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Welcome to Read – Write – Connect, Inc.
the Internet home of Leah Mermelstein.
Leah is an internationally recognized literacy consultant who specializes in K-5 Reading and Writing Workshop. She is the President and CEO of Read-Write-Connect, INC. She is also the author of Reading/Writing Connections in the K-2 Classroom, (Allyn & Bacon), Don’t Forget to Share (Heinemann) and the co-author of Launching the Writing Workshop (with Lucy Calkins) (Heinemann).
Selected Works
DVD
Quality Writing Instruction
This brand new DVD will assist teachers with high quality writing instruction.
Non-fiction
Don’t Forget to Share: The Crucial Last Step in the Writing Workshop
This brand new book will show you how to make your share sessions more instructional.
Nonfiction
Reading/Writing Connections in the K-2 Classroom: Find the Clarity and Then Blur the Lines
This book demonstrates how through careful, explicit assessing, planning, and teaching every student can understand and use the reading/writing connection to become stronger readers and writers at the same time.
Units of Study for Primary Writing: A Yearlong Curriculum: Launching the Writing Workshop
This book shows teachers how to launch a joyful and rigorous Writing Workshop in their classrooms.
QUICK LINKS
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Leah Mermelstein |
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Blog Posts are Below:
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Working On Your Own Writing Can Help You Plan Units of Study
I want to share a quick but powerful story that recently happened to me when I went to do work in the Danbury School District. The reason I want to share this story is that it reminded me how of how powerful it is when teachers do their own writing. There are many ways that working on your own writing will help you become a better Writing Workshop teacher, but this particular story showed me how doing your own writing can help you better plan and understand the Units of Study that you teach.
The story begins with Lorena, a teacher from Danbury, emailing me. I was going into her classroom the following week to work with her team on Writing Workshop. She wanted to update me on where she was in her writing curriculum and the questions that both she and her colleagues had about their Writing Units of Study.
Her second grade team was just about to start a Book Review Unit of Study. Just an aside, this is a wonderful, engaging and authentic Writing Unit of Study that closely correlates with the Common Core Standards. The Danbury School District provides their teachers with a general (and wonderful) outline of each Unit of Study in both writing and reading. The beauty of what they provide is that it gives teachers (especially new ones) a starting point and it also help to bring some consistency across their many schools in the district. There is lots of flexibility in this general outline so that teachers can add, as well as spend more or less time on concepts based upon what their students show them they need or want. Lorena let me know that the second grade team needed help in deciphering what the district was suggesting that they teach in their Book Review Unit.
I began my planning for this work by pulling out the district curriculum. After reading it, I had a surface understanding of what the teaching points meant, but I didn’t feel as though I truly owned them. I could have read and reread those teaching points, but I knew the only way I would truly understand the teaching points was by writing a quick book review myself.
First, I thought of an authentic reason I needed to write one. I decided to write a book review of the book, Shortcut by Donald Crews and I wanted to write it to encourage my nephew to read it. Once I had chosen the book and my audience, I looked at a few book reviews (I found them online) and I read over the teaching points in the district curriculum again. In both the book reviews I found on-line and in the district curriculum, I noticed craft techniques and teaching points such as:
- Different ways to start
- The author’s unique opinion as well as evidence that supported that opinion
- What the book was about (perhaps a big idea or a social issue embedded in the book)
- A summary that was angled towards that big idea or social issue
- How the character changed throughout the book
- Different ways to end
(There were many more ideas. These are just a few of them.)
After that, I spent about twenty minutes writing my book review keeping in mind both the teaching points and the craft techniques I had noticed in the other book reviews. After writing, I looked back over the teaching points that the district had provided. I now felt like I owned these ideas because I literally had messed around with them in my own writing. The Book Review Unit of Study now felt seamless to me and I yearned to take over Lorena’s classroom for the next month so I could teach the entire unit.
When I visited Lorena’s classroom the following week, I used that book review I wrote in my teaching. Of course, the teachers wanted a copy and I was happy to give it to them but I also had a funny feeling while giving it to them.
I felt funny because I wanted them to experience what I did. When I actually wrote my own book review, I had a better understanding of not only the district curriculum, but also book reviews in general. I was able to decipher what the district was asking by writing myself (as well as looking at other book reviews) They didn’t just need my book review; they needed to write one themselves!
Later than day, I spoke to the assistant principal and we brainstormed ways to get teachers writing as part of unit planning meetings. We both agreed that reading and rereading the teaching points isn’t nearly as powerful as jumping in and writing it yourself.
I’m really excited by this idea of using writing as a method for planning Writing Units of Study. I know I will do more of it in the future.
I would love to know your thoughts! Do you write yourself? Does it help you as a writing teacher? Do you think that your own writing could assist you in planning Units of Study? If so, how? What issues do you see with this?
Until next time….
Leah
Copyright, 2012
Structuring Your Minilessons to Support Self-Directed Learners
Greetings!
In today’s blog post I’m going to continue thinking about how to create self-directed learners: learners who are excited, engaged and continually making decisions on their own.
The number one concern I hear in my travels is: this. How do I help my students continue doing quality work during Reading and Writing Workshop even when I’m not working with them?
Really, the question being asked here is how do I help my kids become self-directed learners?
