ASSIGNMENT SIX: DVD Reflection-
Included in your text is a DVD containing video clips of Regie’s
conferences with writers in the classroom. There is a detailed
commentary accompanying the DVD on page 336 of her text. Please watch
the DVD and then look at her teaching notes beginning on page 336 (Regie
suggests just watching without notes first so that you don’t miss what
she and the students are doing.) After both watching and reading her
notes, write your reflection and please post a copy of your DVD
Reflection to the blog.
*NOTE:
If you experience problems playing the DVD please refer to the Writing
Essentials companion website at www.heinemann.com/writingessentials for
directions for playing the DVD. Look in the upper right hand corner for
the link.
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Assignment 6:
ReplyDeleteDVD Viewing – Top ten list:
1.I agree complete with Routman, in that every teacher should video tape themselves teaching. Most recently, I taped myself during my Masters work but I am now convinced that doing this on a yearly basis would be a tremendous benefit.
2.Celebrate every writer with applause and affirmation.
3.Spelling counts! While I could sense that Derek was a bit uncomfortable with being on stage and her direct approach with him on his mistakes, the benefit clearly held up in the end. However, I am not entirely sure the entire class reaped the benefit.
4.Sticky notes: Giving a student the ideas shared during a conference on stickies, gives the student the independence during revisions.
5.Designated space for one on one conferencing, not simply done at their desk or space. (Example: The conference with AlexSandra.)
6.Respecting a student’s first language (AlexSandra). As Routman states in the book, “affirming the writer” first and focus on the grammar later.
7.Be specific, make your conferencing time work well.
8.I am hyper sensitive to the language we use as teachers to affirm students work. For example: “Great!”, “Good Job!” We need to be vigilant and very specific with our praise words or these phrases are meaningless.
9.Have the student read the work. Listen to what the student has written twice.
10.Cueing the writer from their own words.
Assignment 6
ReplyDeleteDVD Reflection
I found the DVD very helpful and truthfully, affirming. When I watched Routman in action I realized two things; 1) she is human. She is not doing something secret that only she can do. She is a teacher and she is teaching. It was nice to see that she is doing something real and frankly something we all can do. And 2) She is doing things that I (and I’m sure so many of us) are already doing and it was great to see that with a little tweaking and effort I can really do what she does, every day with my own students.
Max- I loved seeing how much he enjoyed showing off his work. I find that most of my students really crave and love to show off their work. When they know that they are in a safe environment, even my jaded 6th graders, will open themselves up for positive feedback and celebration. I think that too often, as teachers, our position calls for us to judge (grade) our students. Because of this reality, is imperative that we grab any opportunity to celebrate them that we can! When we are able to celebrate them we are forming a bond that helps them to trust in us and motivation to learn and helps us with discipline. I noticed how Routman always reads through the student writing twice, once for understanding and then a second time for specific words and phrases to celebrate and point out to the class. I also do this when reading aloud to awaken students to vivid and beautiful writing and give them ideas for making their own writing better.
Garrett- I loved how Garrett’s conference was not about him copying someone else’s work earlier but was about how great it was when he found his own voice. Routman spoke with him and gave him suggestions on what might be important to him and it helped him succeed. This success taught him a valuable lesson that I’m sure was more powerful and long-lasting than just having his teacher tell him not to copy and do your own poem. You could see that in this few minutes Garrett found his voice.
Ervin- In Ervin’s conference I noticed a lot of the same things that I noticed in the other ones but another thing I noticed was how Routman listened to what Ervin had to say and took notes so that he could add and revise on his own later. It was a great demonstration of scaffolding. I also noticed how Routman pointed out to the students that re-reading their work aloud will help them find boring or repeated words and how it’s alright to cross them out or change during revision.
Glad you found the DVD worthwhile.
ReplyDeleteMy thoughts on the DVD
ReplyDeleteLike Tonya, one of the things that most impressed me about the DVD was how authentic Regie was when she was teaching. I felt like I had stepped into her classroom and was watching a regular lesson. In my mind I have always differenciated between the celebration of sharing work and conferencing with students. The idea that you could be celebrating kids work while publicly conferencing was new and intriguing to me. I love the efficiency of this idea. I also liked the way she read each piece twice. I like having my students read their own work out loud, but often their voices aren't strong enough for the other students to hear. By reading it myself a second time, I can ensure that the kids hear the story and give the student a chance to read it in his or her own voice.
Probably one of my most important "take aways" was that Regie seemed sincerely interested in the kid's work. Her enthusiasm was real. When she gave the student a compliment it was deserved and when there was something that needed to be improved, she gently, but directly showed them what needed to be done. I noticed that in the individual conference, she was careful to let the student make the changes. I think that sometimes I jump in and take over (usually to speed things up so I can move on to another student.) Even though it was a lengthy conference , Regie never gave the impression that she was in a hurry. Instead her relaxed manner showed Alex that her work as important. I loved watching Alex grow more relaxed and engaged as the conference went on.
I found Derrek's spelling conference quite interesting for a number of reasons. First I was impressed by its length I think I would be nervous about losing the attention of the rest of the students. I really liked the way she had him check off the parts of the word he knew he had correct. I've seen that technique before, but had forgotten about it. It is such a good way to validate what a child already knows. I also liked how she had him write the word quickly several times before moving on to the next word. I do wonder whether Derrek ever misspelled those words again!
