Reading like a Writer- Narrative Writing

Anyone who has ever had writer's block can attest to the overwhelming feeling of never finding the

Photo by Steve Johnson on Unsplash

words that capture your thoughts and ideas. I'm all too familiar with writer's block, and that is why when my students ask me how they should start their essays, I understand their frustration and worry. When I first learned about Reading like a Reader/Writer, I instantly thought about how much this approach would help my struggling writers. I became excited about the possibilities for differentiating for the full range of abilities in my classroom. And I'm happy to say that my excitement hasn't died down.

I introduced "Reading like a Reader" first (You can read about that here). My students have been getting much better at annotating their thoughts and connections while reading. So I felt the next step was to look at the same text we had been annotating through a new lens- that of the writer. According to Peha, "When we read from the perspective of a writer, we focus less on what the writer is trying to say and more on how the writer is saying it. Specifically, we look at the techniques the writer is using to get his or her message across and how those techniques affect us as we experience the text" (Teaching That Makes Sense). The techniques Peha uses to analyze the text are the six traits of writing: ideas, word choice, organization, voice, sentence fluency, and conventions. The hope is that the students will see how the author uses different devices to entertain (in the case of narratives) his/her audience, and in turn, be able to do similar things in their writing. 

"Most of us find our own voices only after we've sounded like a lot of other people." —Neil Gaiman 

We started slow. Very, very slow. 

Since this is a new notion to me, I started slow and with something very low stakes- a poem! As a class, we read and analyzed "Ode to My Shoes," written by Francisco Alarcón, and discussed the meaning of the poem and use of personification. After ensuring they had a good understanding of the poem, I started asking questions about WHAT the author did. Some of the students began reiterating what the poem meant. Until I redirected them, and asked, "What do you notice about the poem? Not what the words mean, but the way the poem is set up? The classroom was abuzz with what they noticed. "It has short lines", "It has five small paragraphs" (then a student corrected with stanzas), "It has a picture of shoes in the background", "There are no periods", "The author used a lot of verbs", and my personal favorite "He is expressing gratitude to his shoes". I was shocked by the details they were picking up on. Without even knowing it, they were analyzing the author's use of sentence fluency, organization, ideas, word choice, conventions, and voice! This conversation was way more than I expected for our first time reading like a writer. I have to say it gave me the confidence I needed to move forward. 

Next, we tackled personal narratives. Earlier in the school year, we read Sandra Cisneros' short story, "Eleven," and a couple of the narratives from the Wonder Reading Workshop textbook. I divided my class into five groups and had them reread one of the short stories through the lens of the writer. I started the class discussion with the question: how do you know these are narratives? My class answered back with: "They have a hook in the beginning," "It has characters," "There's a dialogue between the characters," "There's a conflict," "The characters learned a lesson." Next, I asked them to choose their favorite short story from the five we had already read like a reader, and complete a note-taking guide using a graphic organizer I drafted. The graphic organizer asks them to note what they notice about each of the six traits of writing. 

After brainstorming and outlining our narratives, I asked my students to look over the hooks of the five narratives we had read as a class one more time. Then I asked them to choose three of their favorites of the five short stories and to use the idea of those hooks to write multiple hooks to start their personal narratives. As in everything with writing, some excel, and those that struggle, but I will say that I had way more students feeling confident with their writing this time around. 

"Eleven" Introduction paragraph 

Student introduction paragraph 

Tips for getting started:

1. Use high-interest texts to engage your students. They're going to have to read it multiple times to understand the passage as a reader and as a writer, so if it's a piece of writing they don't enjoy the task will be draining for all. 
2. Try to use a couple of questions to start getting them to read like a writer. Here are a couple of questions I've been using on repeat over the past couple of months: what do you notice? What about the text jumped out to you? What do you notice about the opening paragraph/closing? What do you like about this author's writing style? Using these questions will get them to analyze the author's writing choices and get them to read like a writer!
3. Don't worry about the students copying the author's ideas. I say this because when I first started using mentor texts, this was a genuine worry of mine. And it's also something I have seen from students who struggle to come up with ideas of their own, but now I look at it as using an author's ideas begets not writing anything at all. Small victories build confident writers. 

Follow along to see how our reading and writing transforms, 

• Jenni Merry 

Performance Tasks

At our recent Professional Learning community, my team and I decided to focus on the Wonders Performance Task (P.T.). We chose to look closely at the Performance Task, rather than at the constructed responses and tasks that lead up to the P.T. since, ideally, the P.T. is intended to pull together those skills and concepts acquired along the way.

