via Guest Post: The Authentic Writing Process
This post discusses the power of Writing Workshop. “Writing is never finished, it’s only due.”
Category: Writing Process Explained
write now
It’s 12:15 PM on November 10th. Do you know where your NaNoMo novel is? Yeah, about that. Good intentions aside, I have done everything but just sit and type. I made a video. Updated grades. Reheated a bowl of chili mac (that will come back to haunt me), and read a few Tweets.
But two things grabbed my brain this morning:
- The epiphany that teachers enjoy creating lessons for themselves and having agency, just like students. This has nothing to do with the rest of the post directly, just needed to remember this.
- We must flip reading around to writing, or balance it much better.
For some time now, my professional opinion held the research of the National Writing Project that writing helps us become better readers. Reading helps us become better writers, too, but somehow that message got lost in translation.
Summaries, Claim, Evidence and Reasoning paragraphs, Short Answer Responses, etc. are not ‘writing instruction.’ They are a form of writing, of course, living in the Land of Explanatory, formulaic, structured texts, but alas, really do not help or support writing instruction.
And, as one who prides herself on good writing instruction, it’s hard. It’s really hard.
Until it’s not.
Do you know why middle school students give up on their writing lives? Well, wouldn’t you if no one really cared to hear what you had to say? If you didn’t get the answer “right” or scrambled madly for text evidence just to get the dang assignment done? (I asked my students this week if they ever just grab text evidence randomly and every one giggled and confessed yes.) This is not any teachers’ fault –not at all. I am recommending that we teach them how to find their OWN “text evidence” first. Their own stories, insights, moments, etc.
From The Real Reasons So Many Young People Can’t Write Well Today–An English Teacher
“A 2010 study by the Carnegie Corporation called Writing to Read found ample evidence that writing can dramatically improve reading ability. The authors discovered that combining reading and writing instruction by having students write about what they read, explicitly teaching them the skills and processes that go into creating text, and increasing the amount of writing they do results in increased reading comprehension as well as improved writing skill.”
I know this so well. This message is inscribed in my heart. I passed along Writing to Read to past administrators, who’ve come and gone, and I am not sure current ones want or need it. I’ll ask. In the meantime, I’ll take a look at works and reformulate them to fit the digital instruction:
The current test focuses so much on reading, it’s true, but not all of it. Here is the brief write portion of the test, just in case anyone wants it, (even new teachers).
Here is a lesson on memoir writing:
And the parallel writing structure:
Now I’d better go write my own story.
Best laid plans.
We broke rain records this year, no small feat considering the Seattle area maintains a well-deserved reputation of one of the soggiest places around. Drizzles, downpours, drenching or dollops–no matter the size of the drop, it’s wet. Personally, my older son and I share the love of the gray, goopy clouds. Whenever I think of our rain, inevitably Tom Robbins’ thoughts on rain come to mind. (Some works of fiction stain a lifetime.)
“And then the rains came. They came down from the hills and up from the sound. And it rained a sickness. And it rained a fear. And it rained an odor. And it rained a murder. And it rained dangers and pale eggs of the beast. Rain poured for days, unceasing. Flooding occurred. The wells filled with reptiles. The basements filled with fossils. Mossy-haired lunatics roamed the dripping peninsulas. Moisture gleamed on the beak of the raven. Ancient Shaman’s rained from their homes in dead tree trunks, clacked their clamshell teeth in the drowned doorways of forests. Rain hissed on the freeway. It hissed at the prows of fishing boats. It ate the old warpaths, spilled the huckleberries, ran into the ditches. Soaking. Spreading. Penetrating. And it rained an omen. And it rained a poison. And it rained a pigment. And it rained a seizure.”
― Tom Robbins, Another Roadside Attraction
Imagine the first clear, bright May day. A day after two days’ of testing. More days of testing to come. A moment in time–brief and elusive, but there. When we went outside for zombie tag, students felt so free they asked me to go outside again. Knowing I had hit on a currency I could use to all of our advantages, sure. In years past, we’ve gone outside for a Writing ‘rally,’ or as dubbed this year, a Walk’N’Write.
