Saturday, July 22, 2017

Assignment Seven: Writing Conference

ASSIGNMENT SEVEN: Student Writing Conference - Choose one or two children (classroom students, relatives, neighbors...) 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.

4 comments:

  1. My own daughter was asked to write thank you’s to family member and friends that supported her financially for a school trip. I started our conversation noticing that Lauryn had written a paragraph, but did not include the date, greeting, closing, and her name on the letter. Lauryn read her letter to me and I complimented her by telling that I loved that she was able to write about the three most important events that happened on the trip in such detail. As she reread, she made corrections of capitalizing words and corrected misspellings. Again another compliment was given and I also explained why it was so important to reread the letter several times before sharing writing with people.
    She still did not seem to understand that it was not in a letter format. I asked her, “What is your purpose of this paper and who is the audience?” After responding by telling me that she wanted to thank family and friends for donating money, she immediately saw that she needed to format her paragraph into a letter. My teaching point for this conference was to make sure that my daughter understood the structure of a letter. As she made corrections, we discussed the importance of having each component of the letter.. A goal set for next time was to make sure that she had reread her paper at least 3-5 times before sharing her work with someone else.
    Although conferencing with your own child can be very different than conferencing with a student from school, I believe that overall it was a positive experience. This conference format is a great to reminder, as a parent and teacher to always start with a compliment. It helps to lead with positivity and can lead the writer to fix mistakes rather than feeling discouraged. In the future, I hope to continue to add more compliments into the conferences with my students and child, but to also ask particular questions that lead to the students to take more responsibility.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Great, glad that it was a successful experience. :D

    ReplyDelete
  3. Candace Palmesano – August 14, 2017
    Essential Writing – Assignment Seven
    (I skipped Assignment Six, but I just found the DVD in my classroom this morning so I am still planning on completing #6) I did an informal conference with Bella, an eight-year-old, who lives next door to me. Her grandparents had given her an above ground swimming pool and she was trying to write a thank you to them. It was perfect because her mom was getting a bit frustrated in trying to tell her how and what to write. I first showed her the format I would use if I was writing a thank you, told her that I would write a rough draft and then put it on pretty paper. She was surprised that even Mrs. Palmesano would write a rough draft. I then asked her, why she was writing a letter (because I already knew what writing she was working on) and she said she wanted to write a note to her grandma and papa to thank them. I complimented her on her nice, neat handwriting and that she had already written a list of the things she wanted to thank them. The list looked like this: What to thank Papa & Grandma for, 1. The big swimming pool 2. The 2 truckloads of water that cost $250 (Really this is what her list said!) 3. The hard work flattening the ground and putting sand under the pool 4. The floaty toys – Alligator especially. 5. Thinking of me when the weather was so hot. I asked her if she knew how many paragraphs she might need to write in thanking her grandparents. She thought about it, and said I want to first thank them for the pool and for thinking of me when the weather was so hot. “Could that be the first paragraph?” The second paragraph we decided to put all the things that came with putting a pool in, like the sand and the water. The third paragraph she decided was where she should end her letter because her grandparents work a lot and they might not have time to read too much. I suggested telling them all the reasons she had for liking the pool and first she couldn’t think of anything, but then she said, “I like having my friend, Faith, over to swim with me.” And “I also really like going out to the pool when it is hot and just floating around until I fall off into the water.” When she was done with the rough draft, she read it a couple of times and made a few corrections (she added that her mom hung lights in the trees so she could swim at night because her grandparents didn’t know that yet) and then she wrote in her best printing, on pretty paper, a wonderful thank you to her grandparents. What I think made this paper good, is that she expanded her thoughts from just saying “Thank you for the pool, I really like it.” Moving onto other ideas to put in the thank you note was something I was anticipating, but she really had a lot of ideas. What I did need to help her with was the organization and what to put together in each paragraph. I can imagine doing this with my students for the school year 2017-2018 and I think what is going to assist me is keeping somewhat of a running account so I know who I have conferenced with and who I haven’t.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Oh, this was an awesome writing conference. I LOVE the thank you note she planned to write! Glad you enjoyed the process and see it working in your class next year! :D

    ReplyDelete