Ch. 5 Do More Shared Writing

Well I'm excited. I finished Chapter 5 last night, took a few notes, and decided to give an example of shared writing today in class. I already planned a lesson, so it was easy to adapt today.
It went well. The students responded to what they felt made great stories. (topic, supporting details, make a plan, emotions, element of surprise, an ending that makes the reader want to know more etc...)
Next we discussed writing a story with exactly 100 words to celebrate the 100th day of school. They brainstormed writing clues to add or delete words to their story. (contractions, compound words, split words, figurative language, speaking parts, conjunctions etc...)
I modeled a story I wrote with exactly 100 words and shared the techniques I used. We began with a thinking moment, then shared, and finally began writing. They were put in cooperative groups and we practiced a circle editing with the group. When they received their writing back they corrected as needed and published the final story.
I understand shared writing is teacher directed - student response, but I felt like the writing activity above was very teacher directed yet actively involved the students with constant brainstorming and sharing before they began independent writing.
I appreciate the many ideas for classroom charts and shared writing examples that were presented in this chapter.
I think it would be interesting to complete a shared writing about concerns in the US and develop a class letter to send to president Bush for President's Day.

Chapter 4 Raise Your Expectations

.....after the lesson and say, "I didn't know he could do that." And I respond, "I didn't know he couldn't." (p. 53)
I want to be that teacher - the one who doesn't look for faults, but one who looks for growth and possibilities. Why is it we are accustomed to check and look for errors? If we are to encourage life long readers and writers (they truly go hand in hand) then why can't we encourage ourselves to accentuate the positive and raise our expectations for our students. I don't have the magic answer, but this chapter focused on demonstration and shared writing to foster positive writing experiences. I particularly enjoyed reading all the student sample writings.
I'm attempting more "free" writing in our journals, some we can share, and others include a specific language focus ie....underline your topic sentence, circle your fave 5 adjectives, include a figurative language phrase etc....
I'm anxious to read the next chapter "Shared Writing" especially since I'm trying to incorporate more creative and shared writing.

Ch. 3 Share Your Writing Life

Find your own voice! Great concept - tough to realize. Demonstrating our own writing fosters the writing process. It allows us to view and review our writing visualizing the struggle of thinking, composing, and editing our own writing pieces.
Poetry has been mentioned frequently in the first three chapters. My new goal is to add some daily poetry reading for a few weeks. My hope is to incorporate some poetry writing to share and celebrate with the class. I need to allow an area in my room to display more writing also. I would love to hear some creative suggestions in displaying writing in the classroom:)

Ch. 2 Start With Celebration

"Enjoyment and writing have not coexisted, and they must do so if all our students are to become proficient writers." This was the foundation statement! It was interesting to see the results of the students who were questioned. Many responded that they enjoy writing of their own choosing. I think we try hard to pose themes, ideas, and prompts for them to write about, but if we want our students to own their writing, then we need to allow for more creative writing. I definitely need to celebrate my students writing more. My goal this week is to celebrate the class as writers with a writing activity after we complete the book " The Hundred Penny Box." We will write a hundred word story. I manipulated my writing creatively adding and deleting words and phrases to make an interesting story. I will model my story and brainstorm helpful hints before they begin their writing. It should be interesting to see what they compose!

Ch. 1 Simplify the Teaching of Writing

I believe effective teachers are constantly refining instructional practices. I think you have to connect with young writers through literature, constantly pointing out great writing and modeling every step. This chapter mentions the importance of conferencing with your students to assess and evaluate noting strengths, giving feedback, and setting goals. Due to the confines of our daily schedule this is difficult to schedule. "Whole to part to whole" makes a lot of sense to me and I'm excited about incorporating more writing experiences using this theory.

first blog

I'm a newby - chat with me. I'm beginning a new class and excited to start conversing with everyone:)