Here’s how it is supposed to work:
Students grab their composition notebooks, something to write with, a writing prompt slip (printed out and cut into strips). The ground rules are laid out clearly on the board, and repeated:
- Do not in any way cause any disruption. I don’t want to see my name in an email, hear from other staff members, see a passive-aggressive post on Facebook, be mentioned in ANY WAY, SHAPE OR FORM. Some student asked in disbelief if other teachers put other teachers “on blast” — yes, sadly. They do.
- Stay within earshot: I must be able to see you in the courtyard or the small field at all times.
- Try the prompts. Move after around ten minutes.
- They were allowed to take their cell phones if they wanted to take photo notes.
- Be prepared for an exit ticket (writing a reflection or expanding on an idea).
And, by golly, the majority of students did exactly all of these. They knew that the reason they were going outside was because they were so awesome during the zombie unit, and they earned trust to go outside again.
[embeddoc url=”https://mrskellylove.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/walk-and-write-slips-1mqplp1.docx” download=”all” viewer=”microsoft” ]
Here’s how it worked:
During the first class, one student found some chalk, and one drew a penis on the ground. I don’t know who it was, and I didn’t have anything to clean it up or didn’t think quick enough to grab a cup of water and wash it away. I saw it at the end of the time outside. Middle school students draw graffiti, and genitalia is one of their common art forms. Like cave paintings of beasts and hunts, their choice of symbolism and pictographs trend toward the representation of middle school angst and Maslow’s lowest levels of the hierarchy. Watch ‘Superbad’ if you don’t believe me.
The second misstep was in not confiscating the chalk. From what I saw, there was a small piece of it, I didn’t know where it came from, and moved on. I wish I had thrown it away because other students found it and drew more…things. Pentagrams. Hearts. Butterflies. Initials. And yes, from what admin told me, more genitals. I received an email rightly advising me to make sure students did not do this in the future. But I am still not clear whose students drew all of the drawings.
So now I’m left with the unenviable task of telling my students what happened and consequences. That they have to keep themselves in check, or we can’t go outside again. Some of my fourth-period students waved in other teachers’ classrooms, and when I reminded them that that was a disruption, one argumentative young man justified it by saying the other student waved first.
Sigh.
However, there was far more positive than not. Students wrote. The noticed details, the trash, the good, ugly, and emotions tied with their surroundings. They struggled and grappled with worldly metaphors. Many saw the courtyard with new eyes. They looked up from their phones or used them to take pictures for later writing. They enjoyed the sun on their faces and breathed fresh air. It gave them one of the most important strategies for creativity: look up.
Just…
…look up.
PS If you look closely at the picture, there is a big white square of chalk. Someone drew over the drawing. They had better things to draw.
Structure Series: Essays for the 21st Century
The five-paragraph essay is likened to learning the foundations of structure and organization critical to being able to write other organized pieces. There may be merit to this, however learning how to write something no one reads anymore may only serve to rust and crumble authenticity.
Might I offer some suggestions, or additions to the five-paragraph essay, especially for secondary students?
Consider these sites/links as mentor texts as well as powerful places to publish essays. Use examples of the essays written here and challenge students to compare their essays to these.
Some close reading/close writing ideas:
- Read for anecdotes: these may be strewn throughout the piece, or used in the beginning to provide humanity and context.
- Read for truth (personal truths), opinions (things that strive to persuade) and facts (quantifiable data)
- Read for thesis (claims)– but more importantly, read for ‘what question the writer is ‘answering’ — identify what prompted the piece, and what happened before and what might happen after is critical to consider the context of any essay.
- Identify where the author broke away from the standard “five paragraph essay” and where she may have taken some key pieces for organization — how does it begin? How is it concluded? What points are made in the middle?
