ASSIGNMENT SEVEN: Student Writing Conference - Choose one or two children to conduct an informal conference with. You may choose to use one of Regie’s formats, your own or the one below, which I use in a conferring notebook. You need to find a system that will work for you. Example 1 (and below) is the format I use for each writing conference that I hold with students. Keep in mind that while you are conferring with students, the majority of other students should be writing!
(Note: If you aren’t currently teaching please find a school-age child to do a conference with. We believe you will find it is worth the effort.)
Student Name: Date:
? (Question- Teacher asks)- “What are you
working on today in your writing?”
C (Compliment)- Compliment the student on one
strategy they are using well.
TP (Teaching Point)- What is one
strategy/point/goal you can teach this student to
move them forward?
FNT (For Next Time)- What needs to be a focus
during the next conference/what were set goals?
ASSIGNMENT SEVEN: After completing your one or two conferences, please reflect on how well they went and how they will impact your whole group, small group and independent instruction in your classroom. Post your reflective response to the blog.
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Heather Farnsworth
ReplyDeleteEssentials of Writing
Assignment 7: Conference Reflection
July 29, 2010
As you know, I just moved my family into my mother-in-laws home. Since the move one week ago, a large family on the corner, with many daughters has been eyeing my son and me playing in the front yard. They have so badly wanted to say hello and play with us. This assignment gave me the opportunity to engage.
As my son and I approached the girls they were busy creating a poem on their long driveway with sidewalk chalk. I asked about what they were working on. The replied that they were writing a summer poem but were having a hard time putting just the right abut of creativity in it. As we all stood back and admired the words written on the driveway I complimented their efforts with the way they used vivid language. They weren’t quite happy with the outcome; they thought it could be more creative. I pointed out that since it is a poem, they can play with the look of the words or the format. I suggested that if they were writing about summer, they could write their poem in a symbol of summer. I asked them what they think of when they think about summer. Immediately they call chimed in with tone word: sun! Bending down on their knees, yellow and orange chalk in hand they began a swirling poem about summer in the shape of the hot summer sun. As we finished the poem we placed a title on top. I concluded the informal conference with the question of what they might do next time. They older girl replied excitedly with a poem about a storm in different shapes likes lightening, an angry stormy sea, gray clouds and big rain drops!
I taught the girls that there is more to writing then just the words. Since writing is visual, they can use shapes and pictures to make their words pop and come alive, thus leaving a lasting impression their audience…the people in cars, driving by, and the dog walkers passing by.
The informal conference went well. The girls were left creatively satisfied and inspired to write! This conference is much like what would naturally occur in a small group setting in the classroom. I let the kids run the writing utensil and I guided the kids to new learning. It felt good all around.
Since I am not teaching any students this summer, I asked a neighbor’s fifth-grade daughter to help me with this assignment. While she wrote about what she has liked about her summer so far and what she still wants to do before going back to school, I reviewed Routman’s conference with Paige. I chose to focus on that specific conference because the girl I will be working with seems closest in age and ability to Paige.
ReplyDeleteThe following are highlights from the conference:
What the writing does: I loved the way you read that to me. I could picture the sand castle you described and I laughed when you were talking about getting bounced around the raft when you were going through those rapids.
Question: You told me you hadn’t been doing any writing this summer. How did you like writing this story for me?
Answer: Writing is one of my favorite things in school so this was kind of fun. I’ve had a real busy summer so that part was easy but I wasn’t sure what I still want to do.
Compliment: Your story makes it sound like you’re having a very fun summer. The voice in your writing is wonderful and it makes me feel excited for you!
Teaching Point: When I read this, I find myself going on and on sometimes looking for a place to stop and take a breath. When you read it to me, you stop occasionally. What can you do to help me read it like you do? (commas and periods)
The student did not include any dialogue in her story and that is something I usually find my students struggling with. She had some opportunities to include some and I explained how it could improve the personal voice of her story...but her word choice was already exceptional and the excitement she conveyed with her writing demonstrated she has solid skills.
My only concern is the time it takes. Listening to her read her story to me, reading it over myself, and conferencing with her took a total of a little over four minutes. I could see a conference with some writers taking considerably more time. With a class of around 25 students and getting them to and from my desk, I could see needing about two hours to get to every student. I am more comfortable roaming around the room doing my observations but this activity sure helped me see how much a student likes the one-on-one attention and how beneficial these miniconferences can be.
