This is it everyone!!! Welcome to the last assignment for the course! All coursework is due 6/5!!!
It's been great reading what you all have to share! Take a look at the last section in Regie's text, Writing Essentials, it's chock full of great resources!!!
Teaching in Action: Lesson Essentials
5 Day Lesson Plans & Appendices
• Secrets of Second Graders
• Heart Poems
• Procedural writing
• Hero writing
• Persuasive writing
• Appendix survey
Be sure to look through this section. If you haven’t already done so, look at Appendix A (page A-2.) Re-examine your beliefs about writing by re-reading the statements about the writing process and marking true or false in your book. Did you change any of your previous answers? Would you consider bringing this page to your team or even to your entire school to jump-start discussions about writing?
Take some time to look through the appendices. There are several useful examples included. One we’d like to point out to you is Appendix L- The Genre Characteristics Excerpt on page A-13. Look to the Writing Essentials companion website at www.heinemann.com/writingessentials for the entire chart as well as directions to assist you playing the DVD.
ASSIGNMENT NINE: Final Course Reflection - Critically examine your current literacy program and develop realistic goals to improve your instruction. Also reflect on the balance between your home and school life. If our students are to become happy, literate people, they need happy, balanced teachers. BRIEFLY, share several of your goals with the class by posting them to the blog for this final assignment.
We would appreciate any feedback you might be able to give us about the course! Please email us comments and thank-you for participating in our course!!!! Jackie & Mary!
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I really enjoyed reading this book. I feel like there are a lot of practical and useful ideas that I can try right away in my classroom. Here are some ideas that I have been jotting down:
ReplyDelete1. Less focus on skills based writing. This year I have spent a lot of time teaching to the 6 traits of writing. For next year, I plan on not even addressing the 6 traits until I see a need in the students writing.
2. More writing (everyday). My class next year is going to spend a lot more time writing. Not necessarily long sustained chuncks of time, but a little writing in each of the content areas.
3. More celebration. I loved the DVD and seeing how Regie starts off each conference with a celebration of what that particular student did well. I want my students to know that they are great writers. I would also like to continue trying out the different kinds of conferences.
4. Choice of topic. I would like to advocate for my class the need to choose their own topic on our school wide writing prompts. I think this is important not only because it allows them to write about something they care about, not just what the teacher told them too. I also think about myself and when I'm told to write about something that I really don't care about, the writing is not that great.
5. Focus on writing to an audience. This is something that I don't spend a lot of time teaching or talking about but will in the future. It's important that whoever is writing understands who they are writing to and the different kind of language that is needed.
I think I have very good balance between home and work. I spend a lot of time with my daughters. I coach soccer and I'm also their girl scout leader. I also have a life of my own too, believe it or not. When I'm not at school, or with my kids, I'm climbing mountains and rock. Being outdoors gives me a sense of peace and lets me relax. Not to mention that I'm with good friends and we usually hit a great brew pub on the way home from the mountain! :)
Final Course Reflection
ReplyDeleteThis has been wonderful text filled with so much information it is hard to wrap my head around! Definitely, this text will stay on my desk for rereading reference next school year. After reading this book, I have done a major shift in my thinking as to how I have been teaching writing. Some major changes I plan on implementing next year are as follows:
1. Write more everyday. My students have not been writing enough. Next year this will be a top priority.
2. Use the traits as an assessment, not a teaching tool. For years now, the 6-+1 traits has been the bulk of my instruction. After reading this text, that no longer makes sense. Students need to understand the traits to see how they are scored, but not as a guide for how they write.
3. Always write for the audience and keep it authentic.
4. Model, model, model. At the start of the year, I model how I write, but for some reason I fall out of practice. I now see that I must continue to do this all year long.
5. Finally, I want to get more professional conversations going on the topic of writing. With so much at stake on the fourth grade-writing test, our principal has started mandating a school wide writing assessment three times a year at every grade level. This may be a good start to making our instruction more cohesive, but I do not see how. I plan on working on some ideas to present to our principal, as per Regie’s idea, in place of what we are doing.
The list was longer, but after walking away from this for a few days, I decided to zero in on my priorities.