- In the conclusions: analyze how the conclusion stacks up with leaving the reader with the desired outcome, whatever that may be. Does the conclusion provide wisdom, more questions, a summation of ideas? How? Why or why not?
Op-Ed Pieces from NY Times, Washington Post:
The Right Call: Yale Removes My Racist Ancestor’s Name From Campus
No, Robots Aren’t Killing the American Dream
In contrast, posted in Medium:
A warning from Bill Gates, Elon Musk, and Stephen Hawking
There is always more to the story. Consider what perspectives or voices are not being heard, what are the perceptions, and what is ‘stochastic terrorism’ —
From Quora:
These sites allow for curation and dialogue. Challenge students to find pieces that bounce against one another, the claims and counter-claims of 21st-century discussions. We are not sitting around dinner tables anymore, we are sitting in a web of ideas, and sometimes we are the prey: in this day and age, it is critical to not gloss over what is fake news, but to empower our students to consider and weigh the entire issues at stake. It is a monumental task but may mean life or death. Hyperbole? Not when others are reading conspiracy theories and threatening lives. Even if this isn’t factual–consider that some do believe it, and act accordingly.
Series: Elements of Structure Part 9: Parody & Satire
I think I would cease to function if I didn’t have my sense of humor.
Everyone thinks they have a sense of humor, but…
Humor is one of the most difficult mediums to write. One way to allow students to access their natural silliness is to introduce them to parody and satire.
Parody: intended to spoof by using humor based on an existing piece/genre
Satire: intended to criticize something or someone, often with humor, but not necessarily.
Is Monty Python Satire? (Click for a PDF)
Malcolm Gladwell’s podcast, Revisionist History (did I list that one, too!?) did a show on satire. The upshot is we Americans do a pretty terrible job at satire–it’s McWeaksauce sometimes–but is still important. I wonder what it says about the nation who invented stand-up can’t do satire as well? Hmm.
https://www.middleweb.com/29971/media-literacy-kids-in-the-middle-love-parody/
How would we go about introducing students to parody and satire? They are well-versed in memes and Youtube channels that provide so many examples and are masters at consuming media/humor. But how to create content? Perhaps I would pose the question to them: what angers, frustrates, or annoys them, and how would they like to create their own parodies? It’s important to point out parodies are not mean-spirited or bullying. What rules do they think are silly or goofy (I think the beloved yellow safety vest hall pass might their first target)?
And yes, while I think this is terrible, from a jester-level sense of humor, it is kind of funny:
From a historical standpoint, how has parody and satire changed the world? And it has, no doubt. Mocking rulers, institutions, sacred cows and laws, parody and satire help us all laugh so we don’t cry. And that makes us stronger.
Examples of Satire in Candide/Seattle PI Education Site
And of course: (PG 13 language)
This is something I’m going to try on very soon. We all could use a good laugh.
But sometimes it doesn’t feel good to be the butt of a joke.
Write-It-Right Wednesday
We are writers.
Writing serves my creative mania. In my classroom, historically, we write more than we read. Do I love books? Of course! Am I passionate and excited about passages, excerpts, themes, patterns, characters, and juicy plots? Naturally! But in my experience, if you truly want to a student, a person– to engage, spill their guts, bare their soul and express themselves, writing is it.
Write-It-Right Wednesdays are mini-lesson moments and writing workshop days. Mini lessons are those quick, here is a “thing you need to know” thing. Writing Workshop is a very different animal, and all I’ve learned is from my mentors Holly Stein and Kim Norton through the PSWP (part of the National Writing Project). The Puget Sound Writing Project is no longer, unfortunately, but Holly and Kim began a new venture, PSW Consortium.
Here is Writing Workshop:
- You write.
- Your students write.
- What do you write about? Whatever is on folks’ minds, part of the content, etc. Or what my friend Holly calls “Rule #10: write what you want.”