This post will continue giving you strategies on how to address this. Specifically, this post will focus on ways to conduct minilessons that not only teach new content, but also help kids become more self-directed. For the purposes of this post, I am speaking about Writing Workshop, but these ideas would hold true for Reading Workshop, as well.
On most days, make your minilessons invitations rather than mandates.
If you have been doing Writing Workshop for a while you’ve probably heard this suggestion. What I want to focus on is how structuring a minilesson as an invitation supports self-directed learners and how organizing a minilesson as a mandate gets in the way. As I have said in previous blogs, a vital part of being self-directed is the ability to make individualized decisions that help you move through the writing process. By asking kids to stop what they are doing in their writing and to do what you are teaching in your minilesson every single day takes away virtually all of your kids’ decision making.
Instead of mandating it, I would ask kids on a regular basis to make decisions on when and if they will use it. For example. I might start a minilesson by saying something such as, “Today I’m going to be talking about how to use describing words in your Informational Books. Over the next few days I’m going to ask everyone to try this, but you’ll be the one to decide on the exact day you’ll do it.”
Teach Concepts Over Time
One of the many reasons that kids are not self-directed is because they don’t have an in-depth enough understanding of what you taught and therefore are unsure about how to try it in their writing. That’s yet another argument for making your minilessons invitations rather than mandates, You do however want to ensure that everyone eventually does understand the concept enough to try it and then add it to their repertoire.
Because of that, concepts in Writing Workshop should be taught over time so that you can go deeper, into an idea, as well as untangle confusions that are bound to arise. The hope of course is if you teach a few minilessons over time on the same concept, your kids will have a better understanding of it and will be able to find times and places to try it out.
The Ends of Your Minilessons Are Vital
I just started reading Opening Minds by Peter Johnston. All of Peter Johnston’s work revolves around the idea that how you say something has a major impact on students. I couldn’t agree more!
The language that you use in your minilesson can empower kids to be self –directed or it can make kids believe that their job is to follow your directions. Look at these two different endings to minilessons and imagine how this language would hit your kids’ ears.
“If you feel like today’s lesson will help you move forward, go ahead and try it. If it’s not going to help you today or you feel you need to learn a bit more about it over the next few days, tuck it into your back pocket for another day.
OR
“Today your job is to put describing facts in your Informational Books.”
Both of these endings let kids know that they will eventually try out the minilesson. The first one though asks kids to make decisions and the second one asks kids to follow directions. If we want kids to be self-directed, they have to be making decisions all of the time, every single day.
It’s also important to give kids some planning time before they go off to write. Again, here is some language that helps kids to see themselves as active decision makers.
“Before you go off to write today, it’s important to make a plan for your writing time. If it makes sense to do what I taught today you might want to start with that. Either way, I want you to think about not only what you’re going to do first, but also what you think you’ll do after that and even what you think you’ll do after that. Take a quiet moment to make the plan in your head and then share that plan with a partner.”
Once again, this language suggests to your students that you have full faith that they can do quality work the entire Writing Workshop. With the Common Core Standards asking for mastery, it reminds us how important it is for our kids to not waste a moment of their Writing Workshop and to use that time to practice what we’ve been teaching them across the year.
A second grade teacher that I work with at PS 230 has her kids not only say their plans out loud to a partner, but they also write their plans down and then reflect at the end of Writing Workshop on whether or not they were able to accomplish that plan.
What questions or concerns do you have about minilessons? Are there other ways that you have found that you can use them to help create more self-directed learners? I hope to hear from you.
Leah
Copyright, 2012
Teaching Kids to Be Self-Directed During Writing Conferences
For those of you who have been reading my past blogs, you know I have recently been focusing many of them on ways to get kids to become more self-directed. I’ve settled for now on the word self-directed (Thanks, Jen if you are reading this!) I just think it’s more rigorous than simply saying I want kids to be independent. Yes, I want kids to work by themselves, but I also want the work that they do to be of high quality. The word self-directed embodies more of that image.
Today I want to share a quick conference I had last week with a first grader named Hasik. I share this conference because while doing this conference (and really all conferences) I keep in mind not only the content I’m trying to teach, but also how to ensure that what I teach gets added into the repertoire of what they do during the independent phase of the Writing Workshop. In this way, they are not only working by themselves, but they are also doing high quality and very individualized work.
I decided to write this blog because at times I think teachers are more focused on what they’re teaching kids in a conference and not as focused on ensuring that what they taught will help kids become more self-directed during the independent phase of Writing Workshop.
After, I share the conference, I’ll name out a few of things I deliberately did in order to move Hasik into become more and more self-directed.
I began this conference by watching Hasik write independently. What I noticed through my observations was that Hasik began by rereading his writing piece.
(It’s important for you to know that Hasik’s teacher, Marnie had not conducted a focus lesson that day on rereading.)
He pulled out a pen was just about to mark up his writing when I called him over.
Leah: I noticed that you were rereading your writing today without your teacher telling you to. That’s such a good idea. Tell me a bit about why you decided to begin today by rereading.
Hasik: I was looking to see what was wrong.
Leah: Say more about what you mean by that.
Hasik: (He points to a sentence on his page.) This is wrong. It says: I mad a snowman. That doesn’t sound right.