As we looked at the directions for the P.T., we were all struck with how dense they were with information. In order to be successful on the task, students clearly needed to understand what they were being asked to do. Suffice to say, there were quite a few barriers to understanding (overall English proficiency for ELLs, reading ability, etc.) In an effort to ensure student success, we are tasked with removing as many of these obstacles as we possibly can.

We came up with a to-do list for each member of the team. 1) Each teacher would be responsible for printing out their students' responses. 2) The responses would need to be scored so that all of the allotted PLC time could be used for decision-making and reflection. 3) Teachers would need to be prepared to engage in a conversation focusing on the pros and cons.

In addition to these team-agreements, I offered to create a student-friendly handout that would help students make sense of the directions. In order to do this, I first need to read the directions from the point of view of a student with approximately four to five years of in-class experience.

It's a work-in-progress, but here's an excerpt from my document:

Regardless of the unit, the layout of the Performance Task follows this same basic pattern:

First, you’ll see, in bold print, the title “______________________ Performance Task”

                                                                                                              ↑ The genre will be provided here (i.e., informational).

Purpose: 1) to see if you can answer the three questions about and then 2) complete an opinion, informational, or narrative writing piece (essay) about the two sources provided.

Next, you see the word “Task” and be given a scenario (a little story to help you relate to

           the task (i.e. Your class has been learning about…).

Purpose: Authors who write tests know you’ll understand and do better if you can relate to a familiar situation. You see this strategy used in math word problems all the time: Mrs. “so and so” has 28 “whatchamacallits” and needs to divide them…

Third, you’ll see “Directions for Part 1” and “Research Questions” and directions.

Purpose: to focus all your attention on reading both sources and answering the questions. Being able to read the sources closely and carefully answer the three questions about those two sources are intended to prepare you to write the essay in Part 2.



My hope is that this document will enable our students to improve their understanding of the next Performance Task and their responses to the task.

Lola Jollie
Euclid Elementary School
Proudly serving 3rd and 4th-grade students

Learning Targets - Part I

Have you started to hear more about Learning Targets at your site?


Do you wonder what they are, why should you do them, how to write them, how to implement learning targets or maybe why are they important to my individual classroom?

Administrators, site coaches, District mentors, and Spotlight teachers have been asked to read the book, "Learning Targets" by Connie Moss and Susan Brookhart.  This may be why you are starting to hear more about them this year.


My school site has been writing daily learning targets for the past eight years as part of the daily routine for students.  If you are asked to start implementing learning targets then I would encourage you to go slowly and be reflective in how you might improve this skill.  For me, it is a skill that has be developed over time because it entails a great deal more than just writing a statement on the board for students to read.




The purpose of a learning target is to describe what a student will be able to do at the end of the lesson.  It is essentially taking your entire lesson plan for the period and condensing it down to a one sentence statement written in student friendly language.  Most learning targets start with the phrase, "I can . . ."

You can find plenty of examples for "I can . . ." statements by doing a Google search.  The question, though, which one are you going to use for your lesson today?




Here are some general thoughts that may help you to start implementing learning targets in your classroom:

1.  Keep the learning target simple and in student friendly language

Ask yourself, what is the one concept/skill/topic that you want each of your students to learn during the class period?  Put the idea into a "I can . . ." statement that is written so students can understand it (or come to understand it).

My focus is math so some examples could be:

"I can find the slope between two points."
"I can find the unit rate with complex fractions."
"I can determine the decimal approximation for an irrational number."
"I can present my final project product using my speaking voice."

What could a simple learning target look like in Science, Language Arts, PE (yes, even outside), foreign language, band, Social Studies, AVID, coding, etc.?


2.  Refer to the learning target at least three times during the lesson

Students want to know what they will be learning for the period.  The learning target gives them a focus and goal to achieve for the period.

I would suggest that you visit the learning target at the beginning of the lesson, once in the middle of the lesson reminding students what their purpose is for the day, and once at the end of the lesson.


3.  Ask students to self reflect on the learning target

The way I have students self reflect is by using a ranking system like this:

4 - I understand today's lesson and can teach it to someone who was absent today
3 - I understand today's lesson but cannot teach it yet
2 - I understand some of today's lesson but still need time to improve
1 - I have no idea what happened today

At the end of the lesson, I have students write down the number that best reflects their achievement of the learning target.  I use this system because it keeps students accountable to the learning target in a very low risk environment.




Is there more to learning targets?  Oh yes, but let's start at the beginning.  I have had plenty of missteps along the way as I implemented learning targets into my classroom culture.  But the foundation of learning targets starts with the above three steps - write an I can statement, visit it during the class period, and have students reflect on their learning.  For those of you who have been reading my blog, you know that my focus is a Growth Mindset for my students - learning targets are just another opportunity for my students to ask themselves are they growing during a class period.

