I think by now everyone know members of #G2Great PLN like to talk. As a matter of fact, my good friend and mentor Dr Mary Howard just hit 50.5 K Tweets! To use Mary’s words, “What can I say, I like to talk.”
Teachers embrace talk because it is foundational for creating community. A good conversation grants us access to higher levels of understanding. On May 18, 2017Kara Pranikoff hosted #G2Great to discuss her new book, Teaching Talk, A Practical Guide to Fostering Student Thinking and Conversation and we explored ways to leverage talk to develop greater sophistication for how to use talk to bolster thinking and learning in the classroom.
Bridging research to classroom practice is the heart of Mary’s book, Good To Great Teaching . When we say “yes” to research, the next thing to do is to make our classrooms home to action research. We are all approaching the end of a school year, and now is the perfect time to try out some of the practices we are learning about during our #G2Great chats so we can finish strong and use what we learn in the year ahead.
As I think about how I can strengthen my talk practices in my own teaching. These two tweets sparked my learning into action:
Jenny and Kara inspired me to think about and adjust my own practices. First I will more intentionally offer explicit models to increase student engagement within collaborative dialogue and second I will keep a concrete reference of that dialogue use as an instructional springboard to next steps. The following is a transcript of an exchange between a partnership. The transcript is from two students discussing the benefits of using Thinking Tracks. Thinking Tracks is a tool I created, after attending a Summer Reading Institute at the Reading and Writing Project. The intention for the tool is to help students annotate texts quickly.
London: “Well a thinking track is really like used to jot down something. Like if I say, in the book Shortcut, they’re on a train track. That’s surprising to me, so I’d like jot down a surprising mark.”
Daniela: “Yeah, like um I will use this the Thinking Track by surprising. When they were all like looking and listening to the sounds and looking they were all surprised. I was surprised too that the kids were there on the train tracks. It is dangerous because they hurried and looked at the train coming through. On the other side they thought a train wasn’t coming, but the train passed! Someone could have maybe got hurt.”
London: “It (this book) opens up with a big twist and we just started the book!”
Daniela: “These tracks, like funny, important favorite, and surprised, connecting, I wonder, and there is one more conforce, confus, confusing.” (laughing a little) “You can all use these even the little pictures that show us how to use them.”
London: “It’s just a quick jot.”
What did my transcriptions do for me as a professional willing to shift my stance as a learner?
It shows me that both students have a strong understanding for how to use the tool.
It shows me that Daniela is learning how to integrate academic talk into her conversational speech.
This conversation gives me some insights as to the kinds of language standards I might want to lean into.
I can see that multisyllabic words, even familiar ones, might be still challenging to read flexibility.
I can use this conversation as mentor text to teach other students how to use the tool in a number of ways!
I can read it aloud to the rest of the class, or even next year’s class to demonstrate the value of the tool by pairing that with a copy of Donal Crew’s Shortcuts.
I can leave a copy of the transcript for students to read and annotate in a write around.
Just the act of transcribing their conversation sends a strong message to my students, we value talk here. It elevates their conversations to a new level of importance. They begin to see each other as a source of information to learn from. Wow!
I am grateful that Kara has elevated my own thinking about talk and I am going to use these points and her phenomenal book to fine tune my thinking this summer. Yes, this just the beginning of my learning and I invite you to join me so we can all delve deeper into her remarkable thinking. If you are reading this blog, you are the kind of teacher who is on a constant journey to bring your good classroom practices to great ones. It is every author’s hope that their work will inspire ours. When we read a professional book we are entering into a partnership that aspires to empower learning and benefit the intellectual world that we create for our students. We are co-creating a better opportunities for ourselves and our students. Happy reading.
LINKS
Teaching Talk: A Practical Guide to Fostering Student Thinking & Conversation
On May 11, 2017 #G2Great welcomed my word hero, Donald Bear. Donald Bear joined our chat and he led us through a discussion about word study with students at the center. Words Their Way describes the purpose of word study “…to examine words in order to reveal consistencies within our written language system and to help students master the recognition, spelling, and meaning of specific words.” Words Their Way is a developmental approach to word study inclusive of spelling, phonics and vocabulary. This is interwoven in a balanced literacy approach to literacy and invites students to inquire, manipulate, recognize, spell and understand words.
Students
For students word study is developmental, students move through distinct stages as they learn about words. Using Words Their Way teachers begin with an assessment that resembles a traditional spelling test. The teacher says the word, a sentence with the word in it and repeats the words again. What makes this test different is that the words a carefully selected to identify the developmental spelling stage that the student is in. This is useful because it informs instruction, showing a teacher precisely where to begin word study instruction.