This summer I am tutoring an incoming second grader. I was glad to have a perfect candidate to complete this conference with. Our tutoring sessions have focused mostly on reading, while working on a few basic writing skills. He has improved tremendously since we started working together in October of 2009. However, he still needs work on spacing and turning his great ideas into a written piece. We just started on writing, as reading was a critical focus. I enjoyed the time we spent on writing during our last session, as our course has encouraged me to look at how I conference in a much more reflective way.
ReplyDeleteI first asked what he was going to focus on in his writing today. I was pleased with his reply of finger spacing, and writing three full sentences. As the conference went on I was able to compliment him on remembering to use a “finger space” between his words. As he continued writing I encouraged him to try to leave a finger-sized space between his words, without having to use his finger each time. This was successful and he remarked how it was much faster that way, just as long as he didn’t forget the space! We brainstormed ideas for his writing before we started, and I encouraged him to think out loud as well as to make a list of things that he wanted to include in his story about his visit to his grandparents house. It was really fun that he had just come back from seeing his grandparents, because I was able to share my “grandparent’s visit” writing from our assignment 3. He really liked that! I think that my example gave him some ideas and we didn’t struggle nearly as much with getting the three sentences down on the paper. It was a great piece of writing for him and it made a big difference that he was really excited about the topic!
One point that we’ll visit this coming week is to try and vary the beginning of each sentence. I think that we’ll revisit his Grandparent writing piece and look specifically at how each sentence begins. We can talk about ways to vary sentences to make it interesting for the reader. I wasn’t worried about the repetition that I had seen in the first piece, because it did show great improvement from the previous week. Varying sentence beginnings will be our goal for next time! (Although I understand that this will take a few sessions to work on…. especially since many of the books we read follow a predictable pattern.)
Overall this conference experience was a good way to apply some of the questioning techniques from the book. I think that it will help cement some of these techniques and I’ll be more comfortable using them in the fall. It’s great to “practice” some with my tutoring student!
I am tutoring this summer, so I have been working on conferencing with Bryan. Bryan is doing some writing about what he is reading and activities he is doing during the summer.
ReplyDeleteWhen I first see Bryan's paper I always find one compliment to start the session. He is working on writing neatly so his readers can enjoy what he has written. Naturally that is something that always catches my eye. Once I have complimented him, I have him read it to me. I never interrupt and listen carefully for things that we have been working on so I can compliment his achievements.
Since I have been conferencing with Bryan, his quality of work has really improved. He is trying very hard to work on writing from the red line, capitals, punctuation, word choice (making a visual for the reader), and spelling the words correctly he already knows how to spell. I love to see his smile when I share his accomplishments with his mother and improvements he is making. Before he leaves we always set a goal for him to work toward and a point I will be looking for when we conference again.
When doing the conferences in my regular classroom, I know myself well enough that I will not use a form. I will make up a class roster with space avaiable for writing down notes. This will work for me and I will use it consistently.
I am excited to do the moving conferences to get an overall look at class needs. I know my students will love just a drop in and others need the drop in, even if they do not want them, just to help keep them focused and on the task.
The one worry I have, is whether these conferences will disrupt the students. I find having the special ed assistant push in is disruptive. The students decide if she is talking it opens the door for them to talk. I truly believe a room needs to be quiet so all students can concentrate. I guess if all students are enjoying what they are writing and engaged, the talking should not be a problem.
The other point I just thought about with respects to conferencing is the arrangement of desks. If students are closed in with a student on either side, this will not lend itself to the roving conferences. I will need to think about my room arrangement with writing in mind.
I have enjoyed working on conferencing this summer and feel that doing it in my room will be much easier with a little experience under my belt.
Assignment #7: Conference
ReplyDeleteI am traveling and was able to have a conference with my niece, who is currently in 4th grade. I am in Australia and school is in session for her, so I had her bring her writing journal home. I used the format that you suggested.
Student Name: Date:
? (Question- Teacher asks)- “What are you
working on today in your writing?”
This was a good starting point and let the student discuss what was on her mind right away. The student is working on a personal narrative about the challenges of learning tae kwon do. She was working on adding description to the setting in her writing.
C (Compliment)- Compliment the student on one
strategy they are using well.