Leah: I have to compliment you. Without anyone telling you to, you reread your piece looking to see if anything was wrong, if there were any parts that didn’t make sense, if there were some changes that you wanted to make. It’s one thing to do this when the teacher asks you to, but it really shows your understanding of it when you do it without your teacher asking you to. If there is ever any time in Writing Workshop where you find you’re not sure what to do next, you can always do what you did today. You can reread and see if there is anything that is wrong, anything that doesn’t make sense or that you want to change.
Hasik: Okay.
Leah: You’re right, I mad a snowman doesn’t make sense. What do you want it to say? What would make sense?
Hasik: I made a snowman.
Leah: You want to change ‘mad’ to ‘made’. You’re right that would make more sense. I bet you’ve seen the word made before in books that you’ve read. Can you picture that word in your head?
Hasik: (Hazic closes his eyes. The class has practiced this strategy before.)
Leah: Why don’t you try to write the word made in my notebook?
(Hasik writes maed.)
Leah: You have all of the right letters, but we just need to change the order. Make another picture in your head. What do you think the order of that word might be?
Hasik writes the word correctly now.
Leah: Look, you got it! (I pull out the book The Snowy Day, which has the word made in). Look at how you spelled the word made and now look at how it is spelled in the book, The Snowy Day. Can you point to the word made in that book? You were able to write the word exactly the way it looks in books. From now on, I want you to spell that word made the way it looks in books. Let’s practice it a few more time before you leave me. Write it big. Write it small.
(Hasik practices writing it a few more times.)
Leah: From now on without a teacher telling you to you can reread your writing and see if it makes sense and make changes just like you did today. You can also from now on spell the word made the way it looks in books. Have a great rest of your writing time.
Now that you’ve ‘seen’ the conference, let’s look at through the lens of this question:
What did I do to ensure that Hasik would add what I taught to his repertoire of things he could do during the independent phase of the Writing Workshop?
I’ve highlighted some of the words below that I think were important components of my conference. These are the components that I believe will help you turn any conference into one that teaches kids new content, as well helping them to become more self-directed.
First, I watched Hasik to see what he did by himself on that particular day.
Then, the next thing I did was question him about what he was doing.
After listening to him, I mirrored his own words back to him and let him know how amazing it was that he did that without his teacher asking him to. I asked him to continue doing this type of work during future independent periods of Writing Workshop.
Later in the conference, rather than giving him the correct spelling of made, I made sure he was engaged by asking him to picture the word made and then try to write it. When he didn’t get it the first time, I had him try it again letting him know that he had the right letters but they were not in the right order.
I then showed him the word made in the book The Snowy Day. I had him practice writing the word a few times to further engage him in the process. Finally I ended the conference by being clear with my language on what he could now do during the independent phase of Writing Workshop.
I would love to know your thoughts!
Have you tried any of these techniques in your conferences?
Are there other techniques that have worked in your conferences to help kids become more self-directed?
What are some of your struggles with this concept?
Copyright, 2012
Top Five Reasons to Begin Your Writing Units of Study With Immersion By Paula Jensvold
“Mrs. Tavares, we are not quite ready to write. Tomorrow I think we should partner read books so we can learn more about how to write non-fiction.”
This is what a child said to a literacy support colleague of mine!
It sounds funny (but wonderful) to hear children say that they were “not ready to write” during a Writers’ Workshop. What they were really saying is they needed more time to study the genre that they were about to write in.
What these kids needed and wanted was more immersion.
This year, I have spent lots of time planning and thinking through the immersion phase of my writing units of study. What I found is that if f the immersion goes well , the rest of the unit of study is far easier to plan/teach.
The benefits of doing immersion at the start of a unit of study are vast! Next, I want to share some of the benefits I have found when starting my writing units of study with extended and meaningful immersion.
Top Five Reasons to Begin Your Writing Units of Study With Immersion
1. When you spend time immersing the students at the start of a writing unit of study, they have more exposure to the literature and resources that you will use throughout the unit.
Many immersion lessons involve children partner reading, listening to books read aloud or watching short video clips. These resources can then be used later in the unit of study when the children have a deeper understanding of the genre/craft being studied. Because they already know the materials, you can focus in on the specific craft technique that you are teaching that day. This will enable you to keep the mini lesson short and focused, as well give your kids more time to write!
2. Providing the children with a few days of immersion builds up their excitement. Children often can’t wait to write!
This happens because the immersion builds up their confidence and gives them a better understanding of what they are about to write. This excitement and confidence will certainly help them to be more independent/self-directed during future days of Writing Workshop. 
3. Students get lots of ideas for what/how to write during the immersion phase of a writing unit of study.
Because of this, they are able to be more independent/self-directed during the remainder of the unit of study. Their ideas keep flowing and so does their writing! The quality of the writing is also enhanced because they can pull from what they learned during immersion. More independence also means more conferring for you as a teacher! Who doesn’t want to teach more during Writing Workshop?
4. During immersion, students get extended instruction on how to read texts as a way to get ideas for their own writing.
Once again, this instruction will help them to be more self-directed/independent. Specifically, this instruction will enable them to go to a book/text to get writing help, rather than always having going to a teacher. We’re always trying to get kids to be able to use mentor texts on their own. Immersion really supports this goal.
5. Last but not least, when children learn what the “big” picture of the unit of study is ahead of time, the lessons that follow make more sense.
They can often make better connections between lessons taught at the beginning of the writing unit of study to lessons later in the unit.
It is hard to know how long immersion lessons should last. One day? One week?