What an amazing video! I enjoyed listening to all students’ work. Though each student shared for few minutes his/her poem, there was lot of celebration and teaching. I did not expect Max to be that self-confident because he hesitated to read his poem. he did an awesome job adding sound effects to his poem.
ReplyDeleteI think the idea of whole class sharing is great opportunity to raise students’ self-esteem and get them to enjoy the writing. I was surprised to see Paige and Garret writing about what they feel anxious about. Normally, students who are embarrassed with something, they won’t even feel comfortable to share with the teacher or a counselor. However, students like Garret and Paige wrote about that and share it loud with the class too. I think when the teacher focuses on celebration students are able to perform better. Also, I like that students get to see and hear a lot of poems because it encourages them to have self-confidence and to celebrate their unique thoughts and feelings.
Though Regie was doing a lot of teaching and scaffolding when the whole class was sharing their own poems, her major focus was to have a positive attitude, to smile, and to celebrate every student’s work. One on one conference will be another way to give specific direction to students who are struggling with their writing. However, teacher is only guiding the student to clear up confusion or to finish up the story. It still has to be the student’s words and thoughts.
The video about editing spelling is a useful resource to all teachers. I think having a mini lesson daily for just ten minutes will be so helpful to all students. Teacher’s various strategies to help the students spell the word correctly (e.g. put the responsibility on the student, scaffolding, using phonetics, rewriting, raising expectation…) is a great way to improve their spelling. I learned from that video that I should never ask students to check the dictionary or give them the right spelling directly.
I really enjoyed watching the conferences in action. I got a better feel for them. I really like the shared conference and the spelling work she did whole class because you are able to reach and teach more kids than just the one you are conferencing with. I think these papers need to be preselected- so that the lesson is meaningful to all students.
ReplyDeleteAs far as the spelling lesson – I really like the method of checking the letters you think are correct. We already circle the words we don’t know as we write and keep going because “we want to get the ideas out first.” I will be adding the next step of checking off the letters you think are right then trying another way, before using a spell chhecker or asking a friend.
I also loved how she used sticky notes to make conferencing quick and also to help students remember what they said or talked about. Defiantly adding that to my bag of tricks.
I could see a lot of my own students in the students she showcased. I know that I will need to work privately with some students because they are too shy, where others will bask in the spotlight. I will still celebrate all writer and share for those who don’t want to share for themselves.
I absolutely loved watching Regie in action. Like Tonya said, it’s nice to know that what she’s doing isn’t a big secret, and that any teacher can structure their writing time like this to help students be more successful and develop their love for writing. I only have a writing group of three students, but I’m sure that I could add more sharing time to our sessions so that they may inspire each other and be celebrated. I also realized that I need to be more positive and look at their writing as a whole before delving into corrections and how they may improve their piece. I’m a perfectionist myself, so sometimes I need to take a step back and allow my students voice to be heard without any changes. Sometimes, I’m also trying to speed along the process because my students are struggling writers and take a lot of time to complete each piece. At times I feel that I need to jump in and get them moving so that I can have enough data for their IEP requirements.
ReplyDeleteI really liked the idea of writing on post-it notes in AlexSandra’s conference, rather than on their paper. This allows them to correct things, but also take ownership of their writing and corrections. I also like how Regie wasn’t necessarily direct in her teaching. She made suggestions, allowed for teaching moments to occur within the celebrations, and let the kids have fun.
The editing conference with Derek was very long! Like Susan, I wonder if my students would be attentive for that long. I sort of doubt it to be honest. Working in a Lifeskills room, it is very hard for our students to pay attention to anything in a whole class setting for more than a couple minutes and it has to be very engaging. I also wondered if she did this with multiple students during that time period, or if it was just Derek?
Assignment 6
ReplyDeleteWatching the kids read their writing was fun. I love the way Regie finds ways to have students do exactly what she needs them to do whether it is reading with line breaks, or just getting them to read their work because she would “mess it up” is inspiring. So much teaching is going on during those class sharings. As I have mentioned repeatedly, my students love to read their writing aloud. I have never asked for applause but after one student read his paper on his enchanted place, the other students applauded on their own. They know good writing and I do believe they take initiative from their peers to be good writers. They strive to be better writers because they would like their classmates to clap for them too! I do have several students that I need to have private conferences with and having a “spot” other than their desk is a good idea.
Watching the spelling portion of the video seemed like a lot of time was spent on one student. I don’t think my students would sit still for too many of those stints. However I do think that most of my students can circle their misspelled words and correct them as mostly they are being careless and hurrying. I also use the questions “Does it look right?” or “Does it sound right?” Kids will self-correct their writing as well as their reading with those prompts.
Mastering spelling is one of my pet peeves. I insist on perfect final drafts of any assignment. I instill in my students that all final work is published work and authors do not turn their writing in to be published with mistakes. Teachers who do not expect or hold students to high expectations in spelling are doing a great disservice to the kids and their future.
It was good to see Regie at work and to see that she is a teacher just like I am and I can take her strategies and hold myself to higher expectations in my classroom!
We're glad that everyone was able to make time to view the video. I think Regie would say if the longer conference wouldn't work in your class do a shorter one. (I'm betting there was a room full of adults watching that are out of the view of the camera so that the students knew to behave and sit still. ) :D
ReplyDelete