I complimented on how she had started adding strong adjectives to give the reader a better understanding of the setting. I felt like I was right there in the tae kwon do class.
TP (Teaching Point)- What is one
strategy/point/goal you can teach this student to
move them forward?
One thing I noticed that was lacking in her story was dialog. I asked her about what her instructor was saying as he was trying to teach her a new move? How did he encourage her? We talked about the dialog. I wrote some of the exchanges on sticky notes, so she could go back and insert dialog. We touched on using carrots to insert other words…especially adjectives that she was adding to describe her setting.
FNT (For Next Time)- What needs to be a focus
during the next conference/what were set goals?
She was going to work on adding dialog to the story and we were going to generate a list together of alternative words for “said” to make the dialog more exciting.
I enjoyed using this format. I felt after watching the DVD of Regie, I was better prepared and had a deeper understanding of how to conduct the conference.
Thanks Heather, Leon, Rachel, Kirky and Jessica for sharing your thoughts and comments on your writing conferences. Heather – That’s great that there are other young kids in your new neighborhood…and how cool that they happened to be writing poems on their driveway – good for them – is Mom a teacher? :) What an amazing informal writing conference you had!!! Leon - It was very enjoyable to be able to be a “fly on your shoulder” as you shared your conference dialogue. It seems as though choosing punctuation was a perfect choice. One way to have kept the conference shorter would to have just stopped after discussing the periods and commas. Save the dialogue for next time. Rachel – It was great that your protégé was able to identify and show you how he was working on his writing goal. What a great way to up the ante just a bit by having him NOT use his finger for the space. Kirky – Each teacher needs to find a system that works for them…I think it’s great that you’ve found one that works best for you…it took me years :) One of the ways you can solve the disrupting problem is to have students “sign-up” for conferences…but let them know that they are expected to sign-up at least 1 time every 2 weeks or you will hunt them down. It’s also helpful if they have something they would like you to support them with. Jessica – Lucky you to be in Australia!!! It sounds like you chose a great single focus during your niece’s conference and that it was very successful. Enjoy the rest of your trip!
ReplyDeleteAmy Jensen
ReplyDeleteAssignment #7
For this conference, I was able to use my niece Keri who will be going into the third grade. I was thinking how easy it would be to praise and celebrate her writing since I adore her so much. I didn't realize how much more practice I will need to get one-on one conferences running in my classroom much more effectively.
The biggest problem for me was time. I ended up working with her for 30 minutes. She had written a story about our summer vacation our family took this year. I let her read it to me first without me looking at her paper, which was good, because once I saw her paper I could not get past all the problems with conventions.
However, she had done some repeating in her story which a lot of my students last year did as well. I decided to make this her teaching point after I complimented the ideas and overall story she wrote. I also praised that she wrote a title and wrote neatly on the page.
Where I got into time trouble was that I ended up helping her spelling and other areas on her paper, rather than the focus point I originally decided on. I was so worried about having a final piece done well, rather than revisiting it on another day to work further. In class, I would just need to do one thing with a student and know that I could hit the other areas in another conference or even with someone else while doing a shared conference. That should have saved me more time.
It was really hard to do this conference too because there was no teaching that came before the writing. I just asked her to write me a story about her summer. I'm hoping in class when I am teaching and modeling and doing shared writing, student work will look and sound better. That way I won't need so much time to have them fix all their mistakes.
The last thing I will mention is how I did not write on her paper. I had her do all the writing and editing. I am used to writing on student papers (in red which I know is horrible). This is something I have learned not to do thanks to reading this book! It felt good to be able to implement that practice right away.
Chuck Fall
ReplyDeleteEssentials of Writing
Assignment #7
In my experience some of the more satisfying moments of teaching comes from the one-on-one student conference. The frustration I have encountered is that I do not get to every student over the course of writing. Regie reminds the reader that while the conference is going on, the other students are writing. With more writing time for the students, then it follows I should have more time to conference. I am excited to try a new approach next year.
I conferenced with my son. He is job searching and we looked at his response to a Craig’s list employment advertisement. I pretty much followed the series of prompts Regie provides in her text that starts with a question, finds a complimentary point to make, identifies a teaching point and what should be the focus of the next conference.