I know that my children are ready to write when I look around and see little light bulbs popping up out of their heads. Most hands are raised and the children can’t seem to stop sharing ideas and thoughts. It doesn’t happen right away, but when it does, it feels like watching the little white fuzzy things that are attached to dandelions float away in the sky. There are always a few that stay close to the stem, those children still need more time, but most of the children are ready to go in their own direction with their own ideas.
It’s then I know that my children are ready to not wait another day to write and I turn to Mrs. Tavares and say “Tomorrow we will be ready to write!”
We would love to hear from you!
What benefits have you seen from beginning your writing units of study with immersion? What questions or concerns do you have?
Copyright, 2012
Some Rough Draft Thinking about the Independent Phase of Writing Workshop
Over the past few months, I’ve dedicated my blog to ideas for helping kids become more independent during Writing Workshop.
As I’ve written these blogs, I’ve struggled a bit with the word independence because I’m not sure it’s exactly the right word to describe what I am aiming for. The truth is, I don’t want kids to just stay out of the teacher’s hair while she’s working with others, nor do I want the kids to just keep busy. What I want is far bigger than that, which is why I sometimes question the word independence.
I’ve decided that for this blog post I will share what it is I am aiming for. These ideas I hold dear and true to my heart because without them, Writing Workshop simply doesn’t work as well as it could.
After I share these ideas, I hope you’ll respond to this post with your own thoughts.
1. Kids need to be engaged and working on exciting writing projects.
Part of the trick to getting the independent phase of Writing Workshop to go well is to work hard at getting kids involved in exciting writing projects. (Keep in mind that exciting doesn’t mean always easy or always fun). I’ve been thinking a lot about Donna Amato, a fantastic first grade teacher from Guilderland, New York. Sadly, I learned that she recently passed away. The world has not only lost an amazing person, but also an unbelievably intuitive, brilliant teacher. All I had to do was walk into her classroom or talk to her to be reminded that if kids are excited about what they’re doing, they will work hard even when the teacher is not working with them. In my book, Don’t Forget to Share, I wrote about how towards the end of Donna’s Writing Workshop she would say the following to her six year olds,
“We’re about to gather for a share. You all have an important decision to make and I want you to make the decision that is best for you. Some of you might feel it’s a better use of your time to keep writing. If that’s true, don’t come to the share. Some of you might feel as though a conversation with others might spark an idea. If that’s true, join us at the share meeting today.”
Nobody (really and truly not one single student) made a bad decision or fooled around while Donna was facilitating the share meeting with the other students. Rather, the kids who continued working were deeply engaged in what they were doing. Donna didn’t have a special class or perfect kids. She was a special teacher who worked hard at getting her kids engaged in their writing. How did she do that? That’s for another blog post.
2. Kids need to be able to make decisions on their own and understand that the decisions they make on any given day will be different than other students.
During the independent phase of Writing Workshop, I want the kids to understand how to make a decision that is going to keep them self-sustained and doing work that is appropriate for them. This is not an easy task, but it is certainly ‘do-able.’ Just yesterday, for example, I was in King Street Primary School in Danbury, CT and the students were working on editing and revising their Small Moments. The teacher, Lorena, had given the kids an editing checklist and the kids were using the checklist to help themselves edit their pieces. One student had checked her piece and she discovered that everything on the checklist was correct. My hope for her is that she can, without teacher intervention, understand that just because the checklist didn’t give her editing ideas, did not mean that her work was complete for the day. I want her to understand that she should continue rereading her piece and do what adult writers do towards the end of the process: make small changes that will either lift the content of the writing or improve the mechanics of the writing.
As I looked around the room, there were other students who were easily able to do parts of the checklist, but were having a more difficult time with other parts of it. I don’t want these kids to spend their Writing Workshop with their hand raised waiting for the teacher to help them. I want them to understand that they should use the editing checklist in the best way that they can. After they have done this to the best of their ability, they should simply start a new piece. As you can see from these two examples, I wouldn’t want all kids to make the same decisions because their needs are clearly different.
3. On any day, kids need to go beyond what was taught in the minilesson or the conference.
During our minilessons or conferences we are usually teaching kids a particular quality of writing that we hope they will try out (that day or over the next few days). Teachers will often say that kids are fine at the start of Writing Workshop but once they finish what the teacher taught they are unsure what to do next. Some kids are very obvious about the fact that they are finished and will yell out, “I’m finished!” or follow you around the room. Others hide it better. They might sit quietly, doodle, and color in their pictures as a way to keep busy when they have finished the work of the day. I want and expect more from kids during the independent phase of Writing Workshop. I want kids to understand that it is their job to keep themselves doing good work the entire time. I want them to understand that what was taught that day is only a small portion of what they could potentially be doing during that time. What else could they be doing? Again, the answer to that is for future blog posts!
Now that I have presented some of my rough draft thinking around this topic, I reach out to you, my lovely readers, with these questions.
1. Is the word for all of these ideas above independence or is it something bigger? The word ‘self sustained’ keeps coming to my mind but I would love to hear your thoughts or what words come to your mind that best defines the ideas above.
2. Are there other ideas you would add other than the three I have above? What are your hopes and dreams for how kids will use the independent phase of Writing Workshop?
I hope to hear from you!
Leah
Copyright, 2011
Independent Writers
When I speak to teachers, coaches and principals, they always say that one of the biggest obstacles to a successful Writing Workshop is creating independent writers. I’m not talking here about just getting kids to do things by themselves, but rather getting kids to make wise decisions on their own that lift the level of both their writing products and processes.