I have already begun mapping out my curriculum for next year and I plan on reading this text again during the summer. I have also encouraged most of the staff I work with to look at this course in the fall, and know of at least two that will be taking it.
As for my balanced life…I think I do a good job of this. I have two lovely daughters that are quite active. While I arrive at school at 6:30 am, I generally leave right at 3:30 and rarely take anything home. I would rather spend that time with my family.
Thank you Mary and Jackie for another worthwhile course. After seventeen years of teaching, it is refreshing to have taken meaningful courses that are well worth my time.
Assignment #9:
ReplyDeleteAfter studying in this class I feel fairly satisfied with my attempts at a literacy program. I have certainly learned a few things from this class that I can improve in my methodology. The one item that I know I will be doing more of is having one on one conferences with students. I like the structure of the conference as laid out by Regie. I plan on doing more of these conferences on a regular basis in order to improve the quality of my students' writing. This will allow me to have direct and meaningful input on my students' writing, as well as allow me to follow the improvement of their work.
The balance between home and work is a matter that has concerned me greatly over the years. As a person that has worked in the corporate world, and them as a business owner, I am acutely aware of the challenge of separating these two worlds. One of the things that attracted me to the world of education was the desire to spend more time with my 3 and 5 year old sons. I know that the day will come when time spent with me and their mother will become less important than time spent with their friends. My goal in becoming an educator was to have enough time off to spend with them in these early years of their lives. I want to form memories for my boys as well as my wife and I so we can look back in our twilight years and remember all of the good times we had as a family.
One of the techniques that I used in my years as a business owner was to never take work home with me. I made the personal sacrifice to go into work very early in the day in order to not bring work home. I feel strongly that work and home should not mix. These days, if I do have to catch up on my work I use the same technique. I work best when I know that my beautiful family is peacefully sleeping and I am not missing time with them.
Thank you for a wonderful class. I have thoroughly enjoyed it!!!
Writing Essentials
ReplyDeleteAssignment #9
First of all, it was refreshing to take a class that had a foundation built out of common sense. On top of that it was filled with ideas that actually cut our workload instead of leaving us feeling guilty for all the things we are not doing.
I think as a district and as a school we are on the right track. We have started the conversations at the school level and there is a lot of room for creativity and to run a program the way we see fit. We have a notebook filled with ideas that act only as a resource and not a complete curriculum.
The things I need to work on are not attempting so many writing projects but focus in more on quick writes and writing that serves a purpose. I can throw away the read and respond journals that will save an enormous amount of time and guilt. I need to have a variety of audiences for my writers and move away from me as the primary audience. I think I do a good job modeling; I'm doing it continually and I have them write on a daily basis, but she gave great ideas for quick conferences that zero in on one goal.
I guess I am coming away from this class feeling like I am doing a lot of things right and the things I need to work on are doable. It was very refreshing to take a class based on the realistic instead of the idealistic.
As far as balance in my life. I learned that a long time ago when my children were small, and I continue to keep my professional and home life in balance. Life is too short and children grow up way too quickly.
The employment outlook for teachers in the Portland metro area is quite dismal. I fully anticipate that I will be substituting next school year. If by some miracle I do obtain a full time teaching position; I have learned alot from Regie about becoming an effective writing teacher. It was interesting to see that I had been previously exposed to and used many of her techniques when I taught my first grade class. I learned many more during the course of this class. I would like to do more conferencing including peer conferencing. By doing it, I hope to become more proficient and comfortable at modeling outloud as a writer in fromt of my class. I also would like to incorporate doing individual student revising in front of the whole group. Regie's book and the DVD will be a valuable resource for me. As a substitute teacher it is easy to have a balance between work and personal time. My husband and I are "empty nesters" now and enjoy the time together very much. We have recently purchase property and a home in Central Oregon and plan to move there. Our property is on a lake and it is very peaceful there. We plan to grow a huge garden, raise hens for eggs, and bees for honey. We don't know when we will be able to move there fulltime, but it is important to have goals and dreams outside of work. I know when I get a full time teaching postion again I will have to make the balance I have now a priority. I wasn't so successful in doing that as a first year teacher.
