Students as Initiators of Writing

            An idea that has really stood out to me lately is developing students into initiators of writing.  Previously I’ve never thought of this a goal for teaching writing, but after reading Carl Anderson’s book “Assessing Writers” I really believe that this is a really important goal and purpose when teaching writing to students.  As we talked about in class some teachers use the writer’s workshop format for teaching writing and some do not.  I’ve been struggling with how you can develop students into initiators of writing without using the writing workshop format.  In my practicum classroom the students are introduced to a skill or genre on Monday and work on a writing assignment involving the topic for the rest of the week.  Although my cooperating teacher tries to provide the students with as much freedom and choice as she can, the curriculum and restrictions from her principal don’t seem to allow students to initiate writing.  Anderson emphasizes the importance of the characteristics of a lifelong writer saying, “A writer who initiates writing is someone who understands that the written word has the power to do things in the world, that writing is a way to achieve many important purposes” (16).  I can’t wrap my head around how students learn that writing can do something when they are always writing hypothetical writing assignments that have a sole purpose of meeting the requirements for the assignment.  

     For instance, I just watched students complete an assignment on writing dialogue.  The assignment was short and the students could write about anything they wanted.  I think that the lesson lacked any real purpose other than showing they could use the skill of writing with dialogue.  Therefore in the future, I don’t feel that the students would initiate writing with dialogue because they didn’t really learn how can writing with dialogue can help them accomplish something.  I think that it would have been more beneficial to present dialogue within a context that showed the impact it can have in writing.  I think that one way to help students become initiators of writing is to anchor as much writing into real world experiences as possible.  This will show students how they can have a voice and how they can use it.  I think that this takes a lot of creativity and hard work in order to align activities with writing standards, but it will benefit student learning and motivation.  I have never really thought about teaching students to initiate writing, but now I think it might be the most important goal as a teacher of writing.  If you teach students to become initiators of writing I feel that all of the other essential skills and strategies will develop naturally as necessary tools to accomplish their goal.

     I think that this is something that will take a lot more thought and experience in order to determine the true benefits and path for developing students into genuine initiators of writing.  It seems difficult to teach because it is more implicit, and would have to be laying underneath.  I want to keep researching this and think about it more!

Let me know what you think! Thanks!

Kate

Think Alouds

My first go at a Think Aloud…FAILURE! Okay that might be a little drastic, but it was not as easy or successful as I thought it would be.  Honestly, I think I went into developing a think aloud and implementing it with kind of a know-it-all attitude and it definitely put me in my place really quick.  I learned a significant amount about both of my readers and about myself as a reading instructor.  I think that this is a great strategy to implement in the reading classroom because I believe that teaching students the skills to really get into a story and engage with it is so important to develop students into people who love and value reading.

My Think Aloud covered monitoring skills, focusing on making predictions, connections, and clarifications about the text.  I conducted it with two students who are struggling readers.  We have been consistently working on improving comprehension skills and I thought it would be best to focus on these three to begin with.  I didn’t want to overwhelm the students with strategies, but I wanted to give them a choice of what they could share.  My goal for this think aloud was mainly to help both students develop skills for thinking about the text as they are reading, rather than focusing on sounding out the words that they don’t know.  Both students are really working hard at their skills for reading, but in the process focusing on what they are learning from the text falls short until they have fully gotten through it.

I think that my modeling could have been more explicit in pointing out what I was doing.  I think I chose good places to stop because I did provide the students with significant connections, predictions, and clarifications that I was making while I was reading.  However, the students weren’t able to clearly connect what I was saying with what they were supposed to try out.  The think-along phase probably was the most successful part of the lesson.  I had students give me a peace sign at any time they wanted to think aloud about the text and that was my cue to stop at the end of the sentence to allow them to share.  Both students contributed freely and often, however they mostly shared connections and ideas they had about the text.  They rarely provided predictions and they clarified a couple of times.  As I tried to lead into the student practice with teacher support and self responsibility phase I soon realized that the book I had chosen was way too difficult for them.

