Chapter 12: Make Every Minute Count

I think it is very important to connect our school and home lives. I always wonder what students think I do outside of school. I have gotten so many comments from them that raise this question. One example is when the students went to lunch one boy asked me what I did when they were eating. I told him I eat lunch too. He was so surprised. This made me laugh. Another instance was I was asked what I was going to do after school was out. I said I was going to go get groceries and go home and play with my son. A student that was listening goes “you don’t stay at school.” It is important for students to know that we have a life to outside of school and is somewhat similar to their family’s life. We need them to understand that we do make mistakes and that it is okay. When you connect with students and try to make learning as fun as possible, it makes them more interested and more willing to try harder.

Chapter 11: Build on Best Practice Research

It is hard as a teacher when the curriculum is set and we are told not to deviate from it. This stifles the creativity and flexibility on the teacher’s part. I think it is very important that the teacher is able to deviate somewhat from the set lessons. Some lessons just need some extra help and creativity thrown into the mix. Our Reading curriculum does include writing in it which I think is great. As it mentions, these are two subjects that are intertwined. It is important to be up on the current research. However, there should be some research done on your own in the classroom. Teachers know what works and what doesn’t by trying it out and seeing it for themselves. I find myself trying out different ideas and talking to my colleagues about things they have done and tried. It helps to work together to gain as much information as possible. There are so many resources and programs available that districts do need to be careful when adopting them. It is a huge waste of money if they adopt one that does not work or changes within the year. When reading this chapter it mentioned that students need to be kept in the classroom during these language learning activities. I completely agree. However, I become frustrated because during these times, I have so many students pulled from my classroom for different reasons. It’s hard to find the right balance.

Chapter 10: Make Assessment Count

Rubrics are very important to be able to understand. I have done so much with rubrics over my college and teaching career that I honestly do not like looking at them anymore. We had to do so many of them through our coursework that just looking at them turned me off of them. With that said, I know it is a must to have. It allows students to know what is expected of them and helps to put their writing on the correct tract. Knowing the six traits of writing is very important to make sure that we have a clear goal set in place and to help us throughout our writing process. I know I would be a better writer today if I had a teacher that encouraged me and made writing fun. This was not the case. I dreaded writing and sometimes still struggle with it. When I have to write a paper for a class or for my job it is hard for me to do. It takes me a long time and I struggle with making sure it flows and has a good structure to it. That is why I am trying really hard to make it easier and more fun for my students’. If they view it as fun and not a chore, they will be more successful writers. Later in the chapter it talked about test anxiety. There is so much to be said about this, but I am only going to touch it briefly. I think it is important for the teacher to not put so much emphasis on the test itself. This stresses the teacher and students out. It is important, but there is a more positive way to go about teaching the necessary materials. Assessing student writing is something that happens daily in my classroom. I have a feeling a lot of teachers do it without even realizing they are assessing it. By just walking around the room and giving pointers to students, this is a form of assessment. As teachers we are always doing this.

Chapter 9: Conference with Students

I love the idea of the whole-class share. This is where trust is really key to students. The teacher must show the students the correct way to share their thoughts on how to help the student in their writing. I do believe that this is more for older students, but all age levels could benefit. By showing the students how to do it, it will be more beneficial when the students’ actually start to critique others. This teaches them a valuable lesson on how to accept positive criticism. I had a student this year who did not like to be corrected or helped. He tried so hard and thought that it was bad if he made a mistake. So when he was corrected (in a positive way), he started to cry. By having whole-class share, this will help curb those issues. Roving conferences take place all the time in the classroom. As a teacher, we are always monitoring students as they work and how they are doing on that work. This helps us know where to go from that point.

Chapter 8: Organize for Daily Writing

This chapter continues and adds to what I have said in the previous entries. Modeling is so important to students. This allows them to see what they need to do without becoming overwhelmed with the writing process. They need to understand who their audience is and be allowed to celebrate their writing at the end of the process. By the end of the year, with much modeling, they will feel much more confident on doing the writing on their own. I love the idea of daily writing. This summer I am planning out a journal for students to use towards the end of the school year. By writing every day, they will become more use to the process and gain more confidence. With students using computers so much, writing is important to include in an everyday setting. Free writes also add to the journaling or daily writing. This allows the students’ creative side to come out and gets them interested in writing. I know my first graders are always coming up to me and wanting to tell me a story. It is impossible to listen to every story they have to tell. So allowing them to write it down gives them the opportunity to share it and work on their writing skills. Having students trust the teacher and their peers is very important. It is not only important in writing, but in everything they do. They will be more confident if they know they will not be laughed at or made fun of. It is the teacher’s job to establish and maintain that sense of trust.

Chapter 7: Be Efficient and Integrate Basic Skills

I liked how it was said to have them write and then teach the skills to support the writing at a later time. This makes sense. Students’ should feel that writing is fun and if you explain the other skills during the writing process instead of having them the main focus at the beginning, they will enjoy writing much more. The chapter mentioned that students’ need to make sure they know who their audience is. If they have a purpose, their writing will be much more meaningful. Students need to be able to know where to start their paper and how to focus it. This will make the paper more structured and better put together. Teacher’s need to keep the standards in mind as they are teaching. However, they must be taken in sections. If a teacher looks at them all, it will be overwhelming. Teaching the minilessons helps this become not such an overwhelming task.

