A Writer's State of Mind

I started reading Penny Kittle’s Write Beside Them year or two ago when I first acknowledged that my approach to writing was not working for me or my students. I was bored and hated reading their essays, and they hated writing them. I did what I normally do when I’m stuck in my teaching, talk to friends and troll Amazon. When I started the book, I bought into her ideas on a superficial level. Yes, writing teachers should write, use mentor texts, and inspire students to write about topics in which they are passionate. At the time, though, I didn’t see how I could do that. I was overwhelmed juggling 4 different grade levels of English. After several chapters, I sat the book on my bookshelf; it collected dust.

A few days ago, I started Kittle’s book again. And this time, my experience is completely different. Below are some of the big takeaways from Kittle’s book:

• The process of writing and teaching writing is messy. In other words, there’s no one standardized approach that will magically make kids become better writers.
• Writing teachers must show kids how to write, teach the tools of good writing. Many teachers, including myself, assign writing.
• Kids learn about writing from studying authors. Mentor texts are a key part of a writing class.
• Student choice matters, a lot.

Now that I am writing everyday, workshopping my pieces, and sharing my writing, I am more open to writing with my students. Kittle’s ideas seem much more feasible. I’m in a writer’s state of mind.

Some Thoughts on Assessing Writing with Rubrics...

Last week I started thinking about how I assess writing. In the past, I’ve used rubrics that focus on specific parts of the writing. For example, an essay rubric would have the following categories: evidence and elaboration; organization; ideas; and grammar/mechanics. Developing the criteria for the differences between an A and B, or 5 points and 4 points, feels like splitting hairs! Even while grading, I’d come across writing that did not fit the neat criteria outlined in the rubric I created. It seems silly to break writing down into such discrete parts when we don’t read that way. I read holistically, taking in the whole piece. So why should I break down a piece into discrete categories to grade it? There must be a better way to assess writing...

New Thoughts on Teaching the Writing Process

One idea that developed from Joe’s demonstration lesson about writing routines and processes has stuck with me. As we shared our writing routines and processes, it came to my attention that we, teachers, write very differently from the way we teach our students. For example, my process is very recursive. I write a paragraph, revise, edit and then move to the next paragraph. Despite my process, I always insist that my students complete a full draft before revising or editing. The writing process that I teach is very structured and linear: brainstorm → draft → revise→  edit→ publish. In reality, I think the writing process is more cyclical. This realization spurs me to approach writing in a new way in the upcoming school year. In particular, I would like to try the following:

• Help my students reflect upon their writing routine and process.
• Affirm my students’ routines and processes, especially the ones that yield positive results.
• Model various writing strategies, such as setting goals, free-writing to uncover ideas, etc.
• Encourage students to try different routines, such as listening to classical music as they write, writing on the floor instead of sitting at a desk, to name a few.

Who needs A Fountain of Youth? All you need is the NVWP ISI!

Who needs A Fountain of Youth? All you need is the NVWP ISI!

Enthusiasm, passion, and fun are all words that come to mind when thinking about the first week of the NVWP Summer Institute.  It started out with so many new ideas to explore and people to talk to and it just kept on getting better.  I have not written so much, so quickly in different genres in years.

 I did not know what I would write about during Morning Pages but that blank page is not attractive and, after some tentative scribbling, I quickly filled it up. Writing during Morning Pages made me feel like I was a boy again, just writing for the fun of it. I had forgotten the experience of just writing, of what it was like to write about what I wanted to write and not for someone else, whether they are student, fellow teacher or administrator.  Morning Pages was like a Fountain of Youth, taking me back to the days when I was just a little kid with a big yellow note pad, a pencil and all morning to fill it up. 

Then there were the demonstration lessons. I learned new ways of brainstorming from Maggie and writing descriptions from Janice Jewell. With a nod to Stanley Kubrick and Dr. Strangelove, I learned to stop worrying and love illustration during April Sommers’ presentation.  Gabbie showed me how I could use some of the techniques she employs with her ESOL students with my struggling 11^th graders. Amy’s lesson even helped me understand better the struggles of my wife, who moved frequently during her childhood.  Last but not least, Sarah’s lesson not only gave me plenty of ideas to use as I teach process but the idea for a yearlong study of the effectiveness of teaching strategy and process in improving the writing of  adolescents. 

What a week!  I even started writing something I had wanted to for years.  And, where else do you have a chance to read the first draft of a short story by Mark Farrington?

Responding to Student Writing

A significant portion of my teaching involves my written responses to student writings. I find it’s one of the best ways for me to teach each student as an individual. What are some of the goals you have in responding to student writing? (In the interests of fairness, I must confess that I don’t grade individual pieces of writing, so I don’t need to include in my response some explanation of why I gave the writing a C instead of a B, for instance.)

                                                                                                  Mark