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ASSIGNMENT FIVE: WRITTEN REFLECTION-Section Three- The Essential Writing Day Chapters 7-10
Chapter 7: Be Efficient and Integrate Basic Skills
• How might we integrate skill work into student writing rather than teaching it in isolation?
• Daily Oral Language exercises – THEY DON’T WORK!!!
• The importance of focusing on meaning and quality first
• All writing needs both a PURPOSE and an AUDIENCE
• How thinking aloud can make your teaching more explicit
• Teaching WRITING – not just the language of writing (process, process, process)
• What about writing standards? In your District and State?
• Key writing minilessons
• Revision – how to get students to care about it
• Letting kids in on the secret that – Yes! – Conventions do matter!
• How can we effectively use word walls?
In Chapter 7, suitably titled “Be Efficient and Integrate Basic Skills,” Regie gets to the heart of what so many teachers struggle with: “Fitting it all in!!!” Many of the elementary teachers that we work with are beginning to feel as though their personal motto is: “Jack of all trades; master of none.” We just don’t have the time to teach well what has to be taught. The only answer to this problem is to modify our instruction so it agrees with Regie’s stance that isolated skill work (such as Friday spelling tests, DOL, grammar worksheets…) will not help our students grow into writers (or readers.) On page 144, Regie shares four components for an integrated Writing Workshop:
1. Identify writing genres that would interest students (and meet district requirements)
2. Decide who the audience would be for each piece of writing.*
3. Model your own writing process and show students how you struggle.
4. Have students share writing regularly (for both celebration and great teaching moments.)
*This created the biggest change in my own class’s writing - once my students began to write with an audience in mind, the quality of writing shot right up!
Regie also gets to the heart of what writing with “voice” really is and addresses how to teach children to write with an honest voice in their own writing. She describes voice as “the writer’s unique personality on paper, his own melody in words, her ‘mark’ as an individual. To write with voice, the writer has to be interested in the writing.” We think that many teachers and students are unclear as to how to add true voice to their writing. Regie suggests, “Voice is in the details – but details that show the real person and story behind the words, not just details for the sake of adding more words…”
Integrating those isolated editing skills such as grammar, punctuation, and spelling into our writing will increase the efficiency of our instruction. Bottom line – if the students care about their writing, are writing for a specific audience, and understand that “the importance of editing (and spelling conventionally) is to make their message clear and easy to read for their audience – or reader, they take this job seriously and work hard at making their writing clear.”
Chapter 8: Organize for Daily Writing
• What is our definition of Writing Workshop? What does Regie say?
• How can we have student choice within a structure?
• The importance of writing talk (teachers and students)
• The ultimate nightmare for all of us…scheduling…finding the time to write everyday
• The importance of routines, organization and modeling expected behavior
• Genre study – why it’s important to have both school-wide and district-wide conversations
• The possibilities within genres
Figuring out a way to “fit it all in” is usually one of the most frustrating things many of us face. It starts at the beginning of the year as we first plan our daily schedule and continues throughout the remainder of the year. Considering how you will create your schedule to include a solid chunk of time for both reading and writing will probably be the most stressful piece to the start of your year.
Create a Comprehensive Literacy Framework: Play with your time and consider what changes you might make in your daily literacy framework for next year. Take a look at the samples that Regie provides on pages 185-187 for some possibilities. You do not have to post your schedule, but we believe this is a worthwhile activity to complete on your own.
Chapter 9: Conference with Students
• What is the purpose of a Writing Conference?
• What are the different types of Writing Conferences?
• How can Share be used effectively?
• How to conduct a productive conference
• What about management and routines?
We are so glad that this chapter talks about Share during Writer’s Workshop. Too often this component is skipped by teachers who feel there isn’t enough time in the day to “fit it all in.” However, it’s a vital piece of the workshop and beneficial to all the students. Share sessions are an additional time to teach. The teachers in my school are quite comfortable using Share as their mini-lesson if the need arises. Given the reality of daily schedules they were finding that they couldn’t have a mini-lesson, confer and share everyday. They then realized that their Shares sometimes were the minilessons. For more information about Share we recommend looking at Leah Mermelstein’s Don’t Forget To Share: The Crucial Last Step in the Writing Workshop. In this slim book, Leah explains in detail four types of Share: Content Share, Craft Share, Process Share and Progress Share.
