Week Three Debrief

NIWP
Debriefing Week Three

1. What will you put in your own revision toolbox to help you with personal writing?
• Idea note cards
• Revision ideas
• A permission note to myself to throw away a piece of writing if it’s not working!
• Snapshot, thoughtshot, explode the moment, shrink the century notes and examples to trigger my memory.
• List of helpful web sites to go to when I’m in need of inspiration or a connection with other writers.

2. List two new learnings about rubrics.
• New web sites to guide me through different ideas.
• Co-creating my rubrics with my students for more ownership in their own learning.

• 3. At the end of next week I hope to leave with information about…..
• When the Advanced Summer Institute and the Writing Retreat are so that I can plan for them.
• Learning how soon I can register for the Writing Conference in Spokane
• How to start a writing group outside of school

4. The more important things about Week Three were...
• Getting my presentation done
• Learning about Writing Test Writing and “test wiseness”
• That I can write about those little details in life that I never thought that deeply about before – my grandmother’s roasting oven, my mom’s little childhood table and chairs, finding out where stories come from.

Revising

NIWP
Top 10 Important "Rules" of Revision

1. Have predictable and consistant rituals and routines, arrangements, and classroom structures.

2. Creating a safe classroom community of writers who value each other's work and opinions.

3. Know your students.

4. Convey the role of revision is a recursive process, and that we are always revising in one form or another.

5. Ask guiding questions, don't tell specific answers, and resist the desire to fix the student's paper.

6. Give students choices in their writing, revision, and their audience/purpose.

7. Provide "Tool Boxes," with specific notes on index cards to guide students through the writing process.

8. Create a common revision language, and a shared shorthand for communicating revision symbols.

9. Respond to student's writing as a reader, not as a teacher, and limit directions to one or two at a time.

10. Remember, students need to own their work/writing.

Reflection

NIWP
Chapters 6 and 7
After the End
By Barry Lane

Invention is a form of organization.
Graham Greene

I think I did pretty well considering I started out with a bunch of blank paper.
Steve Martin

I love these two quotes that Lane introduces Chapters 6 & 7 with because they make me chuckle, especially Steve Martin's. I can imagine the student saying, "What more do you want from me - blood?"

Lane has a great way with breaking down tasks to make them do-able and creative! It seems like it'll be quite easy to guide students through the many visual writing techniques that Lane suggests - like the helicopter ride web charting. What a creative and fun way to begin their connections for a story - fiction or nonfiction. Until now, I had not heard of moment mapping or character graphing. These are great ideas and I will model these to my kids, as Lane recommends.

I like the idea of writing in the third person, although I haven't done it very often. This is something I'd like to pursue on my own. It's interesting, like we did in class, to write from the first person's perspective and then switch perspective. What a notable change in assignments with fast results. I had fun doing this, and I imagine my kids will, too.

In Chapter 7, Lane captures my heart when he talks about the teacher who didn’t read Jane’s 17-page paper, and all the self-induced guilt she sorted though before she conferenced with the student. Gads, can I relate!!! Yet, everything worked out because of the teacher’s standard approach to conferencing! Will I ever be there? I feel as if I’m going to have queue cards coming out my ears; do this, don’t do that.

Lane makes several suggestions about creating an atmosphere in the classroom. I really tried to do that this year by bringing in an 1860’s Great Wheel and a large bundle of raw Shetland fleece, plus a rocking chair, an old school desk, and a cute little table and chair set that my mother used when she was little – she’s nearly 72 now. I also put up fabric on the walls trying to create special corners. It takes time, and faith in my students that they won’t hurt my antiques, but it helped me feel more at home, which I hoped it translated over to the students.

I also liked Lane’s suggestion of creating reading journals, and journals that allow the student and teacher to communicate back about a book. Again, I don’t know where this time would come from but, in a juggling act, I suppose a few minutes carved out of here

Thought

Action expresses priorities." ~ Mohandas Gandhi

Reflection

NIWP
After the End
by Barry Lane
Chapters 1 - 5

Books aren't written. They are rewritten.
Michael Crichton --- few writers would know better than Crichton, the author of many, many books and television screen writing! I think I"ll believe him.


When I first ordered this book in January, I was really excited because it came with such high recommendations from the upcoming Spring NWP conference in Spokane. But when the book arrived, I have to admit to being very disappointed: how could teaching and learning revision be any fun??? Seriously!!! I put my name and date inside the cover page, and tossed it into my school bookshelf thinking anything else would be more interesting to read. Little did I know that in seven months I would be raving about this book and revision, and actually looking forward to revising my own work!

While I'm confessing my lack of talents, I must admit to not being very excited to read content information unless it regards something that I am particularly interested in, for instance knitting. I have a difficult time breaking down the info to where I am at knowledge-wise, and learning from there. After the End was in the category that I didn't want to pursue because I could not fathom how revising could be interesting nor how it could be taught! Little did I know or understand!

The first five chapters in Lane's book actually make sense to me, thanks to slowly reading them and our class discussions! It was like a series of flashbulbs going off in my head as Lane was able to breakdown so many writing techniques that I had no idea even existed. And with each one, I was able to better grasp how I can improve as a writer and as a teacher, explaining these to my students! (Yeh!!!)

