After my first book was published, one of my friends gave me a knowing look and said, “I’ve figured out exactly what your story means.”

I nodded wisely, two of us in on the same secret together, but truthfully? I was eager to hear what she had to say. Because in all the time I’d spent writing, revising, and talking about the book to other people, it had honestly never occurred to me to ask myself what the story meant. In my mind, Not Enough Beds! was a simple tale about too many relatives showing up for Christmas Eve, and the funny places everybody finds to sleep when it turns out that—wait for it—there are not enough beds. I thought it was a funny family alphabet book, not a commentary on the human condition.

Which just goes to show how much writers know about their own work! Apparently, as my friend explained, the 224 words of my story are actually a moving testament to the fact that we’re all just going through life looking for where we belong in the world, and family are the people who make a place for us no matter what.

Usually in my pieces here I talk about things that you can suggest to young writers to give them an entrée point to more powerful writing. This week, I’m suggesting something that you might want to avoid suggesting: don’t put too much emphasis on what their writing means. Some writers may have a clear intention for their meaning as they write; but just as often, based on the writers I know, that isn’t the case. In fact, my friend and poet Laura Purdie Salas talks about just that in a guest blog here.

There isn’t anything wrong with a writer having a meaning in mind as they write a particular piece. What I’m warning against is putting too much emphasis on that meaning as a prerequisite to writing. My own experience over the course of many different books now is that I rarely have a clear sense of my intended meaning when I start the project. Sometimes the meaning emerges as I write; other times, it takes readers to help me identify possible meanings. Trying to superimpose a meaning can kill creative energy. Or even worse, it can make writing turn out heavy-handed and preachy.

A big part of the fame of Leonardo da Vinci’s ”Mona Lisa” is that we can’t be sure what the artist meant when he painted her and her famous smile (actually, even the word “her” is in question when it comes to this piece of art). But that’s doesn’t detract from our response to the portrait. Art isn’t defined or constricted by what the artist meant; as a viewer, we have the privilege of applying our own meaning.

It’s fine if writers allow readers that same privilege.

So what’s the perfect game for somebody who lives in a state with lots of dairy farms, spends a huge hunk of her time writing or reading, and has been known to insert a butter head into a novel as a red herring? Why, it’s Cheese or Font, of course!

If you’ve never played, please remember to come back and finish reading after you’ve wandered here to check it out. Because along with being an entertaining time-waster, fonts can also be a fun tool for helping students explore the concept of character voice.

I’ve talked before about helping young writers develop their writing voices (most recently in “Lost”). But along with the overall voice of the writer who is creating the piece, each character in a story must also have their own distinct voice. Yet too often, all the characters end up sounding exactly the same in student first drafts.

Sometimes none of the voices sound the way that real people talk. They’re overly formal, like a textbook or legal document would sound if it stood up and started declaiming. In those cases, I encourage the students to do more eavesdropping. Listening is a great tool for learning the nuances of speaking. Another easy tip is to have students read all dialogue out loud—they will quickly hear if it sounds too stilted. Finally, remind students that dialogue is one place where contractions are almost always preferred—most people default to contractions when talking aloud, even though they’re frowned on in more formal writing.

Other times, the problem is that the voices in a story draft sound like real speech, but also sound too much alike, or don’t match the characters to whom the writer has assigned the voices. The ten-year-old rebellious boy character sounds exactly the same as the understanding great grandma whose home is infested with lace doilies.

Here’s where font fun comes in. Next time your students have the chance to write on computers, ask them to write a scene where two or more characters in their story are discussing the story’s events. For each character, they should find the font that best represents that character’s voice when writing his or her dialogue. For that rebellious ten-year-old? Maybe a font that looks like a childish scrawl with sharp edges. For the doily-loving great grandma? How about a beautiful italic script?

It’s a cheesy but effective way to get students to truly “hear” the voices of their characters.

*Extra credit if you can tell me if Georgia, Broadway, and Niagara are cheeses or fonts!

Periodically I tire of the financial ups and downs of life as a working writer, and I explore careers that might generate a larger and more stable income. One of the last times I pursued this notion I used an aid: a job-hunting guide for creative people. My understanding of the book was that it would steer me towards work that suits my artistic bent but also allows a life of comfort and security. I read the introduction and filled out the self-interest tests. I identified my creative “type” and eagerly located that section, sure that a career that combined creative fulfillment and the ability to pay the VISA bill without whimpering was a mere page-turn away.

So—what two careers did the book encourage me to pursue? 1) Puppeteer, and 2) Mime.

Any professional mimes who read this, feel free to correct me, but I’m guessing that you occasionally struggle with erratic and insufficient income too.

But if the answer isn’t as easy as learning how to climb an imaginary rope, what will get me through those lean times when my income is unpredictable? I think it’s the fact that I was raised under the influence of my practical and money-wise father. However much money management might not be my natural aptitude, repeated exposure to his example allowed me to learn skills I likely would never have otherwise developed.

Not every student in your classroom is going to have a natural aptitude for writing. But placing them under the influence of amazing writers can go a long way towards teaching them skills they might never have otherwise developed.

To me, this means more than just putting great books into their hands; it requires thinking and talking about books from a writer’s perspective. Here’s an example. When I’m struggling with plotting, I’ll choose to read a book that I’ve heard is strongly plotted. As I read, I continue to ask myself what tricks the writer is using to make the action of the story seem both surprising and inevitable.

You can make a game of it to create this experience in your classroom. Stop the class at the end of each chapter and review what’s happened so far in the story. Then ask students to anticipate and write down what they think will be the key action in the next chapter (but have them keep their predictions a secret). When that next chapter is finished, stop again and ask students how many of them guessed correctly—and what they anticipate for the following chapter.

I can almost guarantee that after several rounds of this, your students will bring stronger plotting skills to the next story they write. Reading like a writer inevitably leads to writing under the influence.