Latest laptop initiative: Author to teach writing

By CLARKE CANFIELD, Associated Press

©Copyright 2002 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

E-mail this story to a friend

Staff photo by Herb Swanson Author Stephen King talks with seventh-grader Sophia Wright about her laptop computer Tuesday while Drew Taggart listens at Freeport Middle School. "There's never been a class that has had what you have before you," King told the students. "When I was in the seventh grade, I was given a pen."

FREEPORT — If best-selling author Stephen King has his way, the Maine laptop initiative could have one more benefit next year: his writing instruction.

King told a group of Freeport Middle School seventh-graders Tuesday that he would like to set up an interactive, Internet-based system through which he could teach writing to students.

The idea is conceptual for now, King said, but it illustrates the learning possibilities that the laptop computers bring to Maine classrooms.

"I would like to teach writing via this technology," King told the students. "I would like to get in touch with you and have you get in touch with me."

King and Gov. Angus King visited classrooms and talked to students and teachers about their 115 Apple iBook laptops. The laptop initiative calls for putting a computer into the hands of every middle school student in Maine.

About 18,000 of the iBooks were delivered in September to students and teachers in 239 schools. Another 18,000 are scheduled to be delivered next year.

The governor and the author, who are not related, also spoke to the students as a group.

The governor said delegations from Scotland, France and Canada have visited Maine in recent weeks to learn more about the laptop program. The world, he said, is watching.

"You are going to be in the history books," Gov. King said.

Stephen King, who grew up in nearby Durham and now lives in Bangor, said all students in time will have computers as part of their learning arsenal.

"There's never been a class that has had what you have before you," he said. "When I was in the seventh grade, I was given a pen."

King is best-known as the author of more than 30 best-selling books. But he is no stranger to teaching or to the Internet.

He taught English at Hampden Academy in the early 1970s, and two years ago wrote "On Writing," a book about his life and his craft.

A couple of years ago, King distributed a 66-page short story, "Riding the Bullet," on the Internet by allowing users to download it for $2.50. He also distributed a book, "The Plant," over the Internet using an honor system where readers were supposed to pay a dollar for each installment of the book.

He is now proposing to combine his writing knowledge and the Internet to help Maine students.

King told reporters that he can envision establishing a dialogue with students, giving them assignments and posting good writing examples online for others to see Ð just like in a classroom.

He said there will be "stumbles and falls" in the teaching project, but that the opportunities are plentiful.

"That's what's so exciting about this," he said. "We're like surfers riding in the curl."

King also weighed in on the debate over whether the laptop program should be cut to help the state deal with its $240 million budget shortfall.

The Legislature is scheduled to convene today to begin addressing the shortfall, and cutting the laptop plan is one area that has been discussed. Under Gov. King's emergency budget plan, the laptop initiative faces a cut of $9.6 million.

Stephen King said he doesn't see any viable reason for legislators to stop the program.

"It comes down to the question of what's fat and what's muscle," he said. "If you consider teaching Maine schoolchildren to be 'fat,' I suggest you have to go back and rethink your situation."

To top of page