Next month, I will talk more about learning targets and how I gather other data to determine if my data coincides with students' self reflection scores. 

Teaching and still loving it,

                                                                                                                        Kevin Stott

                                                                                                                        De Anza Middle School

Integrating Visuals in Order to Build Connections in Math

"Numbers, Pictures, Words!" I am a broken record as I walk around the room and gently remind students that when completing word problems, they should have all of these three criteria by using the Read Draw Write process. As we all know, if students can use the skill successfully in a word problem, chances are they have mastered it. In 6th grade, I have come to realize, few lessons introduce a new concept without a word problem or two, so as I collect their exit tickets or tests, I am looking for these three criteria. I expect students to struggle, but the part that amazes me is what the struggle is. Some students complete the problem correctly, but their picture does not match their numeric solution. Others provided a perfect model with an inaccurate and illogical answer. The worst scenario is when they all seem to get it just to present you with wide eyes the next day when you give them a similar problem to the day before! *Cue sad music here*. Students haven't internalized the connection between their pictures and numbers, which leads to difficulty when they are trying to provide reasonableness to their answer. Is this important? Yes, because as well all know, it wouldn't be Eureka or common core if it didn't have a picture or strategy when teaching a skill. The great thing is that the solution requires 1 question and some old fashion color coding! 

                

                                                                                

                                                                               I see it!!! Can't you??

When I look at our program, I am thankful that we teach multiple methods and models to assist our students in their understanding of something as simple as addition. Models were something I wish I had growing up. As a visual learner, multi-step word problems were tricky if I was unable to picture it. I still remember the problems that sounded like this "Now Jerry lives 3. 8 miles from school and 2.6 miles from his house lives Sherry in the opposite direction. Jack can travel to the school and back in 8.6 miles. If they walked to school tomorrow, how many miles would they walk all together to arrive to school? So there I was, drawing squares to represent buildings and arrows to represent paths to their destination. Most students today could solve this problem with three simple tape diagrams and a few labels. So why the disconnect? After countless examples of a problem side by side with a tape diagram/model, they still didn't see it!  So I did what I do best when I want things to stand out--I color-coded, and the students helped me. When you make the students find the connection, they are more likely to see it and internalize it on their own. 

Bridging the GAP and making the connection

Incorporating this strategy can be completed or every lesson. The following steps to incorporating this into your lesso is simple. This is how I embed it into my daily lesson. 
1. Complete problem with your picture and your drawing. 

2. Once your model is side by side with its corresponding drawing, you break up the equation and ask students to connect it to their picture by using the following stems using my example.
          "I see 45 in my equation, but where do I see it in my picture/model?" 

3. Have students look at the picture and tell me once they see the 45. Once they have done this I color code them the same color-in the example it is represented in pink. 

4. I continue this process with all the pieces within the equation. "I see 3/4 as my divisor, where do you see it in my picture?" and then color code it--in the example it is represented in blue. 

5. I continue this process with the answer of my problem. " I see 60 as my quotient, where do you see it within my picture?"

6. Now lets look at my answer and see if based on my picture if it logically makes sense. During this time I discuss that the whole tape is bigger than the 45 which makes sense because it is only 3/4 of the tape and 15 + 15+ 15+ 15= 60. 

7. Once we have completed this together then I reveal my overall anchor chart for that lesson that have the same colors. I then leave this up throughout the entire lesson for students to refer to. You can complete this on any following problems and that way throughout the entire lesson you are building that connection. 

8. In my class I wll have students complete a seperate problem color coding their work OR provide them with a copy of my anchor chart that we colored together to glue in. Students can continue to refer to it as the module progresses. 

I have seen a big change in my students when they are required to make connections between their numbers and pictures. This is a valueable tool that not only allows for class discussion and reasonableness. 


                                                                  Lively Teaching, 

Jessica Magana

Learning & Growing

Nurturing a Love for Literacy

As I was listening to the Jay-Z song, "Girls, girls, girls" I couldn't help singing to the tune but saying 🎶"books, books, books I do adore"🎶. And the truth is, books I do adore! My only hope is that some of that love rubs off on my students. The problem is, how can I ensure I provide them with access to enough books to spark that love? Well I think I found a  couple of ways and I'd love to share them with you. 

Collaborating with Colleagues

Create a system where you and a colleague can share your passion for literature. I'm fortunate to work with a fellow 7th grade teacher (Mrs. Valverde) that is just as passionate about books if not more than I am. So once a semester we have our students create a quick "booktalk" on their favorite book. We then review our students' work and select our favorite book talks and exchange them. Our students are psyched to read the book talk from other Wildcats while sparking that curiosity to read. Some of them expand their horizons and read a book they would have never picked out! For the first semester we "booked" each other during Halloween! Who said books couldn't be treats?  Our scholars were just as excited to receive the recommended novels as we were!

