Modeling Writing

How do we teach children to become better writers? Model. Model with your writing, student writing, writing from other classrooms, models from Lucy Calkins books… Just Model.

Maybe you’re a great writer, but you are uncertain how to show your students. Maybe you’re uncomfortable because you don’t feel you learned to be a good writer. Believe it or not, you know more than your kids and modeling is the best way to teach your students.

It’s unfair to ask kids to do something that hasn’t been demonstrated for them.

Writers are the best writing teachers. The only way to become better at something is to practice. It’s important to practice what you preach. If you want your students to publish one writing piece a month, then consider publishing one of your own every month. Model your writing in front of your students, using your own writer’s notebook. Let them know what you have written, want to add next, and will be working on before the next writing lesson.

Student models are also important. Have students share their writing daily. Don’t just ask kids to share, ask for students to share things that fit the lesson or models a technique they have learned. When items like this are shared, other students in the class will strive to meet the model.

Sometimes you need to look other places to find student models. Don’t be afraid to ask other teachers to share student writing that demonstrates a skill you are working toward. There are also student exemplars in the Lucy Calkins writing units.

Ask your coach if you need help getting started!

Best Practices for 

Displaying Print in Your Classroom

Creating effective anchor charts  with your students and incorporating them into daily instruction is very powerful.  Using authentic print is definitely meaningful to the children. It is exciting to watch students learn to use the anchor charts to develop and extend their literacy and mathematical practices. 

Examples of Commercial Print

Examples of Authentic Anchor Charts

“When information is presented only in spoken form, 10 percent is recalled after seventy-two hours.  Add visuals and 65 percent is recalled in that same time period. (Medina, 2008)”      Brain Rules    

Does the print displayed in your classroom on charts and displays:

• build a sense of individual and group ownership over the classroom?

• model teacher and student handwriting versus store bought commercial print?

• acknowledge and celebrate every child’s effort?

• have a meaningful connection to current learning?

• serve as a teaching tool for students to utilize during their independent work?

• highlight authentic reading and writing tasks and strategies- those that are purposeful and meaningful in real life?

• generate excitement about learning?

Yes? No? Sometimes?

Not sure how to accomplish this?

Directions: Click the link by The Children's Literacy Initiative below and check the strategies under the following effective practices that you'd like to implement in your classroom.

Plan how and when you will implement these strategies with a colleague or coach.

https://www.cli.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/Best-Practices-for-Displaying-Print-in-My-Classroom.pdf

Thinking About Reading Strategies With Students

Jennifer Serravallo explains that a strategy is a series of actionable steps, a process to help readers tackle a skill that is not yet automatic for them.

She explains that strategies expand beyond comprehension into other areas of reading such as decoding, reading with fluency, developing stamina and engagement, writing about reading, and conversing about texts.

Strategies Help a Learner Become Skilled

For readers, Jennifer says that it’s helpful to go a step beyond saying “You should visualize when you read” to saying, “When you are reading a story, imagine yourself to be in the place. Use your senses to experience the world of the story. Describe what you see, hear, smell, feel.” This is shown to the right. In this example you can see how a student might use his senses to think through a piece of text. For someone who isn’t yet able to visualize, this helps them see things much clearer and makes the visualization doable. Eventually you will want the students to demonstrate automaticity with visualization, but practicing the skill in this way will help build up to being independent.

Strategies for More than Comprehension

Reading is complex and multi-faceted. Depending on the reader, one of a number of goals may emerge as most important. Some students may need support with one area of comprehension or another while others will need to work on being able to decode the print or read the text with fluency. Staying engaged and focused while reading may also be areas to address. Strategies can help here, too.

For example, instead of saying to a reader “read for the whole 30 minutes without getting distracted,” we may find it helpful to explain to them how to do that. The picture below explains to the reader how to stay engaged with reading. The teacher might say, “Set page goals in your book by reflecting on your log. Mark your brief stops with sticky notes. When you read and get to a sticky note, stop and think if you were focused or distracted. Decide to read on, or re-read.” 

Taking it to the Classroom

Strategies are at the core of everything you do when you are teaching reading. During whole class mini lessons, make sure to not just demonstrate but to also articulate a strategy, making clear how a reader uses the strategy. When you pull your students into a small group, form the group based on a strategy they could all use to improve their reading. Finally, when you meet with students one-on-one in conferences, do more than just talk to them about their book; support them with their individual reading goal by introducing and helping them to practice a strategy.

Be aware of who is doing most of the talking during a conference or a small group. If the teacher is doing most of the talking then the teacher is also doing most of the thinking. In The Reading Strategies Book, Jennifer give a list of prompts such as questions, directives, and compliments to keep the students active in thinking and learning. 

Serravallo, Jennifer. "Expanding Our Approach to Reading Strategies."MiddleWeb. Heinemann, 24 Aug. 2016. Web. 01 Sept. 2016.

Thinking About Reading Strategies With Students

Jennifer Serravallo explains that a strategy is a series of actionable steps, a process to help readers tackle a skill that is not yet automatic for them.

She explains that strategies expand beyond comprehension into other areas of reading such as decoding, reading with fluency, developing stamina and engagement, writing about reading, and conversing about texts.

Strategies Help a Learner Become Skilled

For readers, Jennifer says that it’s helpful to go a step beyond saying “You should visualize when you read” to saying, “When you are reading a story, imagine yourself to be in the place. Use your senses to experience the world of the story. Describe what you see, hear, smell, feel.” This is shown to the right. In this example you can see how a student might use his senses to think through a piece of text. For someone who isn’t yet able to visualize, this helps them see things much clearer and makes the visualization doable. Eventually you will want the students to demonstrate automaticity with visualization, but practicing the skill in this way will help build up to being independent.

Strategies for More than Comprehension

Reading is complex and multi-faceted. Depending on the reader, one of a number of goals may emerge as most important. Some students may need support with one area of comprehension or another while others will need to work on being able to decode the print or read the text with fluency. Staying engaged and focused while reading may also be areas to address. Strategies can help here, too.

For example, instead of saying to a reader “read for the whole 30 minutes without getting distracted,” we may find it helpful to explain to them how to do that. The picture below explains to the reader how to stay engaged with reading. The teacher might say, “Set page goals in your book by reflecting on your log. Mark your brief stops with sticky notes. When you read and get to a sticky note, stop and think if you were focused or distracted. Decide to read on, or re-read.” 

Taking it to the Classroom

Strategies are at the core of everything you do when you are teaching reading. During whole class mini lessons, make sure to not just demonstrate but to also articulate a strategy, making clear how a reader uses the strategy. When you pull your students into a small group, form the group based on a strategy they could all use to improve their reading. Finally, when you meet with students one-on-one in conferences, do more than just talk to them about their book; support them with their individual reading goal by introducing and helping them to practice a strategy.

Be aware of who is doing most of the talking during a conference or a small group. If the teacher is doing most of the talking then the teacher is also doing most of the thinking. In The Reading Strategies Book, Jennifer give a list of prompts such as questions, directives, and compliments to keep the students active in thinking and learning. 

Serravallo, Jennifer. "Expanding Our Approach to Reading Strategies."MiddleWeb. Heinemann, 24 Aug. 2016. Web. 01 Sept. 2016.