So I'm teaching 6th-to-8th graders in this afterschool program, combining writing and art exercises into a zine-making course called Pub Your Ish!
Two afternoons a week, they start out with three mood words, a timed writing exercise, and move into a topic or an art project.
You can imagine Wednesday the 12th of September.
I had learned two dance-community friends had died - Stephen Adams was a sommelier in the restaurant Windows on the World at the top of the WTC, and another morris-dancing buddy, and son of an English Country dancing family, Chris Carstanjen, was in one of the planes that crashed into one of the towers. So I was able to bring the immediacy of 'this isn't just a story Out There; someone known to someone here with you, died in this.' - which put the human side of things immediately within their grasp! We discussed their views and knowledge of the incident, what they would say to such a person who would do such a thing as this; and then made cards addressed to 'someone affected by the event' - some wrote angry notes to terrorists, or the prez, and some wrote sympathy & get well cards to victims and survivors, and both were powerfully cathartic - to me as well as the kids.