Making Sense of “The Boy Who Died”: Tales of a Struggling Successful Writer

This article presents a case study of a fourth grade boy's experiences in writing, preceding and following a story he wrote about a boy whose struggles in writing led directly to his death. We explore how Max's writing experiences related to his identity, specifically his sense of himself as a writer, his struggle to communicate his ideas, and his discomfort with expressing private thoughts and emotions in print. Drawing on a range of qualitative data, we examine Max's experiences with writing workshop, journal writing, responding to literature, and a state writing assessment. Max's story argues for the importance of considering issues of identity in the writing classroom to help students build on the successes that often hide behind the surface struggles of their writing.