- Use images, news stories, personal anecdotes, objects, postcards, whatever.
- Writing is sacred time.
- If someone comes in the room to observe during this, they are asked to write, too.
- In small groups, each person takes a turn to read their writing. Nothing is in the listeners’ hands. Nothing.
- Second read: the listeners give feedback. Never, ever hand your writing over to someone else to read. Yes, it can get noisy. This is not about spelling or editing.
- The listeners take a few minutes to verbally give feedback, and hand over the feedback slips to the writer.
- The writer says “thank you.” That’s it. They can choose to take the listeners’ advice or not. This is important to teach in terms of preparing writers for criticism and to understand their own craft.
This is Holly’s Power Point. I hope she doesn’t mind me sharing it.
[embeddoc url=”https://blog0rama.edublogs.org/files/2016/07/writing-groups-intro-2adykru.pptx” viewer=”microsoft”]
Writing Partner Feedback Sheet I have a format in Publisher where I put these two up on a page, and double-side photocopy. This document contains the essential information.
[embeddoc url=”https://blog0rama.edublogs.org/files/2016/07/Writing-Partner-Feedback-Sheet-16fq66g.docx” viewer=”microsoft”]
For the grammar lessons, I may try to use Grammarly in the classroom.
Here is an example from a student from a memoir unit:
And for heaven’s sake, start a writing blog for your students: http://poetryclub.edublogs.org/
Update: Two Writing Teachers wrote a great piece on Writing Workshop. Read and keep.
CCSS + Writing Instruction Reflection
If you read one article this summer, my mentor Holly might suggest this one:
Are modern standards breeding a decline in cultural literacy?
I highly recommend it, too.
This post is getting messy. Filled with bits of type and text, like overcooked alphabet soup. Consider it a link festival, full of rabbit holes and mad hatter tea parties. The question presented is now that CCSS is established in many states, what have we lost or gained?
Reminder to read and understand how to move forward with CCSS in ELA/SS:
Back in 2013, Dr. Gentry published an article, “Will Common Core Wreck Writing in Schools?”
First, I am wondering if we even have a sense of what is ‘teaching writing?’ It doesn’t seem to exist. There is the editorial/grammatical end to the whole language approach of ‘any mark is a good mark on the page’.
How Common Core Might Not Support Real Writing
Writing is shifting back to a product approach.
Students aren’t given choice of topics.
Children are forced to write from rubrics or templates that stifle creativity.
Ownership for children is out the window.
Common Core says every teacher is a writing teacher but we haven’t been trained to teach writing.
Teachers neither have the time nor the training for teaching the writing process.
Too much test prep and testing take time away from time for writing in school.
Our state writing test is based on strict rubrics and products—creativity doesn’t count.
Our state writing tests are scored by computers—add more sentences and the score goes up.
Teachers no longer teach conventions like spelling and handwriting.
Most of these fear seem to be the opposite outcome from Common Core. I’m not quite sure what the rumors were, or where the fears came from. But the testing part does seem to have some merit at first glance. Later this weekend I’ll be completing a Prezi that contains the brief write rubrics for Common Core writing assessments, and they are valuable for any content area.
Some of these fears are truly odd: since when have standards given students specific topics? And since when have standards ‘taught teachers how to teach writing?’
And on what metric is creativity? I’m not sure. I’m still a bit baffled.
Contrasting to Gentry’s article, the Atlantic published an article about how the CCSS revitalized and revolutionized writing in schools by Peg Tyre:
New Dorp’s Writing Revolution, which placed an intense focus, across nearly every academic subject, on teaching the skills that underlie good analytical writing, was a dramatic departure from what most American students—especially low performers—are taught in high school. The program challenged long-held assumptions about the students and bitterly divided the staff. It also yielded extraordinary results. By the time they were sophomores, the students who had begun receiving the writing instruction as freshmen were already scoring higher on exams than any previous New Dorp class. Pass rates for the English Regents, for example, bounced from 67 percent in June 2009 to 89 percent in 2011; for the global-history exam, pass rates rose from 64 to 75 percent. The school reduced its Regents-repeater classes—cram courses designed to help struggling students collect a graduation requirement—from five classes of 35 students to two classes of 20 students.