The “Tips for Successful Whole-Class Shares and Conferences” on page 215 are excellent ones to keep in mind. The bottom line for Conferences and Shares is that students should feel successful and want to continue to write. Make sure what you say to the child encourages them to keep on writing. “The conference is secondary; the student as writer and confident learner is primary.”
Chapter 10: Make Assessment Count
• Understanding how rubrics work
• What about Test Prep? THE BEST TEST PREP IS EXCELLENT TEACHING!
• How can we collect reliable data on students’ writing throughout the day?
• Guidelines for grading and providing evidence for parents, administrators and the public
“There is lots of writing assessment going on these days, but little of it actually improves the quality of students’ writing.” As Regie continues she points out that this ‘assessment’ “is seldom used to improve daily instruction.” This chapter is about becoming more knowledgeable about assessments. Regie notes, that unless teachers know how to teach writing well, it can be a waste of time to examine students’ writing and place students on a writing continuum. She encourages you, as a staff to “write together, study together, converse together, gather school-wide data, analyze these data and set goals for improving writing instruction. There is no shortcut to helping students become effective writers and there is no program you can buy that will do it for you.”
Remember to use rubrics judiciously and not overdo it. They should be “used as an evaluation tool, not as the driving instructional force.” “Use professional common sense. It is not advisable to apply rubrics to ALL writing nor to score ALL writing. Just as our students need lots of practice reading many texts without the expectation that they will be assessed on everything they read, they need lots of practice writing without being assessed on everything they write.” (Page 243)
Have your students do a lot of writing! “Extensive writing across the curriculum as part of an excellent writing program is the best preparation for doing well on (standardized) tests. Readers have to read avidly to become readers and the same holds true for writers. Kids who write a lot develop higher-order thinking and understanding that translates to higher achievement on all types of tests.” Be sure to check out “Try It Apply It” on page 246 and throughout the chapter for ideas to incorporate into your program.
As Regie points out in this chapter, “The joy has gone out of writing.” We need to “concentrate on developing kids as learners rather than kids as test takers.”
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Fitting it all in is really the challenge. At our school we have a four day school week, which we would never trade, but getting everything balanced can make your head spin. Many teachers do not regularly practice isolated lessons on grammar and spelling. Writers’ workshop is the preferred way to teach writing, but like I said in a previous post, it can be tempting to pull out a worksheet when it seems like they are not getting it. From the reading I’ve done, I now know to model more writing rather than go to the copy machine.
ReplyDeleteAt Corbett, we practice place -based education. Our focus is the Columbia River Gorge. We rotate on a three-year cycle: people, plants/animal and geology/ natural resources. Within our “Gorge Study” we have plenty of opportunities to incorporate writers workshop. This year, we’re studying the plants and animals of the gorge. We have just wrapped up a salmon unit. Within this unit the children wrote a pattern book based on Brown Bear, Brown Bear, a salmon life cycle journal- in this piece they took the salmon’s perspective and wrote about life in each phase of the life cycle. We have just begun a “small moments in the forest” personal narrative. Incorporating our science and social studies with writer’s workshop has been truly like getting two birds with one stone. Fortunately, our team of six primary teachers works together to plan, so much of the prep work is spread out.
We have mapped out the year so “gorge studies” and writing will continue to be linked. Animal study and reports; wildflowers and poetry; birds of prey and letter writing. For me, the big picture was attainable. It is the details of each lesson and how to embed teaching the conventions within this big picture that was the challenge. Now, I feel like I have a stronger grasp of what I need to do.
I appreciate the clarity of the conferencing chapter. Typically, I practice roving conferences. During this time I’ve come to realize that I mostly focus on conventions. Ahah moment… I need to give more praise and validation. The variety of conference suggestions offered in the book is very helpful. What I think will be most helpful is the whole group share. I’ve done a few and never thought of them as conferences. The idea offered that I think will facilitate instruction is to let the kids know you’ll be looking for examples of the lesson just taught to share. Most kids love to share and it’s a great incentive for them to do what you suggested.
I think I’d really like a four-day workweek, but can see how it may prove to be a challenge to get everything done. Is your school day extended? I love the focus of your place-based units on the Gorge and the 3 year rotation is a great way to organize yourself and cover material.