Expanding Your Library: First Book Marketplace

First Book Link

First Book Marketplace is a site where teachers can order books for discounted prices. Sometimes the discounted price goes down by 50% off! They rotate their book titles monthly so your choices are always broad. I've filled most of my personal library with books thanks to their wide selection and affordable prices. Not only do they provide affordable prices for teachers but they also provide access to hundreds of books to our students for free!😱 

If your school site is a Title 1 eligible school or at least 70% of your students come from low-income families you are eligible to sign-up for an account! This account gives you access to their market place (with discounted titles) and your students have unlimited access to hundreds of digital books! All you have to do is sign-up for an Open-Ebook code for each of your students. My students love it since they can read their books on their phones or Ipads. I've attached the link to sign up by the image above.

Last But Not Least: The Benefits of Books

          Can their phones or computers do this? 🠆

If you need any additional information or help feel free to contact me or comment below.😊 I hope I sparked the love of books in you!

Learning and Growing, 

Nancy Vargas

Leader In Me Part 3

In my previous two blog posts, I introduced the Leader In Me program and the 7 habits of happy kids that my school adopted last year. In my first blog post, I introduced the 3 stages students go through during the program: Independence, interdependence, and developing the whole person. I explained the independence stage and the first 3 habits: 

             Habit #1-Be proactive; 

             Habit #2-Begin with the end in mind; and

             Habit #3-Put first things first. 

In my second blog post, I explained the interdependence stage and its 

3 habits:

             Habit #4-Think win-win;

             Habit #5-Seek first to understand, then to be understood; and 

             Habit #6-Synergize. 

Finally, I will explain the last habit that focuses on developing the whole person.                

             Habit #7: Sharpen the Saw. 

This habit helps students to learn to take care of themselves and why it is crucial. 

Taking Care of You 

Our students don't realize that it is important to take care of themselves. Why should they? They are just kids, right? But, as adults, we need to learn to take care of ourselves, as well as, teach our students to do the same. Habit #7-Sharpen the Saw teaches students to take care of four aspects of their life: their body, their mind, their heart, and their soul. To introduce this idea to students, you must make it relatable. I always use myself as an example. I begin by teaching them how to take care of their body. I ask the students what would happen if I didn't take care of my body. The responses I usually receive are, "You will be fat," "You will be lazy," or "You will get sick." After a few responses, I then ask, "What should I do to keep my body healthy." I would have students use a Kagan strategy "think-pair-share" to discuss with their peer's ways to keep their body healthy. Then, as a class, we would chart the responses and keep the chart up to remind us to take care of our bodies. The students are great at remembering that eating healthy food like fruits and vegetables, exercising, and drinking water can help them be healthy. 

Making Deeper Connections

Taking care of their bodies is the easiest of the four aspects students know how to take care of. The other three require making a deeper connection to understand it. When asking students how and why we should take care of our minds, students don't see school and school type of activities as something important. I let students know that when they do school work, they are sharpening their saw by working their brain muscles. My favorite video to show to explain this concept is the growth mindset videos from Class Dojo. You can find the video on YouTube called, "Growth mindset for students-Episode 1/5." After the video, the students discuss it with their "Think-Pair-Share" partners and how they will work on building their brains. This video is especially important for the lower performing students to understand that they may not know something yet, but if they work hard, they will learn. 

Students know that they have a heart; it keeps their bodies alive and it beats. What they don't understand is that there are other ways to help their hearts and keep them healthy. Kindergarteners are egocentric and don't realize that their words and actions can affect others in a negative or positive way. My favorite read-aloud is, "How the Grinch Stole Christmas." (This is a Christmas story, so please make sure to clear this story with your non-practicing families.) The grinch teaches students how his heart starts out small because he hates Christmas, but it grows three sizes because he thought of the Whos and how Christmas made them happy. After the story, I have the students come up with ways to help others and we pick some to do in our class. 

Finally, it's important to teach students about their souls and how to take care of it. Students don't realize that doing things they love is taking care of their souls. It rejuvenates them, it helps their heart and develops their interests. Sometimes students don't realize that their interests could lead to a career someday. This section of sharpening your saw helps students see that doing things they love could lead to a future career they knew nothing about. As a class, we get into our "think-pair-share" partners to discuss our interests. Then, we chart them. As I write them down, we have a discussion about it and if it could lead to a career. This is so exciting to see students get excited about their interests and how it could lead to a career they love. Now that you know all about the 7 habits, I hope I have sparked interest in it. I hope you learned how it is used, taught, and what students can gain from it. 

