Conferring With Student Writers Pam Burnett

The HEART of your writing workshop will be conferring with the students—the hardest part—but you won’t get the best results if you don’t include this. Remember: What gets monitored, gets done. If you don’t monitor their writing, then the writing becomes something they do, but no drastic improvements will take place.

What are all the OTHER students doing? To begin with, you cannot confer effectively unless rest of class can work independently. Common issues: no ideas for writing, “I’m done,” or spend their time with hand raised waiting on you These must be taught in mini-lessons May need to work on building stamina for independent writing prior to starting conferences

Rarely will your writing workshop/conferring run without a hitch even after students learn your routines/structures. Management issues arise almost everyday: too loud, too much commotion at a writing table, etc. If students don’t feel invested in their writing, difficult to manage. ( maybe not publishing enough, writings aren’t displayed or celebrated, not a meaningful activity to some, goals/deadlines not set)

Writing Workshop Mini-lesson minutes independent writing/teacher conferring 5-10 minutes-Share time Even though your “teaching” time is only about 15 minutes, you’re still teaching 90% of the time you’ve devoted to writing IF you’re conferring.

Can have individual and group conferences Want conferences to go quickly, maybe 5 minutes each if individual conferring

Predictable Structure for Student Conferences Looking through two different lenses: one for strengths and one for next steps Teaching a Strength Research Strength through conversation/reading student’s writing Decide which strength(s) to make public in the conference Teach by naming the strength and why it’s good Record by writing down the strength that was taught Teaching a Next Step Research a next step through conversation/reading the writing Decide which next step to teach Teach by naming the next step and explaining why it is good Record by writing down the next step that was taught

Research Phase  To understand conferring, think about times when someone has conferred with you. “What’s been going on with you?” “How’s it going?”  Causes you to reflect on yourself/work  Your response has less to do with the words that person said than with your sense of whether he was truly interested—nodding, leaning in, etc.  Good conference begins with deep listening.

Ask the student what they are working on and allow them to set the agenda for the conference. Listen! Help him articulate and explain his intentions (not just writing about my dog or a poem or wanting to hear a detailed outline of what they are writing about) but the writer’s goals and strategies that could carry over to other writings (student has checklist in hand) You want to know what new stuff they are doing to be an even stronger writer Your goal is to help the WRITER, not the WRITING

Point out the strength (or an attempted) that you noticed and give it a name/why it made his writing better. Choose a strength that they may not realize they’re doing. Remember, you’re “teaching” a strength, not just pointing out something they already know Name the strength so they can carry it over to other writings—name it anything that makes sense! Easy to scan for mechanics/point out mechanic strengths, too Try to point out a craft strength as well What if you can’t find a strength ?? May focus on volume of writing, stamina he displayed that day during writing workshop, inventive spelling for bigger words, how he came up with an idea for writing on his own, etc.

When you’re observed by the administration, what motivates you more: starting the conference after the observation with the positives that you’re doing or with the needs? Pointing out writing strengths to students affects their attitudes toward writing. Is it okay to accept and praise a 3 rd grader that is writing at a 1 st grade level? Accept that this is where he is and teach him how to move to the next step.

Showing students what they do well, regardless of on grade level or not, affects not just self- perception but motivation and gives them a reason to try harder.

Let’s try researching a writing for strengths

Decide and Teach Phase for Next Steps Reigning question is “What does this student need most at this time that he could keep doing tomorrow when I am nowhere to be seen?” Not about KNOWING what to teach but about DECIDING what to teach. No one right choice. Not trying to “fix” all of a student’s needs at once Notice all you can before deciding what to teach Pay attention to what the student’s intentions are PLUS your own observations to make a decision. Can sometimes do both. (Student wants to work on leads but you notice that all his sentences begin with Then or We. What do you do? BALANCING ACT

What if you don’t know what to teach a student? No one has excellent conferences all the time. Don’t let yourself off the hook— decide on something you know something about and go with it. Ending sentences with periods, starting sentences with different words, working on volume (such as writing past the end of the page), referring to a mini-lesson you recently taught, a recent lesson you’ve taught on punctuation skills

Possible Craft Skills to Teach See handouts

Record strength/next step Important for both teacher and student Refer to last conference prior to start of the next time you meet Try to meet with each student once a week

Let’s research the same writing for possible next steps.

Carl Anderson Conferring with a student

How do you keep records of your writing conferences?

Questions?? Next month we will begin looking at Informational Writing