The critical difference between pre-CCSS and emerging CCSS is writing argumentative and explanatory pieces.
In the coming months, the conversation about the importance of formal writing instruction and its place in a public-school curriculum—the conversation that was central to changing the culture at New Dorp—will spread throughout the nation. Over the next two school years, 46 states will align themselves with the Common Core State Standards. For the first time, elementary-school students—who today mostly learn writing by constructing personal narratives, memoirs, and small works of fiction—will be required to write informative and persuasive essays. By high school, students will be expected to produce mature and thoughtful essays, not just in English class but in history and science classes as well.
The NCTE provides their take, which correlates to the analytical approach, and appears more inclusive instruction.
Writing grows out of many purposes
Writing is not just one practice or activity. A note to a cousin is not like a business report, which is different again from a poem. The processes and ways of thinking that lead to these varied kinds of texts can also vary widely, from the quick email to a friend to the careful drafting and redrafting of a legal contract. The different purposes and genres both grow out of and create varied relationships between the writers and the readers, and existing relationships are reflected in degrees of formality in language, as well as assumptions about what knowledge and experience are already shared, and what needs to be explained. Writing with certain purposes in mind, the writer focuses attention on what the audience is thinking or believing; other times, the writer focuses more on the information she or he is organizing, or on her or his own emergent thoughts and feelings. Therefore, the thinking, procedures, and physical format in writing are shaped in accord with the author’s purpose(s), the needs of the audience, and the conventions of the genre.
And the NWP weighs in with their suggestions for ‘teaching writing.’ I’ve labeled each suggestion to make sense of what skill it may be adressing.
NWP: 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing
Table of Contents: 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing
- Use the shared events of students’ lives to inspire writing. brainstorming/ideas
- Establish an email dialogue between students from different schools who are reading the same book. literary connections
- Use writing to improve relations among students. audience/purpose
- Help student writers draw rich chunks of writing from endless sprawl. organization
- Work with words relevant to students’ lives to help them build vocabulary. vocabulary/word choice
- Help students analyze text by asking them to imagine dialogue between authors. RAFTS (role, audience, form, topic, strong verbs)
- Spotlight language and use group brainstorming to help students create poetry. revising/craft
- Ask students to reflect on and write about their writing. self-assessment
- Ease into writing workshops by presenting yourself as a model. craft
- Get students to focus on their writing by holding off on grading. self-assessment
- Use casual talk about students’ lives to generate writing. brainstorming/ideas
- Give students a chance to write to an audience for real purpose.
- Practice and play with revision techniques. grammar/revision/editing –conventions/mechanics
- Pair students with adult reading/writing buddies. workshop/mentor
- Teach “tension” to move students beyond fluency. craft
- Encourage descriptive writing by focusing on the sounds of words.
- Require written response to peers’ writing. workshop/craft/revising
- Make writing reflection tangible. annotating, self-assessment
- Make grammar instruction dynamic. grammar/revision/editing –conventions/mechanics
- Ask students to experiment with sentence length.
- Help students ask questions about their writing. self-assessment
- Challenge students to find active verbs. RAFTS (role, audience, form, topic, strong verbs)
- Require students to make a persuasive written argument in support of a final grade. audience/purpose
- Ground writing in social issues important to students. audience/purpose
- Encourage the “framing device” as an aid to cohesion in writing. structure/craft
- Use real world examples to reinforce writing conventions.