In my last blog post, I spoke about how the physical environment can support kids in becoming independent. In this post, I want to examine how strong management skills are another key ingredient to creating independent writers. As you’ll see, the ideas in this post are simple, but I think because they are simple, we sometimes overlook the importance of them. I want to share 3 management tips that have made all of the difference in the classrooms/schools I work in.
1. Be mindful of which problems you are solving:
Good educators want to help kids so if we see them struggling we, of course, have an urge to jump in and solve their problems. It’s important, in these situations, to look at the big picture of independence and solve the problem in a way that supports this.
Let me give you an example of what I mean here. A student is struggling to come up with an idea. You could sit and talk to that child and remind him of a topic/story that he could write about and then send him off—problem solved, right.
Well, kind of.
It’s true that you have solved his problem of not knowing what to write about, but the child won’t know how to solve it by himself next time. Solving the problem in this way might be easier, but the problem is that you’ve only solved the problem for the moment. You will continue to have that student (and others like him) look towards you when they don’t know what to write about. That will take kids away from writing and you away from conferring in more in-depth ways. You can’t help kids improve the quality of their writing if you are just helping them come up with ideas.
In reality, you’re only putting a band-aid on the problem.
In a well-managed Writing Workshop, teachers are always mindful of solving problems in a way that doesn’t just put a band-aid on the problem that is happening in that moment.
In the above scenario, rather than just help the kid find a topic, I would share some strategies of how he could solve the problem of not knowing what to write about on his own (reread old writing, think about topics that he knows a lot about, look at other books to get ideas) and then ask the child to choose one of these strategies to try that day with my help.
Finally, I would end the conference by letting the child know that the next time he struggled with coming up with a topic, he should try that strategy (or other strategies) on his own.
Keep in mind that whatever the problem is, (I don’t know what to write about…how do you spell _____________________? I am finished. What should I do next?) it’s going to feel easier to just solve the problem for them and be done with it.
I strongly recommend that you fight that instinct and instead slow down and teach towards these problems in ways that help kids see how they can solve them in the future on their own.
2. Be proactive:
At times, it’s great to think about the problems that might occur before they even happen and then try to teach in a way that avoids the problem all together. Last week, I was in Lorena’s second grade classroom. At the end of her writing minilesson, she had the kids think about what they were going to write and then turn and practice that idea out loud to a friend. Before she had them turn to a partner she said, “Now if you are not sure what you’re going to write about today ask your partner to go first. I’m sure if you hear what he/she is writing about it will help you think of a topic.”
Sure enough, there were a few kids who didn’t know what to write about, but they followed their teacher’s advice and it became a non-issue. I recommend that you take some time and reflect on problems you know that kids have during Writing Workshop. Then, think of some possible solutions and do what this teacher did: Try and solve it before it even becomes a problem.
3. Get comfortable with silence:
Sometimes the solution is easier than we think—just stop talking and give them time to figure it out on their own. ☺
This same teacher had one child who still didn’t know what to write about. Rather than jumping in and talking to the child, she solved the problem with silence. She said, “Why don’t you go back to your seat and give yourself a moment to think? I have a feeling that will help.”
The student went back to his seat and the teacher –as she always did-spent the first few minutes watching the kids but not talking to them.
Sure enough, when she went to check in with him after a few minutes of silence, he had thought of an idea and happily started to make his book. Because we’re in the habit of helping, I often see teachers jumping in to solve problems that really could be solved by the kids if they just had some time and some quiet moments to process.
Letting the kids solve problems on their own has many benefits. One, it will help the kids realize that if they are patient with themselves they can actually solve problems on their own. Additionally, by not solving the problem you are actually empowering them in huge ways. Think of how good it feels to solve something on your own that you weren’t sure you could. That’s exactly how kids feel when they do it. If we always solve their problems for them, we rob them of that amazing feeling! Don’t rob them of this. 
Embrace the silence and empower kids to solve problems on their own!
As you move into November, I suggest that you reflect upon these seemingly simple management techniques and ensure that they are in place. If they are not, slow down and work on them because if you don’t it will be nearly impossible to move into more in-depth teaching.
Many teachers are moving into Units of Study such as personal narrative, small moments, persuasive writing, and non-fiction to name a few. On top of that, they are trying to align these units of study with the Common Core Standards. This will be impossible if the kids are unable to work independently.
Please add other management tips to this list that have helped you to run a Writing Workshop where kids joyfully and independently make decisions that ultimately improve their writing and allows for in-depth teaching inside your Units of Study.
Copyright, 2011
Independent Writers
Creating independent writers is essential!
There are many things that kids need to be able to do in order to work independently during Writing Workshop, but below are two that are especially important at the start of the year. They are:
1. Kids need to be able to make wise decisions that help them do quality work throughout the entire Writing Workshop.
2. Kids need to be able to gather and clean up their supplies quickly and without teacher intervention.
I had the opportunity at the start of this year to work with a great team of teachers and administrators from Danbury, CT and together we have been looking at a few different factors that can support kids in becoming independent in both of these ways. In this blog post, I want to share a few things that we discovered.