The conference was defined by my son’s stubbornness. He doesn’t like to take coaching, especially from his dad. Nevertheless, he wrote a reply to the Craig’s List ad, which did lead to a call from the prospective employer. When my son let me see his work, he had a hand written rough, and had typed 80% of his text into his computer. I asked what he was working on and asked to see his computer and hand written work. I immediately noticed his failure to use conventions and that it was not organized. I complimented him on his extensive experience as a computer game player (the job was for a “game tester” in California). Then I asked that we go back to the original Craig’s list prompt and suggested he organize his information according to the questions from the human resource department. He accepted this and created paragraph breaks and topic sentences. I said I would come back in 15 minutes and check in on him. I said I noticed a lot of conventions problems I expected him to have corrected by my return (FNT).
Conferences are great! I really want to work on doing whole class conferences. This way more students can see how a piece of writing develops.
I was in Ashland, teaching at a theatre camp for high school juniors for three weeks, and found it difficult to find an appropriate student who had the time to sit and write. The schedule is rigorous for the students and staff, so I did not have much time to complete this assignment and had no previous experience with the student. However, I think how the lesson turned out clarified for me that you don't need tons of time to still have a positive effect on students' writing.
ReplyDeleteI work closely with the eight senior assistants who help run the camp and had one of them write a short piece, explaining why a show of her choice was a life-changing event. I asked her to write the piece with her choice of audience, as long as it was someone she knows who does not appreciate theatre as she does; she chose her cousin.
I used a version of the Teacher-Directed form on page 236, with some modifications for the more advanced level of the student. As Ariel is a pretty accomplished and technical writer (she enters Sarah Lawrence this fall), we focussed mainly on her content, which is one of my goals for this next year. I should say that while she wrote coherent, intellectual thoughts, there was little of her own voice in the piece (or at least what I could determine with only knowing her for two weeks). Her writing was academic, but not too interesting.
After praising her on her well-organized and structured piece, I started with "What are you trying to say to your cousin?" The words she used in conversation were much more revealing and emotional than how she wrote, so we worked on adding her feelings into the piece. She wrote about the play Ruined, which won the Pulitzer in 2009 and deals with the horrible treatment of women in the war-torn Democratic Republic of the Congo. As we went through the piece, the encouraging and clarifying language list on page 227 came in handy, allowing her to "translate" her piece into one more in tune with her audience. Her cousin is not a college-bound student and regards theatre as a "worthless hobby", without application to the world.
When Ariel wrote FOR her audience and changed the words and arguments to fit, the piece became much more individual and had a clearer message. Ariel decided that re-telling the play did not suit her purpose, so she deleted this information and focussed on how the play has changed her idea of women's rights and even cell phone usage. (Some of the ore mined in the DRC goes into every cell phone used, and is extracted at high ecological and human costs.)
After Ariel completed her rough and first drafts, I had her read both to her other senior assistants. Granted, the meeting was at 12:30 AM, but her final draft even made some of the other students laugh and cry, where as the first draft mostly made them say "interesting."
I am eager to apply this in a more structured atmosphere with students who are not as accomplished as Ariel. My challenge has always been to limit my comments and not write every suggestion I could to improve the paper. I hope altering my conferences to focus on voice will have as much success as I had in the short time with Ariel.
Thanks Amy, Chuck and James for sharing your comments on conferring. Amy – time is always are arch nemesis in teaching not matter what subject or grade we teach. The best way to minimize the time of your conference is to stick to one teaching point per conference as well as possible sticky with one writing goal for a period of time so that one conference flows into the next with any given student. Like you mentioned, you were in a different situation with your niece, as you probably hadn’t known her too well as a writer, where you would be with your classroom students everyday to get to know them as writers. Therefore, she needed to read the piece which makes it much more time cumbersome. I loved that you had her do the writing on her own paper…what a way to give her the opportunity to own her writing!!! Chuck – I think our own children are our most difficult students to teach…and sometimes we don’t have as much patience as we do with our children as we do with our kids in the classroom. I’ve been working hard on the patience issue this summer :) I think using Regie’s format was a great place to start as you discussed his job application. I’m hoping that both the compliments and the teaching points you gave him helped to land him his job! James – It definitely sounds as though adding voice, especially since the piece was being written for her cousin, was a perfect choice. I found when discussing the importance of both audience & purpose with my students, the writing that happened in my classroom completely transformed! I’m glad that this experience was such a success for both you and Ariel and I appreciate the effort you both took to make this experience happen during the busy summer.
ReplyDelete