Improving Student Writing - Wendy Ritter

[Wendy Ritter]

My discussion title is more of a question than an answer, one which has been a main area of focus for me over the last few years. 

   I currently teach special education at Florence Drake Elementary.  Although my day is filled with teaching reading and math to 4^th, 5^th, and 6^th graders in both small group pull-out settings and working in collaboration with the general education teachers team teaching; teaching writing has become an important part of my schedule.  I worked with the 5^th grade teacher teaching the whole class (general education, special education and second language learners) writing.  

We worked hard to provide our students with an organizational framework which helped them write an organized story using paragraphs.   Using specific techniques such as adding similes and dialogue also helped our students improve in using voice.   Although our students were able to draft an organized story, I was discouraged with the ways our students were revising and editing their work.  We would provide the students with specific revising and editing steps which helped many students make some changes in their writing.  The specific steps made their revising and editing such a step-by-step process instead of the fluid process of reading and rereading a story, making small changes each time.   

  Our students also struggled with editing their work, especially with students in special education and second language learners.  They had difficulty locating and correcting capitalization, punctuation and grammatical errors.  The 5^th grade teacher and I tried a variety of ways to help the students improve the editing process.  

  As writing is an essential component of learning, especially with our new core standards, it is important to help our students improve their writing skills. 

 Taking part in the Summer Institute is such an amazing opportunity.  The collaboration and sharing of ideas will not only provide me with new techniques and thoughts regarding the teaching of writing but will also continue to energize me to become a better writing teacher.   

[Gia Maraccini]

Hey Wendy!

I wish I had a golden ticket to hand over to you for encouraging the revising and editing process, but sorry!  I teach 6^th grade ELA and struggle with the same things.  I have discovered a few things that help the process along, though they still seem a bit too “jerky” and aren’t as fluid as I would like to see them.

Kelly Rubero and Abby Olde gave me a revising technique that I use all the time now.  We ARRRG out our paper.  Each letter stands for one thing that they need to go back and do in their paper.  For example, A might be to add one color word and one of the Rs might be to remove on boring verb.  I have the students write ARRRG at the top of their paper and cross out each let as they work their way through their paper.  We make a big deal out of it being an ARRRG kind of day and the kids have fun making the sounds.  A lot of times the G is Get someone from the class to read over your paper and let you know what they think of your changes.  This let’s students pick who they think will give them some good input on their writing. 

I use my student’s writing test scores and create editing partnerships.  I try to pair my higher writers with my lower writers and then also pair my mid- range together.  I then have an editing checklist that I copied out of No-Nonsense Guide to Teaching Writing: Strategies, Structures and Solutions by Judy Davis and Sharon Hill.  I have a class set of the checklists and sometimes I have the students edit the other paper on their own and sometimes I have them talk it through with their partner.  It really depends on the time of year.  I also have a sub grouping list on my desk, which my students don’t know about.  I sometimes will mix it up and partner the highs together and pull the lows for a mini lesson with me.  If you would like to look at this book or the checklists, I can run into school next week and pick them up for you. 

Good luck!  I am hoping you discover the golden ticket and tell us all about it in your demonstration.

Gia

 

[Laurel Topken]

Wendy,

I struggle with this issue even with college students.  It is one of the things I will be looking at when I research more about workshop/student response groups.  So many students think that their best work is done last minute that they end up thinking that they are done when the paper reaches the page limit.  They don't want to revisit the work or they don't see the value in it.  There are many different thoughts on how to get students to revise, but to get the best one for the most revision in the greater amount of students still alludes me.  I hope that you get a few good ideas in your research.

 

Laurel

 

[Marnie Smith]

Wendy,

This has certainly been an area of struggle with me as well. Years ago, I and a team of colleagues came up with a writing rubric for each grade...One of the checkpoints was "each sentence begins with a capital". I would have students turn in a paper with capitals obviously missing yet the box would be checked as completed. I would then say, "You're certain you've checked the WHOLE paper and you aren't missing any capitals or punctuation?" Which would always garner a resounding, "Yes". I never knew where to go from there other than pointing out all the "missed" areas of the checklist, which in a sense, was me editing the entire paper. Multiply this by a class of 20 or 25 and that's a lot of time invested. How do you get them to see the errors when they don't or won't see them? Much less going a step further, as you have, and making it a natural part of the process. I really look forward to what you have to present.