ReplyDeleteYou and your team are also smart to plan and prep together; it’s a great way to save time. YEAH! I love that you had an ah-ha moment! Many teachers in this course have shared that they also were focusing a lot on conventions and felt they needed to celebrate and praise students’ efforts and content. Glad this section was useful for you!
I am so glad it is being instilled how important it is to celebrate our writing! We have writing celebrations when we finish up a writing unit, but for some reason, it has been the thing that has gotten cut on a daily level when we "run out of time." I love the reinforcement that writing quality shot up when the audience was in mind for the writers...
ReplyDeleteI teach in a school where parents are VERY concerned with percentages, who is identified TAG, who is qualifying for SUMMA, etc. Unfortunately, these parents LOVE spelling tests, and because of that, our administration supports us giving them. It is humorous to me, because it feels like the most out of context exercise when our class takes its weekly spelling test. We do not practice the words all week during writing (they practice at home for homework). So, come spelling test time, we take the test, kids get their scores, and parents seem to be happy. I truly see no correlation, however, to how kids spell on their test versus their spelling in context of their writing. I was glad to see that idea was reinforces as well!
Third grade has been an AMAZING grade to teach voice... I always say it's the heart of the writing. Voice makes your writing your own. No one else could describe an event like you can - with your humor, your juice words, your feeling words - it's all your own, and that's voice! It's a tough thing for kids to grasp at first, but I really saw they got it when we would share some of our writing that had strong personal voice. Then the kids would say, "Oooooh, I get it!" And the next day, their writing had more personality. I love focusing on this in their writing - it's like asking them to transfer their personalities into their writing pieces.
Conferencing is one of the things I love to do most with my kids. One on one conferences give us time to discuss strengths as well as set goals. One of the tough aspects of this is class size this year. It just seems like so much time passes in between the time that I am able to meet with each student again!
Also, this year, in my first year teaching third grade, we use rubrics for our writing assessments often. I see how rubrics really anchor a child to expectations and guidelines. And they offer such a clear snapshot to the parent during conferences for what we are looking for, and what they are working toward. Rubrics have been a wonderful guiding tool this year in our writing assessments!
Chapter 7 got to the heart of where I see the problems with writing instruction. So many times, we want the perfect program or perfect combination of activities that will get our kids writing and reading at or above grade level. Obviously, it doesn’t happen and everything should be integrated. I started off the year, doing these isolated exercises that I was told to do and realized how much time I was spending at the copy machine. As I read this book and as I change my literacy time to be more efficient and effective, I am finding that with the most effective strategies, I am at the copy machine a lot less. For example, today we did shared writing and wrote a beautiful story about being brave. We wrote it after a read aloud about Chester the brave raccoon. We integrated CAFÉ strategies into the reading and wrote a summary identifying the main idea and supporting details (the common core standard). I didn’t have any copies to make and everyone was very engaged and interested in the activities. I felt really good after the activities. I felt like we actually accomplished something. The students were interested in what they were doing and gave much better results because of that. I do see that I need to address the audience of their writing and make sure that they become more aware of who they are writing a particular piece for.
ReplyDeleteFor chapter 8, I plan on reworking my entire liter block time frame this weekend. I have already made some changes but plan on doing some more extensive changes this weekend. I found the information in chapter 8 to bring about some great things to keep in mind.
Chapter 9 on conferences reminded me of what I should be doing when I conference with students. I have not been doing a good job conferencing for the right reasons with students. The chart on page 223 was especially nice for me. I am a chart person!
In chapter 10 I affirmed what I believed about rubrics and also that not all writng has to be scored. Not only is it ineffective but it is also not realistic. I also liked the thoughts regarding test prep. The best test prep is excellent teaching. I definitely feel the push to do lots of test prep—re: teach what we know is on the test. I see why, I am at a focus school so we are under a lot of pressure by the state. I think that is something great to keep in mind as we approach assessment time.