Create Charts with your kids
While kids are working during Writing Workshop, they’ll have to make many decisions to ensure they are productive the entire time. Some of these decisions are:
1. What do I do if I think I’m finished?
2. What do I do if I don’t know what to write about?
3. What do I do if I don’t know how to spell a word?
Teachers can teach kids how to solve these problems (as well as others) on their own by creating charts with their kids that outline a few possible solutions. I used the words ‘a few’ very purposely here. I think that too many options can be overwhelming, while giving only one option will not work for everyone every time. I love charts that have 3-4 options on them because I find that it gives kids some structure while still expecting them to be autonomous. Kids are also more likely to use the charts independently if there are both words and pictures used. A great blog to go for more information about that is www.chartchums.wordpress.com
Model how to use the charts:
It’s not enough to make the charts. If you want the charts to enable kids to be independent decision makers, you must model how to use the charts. For example, a teacher I worked with recently created a chart with her students about what to do if they thought they were finished writing. The chart had three possible decisions they could make:
1. Reread your writing and add to it.
2. Reread your writing and revise/edit it.
3. Start a new piece of writing.
Before she put the chart up in the classroom, she pretended like she was a first grade student, and was finished writing. She then modeled reading the chart and making a decision that enabled her to keep doing great work. After she had done that lesson a few times, she displayed the chart in the classroom and explicitly told the kids it was their job to use that chart to help them decide what to do when they thought they were finished.
Have charts move from grade to grade.
While visiting first and second grade classrooms in Danbury, CT, I was floored by how independent the kids were so early in the year. There were a few charts up around the classroom already and the kids were using them seamlessly to work independently and solve problems during Writing Workshop. What I discovered was that the charts that the kids were using in those first few weeks of school were created the year before in their Kindergarten classrooms. Those charts then moved with the kids to First Grade. Teachers often become aggravated because they know that kids learned something the year before, but the kids act as if they have forgotten. Having the charts from the previous year made what they learned crystal clear to everyone and it also helped both the teachers and the kids to hit the ground running.
Create Clutter Free Environments:
Another thing I noticed while visiting classrooms in Danbury, CT was how clutter free the classrooms were. The kids were easily able to get their supplies, as well as clean them up without teacher intervention. Because of this, the kids spent the majority of their time writing and the teachers spent their time differentiating instruction by conferring with individuals and small groups. What could be better than that?? The classroom only had the materials out that the kids were presently using and teachers had made sure that they had taught the kids how to use those materials. Materials that would be used later in the year or the teacher’s materials were stored away, making it easier for kids to use the room by themselves.
I hope that you’ll add more tips to this list, as well as share the successes and challenges you’ve discovered while trying to create independent writers.
In future blogs, I’ll talk about other aspects of independence.
Happy Weekend!
Leah
Copyright, 2011
Celebrations in the Writing Workshop By Paula Jensvold
My teammate and I spent the summer thinking and working on our curriculum calendar for the teaching of writing. We knew that we wanted it to be more specific this year so we began with one document that included both reading and writing units, goals for each unit, an approximate timing of the year and a list of books for each unit that we promise to use. As we were sitting in my kitchen feeling rather productive, I asked “Anything else we need to add?” She immediately said “I think we should add another column that makes a plan for celebrations.”
Celebrations! What an important part of any unit of study. I am reminded of a quote that I have heard Leah say more than once “It is not always fun to write, but it is fun to have written”. A celebration is not just about celebrating one final product but rather celebrating the learning that occurred throughout the writing process. It is a time to have children reflect, revise and edit good pieces of writing and turn them into great pieces of writing. It is a time to applaud children for having diligently written day after day; even when they felt stuck or were unable to write that “perfect” ending to a story. It is a time to provide both teachers and children with closure and an understanding that we have learned the most we can and it’s time to move on! Often times my favorite part of a unit is watching and listening to children as they get ready for an upcoming celebration. The classroom is often filled with whispers, smiles, a sense of pride and excitement! “Only two days until I get to share my story” says Emily, “I can’t wait”!
Here are a few things to think about when planning a writing celebration:
1. Mark the calendar with a celebration date well ahead of time so that the children know it is coming. Marking the calendar not only keeps them on track, but also you and puts a clear ending date to a unit.
2. Keep things simple. Stick to the same time frame that you would for a normal Writers’ Workshop. No need to block out extra time in the day.
3. Don’t forget that a celebration day should not only include children sharing a published piece, but also a time to clean out those writing folders and get ready for the next unit of study.
4. Celebrations should happen often enough that children are rejuvenated and excited about the writing process; ideally once every 4-5 weeks.
5. Don’t make the celebration bigger as you go through the year; just make it different and relevant to the unit of study!
Many of you are probably like my teammate and I…we seem to run out of those “different” ways to celebrate. So here are a few of our favorite ways to keep things fresh!
Simple and Easy!
It can be as simple as adding colors to pictures and a cover on the front of a book. As a whole group, have children share their favorite sentence in the story, or the title, and then split the children up into smaller groups to share their whole story. Small groups will enable your children to be good listeners and to finish in a timely manner. Add an apple juice toast to good writing, eat a chocolate covered strawberry and clean out those folders to be ready to start your next unit!
Lists, Letters, Signs and More!
We all have a guest teacher at some point in our year. Create an “Important Things to Know About Room ____” book after a Writing For Many Purposes unit. Have children publish in different types of writing: a list of greetings, a letter describing a class management plan, a sign to alert of any allergies or a business card to tell what a student is particularly good at. Place all pages of the book in a binder. The celebration will come the first time a guest teacher walks into the classroom and admires the book with the children.
