I love what chapter 7 says about being "present" and "out among the workers" while your students are participating in writing workshop. So many times you see teachers who use writing workshop as an extended planning period or (a less-horrifying scenario) as a time to pull students for random individual instruction. Yes, it is a time to work individually on students, but about their writing.
It is humorous to look at the sense of control teachers fear losing with writing workshop. We don't know what to do with ourselves when students are all working individually on slightly different things and are at different places in their work. We have to learn to roll with it and stay with the students as much as possible.
I really like the idea of the 2 specific places in the room for writing workshop- one where everyone comes together and another where students know they can go to spread out. In my classroom, the students meet at their "smartboard" spots when they meet as a class, and they have assigned seats. When they spread out to take tests or work on something as complete individuals (aka: no help from neighbors) they go to their assigned area. Some are at tables, some at desks, and some on the floor. While they are assigned, I'm sure they could switch if need be.
In chapter 8 I like how they do not shy away from admitting creating a writing workshop in the classroom can be a daunting task that is both difficult and time consuming, but as I read this I am brought back to one of the first chapters in which they stressed that writing workshop will be nowhere near perfect the first, second or even tenth time you try, but all you have to do is put in the effort and keep trying and you will see results. Students will be at many different points in their writing, on different topics, in different genres etc and it is not our job at teachers to have a complete handle on it- that would be insane. We just have to give them guidance and be there when they need us. (Kind of sounds like parenting)
Moral of chapter 8: Relax. Writing is messy.
Publish or Perish! haha love this, especially because I realize how easy it is to start something and how incredibly difficult it can be to finish it, writing especially. It is very difficult to put ourselves out there and say "okay, look at this, I made this, it is all me, and its done, complete, ready to be critiqued!" ahh that's so scary! At least with a draft you can always say "well I'm still in the process of fixing it, editing it." But a final draft is final... or so it seems. But I love the idea of giving students a deadline and have them work towards it. OF course their writing will never be perfect, but get it as close as you possibly can to perfect, or what you want it to be, by that date. I like the idea that this is very similar to an author-publisher relationship.
And I could go on forever, this book is so insightful! Ill call it a night right there though :)
This post was fun to read - I like the "Moral" of chapter 8. So true. Writing is messy (as is learning in general). This is nothing we should be overly anxious about. It is to be expected, even welcomed.
ReplyDeleteIt is hard to finish a piece. It's fun to have the new rush of ideas, start a piece and enjoy writing through it. It takes a lot of persistence to see something all the way through.