I found chapter 7 extremely helpful. Regie really addresses the issues of incorporating direct skill instruction into a writing block. My approach has always been to read their writing and see what skills need the most work and teach those. I feel I have had some success with this and at the same time have become overwhelmed with the different needs of each student. Groupings sometimes helped with this, but still some kids struggled to get the needed skills. After reading Regie’s approach to writing, I feel my best solution to this is to write more and think out loud in front of students so they are getting more constant modeling of good writing and still teach skills based on what they need the most work on. In this chapter, the section on “voice” really made me reflect on times I’ve asked students to add more descriptive words to improve their piece and now understanding I was probably taking away from their natural voice in an effort to improve their writing. I agree with Regie and plan to stress the writer’s audience more in the future to get quality writing. I liked the direct techniques Regie shared at the end of this chapter and was glad to see I use many of them already. A new technique I can use in the future is personal word walls. I have always used word walls with writing instruction, but never personal word walls.
ReplyDeleteChapter 8 was filled with more excellent strategies. I liked the idea of writing and publishing more short pieces, even in the older grades. It seems as kids get older, the length expectation gets longer. I’m glad Regie pointed out length has nothing to do with quality. I also thought the writing record, which had a column for audience was effective. It was interesting to read the suggested times frames for writing on page 187, but I am curious to know how Regie would organize a 50 minute language arts class with 30+ students, especially if you are incorporating the reading to writing connection. I am also curious to know more of the writing topics/projects Regie has had success with in older grades. Many of the shared examples seem to work wonderfully in elementary school classrooms, but I don’t see 8th grade students writing passionately for a school guidebook or a welcome note.
An invaluable lesson, from a beloved professor, I learned in teacher training was only and always write positive comments on student writing. Students are making themselves vulnerable when they write and that is scary for some students. This advice has served me well and it was reiterated by Regie in chapter 9. Giving students positive comments about their writing is so important. I can see the benefits of whole class conferences, you are celebrating and teaching revising skills at the same time. I could definitely see myself using the roving conferences teacher note sheet on page 217 and the teacher talk examples in the chapter are exceptionally helpful.
Chapter 10 re-affirmed by beliefs in how a rubric should be used. In past classes, I have used them during peer conferences and as self evaluation tools as well as for the final teacher grade. It is important of students to know how they are going to be assessed. Again, I like how Regie pushes teachers to aim high and to get students to take responsibility for their own writing through being able to evaluate their own work.
Jennifer,
ReplyDeleteWhen I taught first grade in Lake Oswego the parents were the same. I actually turned the spelling tests over to them. I didn't have to do a thing and parents happily had a list of spelling words to work on with their students. I had a binder that had a section for each child. In each section was a copy of the 100 most frequently used words. Students could have a goal of 5,6,7 or up to 10 or more words based on how many they wanted and how well they did on the test. (Given once very two weeks by a mom.) She would mark in their section which words they were studying with a dot. Then when they got them correct on the spelling test they were highlighted. If a word was not spelled correctly, no big deal. It was just added back to the next weeks spelling test. I didn't keep any score record or do anything with the tests. The mom corrected them right after the test and sent them home with the child that day with their new list of words. Easy and I figured that the words were at least ones that they'd need to know.
I love your child friendly definition of voice. With your conferences...are you keeping them short and tight? I know it's great to connect and take time with each child, but in order to get to more children it is helpful to keep the conference to less than 10 min. 5 would be ideal, but Jackie and I both struggle with this. :D
Hi Jessica!
Yes, students need tons and tons of time to write and think about their writing and to talk about their writing. This is what they need, not a lot of worksheets!
How did your re-working of your lit block go?
Hello Kaetlyn,
I have seen students in this class that teach middle and high school share about some amazing writing assignments. Often for the older grades there is a connection or spring board from a literay piece, novel, short story, poem, that they had read and then thought provoking questions and topics that ask for evidence and documentation that allows the students to share their view point.
I would say you could try writng to Regie and asking her. :D Here's a link to an online form to conatct her:
http://regieroutman.org/contact-us/
Though I know she says she doesn't like email. You might try writing and mailing her a note in Seattle. I'm sure her publisher would pass the note on.
In one of my other classes this term I had an 8th grade LA teacher send in some assignments. Maybe they will jump start some ideas for you:
2) a. Subject/topic: Language Arts/The Diary of Anne Frank
b. Standard/Objective: ¬Analyzing factors that contributed to the Holocauste
c. Strategy/Activity: Storytelling—Teacher will read “The Children’s Story” (about a teacher who manipulates children into easily shifting their beliefs) out loud to the class. (could easily be extended to a writing assignment.)