I have trouble distinquishing what thoughtshots are - I think I understand but then I get all muddled up again. So I have been rereading Chapter 3. Lane's example on page 48 helps me sort things out between snapshots and thoughtshots. "...if writers are just writing snapshots, perhaps their writing could benefit from the introspection and personalality development a thoughtshot brings to a character, or the larger purpose reflection can add to an essay. Or perhaps the writer could tint her snapshot with the emotions of thoughts of her character or herself. Writers learn to tint their snapshots with a character's feelings and visa versa."

I need to practice this technique so that it comes more naturally to me in the future!

Another cool part of Lane's book is Chapter 5, Explode a Moment, Shrink a Century. Lane's own chapter quote: Time to a writer is like playdough in the hands of a toddler. What an interesting thought! I like the idea of exploding the moment - getting all the pithy details out there for the reader to visualize and contemplate! Why couldn't I have thought of that? It seems so logical yet it's a amazing revelation! The Explosion of te sister pouring the milk over her younger sister's head was done perfectly; I could see and almost feel the cold liquid making a huge mess all over the child and the floor!

Next month, when I go back to my classroom, I will reorganize my professional bookshelf and put Lane in the front for quick and easy reference. Thank you for insisting that we read this book as I wouldn't have done so otherwise!

Reflection

NIWP
Chapters 13 and 14
Conferring
Learning to Confer
by Lucy Calkins

When I first start reading Chapter 13, Conferring, I had a difficult time swallowing the part w/nine-year-old Becky saying she was going to confer with herself - I don't think I have had any 12-year-olds saying that. But as I read further, I was able to buy into more of this particular classroom environment. The teacher has obviously done an excellent job in modeling what the classroom should look like, and how it should operate - very admirable!

So I kept on reading, which makes me wonder how I've gotten into my seventh year of teaching and I hadn't heard of Calkins until the Summer Institute. I appreciate Calkins' list of questions that should apply, no matter what age of the writer or the genre of the writing. It would be a good idea if I put a list of questions in each student's tool box so they would consistantly be able to ask good guiding questions.

Calkins identifies conferencing is at the heart of the writing project. And while Calkins admits that learning to conference is a difficult process, she stresses the importance of meeting individually with students and that this act should not be compromised. on!

Another set of questions Calkins advocates from teacher to writer, revolve around what the writer needs to hear. It's a way of connecting to the writer's heart which can lead to deeper heart-felt writing. I think this technique will take time to develop, as the year progresses, because you need to know your students.

In conclusion of this chapter, Calkins reminds us that we will not always be there when our students write, so students need to be reliable for their own success. "Students need to become critical readers of their own texts. Our job in a writing conference is to put ourselves out of a job, to interact with students in such a way that they learn how to interact with their own developing drafts," Calkins writes. I hadn't thought about it in this way - putting myself out of a job - but maybe this is in the April-June time frame, and then I'' be looking forward to the next batch of kids in the fall!

In Chapter 14, Learning to Confer, Calkins discuses how we can confer with ourselves and how we can conference with others to re-see a subject or a scene. I love re-seeing a scene in my mind - that's one of the best things about writing! Then, still delving deeper into the scene by asking: What do I wonder? Where is the mystery?

I like how Calkins tells her students that they can start anywhere in the story or memory; it doesn't have to be when the sun rose in the sky, it's the event that is important, then the details; big picture, little picture.

Yet, when conferencing with students, Calkins says there are also times to stop and do mini-lessons or reteaching with the class. I think this part of the writing process is quite a juggling act because as a teacher you need to be aware of where each students is at, the management of the entire class, and what time it is, too! It makes me wonder how I'll ever get anything else taught, but I realize that this is the ability to organize and to see the big picture of getting a great deal accomplished in a relative short amount of time. Everything needs to be interwoven - and for me this year it will be geography, reading, and the writing process! Whoa, Nelly! Let's not get overwelmed before the school year even begins!!! Think, write, rethink, rewrite my plans!!! If you plan, they will understand...fingers crossed!!!

Reflection

NIWP
Chapter 11: Establishing a Predictable Workshop Environment
by Lucy Calkins

In my classroom, there are somethings that I do routinely, and others that I think are done by a desire to squeeze something else in, or shake things up a little. But, Lucy Calkins has come to realize that "we (as teachers) need to anticipate how we will initiate, scaffold, and guide the classroom community toward an ever-deepening involvement, and we need to select rituals, arrangements, and classroom structures." Calkins goes on to paraphrase Don Graves, "The best workshop teachers value structure and organization." Important concepts that I need to guide my teaching towards, to frame my classroom planning and function around.

Calkins urges teachers to give their students an hour a day, every day, to write. That would be nice, but there's no way I have that much time available. While I'll have my students for two periods, back to back, I have to split that time between writing, reading and geography - about 33 minutes each if you divide them equally. I'm still debating how to do all of this in such a short time.

On another note, my favorite time of day for this class has become 10:30 - when I know I'll have uninterrupted time to work. I need to be able to give this gift to my kids since it can become such a rewarding work time.

This year I've had posters covering many of my walls, but after our readings, I realize how important it is that I post student writing, advertisig their success for others to see. Maybe I'll make two copies their papers, handback the originals, post one copy and put the other copy in their portfolio collection. I would also like to explore the idea of Publications Celebrations - maybe coffee and donuts before school when parents or relatives are dropping their kids off. Another thought to run by my peers - maybe we could do a multi-grade situation in the cafeteria?