We use mentors to help students become better writers. We want these mentors to teach them and inspire them and moving their writing forward in ways that our mini-lessons and conferences alone could not accomplish. But we also want to use mentors to help students develop a thriving and lasting writing life. If writing is […]
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The “Data” that Writing Workshop Works Part II
I was surprised to see him in the doorway of my classroom, holding a piece of computer paper. “Steve! It’s so good to see you. How’ve you been?” It was 3:00 on a Tuesday. I wondered why he wasn’t at practice. A star baseball player, Steve isn’t the kind of student who hangs around after […]
Mentor Text Wednesday: Mentor Text Anchor Charts
All year long we have been working backwards. In our genre-driven workshop, we have always begun with a genre, figured out how it works, and searched for an idea to fit it. But now that my students have a command of several genres and an understanding of the varying purposes and audiences of each, they are […]
Year-End Digital Writing Portfolio
As our students end the year, they are preparing their final assessment — a portfolio of their work this year. Writing portfolios are nothing new, but as we thought about how we should structure the portfolio and what it should include, we considered, Since our students have submitted all of their work digitally this year, […]
An End-of-the-Year Mentor Text Workshop
You know those last two weeks of school when you feel like you’re in limbo? It’s not enough time to start another unit, and yet what to do during class while students are prepping for exams and compiling writing portfolios? I am spending two weeks (nine, 45-minute class periods) on a workshop on mentor […]
Encouraging Revision: Advice for Teachers from a Student Writer
In April, my returning creative writers choose from one of two projects: write a novel, screenplay or book of poems in 30 days, or revise their novel from November. Catie, a senior, was the only student who chose revision. I wasn’t surprised. It’s hard to motivate students to revise! So I pressed her a bit, […]
Mentor Text Wednesdays: Dropbox Project Tutorial
Watch this short screencast below (click on the picture) to learn how to access and add to our Mentor Text Dropbox Project!
Dabbling in Standards-Based Writing Assessment
Teaching writing is not for the faint-hearted. Assessing writing is even less so. For years, I have struggled in vain to find the perfect system — “objective” one-size-fits-all trait-based rubrics, rubrics I have created, rubrics my students have created. None ever seems to accurately measure what I see in a student’s writing. And while I […]
Mentor Text Wednesday: Creating Writers not Writing Automatons
Can we agree that we hate the five paragraph essay? Every time I confer with a student who says, “Well, I have two body paragraphs, but I need one more”, I shudder. FIVE IS NOT A MAGIC NUMBER has become my mantra. I’m thinking about making a poster to hang in the front of my […]
A Lesson for Tomorrow: Writing Like Crime Scene Investigators
I cringed as I listened to a former student explain how her teacher grades discussion. “You have to talk three times to even be graded,” she said, swirling the last inch of iced coffee in her plastic cup. “And you can’t ask questions. Questions show that you haven’t thought something through enough to talk about […]
moving writers 