However, when it came to doing the literacy activity on biographical writing, after reading aloud the story of Matt Groening, there were problems. The next section describes some of the issues that the mentors reported in their journals.

The Problem with Biography
The children encountered trouble understanding some post- story activity instructions. When asked "What did you learn about the craft of informational or biographical writing?" Boys and girls wrote:

"Nothing"
"I don't know."
"I learned that informational or biographical writing is like writing about his life and what he's best at."
"It was informational because it tells you about Matt Groening."
"I don't know."
"I learned information on his life, his progress, and his childhood."
"Informational biographical writing is like writing about his life and his adventure to comics to a TV show."

The lack of familiarity with this genre was further noted in the children's responses to "What techniques can you apply to your own writing?" For example, three boys answered that they would make their handwriting "neater" while another noted that he would use "normal writing". Several girls did not even provide a response to this question while another wrote "I don't even know what this means." Responses to this question showed student confusion over the meaning of biographical.