- Think like a football coach. RAFTS (role, audience, form, topic, strong verbs)/mentor texts
- Allow classroom writing to take a page from yearbook writing. mentor texts
- Use home language on the road to Standard English. word choice/sentence fluency
- Introduce multi-genre writing in the context of community service. audience/purpose
Evolving from the fears of the CCSS writing standards to the present, what changes do you think have been most effective, and where are some areas educators are still confused? What is most beneficial to students, or is an understanding that writing is complex, and approach with patience and grace the most important thing?
Scholarly articles if you’re really bored this summer:
http://www.albany.edu/cela/publication/article/writeread.htm
http://readingandwritingproject.org/about/research-base
http://blog.penningtonpublishing.com/reading/twelve-tips-to-teach-the-reading-writing-connection/
Write now!
http://sho.co/embed/17FCLRecently our administration sent out a valuable PD article, ‘Write More, Grade Less: Five Practices for Effectively Grading Writing’ by Lisa Lucas. Having been a big believer in the quick write for years, this sparked a renewed interest in R.A.F.T.S. writing. In addition to our drabbles, R.A.F.T.S. prompts can be content-focused, creative, and imaginative. Middle school students, in particular, feel the squeeze away from creative writing and often freeze up. RAFTS are not new, but they are tried and true.
[embeddoc url=”https://mrskellylove.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/write_more_grade_less_llucas-2-1ry0a7u.pdf” download=”all” viewer=”google”]
And don’t forget about this! https://www.writeabout.com
Wrapping Up a Year…My Gift to You
As I begin to write out the last two weeks’ worth of lesson plans and agendas, it strikes me that I really don’t want this to be quite over. Yes, I can hear you all now, that you can’t WAIT to get out for summer vacation, not have to worry about a darn thing, and mentally and emotionally prepare yourselves for high school. Well, I’m looking forward to summer break, too. But it shouldn’t feel like this permanent boundary, that once crossed, you can never return. I haven’t taught 8th grade students before, and while I was teaching 7th grade, I had a pretty good idea that I would see most of you again. Now that you’re off to high school, this is when you will really need a friend, a mentor–I just wanted to let you all know I’m still here for you, so please email me, let me know how you are, and ask questions.
Some of the things we’ll be finishing up are:
- Writer’s Portfolio: In my overly ambitious attempt, I don’t think it will be possible to bind and laminate your writer’s resource guides, but you will have your Writer’s Portfolios, and those are still heavily graded.
- Make sure all missing assignments (blue sentence packet, set 1 and set 2 of the grammar vocabulary words, your burning questions summer reading list) are all completed by June 12. Grading begins then, and I must have my grades done before school is out.
- We will conference over the Writer’s Portfolios:
- We still need to add poetry
- We still need to add a small expository piece
So, write, write, write! Get your assignments done! Don’t worry, be happy!
Writing Process Review
The writing process is just that: a process. It’s okay to take a step back if you need to change or correct your work.
To get started, here are the steps:
- Pre-write: brainstorm, know who your audience is (your readers), know your purpose, and organize information. Overhead an interesting conversation? Heard a quote on TV or the radio, or found an interesting website or blog? Those can be inspiration for writing.
- Draft: Start organizing your ideas into topic sentences, supporting details, and create more solid sentences and paragraphs.
- Revising and Editing: Use your tools for making your writing better: a friend, a parent, read it out loud to yourself. Keep in mind the Six Traits: ideas, voice, word choice, sentence fluency, and conventions.
- Evaluate and Proofread: Check with a “fine toothed comb.” All of the punctuation, grammar and usage should be checked. Example: do you use an “&” when you should use “and?” Do you have fragments or incomplete sentences? Do your subjects and verbs match? (“I is the biggest girl” is incorrect — “I am the biggest girl” is right.)
- Publish: Whatever format you need to turn it in, make sure you follow the guidelines.
http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/
http://www2.pylusd.k12.ca.us/glk/jlaurich/Images/writing_process.gif
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/fine-toothed+comb
http://www2.pylusd.k12.ca.us/glk/jlaurich/StepUpToWriting.htm