Tuesday, February 25, 2014

Gear Up

The Slice of Life Story Challenge kicks off this Saturday, March first. Hosted by the reflective teachers at Two Writing Teachers, the challenge calls for a "slice of life" blog post each day for the month of March. Get all the details here. Join us! My students are going to draw for dates and blog through the month too. I'm excited to write and share with them.

I write with my students. I had the pleasure of meeting Chris Lehman this past weekend at SC IRA and like him,  I believe we must write with our students. How else  will we troubleshoot? How else will we learn where students will have difficulties? Lehman's Friday morning keynote had many take aways, but one thing he asked resonates for this challenge: "Are you an editor or a teacher of writing?"

Teachers of writing, write. Editors correct--even if those corrections are only verbal.

Here are five writing reminders I'm going to take into the March challenge.

1. Coach the writer.
When a student has a question or is struggling with part of the writing, I'm going to pull up my own draft and say, "Well in my writing when I'm not sure (how to begin, how to transition, how to use ...whatever the student's concern is), I..." I am going to do more coaching with my draft on the table next to the student's.

2. Compliment more than correct.
The Slice of Life Story Challenge is about writing everyday (or often, if students are posting to a whole-class blog). The challenge brings writers together in community, for support and celebration, not criticism and correction. What really moves us forward is the little compliment or connection a reader makes in comments.

3. Share writing successes.
If one writer in my community is particularly great a leads or using imagery or setting up a circular ending, I want to celebrate that and point out that student writer's practice to others in the class.

4. Acknowledge the work.
Writing is hard work, not magic. Talk about it. When I get stuck, like Chris Lehman, I look at what others have written. He shared a story about being stuck while writing a forward. He looked at the forward Donalyn Miller wrote for his latest book, Falling in Love with Close Reading. He copied her writing into Word. Noticed the word count. Compared it to his own and then got writing again. Real writers sometimes work from models. We find inspiration in others. When I get stuck, I outline. I read closely. I map out the paragraphs and then try it myself. Students can do that too.


5. Connect to others.
The Slice of Life Story Challenge connects students to others. It is a feast of writing and commenting.  I've focused on publishing student writing outsideof the classroom more this year than ever. It has made a huge difference in how we write and talk about writing. I want to keep that going. That means sharing our authentic selves, our moments and our slices with students and teachers we may just meet. It's going to be exciting! 

19 comments:

  1. How lovely to think of what we do as "a feast of writing and commenting." So rewarding, isn't it?!

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    1. It is rewarding! I was telling students just yesterday how wonderful it was to meet so many slicers at NCTE in Boston. Thank you, Tara.

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  2. I needed to hear these reminders today. I'm not slicing with my students this year. I thought about it but became overwhelmed before even beginning. I can though, share my writing with them more often and encourage them to connect with each other through their writing. In fact, I have a couple of excellent student posts that I want to highlight!

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    1. I understand the overwhelming feeling for sure. Last year I jumped in with all of my students. This year I'm scaling back a bit in order to comment more and build community better. It sounds like your students are blogging already--do they participate in other communities or challenges? Just thinking of creating some lists for my students who want to discover writing communities.

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    2. I, too, wanted to try and got overwhelmed by other events. I'm going to do my best to blog a bit each day (and may double dip with my grad school blogging). I love that you scaled back a bit, Lee Ann. Sometimes, we fall into the "go big or go home" mentality. It's easy to do.

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  3. These are reminders for every writing class every day. So much depends on the feedback which spurs the writer on. Thanks for outlining these points.

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    1. Thanks, Elsie, Chris Lehman inspired the list. Loved his "inspiration and perspiration" keynote on writing and writers last week.

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  4. I need to bookmark your post for further reference! Great advice! This year my students are not slicing. I am a little sad, but we are working on building capacity (so, maybe next year). See you in March!

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    1. Thanks, Jaana. All things in due time. Capacity building is important. Looking forward to seeing you slicing in March too.

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  5. Will share this with a colleague who is taking the challenge with his class, Lee Ann, & will savor it for myself too. Looking forward to your posting!

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    1. Thanks, Linda! Now if I could just keep up with the Tuesday slices all year. I haven't managed that one yet, but I love reading the posts from those of you who do!

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  6. Valuable reminders! I will share them with my students tomorrow as we learn about assessing writing.

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    1. Thanks, Beth. I wonder if your students would be interested in reading/commenting on my students' slices?

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  7. I love this! I was expelling the challenge to my students today, and I told them about how participating will put me in their shoes. I then invited them to try it! I have a few takers and I think they will see it through. Since I am participating for the first time, my class is "unofficially" participating. Maybe next year!

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    1. Explaining not expelling! Hate autocorrect!

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    2. For some reason, replies are getting tricky and our Internet is going up and down. My reply landed at the bottom of the page this time. Opps.

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  8. Such great ideas! I think my favorite is #5. I've made so many great online friends through slicing!

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    1. Thank you, Carol. Number five is my favorite too. I've so enjoyed the friendships I've made by writing with others online.

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  9. Autocorrect gets me too! Will you share your students' posts too? I've sliced with my high school students in a couple of ways--sometimes working out a contract for posts/grades and another time doing a mini-challenge. This year volunteers are posting a slice per day. Though I think as of yesterday I might have more than one volunteer per day. We'll see. I'm looking forward to it!

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