Students engage in inquiry. Students are involved in a hands-on way where they are sorting words and checking them with a partner. They reflect by declaring or stating what they believe the letter, pattern or meaning is based on the sorting and then comparing and contrasting the words in the sort. Students then extend this by engaging in activities at their seats or at home. This can be in a variety of forms such as; a variety of sorting activites, games, cutting and pasting, using a word study notebook or making word charts.
These hands on activities provide for collaboration where students are exploring and discovering words. Students have opportunities to work in pairs, small groups or individual activities. A student centered classroom where word study is part of the balanced literacy approach is a classroom that is alive with discussion and discovery as students learn about words, whether at the alphabet level, pattern, or meaning level.
Teachers
One of the challenges of word study is there is so much to know about words and it is one part of the balanced literacy day. The key for teachers is to approach word study with a sense curiosity about words. Embracing some word joy as you watch students discover words as you guide them will support teaching and learning. Being open to learning with each new sort will allow for students to engage in rich discussion as they consider different rationales for why words are sorted in one way or another. Teachers of word study understand the reciprocal nature of reading and writing as well as the synchrony among reading, writing and spelling development and instruction. Word study therefore cannot only happen during an isolated word study block, but it must be integrated throughout the day. In writing workshop, reading workshop, read-aloud and even the content areas there are opportunities for students to play with the words or features of words they explored in their Words Their Way sorts.
The word study lesson begins with the teacher demonstrating and introducing the sort using key words or pictures. Turning the lesson over to the students, allowing them to inquire about the words, noticing and naming patterns allowing discourse around any possibility related to the phonology (alphabet), orthography (pattern) or morphology (meaning) is where students begin to develop word recognition, spelling, and vocabulary creating a positive impact on their reading.
Parents
Teaching and learning is one profession where every stakeholder around us has experience watching or participating in for at least 12 years of their own lives. Parents and teachers has imprinted in their memories what teaching and learning meant, likely when they recall their memories of their favorite teachers or how they learned spelling. These memories are imprinted into their minds and unfortunately do not account for any later researched ideas about how the brain learns. The fact is that we know a lot more now than we did when we were in school or when our students’parents were in school. Additionally, because it “worked” for one of us does not mean it worked for all of us. That being said, we have to acknowledge that when we talk about learning about spelling we need to provide not only strong professional development for teachers, but also support for parents, knowing their brains will be predisposed to resist these ideas about spelling because they are different than their knowledge of how they learned to spell.
Exposure, experience and time are necessary to change the perspectives of parents so that they can see the benefit in learning about spelling through this developmentally appropriate approach. When parents see the learning, when they see their children experiencing word joy and learning 10 more words rather than one at a time, ideas will begin to change around the teaching and learning of phonics, spelling, and vocabulary.
Donald Bear offers so much in the world of phonics, spelling and vocabulary and shows us just how critical these are to developing strong readers and writers. Be sure to check out Donald Bear’s website as well as some of his favorite websites.
As I ponder the collective commitment of dedicated educators who live and breathe a vision for Brilliant Tapestries, I am drawn to Maya Angelou’s words:
We all should know that diversity makes for a rich tapestry, and we must understand that all the threads of the tapestry are equal in value no matter what their color.
The colorful threads of our Brilliant Tapestry symbolize our responsibility to be relentless advocates for every child who enters our classroom. Cornelius and Courtney are widely known as student advocacy leaders so we were hungry for their message of hope, evidenced when our conversation quickly trended on Twitter. For one inspirational hour, they became our teachers and we were willing students eager to soak in their wisdom. The energy was palpable as we formed a community of kindred advocacy spirits where our hearts and minds intersected in a joyful expedition of Brilliant Tapestries.
As I began the daunting task of reflecting on a conversation that surpassed the 1000 tweet storify limit, I was filled with the awesome responsibility afforded me to write this post. I wrestled with doubt in the days that followed the chat, wondering if I could possibly do such a critically important topic justice in a brief overview. But then I remembered that every journey begins with a single step and my hope for a post that would reflect first steps quieted my fears:
Our #G2Great educators reflect varying stages in their advocacy journey so for some this journey is in the early stages. #G2Great educators willingness to engage in this discussion represents their sense of advocacy urgency but this is also accompanied by equal parts of trepidation as we consider where to begin such expansive work. It is this breadth, however, that makes first steps even more important as those initial steps can offer an entry point for what follows.