ReplyDeleteOverall I enjoyed synthesizing Regie's text. As some of the previous teachers have noted, her book is full of practical methodology ready to use in a "real world" classroom. My only criticism would be that the text is focused on the younger grades (as I believe that is her focus/specialty). It would be neat/useful to see Regie evolve her text toward the secondary level.
ReplyDeleteAs I stated in my first post, the school I work for has no formal literacy program. Although lacking a structure, I am able to be creative and try new methods and ideas. Here are Regie's suggestions I will be incorporating next year:
1. Do more shared writing
2. Focus on purpose of writing assignments and develop a wider audience for student writing.
3. CELEBRATE student writing through non-traditional avenues (i.e., get creative!)
As far as being a happy and balanced teacher, I am a work in progress. Because of the population I work with I go home most days feeling empty. It take a lot of motivation and will to get myself to do something productive and good for myself after work (i.e., workout, cook dinner, walk my dogs). Lucky for me I have a supportive, wonderful husband who helps me remember what my purpose is...
Thanks for a great class!
Over the course of this class I have learned a lot of practices that I will take to the classroom. Being a part time Spanish teacher and part time sub I had not ever been trained on how to teach writing. I have endorsements in Language Arts and Social Studies, and with my pending job approval to teach LA/SS next year I wanted some education on how to best teach writing.
ReplyDeleteI first looked into our own school practices and was surprised to find that the middle level writing guide was all on a CD Rom that nobody used. The elementary program is well mapped out and works alright for the younger grades. After asking teachers about writing they told me that they just look at the standards and make their own curriculum. I left my conversations with the teachers feeling frustrated. How was I going to teach writing next year and have no guidance on how to do it?
This book has been my saving grace. I have learned how to use and implement the Optimal Learning Model, and I have numerous other strategies to now use. I have learned the importance of conferences and how to take more time with each of my students. I have learned the importance of daily writing, and activities that make it possible.
I rarely wrote before this class, and I now find myself writing all of the time. I didn’t realize how uncomfortable I was writing until reading this book. I now understand that I as the teacher need to be comfortable writing with my students in order for them to be open and comfortable.
One thing I am most excited about from this class is the influence it has had on my school. I have been very involved with my co-teachers throughout this course. I am always asking them questions and probing for feedback. I was extremely distraught to find that none of the middle level teachers have time for independent reading. All of the studies in the book show that reading and writing directly correlate, yet none of the teachers in my school make reading a priority. Even if you look at the state tests that the students have to take it’s based on reading. They have to read questions be able to evaluate and write on the them. After having conversations with fellow teachers on the importance of reading they have decided to change the way they structure their classes. They are now going to make time for reading every day. I was excited to see how this class sparked a change in my school.
Hopefully I will be teaching LA/SS next year and I will be able to use this book as a reference. I can’t wait to get started on the Hero writing and all of the meaningful writing they will create.
The school year is almost over, and although I always try to spend time with my family time I know that I often bring too much work home to grade. Below are a few goals that I hope to implement next year:
Fewer worksheets
More meaningful writing opportunities
Way more conferences with students
More positive compliments and encouraging words to students
Look for and take writing PD
Collaborate with other teachers on writing ideas
Share the OLM
Less homework for both the students and myself
Home/School Life:
ReplyDeleteI think I share the same feelings and perceptions about home and school life that some of the other students in this class have already shared. My wife and I had our first son a year ago and it has completely changed my views about how I prioritize things. I've never really been one for bringing work home (my dad was a workaholic and would bring things home every night; he would even bring things on vacation). I made it a goal for myself that I would come in early to get caught up on grading and lesson preparations, and leave on time in order to be with my family. In the four years I've been in this school I've been able to stick to that goal fairly well.
The one area I would like to put more effort into is my personal health. Since having our son, the exercise routines have decreased immensely. I feel that this has had an impact on my stress level, and I have found myself getting more agitated at times. My plan for the summer (if the rain ever stops here in Portland) is to establish a better exercise routine that I can carry out through the school year.
In regards to my literacy program I feel that I have done a pretty good job this year maintaining a balanced schedule. Not only did I incorporate our district and state learning targets, I was also able to weave in all of the writing traits, the forms of writing, fun and interesting writing projects, and reflection journals. I believe that this combination has definitely improved my students' writing abilities. They're probably sick of writing by now, but they'll have plenty of time to rest in about 10 days.