I let the students choose between two picture book biographies and they book decided to read Harry Houdini: The Legend of the World's Greatest Escape Artist and I soon realized that the wording was too difficult for the students, especially when one of them pointed it out to me.  Both students were working hard at trying to get through the sentences, which in turn didn’t allow them the energy or effort to put into thinking about the text and their own reading strategies.  I think that another downfall of our think aloud was that I didn’t give the students as much direction as I think they needed. 

At first I thought I didn’t want to direct their attention too much and I wanted to see what they were noticing in the reading.  However, I think that both of the students would have benefited from think aloud prompts.  I found some good ones on the Internet and some that I have thought of that I think I will try out when we do this again.

·      What do you think will happen next?

·      Let’s think about what’s going on here.  What do you think ­­­(character) is thinking right now?

·      Try to visualize this part.  What do you see?

·      So far I’ve learned…

·      I wonder why…

https://icon.uiowa.edu/d2l/lms/content/viewer/view.d2l?tId=3141942&ou=2336925

Overall both students seem more confident about making personal connections to the text than asking questions, making predictions, or making clarifications.  This is great because I can tell that they are really trying to understand the text in a way that works for them.  But I really want to try to work on developing these other strategies too!  I think that choosing a book where they won’t struggle through the sentences as much will definitely help and working through the modeling more slowly and stopping to explain what I’m doing will also help.  I was really surprised at how hard it was to describe what we were doing in a way that the students would understand and be able to try it out, but I was really happy by their enthusiasm and determination to read through the book even though it was too difficult for them.  I think that the strength I have in using this strategy is determining what to point out and notice aloud with the students in a natural genuine way.

I am going to try this again with my students on Monday because I really think that they can get a lot more out of the think aloud than they did on Friday.  They both wanted to read the other book I gave as an option also and I think that it is a better option to help them focus on the reading strategies and thinking aloud.  I learned that the two readers that I am consistently working with are both good at determining what is important in the text, but they zero in on those things instead of also thinking about the details that can teach us more about the story.  I want to work with them on emphasizing the importance of immersing yourself in a story and taking your time to work through it instead of always trying to get through it as efficiently as possible.  I definitely learned that doing a think aloud successfully takes practice!!!  Also I learned that that the students can’t learn these strategies in one day.  I think that a think aloud will be most absorbed and ingrained if it is done frequently and consistently.

I think it is a great strategy, I just need to work at it in order to learn how to do it successfully!

Thanks!

Kate

Inquiries

From the first time I started thinking about a topic I really want to learn about this semester, I have been overwhelmed with ideas.  There are so many things that I want to learn about to make teaching literacy as genuine and significant as possible.  However, I knew I needed to pick one thing to focus on.

I am really interested in figuring out the best ways to connect with students through literacy.  I really believe that in order for students to reach their learning potential teachers need to find different ways to really reach their students.  When I think about it realistically though, I image myself bringing a lesson that I think will really help me connect with students and help make their learning more genuine.  And then I image that same lesson completely failing when it’s actually attached to students.  So I want to figure out different ways to do this that are genuine and will actually be successful.

Because I’ve never looked into this or really read anything about education other than what I have read in my classes I’m not sure what scholars I will be reading in order to really learn about how to reach students.  If anyone has any suggestions, please send them my way!  I think that something specific that I would like to investigate is reaching students by connecting literacy to real life.  I think I will be trying to figure out what works and what doesn’t with the students I work with in my practicum classroom.  From working with them I have learned that they are much more focused on the lesson and engaged when they are interested in the lesson.  I am going to try to develop lessons that I think my students will be excited to learn about and really look at the differences of the connections that students make. 

The main question I want to consider is, How can I help students make connections from literacy to their real lives in ways that are authentic and make sense?  I don't want to force it because then I don't think that students will make deep, meaningful connections that will stay with her.  I'm kind of all over the place with this idea and curiosity right now.  I think that as I look into it and read about it, I will be able to focus in and really figure out exactly what I want to know.

Until then!

Kate