5) a. Subject/topic: Language Arts/The Diary of Anne Frank
b. Standard/Objective: Evaluate character motivation in a literary text by using perspective-taking to analyze responses to conflicts.
c. Strategy/Activity: Journaling—Students will write about their own conflicts with parents friends, feelings of loneliness, stress, jealousy, lack of freedom, oppression, and being inhibited by rules.
(I loved this one as I can see it appealing to so many students. There are many engaging ideas that students can relate to and have stories to share.)
Since The Ousiders was my all time favorite book growing up, I'll share what she submitted for her unit on the story.
ReplyDeleteThe Outsiders Unit- Grade 8
1. Remember
Identify the physical traits of character from the novel
Brain-based Strategy: Drawing and Artwork
Instructional Strategy: Students will draw and label the physical traits of Ponyboy, Soda, Johnny, or Dally.
2. Understand
Students will demonstrate understanding of the personality traits of characters in the novel
Brain-based Strategy: Brainstorming and Discussion
Instructional Strategy: In small groups students will distinguish between Darry, Soda, Ponyboy and Johnny by discussing their varied personalities.
3. Apply
Students will apply their understanding of Johnny’s situation in the novel.
Brain-based Strategy: Role Plays, Drama, Pantomimes, and charades
Instructional Strategy: Students will prepare a courtroom defense for Johnny’s crime and will present their arguments to the class in a role play of the court room scene.
4. Analyze
Compare and Contrast two groups in the novel
Brain-based Strategy: Graphic Organizer
Instructional Strategy: Students will create a Venn diagram to compare and contrast the lifestyles of the Socs and the Greasers.
5. Evaluate
Evaluate assumptions that characters make in the Novel
Brain-based Strategy: Cooperative Learning
Instructional Strategy: In groups, students will go back through the chapters read to date and will both identify and critique the assumptions each group, the Socs and the Greasers, make about each other. Students will establish when these assumptions are logical or illogical. Students, with the help of their group, will provide data/evidence for their critique.
6. Synthesis
Develop a theory on the importance of nature to humankind
Brain-based Strategy: Writing and Journals
Instructional Strategy: Students will journal about Ponyboy’s views of sunsets expressed in the novel. Students will continue to write about a similar experience when he or she has appreciated or been awed by an element of nature or experience within a natural setting. Students will come to a conclusion about the importance of nature to people or the influence of nature in people’s lives, views, thoughts, reflections, etc.
Hopefully some of these examples might help. Does anyone else have ideas to share?
These are all great ideas, thank you. Literature response writing, like the assignments you mentioned, has worked well for me in the past. This and agree/disagree statements always seemed to generate quality writing from students. I guess my comments were more questioning once you involve literature, which is crucially important, how are they still writing enough according to Regie's framework. I understand as well that those are guidelines and you need to do what is best for your situation. I think I was coming from a slightly frustrated point that you could never provide the max. amount of time for each category with only 50 minutes. Also, knowing how important daily writing is for students for their literacy development and only have control of 50 minutes of their school day is difficult sometimes.
ReplyDeleteYou are right though, I could always contact Regie.
Thank you :)
Oh, sorry, missed the time piece. :) Yes, 50 min. is a short amount of time. I know when Jackie and I were teaching together (long ago in a galaxy far away) that we often worked on creative/flexible scheduling. It's rare that teachers have the ideal situation. Could you consider a 3-2 week and then a 2-3 week for focusing on specific topics/content?
ReplyDeleteTruly, for all teachers, there isn't enough time in the day to do all that we want/need/should. This is where writing across the curriculum comes in. Have you had or could you have conversations with your staff about the importance of incorporating writing in all subjects. Or get together and share how the other disciplines are including writing in their instruction. Maybe this needs to be conversations with your team/department and then principal or director of curriculum.
Another thought is to start the discussions of extending the literacy block to 90 min. Or even for some days if it's not possible every day of the week. I would, if you have the time, drop a note to Regie. I don't think it could hurt and she may get back to you with some great ideas. Sorry I don't have something more concrete for you...given the differences at every school it's difficult to offer a specific answer.