Sincerely, 

Marcy Mesa

Rituals and Safe Spaces

    As I continue on my journey of implementing Conscious Discipline, I have been incorporating small pieces a little at a time.  Chapter 3 is all about building a school family.  

         Caring relationships create an optimal    environment for learning, alter our physiological       state and prime the brain for elasticity.  -Dr. Becky Bailey

Rituals are an expression of unity, and they help hold the school family together. The first ritual I knew I wanted to incorporate was how I greet my students at  the door before entering each morning. 

    I "bitmojied" myself and made a poster of some greeting options. I posted it by my door. The students choose their own greeting (hug, dance, fist bump, or high-five) each morning and that's what we do.  I always look in their eyes, say "good morning, (name)", and give a positive touch. I plan to add more throughout the school year.  Our good-bye ritual is where the student boss (helper) of the day picks a Go Noodle song.  We turn the lights off and the disco ball on, and dance to celebrate our day of learning!

Another ritual I incorporated was the "Wish Well" ritual.  This is where we acknowledge students who are absent. When I call out for attendance and the student is absent, we say, "we wish you well, _______".  We also do this if that student's name pops up during random sticks, etc...
There are ten suggested rituals in The Conscious Discipline book.  I will go into more of those in my next blog post.

An idea I incorporated was a safe space area. Well, a modified version of one.  I sent home a page with directions for families to put together for their child with photos, stickers, drawings, etc... I laminated each page and put them into a binder. It stays in our book stand by the rocking chair.  The picture on the far right shows a student looking at his family page while in the chair.  He was invited to go there when, after recess, he was crying that he missed him mom.  He sat there for about 4 minutes and came back to join us in our whole class activity.  I thought this practice may be abused,  but it hasn't been at all.  In fact, it has shed light for the other students when one of their classmates is feeling down and needs this opportunity to regroup.  They show empathy towards him or her.

What are some class family rituals you already do in class?  You may not have thought of them as rituals, per se, but those small acts have been helping to create your class family.  These are the acts that the students will let you know if you forgot to do them!

Happy Teaching!

Erin Grebel

Forever in the Middle: The Global Read Aloud

The past two years in the Fall, I've participated in an awesome learning experience and global collaboration opportunity:  The Global Read Aloud. If you have visited my classroom during this month, chances are you saw this in action.

The Global Read Aloud is organized by ELA guru Pernille Ripp with the idea that students around the world are read aloud one common book. The goal is to promote reading for enjoyment and collaboration between students. It sounds pretty amazing, right?  It completely is!

Here is some basic information about the Global Read Aloud.

Book selection
The Global Read Aloud book selection begins months (maybe even a year?) before the Read Aloud begins. Books are selected for four age groups: picture books, early readers, late elementary, middle school, and high school. Once the books are selected, teachers can register for the Global areas Aloud, which helps the organization keep track of where schools are participating from. The GRA began in 2010 with 150 students and now has over 1 million students participating worldwide. The organization does not provide books or materials for the teachers.

This year, the books selected for each group were
Picture Book Study

 

 














Early Readers                     Late elementary           
              



Middle School                         High School  
             


This year my classes are reading The Bridge Home and it has brought up great questions about many relevant and heavy worldwide issues such as homelessness, gender equality, child labor, and even spousal/child abuse.

Types of collaboration
The easiest way to start working with other GRA teachers is the join the Facebook group. From there, teachers can start sharing ideas and make plans for collaboration. We have used Padlet, Flipgrid, "snail mail" postcards, GoogleHangouts, and Twitter slow chat to collaborate with our partner classes. Some platforms are easier than others of course and it is up to the teachers to decide what works best for them and how many connections they wish to make. I try to have my students collaborate at least once a week with another class.

Student feedback
I added a question to a quick quiz on the last few chapters of reading to get student input on their experience. Student input is often the most valuable of all. These are some of their responses:

• "I think it's cool because we get to communicate with other people about the book."
• "Getting to talk to people across the country and around the world is interesting because we see how they think."
• "It's nice to know so many schools in the world are reading the same book as us. It's also a great way to discover books."
• "It's just one giant book club and it expands my thinking."

I love each and every unit during the school year for different reasons, but the GRA is definitely a highlight of my Fall semester. The students, even at this age, love being read to and a bonus is that they are reading great literature and looking forward to talking about it.

For more information about the GRA, please see the FAQ page or comment below with your questions.

Keep the magic alive,













Kandyce Valverde