Technology That Doesn’t Mean More Time For You!
If you teach children of the younger grades and have older children in your building, utilize them! Invite a class of fifth or six graders to sit with a younger writer at the computer. As the younger child reads their story, have the older student type. It might be helpful to have a template set up for the older student to follow. Encourage the older child to ask for input about font, size of font for the cover, etc. Already by just having sat at the computer, the younger child has shared their story aloud with another person.
Comments Please?
After each child has published, staple a “Comments Please” paper on the back of their piece of writing. Place all of the pieces of writing in front of the classroom and have pairs of children select one piece to read. After they have read the writing, have them place a comment on the back. It is important to model this and perhaps even make a list of things that they have learned to do during this unit of study. Remind the children that comments should relate to what they have been working on in Writers’ Workshop.
Lights, Camera, Action!
Get those flip cameras out! After children have finished a unit of poetry and gone through the revision process, record them reading their favorite poem (it is often fun to have a few costume/attire pieces such as hats, glasses, etc that a poet might wear). After you have recorded everyone, show the clips to the whole class. Add a croissant while you are watching and they will really feel like poets!
Dear________.
If you have just finished an author/mentor text study, instead of having your children publish a piece from the unit, have them write letters to the author describing something that they learned by studying the author’s books.
There are so many more ways to have your children share published work….so add a comment to the blog about how you publish and then keep reading the blog to get others’ ideas. In a short time, we will all have that column on our curriculum calendars filled in for the upcoming school year!
Copyright, 2011
Some thoughts about the first few days of school
Most of you are probably back to school now so I wanted to take this opportunity to wish you the happiest of new years!
The start of the year for teachers is always an exciting, but stressful time.
There are cubbies to label, bulletin boards to put up, first days to plan, read alouds to choose, yearlong calendars to revise….
The list goes on and on.
Teachers are busy and stressed and excited all at once during these early days because there are so many things that seem important about starting the year and usually it’s in a teacher’s personality to want everything to be just right.
It is helpful to remember on those particularly long first days that we’re thinking and planning and determining what’s important through our own eyes……the eyes of an educator.
For a moment let’s take off that lens and instead of looking at the start of year through our own eyes let’s look at it through the eyes of two students, my four-year-old niece and five- year -old nephew. Both are at the starts of their school years and they reminded me that what kids and teachers think about during those early days are so different.
Here is part of the email that my sister-in-law sent me yesterday to let me know how school orientation had gone for them.
Vince and Celia had their orientations this week and they both did great. No surprise, Vince is very excited about Kindergarten and riding the bus to the Pittaway School for his extended day in the afternoon. He had a tour of his building and seems very comfortable and ready.
Celia had her orientation today and it went really well. I had to leave her in the classroom with some other kids and the teachers for the parent orientation and that was rough. Full red face, wet eyes and clinging but she didn’t cry. She knows the teachers from visiting with Vince and they were great. They were able to distract her long enough for me to run out. When I got back almost an hour later, she was all smiles. She had a great time. She was a little bashful saying goodbye to the teachers and when we went out into the hall she froze and wouldn’t leave. She looked up at me and said, “But mommy that’s my friend!” She then turned and went back to say good-bye to Madison. (Celia doesn’t say good bye to people she knows usually so I was stunned to see her do this)
Then it was my turn for wet eyes. Vince’s old teacher was in the hall and saw her do this. She welled up too and gave me a big thumbs up when Celia wasn’t looking.
We walked around the building and went to the playground for a bit and then she skipped to the car saying, “I love it here! I can’t wait to go to school!”
What did I learn from switching my lens and looking at the first day of school through the eyes of two of my favorite students?
What mattered to Vince? That’s obvious. He gets to take the bus to the Pittaway School for extended day. What could be more exciting to a five –year- old than that? It’s the first time he is traveled without an adult he knows and by doing so he is creating his own independent life. I learned firsthand how important this independent life was to him when I asked him a few weeks ago if I could come do Writing Workshop in his Kindergarten classroom during the upcoming year. He clearly wanted to protect his independence and tried to spare my feelings by telling me that it would be a long ride from Hoboken (where I live) to his school in Ashland. I pushed a little further and reminded him that I could sleep over his house the night before to ease my traveling burden. His answer was a polite but clear no!
Sniff sniff…
And what’s important to Celia? For her it was making a new friend named Madison. Celia has been talking about having friends for a few months now. She said that she had a friend at camp and when I asked her what her name was she said that she didn’t know because she hadn’t spoken to her. It was clear this summer that she had heard about having a friend but didn’t quite get what that meant. On her first day of school, Celia not only made a new friend, but she also, for the first time, truly understood what it meant to have a friend and how a good friend can enrich your life and even make you want to go back and give a good bye hug.
I hope that by looking through those first days through the eyes of students it eases your stress just a bit.
Maybe the color of that bulletin board isn’t as important as it seems.
The kids will live if your first Read Aloud isn’t perfect.
That first Writing Workshop probably isn’t as important to them as it seems to you.
They’re probably too busy thinking about buses, extended days and new friends to even notice…….
How is the start of the year going? I would love to hear stories through both your eyes and your students.
Copyright, 2011
Balancing Planning and Listening
Happy school year to some and almost new school year to others!