Chapter 6: Capitalize on the Reading-Writing Connection

I found it interesting where it said that Reading and Writing are separate subjects. We teach Reading and Writing together. In our Reading program, it incorporates a writing section into it. I think they are two subjects that should be linked together. What you write usually is something that you end up reading so it makes sense to connect the two. I also think it is very important to have the students read as much as possible. It is also important to have them listen to the teacher read. This builds the skills necessary to be able to understand what is being read to them. After lunch, before we go out to recess, I read a few chapters out of a book. Before we start the next day, they review what we read previously. In a fourth grade classroom, I observed a teacher who had her students snap every time they heard a simile. This was what they were working on and it really challenged the students to listen carefully to the story. By incorporating little things like this into a read-aloud time, it will help strengthen the students’ skills. Several times a week, I allow the students “book box” time. I have a large number of books they can pick from and they find a spot in the room. They then read. Once they’re done with that book, they may go and grab another book. I believe summary writing is a bit complex at the first grade level. It is a skill that needs to be mastered, however with some time. I do believe that they should be able to talk and discuss to come up with a summary of what they have read. This helps them to truly understand the content.

Chapter 5: Do More Shared Writing

I can remember a shared writing activity we did when I went to school. The teacher started a story with a sentence. Then she passed the paper to a student and they had to add another sentence that made sense with the first sentence. The paper got passed around till everyone had a chance to write a sentence. The teacher then read the whole story to the class. I loved hearing the story. It was always entertaining and neat to see how everyone interpreted each sentence. It is great to do writing activities like this because it makes writing fun and adds a different twist to the writing process. It also does not put so much pressure on each child to write a whole paper on their own. Obviously, they need to be able to do this, but it does take the pressure off once in awhile and makes writing fun. This is an activity for an older age group. However, as a first grade teacher you could have the students tell you the sentence they would like to add and either you could write it on the board or help them to write it themselves. Also in this chapter it said not to focus so much on editing, but more on content. I feel I do not do this as well. I find myself working on editing just as much as the content. I see where it is important to teach them to write meaningful sentences, but if they do not learn the editing part how is that helping them for the future? Cutting up and reassembling sentences is a neat activity and skill to have the students do. This is also an activity you can do at the first grade level. We have a program on the computer that has a scrambled sentence, and they are to drag the word to the correct spot. Once they have it, the program reads the whole sentence so they can hear how it is suppose to be.

Chapter 4: Raise Your Expectations

I feel I am always trying to challenge my students to raise their expectations. I agree that many times they are set way too low. When I student taught in a kindergarten class, by the end of the year they were adding simple numbers using manipulatives. I was absolutely amazed. Now with my first graders, I am always pushing them and trying to get them to achieve at their highest level. During a team meeting, our lead teacher was going over some of the indicators for Math. In first grade they are to know how to count to 100. But by second grade it’s something like 1,000 (I need to double check that number). However high, it was a big jump. So now we focus more on trying to get the students to count and write as high as they can. The more you expect and push your students, the better they will be later on. It is very important to have high expectations when it comes to writing. Many kids are so lackadaisical when it comes to writing. With everything around them becoming more and more technology related, they don’t take the time to truly perfect writing. Text messages and emails are all abbreviated to save time and punctuations are not included in texts. When it comes time to get a job, they will be hurt if they did not take the time to learn how to write and communicate correctly. That is what employers are looking for. A resume needs to be articulated correctly, flow, and make sense or they will be less likely to get the job.

Chapter 1: Share Your Writing Life
When having my students’ do a writing project, I noticed I incorporate a lot of the same ideas mentioned in this chapter. I believe it is very important to have students do a writing project that they are interested in. If you make students’ only do projects that you pick for them, they will become bored with the whole process. It does not allow them to think creatively on their own and challenge them to come up with a topic. As a first grade teacher, I incorporate modeling into each writing topic. This is key at such a young age. In the chapter, it mentioned that a person can become easily frustrated when something seems overwhelming. Since first graders have not had much practice with writing, it is key to model for them how to start and continue the project. By just giving them a topic and telling them to write about it, they could give up before they have even started. I make sure I model how I would start my paper. I even give them a beginning sentence. We brainstorm ideas of what to write about and then I take those ideas and show them how to put them into a sentence. I like the idea of having them keep a journal or have a weekly writing topic to do. This helps them practice writing. I think this would be more useful towards the end of the year for first grade.

Chapter 2: Start with Celebration
I think it is a great idea to have students share their work. On one hand, they take the time to make sure they do a good job knowing that it is going to be read in front of the class. They take more pride in it. On second hand, it teaches them public speaking skills. I still have trouble getting in front of a big group (other than my students) and talking. I get really nervous. If we start at a young age having students get up and speak, they will be more comfortable later on because they have done it for so long. As I mentioned above for chapter one, having the students do some creative writing is very important to keep them interested. When I student taught for a fourth grade class, she used some very creative writing prompts. The students loved them and it was so much fun to read. One was they had to write to a farmer (they were a turkey) and convince the farmer why he should not pick them for the Thanksgiving meal. It was so cute. They then shared their work and it was hung in the hallway for everyone to see.

Chapter 3: Simplify the Teaching of Writing
It is hard for me to view myself as a writer. I feel I am not very good and always get nervous about making it sound how I want. I do think it is important to make the transition to feeling better as a writer. By feeling better, you give off a more positive feeling when teaching it to the students. When it mentioned in the chapter, that they write at staff meetings I remember always dreading when they mentioned we would have to do a writing activity. I always got nervous that I would not be able to come up with something correct or people would secretly make fun of what I have wrote. This is why it is important to start the students out young with learning how to write and learning how to share their work in front of the group. Once again it is very important to model. It gives the students a base from where to start and helps them to make a comfortable transition into the writing process. Another interesting comment I found was about using red pens to mark papers. I can absolutely relate to this. Every time I look in my drawer to find a pen to grade a paper with; I always look at the red and bypass it. I never use a red pen because I too remember all my mistakes being marked in red. That’s the classic example of when something is wrong marking it in red. So I try to not use it to help my students not have that memory.