Teaching Writing as a Process By Alicia Smith Stacey Wilson

This presentation was created by Alicia Smith and Stacey Wilson, Teacher Consultants, for the National Writing Project, as part of the 2014 Santee Wateree Writing Project.

The 5 Tenets  Teachers of writing should, themselves, write so that they are in touch with their own writing abilities.  Students should experience audiences other than the teacher as assessor. Other audiences include self, peer, and teacher as a partner in learning  Peer response groups can lessen the load of correcting papers and yet ensure that the students get ample writing experiences and constant feedback.  Students should be involved in the evaluation process.  Teachers should stress the written product less and emphasize writing as a process more.

The Writing Process  Prewriting: brainstorming  Writing: ideas take shape by putting words on paper.  Sharing: students gain a sense of audience  Responding: writers gain an understanding of what distinguishes effective from ineffective writing.  Revising: reworking  Editing: correctness  Evaluating: Feedback for the student writers

Clustering  Clustering is a nonlinear brainstorming process that generates ideas, images, and feelings around a stimulus word until a pattern becomes discernible

Cooperative Writing Kindergarten-2 nd Grade  Interpersonal skills  Students need many opportunities to listen and speak before they can become fluent readers and writers.

Cooperative-Writing Lesson  Talking Trees  Objective: Students will develop interpersonal skills and language arts skill.

Writing  Who are they writing to (audience)  Write for teacher  Writing for self

Short Exercise Select a place where, right now you would rather be. (3 minutes) Skip a line and write a letter to your Mom, or some other loved one, in which you tell the person about this place (3 minutes) Write a letter to your principal or superintendent in which you request funds to subsidize you being in this place and which justifies the released time necessary for you to be there.(3 minutes)

Sharing/Responding 

Revising  There is no one correct way to revise  Rearranging, adding, rewording, removing

Some things to focus on Fletcher states that we cannot force students to revise but here some things to look at:  Change the beginning  Change the ending  Add a section  Delete a part  Change the order (re-sequencing)  Change the tone  Change the point of view  Change the genre (65)

Strategies for Revision  Building communities of writers  Inviting drafting and redrafting  Authorship  Publishing

Editing  Grammar  Punctuation  Spelling  Usage

Choose an Editing Routine  Share the responsibility of editing  Create a checklist (3 or 4 skills) for students to check off the skill and also the teacher (Fletcher, 94)  Can also be done in small groups or individual conferences

Evaluation  Rubrics- don’t always have to use them as long as students know what you are looking for  Don’t focus on everything, narrow it down  Help students evaluate themselves whenever possible

Evaluative Questions  Can you tell me about something you did well in this piece of writing?  How does this piece compare to others you have written?  Is there something you are proud of about doing here?  Is there any place you are less that fully pleased with? (Fletcher, 106)

Possible Areas of Focus for Evaluating  Quality of writing  Correctness of Conventions  Use a variety of composing and revising strategies  Participation in the workshop

Overlap between workshop and testing Writing Workshop -Choice of topic -No length requirement -Conference with peers or teacher Both - Generate ideas on topic -Use supporting details -Reread for meaning -Stay focused on topic -Proofread for errors PASS Test -Assigned prompt -Length requirement - No input from teacher or peers Fletcher, 110

Works Cited  Fletcher, Ralph and JoAnn Portalupi. Writing Workshop: The Essential Guide. Portsmouth: Heinemann, Print.