I think the most profound thing I've realized through teaching writing is my own inabilities as a writer. I took this class to search for new ideas for my students, but also for myself. There were a lot of great ideas I'm planning on incorporating and I'm looking forward to usign them next year.
Thanks for doing such a great job with your feedback. It is very appreciated.
Derek
My goals for next year are the same as always - become a better teacher of reading and writing. I've taken many classes and read many books, and I think I've finally come to the place where I like what I've learned, and I feel confident that I can now put a program together that will truly help the students.
ReplyDeleteThis summer I plan on putting together some sort of outline for myself utilizing some of the things I've learned from this class and some of the great books I've recently read. Whereas in the past, I always followed the reading curriculum that the classroom teachers were using. Every week we read the "next" leveled reader, which did not relate to the last one in any way, shape, or form. (Okay, they were both books.) Even if the students and I were not at all interested in the books, we read them. The ones for the 5th and 6th graders were especially dull.
Next year, I want to pick certain leveled readers and using "Books Kids Will Sit Still For 3: A Read-Aloud Guide" find and interesting read alouds to build background information. I want to use The Sisters books to develop a better management plan and to help the students learn to assess themselves. I'll also use them and Regie's reading book to get some more ideas about being a better reading teacher. I have already gotten some great ideas from "Teaching Reading in Middle School," "Launching Rti Comprehension Instruction with Shared Reading: 40 Model Lessons for Intermediate Readers," and "Teaching Written Response to Text: Constructing Quality Answers to Open-Ended Comprehension Questions."
As for writing, I will continue to use, and add more of, many of Regie's suggestions. In addition, I want to use mentor texts to help teach some conventions. I have "I Can Write Like That!: A Guide to Mentor Texts and Craft Studies for Writers' Workshop" and "Mentor Texts: Teaching Writing Through Children's Literature" for that. "The Mechanics of Grammar" also has some good ideas. I want to be very careful, however, to make sure I don't teach skills out of context and to not have them practice out of context. Instead of having them practice several isolated examples of a skill, I'd like to have them do one example inside a paragraph.
I'd also like to add more poetry reading and writing to my curriculum. I recently purchased Regie's "Kids" Poems" books, and I'm really looking forward to using ideas from them, since they correspond so well to what she has written in her "Writing Essentials" book.
Because of reading this book, it's also given me the courage to write. I've done well in the past when I had to write something for a purpose, but I haven't had the confidence to write free prose or rhyming poetry for my own enjoyment. I'm excited just thinking about letting myself feel free enough to do that this summer. Then I'll even have samples to share with my students.
Although it looks like my entire summer will be out of balance with my concentrating solely on school, it's actually something I look forward to. But in order to not burn out, I play the piano and am taking lessons. I like to work out, and I walk often with my dog. I make greeting cards and scrapbook pages, and I sew, but I haven't done any of that this entire school year! We are going to travel (need some sun, sand, and sea.) Finally, I've only allowed myself the luxury of reading mysteries at night before bedtime, I want to read for enjoyment during the day!
Thank you everyone! Your responses and goals look great. You have all earned A's for the course and we appreciate your kind words about the class! It means a lot to us. We hope you all have a wonderful and restful summer! Mary and Jackie :-)
ReplyDeleteYes, it was a great class, and one of the most helpful books I've found!
ReplyDeleteI very much enjoyed the practicality of this book. Where some of the processes were geared for the elementary level I feel I can teak them to fit into my classroom. I really like the teacher as writer aspect. I am very much planning on taking the time to write in front of students next year. I do this some in my writing unit but I can see there are other places I can truly put in writing and model what students need to do. I have definitely decided to look at the worksheets in my classroom. I think there is a place for them however I think I will put less emphasis on them. I am still processing the exact ‘how’s’ of this idea. I know that I want my students to both read and write more. I am hoping that I will be able to strike the balance between what needs to happen for state testing and making life long learners.
ReplyDeleteAs I mentioned earlier I have found the balance in my life between school and home. My family also knows that there are a few weeks each year hat will be crazy and overwhelming. I think with their continued support and my commitment to the separation, I will stay on track.