler-hood."

Embracing the Low Tech Revolution - Spencer Education This is the first in my summer series I’m calling Low Tech Learning. In today’s podcast and article, I explore the negative aspects of a tech-centric environment and the movement toward going low tech. I also want to provide some nuance and balance to set...