Over the past few years, I’ve been thinking a lot about the relationship between two vital parts of teaching:
1. Creating thoughtful plans for a year, a month and a day of teaching
2. Conducting daily assessments of your kids and then using these assessments to teach in a more organic/less planned out way.
What have I learned? In a nutshell, it’s hard to find the right balance between these two vital parts of being a good teacher.
Planning for a reading and writing workshop is essential. I find that when teachers don’t do any long term planning they have a difficult time knowing where they are going and/or reaching any sort of agreed upon outcomes. Planning is especially important now for many of my schools because they are trying to align their unit plans with the Common Core Standards. On the other hand, even when you have a cohesive plan you don’t really (or you shouldn’t) know what you’ll be teaching in reading and writing workshop on any given day because what kids say or do in your classroom will reveal understandings and confusions that may not be included in your already existing plan.
I have found that when teachers teach from a plan that is too scripted they often forget to watch their kids and they are less aware of what their students are learning or not learning. Even if they do notice confusions or understandings, at times they’re more focused on ‘getting through the planned lessons’ than addressing what they see.
It really is so hard to find the right balance!
I learned firsthand how difficult finding this was a few years while I was working with Millie’s first grade classroom. Millie and I had carefully created a plan for her small moment unit of study. We had not only planned out every lesson for every day, but we had also planned our exact methods for how we would teach each lesson. On that particular day I had done a lesson off our plan on how good writers think about what part of the story is important and add more to that page. Even though the lesson was very clear, many kids still seemed confused and didn’t know what else to say about the important part. When I conferred with Angus things got even more frustrating. Angus told me that the most important part of his story was when he collected shells on the beach with his mom. When I tried to get Angus to add more to that important page, he point blank told me no. I kept repeating the teaching point from the lesson over and over again and he kept telling me I was wrong. Finally, when I stopped trying to keep to my plan and listened to him he told me that he didn’t need to add more to the ‘collecting shells’ page. Rather, he needed to add another page to the end of his story because at the end of the day he took all of the shells he had found on the beach home with him. What I realized from listening to him was that he was right. He didn’t need to add more to the shell page. He could show that collecting the shells was important by ending his book with taking the shells home.
I realized from our interaction that adding more about the important part was more complicated than my writing lesson had suggested. I couldn’t have planned for that. I could only figure that out by working with students and listening to what they said.
Thankfully, I took a detour from the carefully laid out plan and did a few more days on how to add more to the important parts of your story—one of those lessons being that you can circle back to the important part at the end and I used Angus’s small moment story to teach that.
There you see it…the tension between planning and listening. I had a plan for my small moment unit that looked good on paper but that plan was not enough to grow my students as writers. I had to listen to my students and realize that what I had planned was inappropriate and not enough for many of them and certainly much more complicated than I had originally thought.
As we enter into another exciting school year, I want to offer four tips on how to create unit plans and organize your class for writing and reading, while at the same time watching and listening to your students.
1. Plan some teaching ideas, but don’t over plan
When I conduct planning sessions with teachers I do not suggest a day-by-day plan nor do I suggest that you plan 28 minilessons for 28 days. Why? When planning, you might think that it will take just one day to address a particular concept. You might end up being right, but there is just as good of a chance that once you watch your kids interacting with the concept you’ll realize that they need more instruction. You’ll want your plan to easily accommodate for that.
Also, just as you saw with Angus sometimes you come up with lessons that weren’t part of your original plan based upon listening to your students.
2. In your planning sessions, anticipate problems that might arise
I think it’s helpful to not just plan your minilessons, but to also think about possible pitfalls and problems. Once you’ve considered what problems might come up, you can then try to be proactive and imagine possible conferences and small group work that you could do during the study that might address these issues.
Will those problems definitely occur? Of course not, but if they do you have come up with ways to differentiate throughout the unit.
3. Plan collaboratively
Four heads is better than one head. One of the things that has improved my teaching the most is the realization that everybody’s brain thinks differently and that everyone in a planning session has something interesting to offer. For example, I’m a very big idea person so in a planning session I can often help with that. My mind doesn’t however naturally consider details so it’s always great for me to be in a planning session with someone who does because they remind me of some of the details that I would have forgotten if I were planning on my own.
I also suggest that you plan reading and writing units with people that you might not typically work with. When I worked with Lucy Calkins at the Reading and Writing Project, she always suggested that we plan and teach with unexpected people. It’s easy to plan with only like-minded people. It’s more challenging (and usually worthwhile) to plan with people who go about things in a slightly different manner. I live by the mantra that most teachers want to do what’s right for kids even if we disagree with what that actually is.
Just like it’s important to listen and learn from our students, I find that when I listen closely to people who think differently from me I usually learn something as well and it definitely enhances my unit plans
4. Observe your class at the start and end of Writing/Reading Workshop
Don’t forget to plan for time to watch your kids throughout the unit. I suggest that teachers begin and end their writing and reading workshop with a few minutes of just watching the kids. I let the kids know that I am not talking to them during this time but just watching how they work and how they solve their problems on their own. This careful listening and watching gives me lots of food for thought because I can see what they mastered and what confusions I still need to untangle.
I would love to hear from you. What types of planning do you find helpful? How do you ensure that you plan in a way that allows for flexibility and assessment?
Leah
Copyright, 2011