Armed with renewed determination to take those first steps in the name of our Brilliant Tapestries, I turned back to Cornelius and Courtney for inspiration and revisited a multitude of tweets. Narrowing this passionate discussion into a brief overview was formidable and yet doing so was a fitting first step. Eight BIG ideas emerged from this awe-inspiring chat that I will forever hold dear. Although this feels inadequate to represent the scope of wisdom that loomed large in #G2Great, it is my hope that my noticings can offer a starting point for new or continuing journeys in classrooms across the country:
BIG IDEA 1: Acknowledge that the journey is needed
We can no longer afford to turn a blind eye to the children who enter our classrooms and our responsibility to acknowledge and honor the identities each of them bring to the learning table. We must sharpen our professional lens to truly see the unique identities in front of us so that we can begin to ‘cultivate’ community. It is only when we can celebrate every colorful thread in each child’s life tapestry that we will embrace those identities with an open heart knowing that each distinct thread adds to the beauty of our Brilliant Tapestries.
BIG IDEA 2: Assume responsibility for change
Once we acknowledge the Brilliant Tapestries that inhabit our classrooms, we must then begin the change process that will allow us to truly create a culture of inclusivity that celebrates each child. To do this, we must begin by accepting our professional and ethical responsibility to children by recognizing that the structural systems in place are inadequate to make the significant changes we know are necessary. Once we do this we can begin to create new systems that will support our efforts to celebrate our Brilliant Tapestries.
BIG IDEA 3: Broaden your identity perspective
For too long, identity has been narrowly defined by color, gender, race or even financial status. We cannot truly see children as long as we focus on narrow descriptors of what we deem defines them. If we look closely, we will find that the identity they bring to our classrooms extends far beyond a label confined to a single descriptor. When we take time and effort to know children at a deeper level, varied identities begin to gloriously emerge both within and beyond our school walls as each one adds to our Brilliant Tapestry.
BIG IDEA 4: Lift students voices in joyful harmony
While these are important first steps, we will never truly create the inclusive classrooms our children deserve until we invite students into the conversation. Simply acknowledging that diversity exists is not enough. Inclusive assumes that we empower our students by lifting up their voices in ways that will give them choice, voice, and agency. And lifting up their voices means that we must truly hear them in order for our classrooms to change in any substantive way. Their voices are interwoven in our Brilliant Tapestries and bring it to life.
BIG IDEA 5: Widen your scope of reference
Embracing inclusive classrooms is certainly another important step in that journey but this means that we must move beyond our classroom doors. Embracing inclusivity is not limited by the life students live in our school but extends to the life they live beyond our schools. It is important that we don’t simply depend on formal structures to engage students and parents but find informal ways to demonstrate our role as ‘fierce and unapologetic advocates’ from both sides. Brilliant Tapestries reflect each aspect of our students’ lives.
BIG IDEA 6: Plant and nurture seeds of respect
We cannot create inclusive classrooms by simply giving lip service to the process of inclusivity. Rather we begin by planting the seeds that will create classrooms rooted in respect based on relationships we build with children in and beyond our school setting. Those relationship are not simply the ones that we build between teacher and students but extend to peers and community. These respectful relationships are reflected in our words and actions as we listen to and interact with students in ways that honor our Brilliant Tapestries.
BIG IDEA 7: Build a strong foundation first
This important work can seem so expansive that it’s tempting to want change to happen overnight. But time can be our greatest gift as we begin by creating classrooms where our children feel safe while acknowledging that we may well be their only safe haven. Creating a safe classroom culture takes time and in some cases may require undoing damage already done. We must ensure ‘safe’ is not just in our minds but also in the minds of the children who inhabit our classrooms. We strengthen the threads of Brilliant Tapestries by strengthening the foundation that supports those threads.
BIG IDEA 8: Courageously forge a new path
We have become complacent about how we define ‘normal’ and often based on our own sense of normal. Welcoming new students into our classrooms year after year requires us to see a new normal that is inclusive of every child in that classroom in that year. The educators participating in #G2Great received a hefty dose of brave, but we must initiate these same brave conversations in our schools. Our conversational journey was a supportive one – the same journey schools need as they redefine normal and create inclusive classroom. We will only truly celebrate our Brilliant Tapestries when this spirit can spreads across every classroom in every school.
As I close this post and reflect on the BIG ideas of our Brilliant Tapestries inspired by Cornelius and Courtney, I am further inspired by the words of Cornelius in a recent Heinemann Blog Post, Cornelius Minor on Being an Advocate for Your Students. In his eloquent words:
As each of us launches a personal and professional journey of choosing to do something to celebrate Beautiful Tapestries that inhabit our classroom, we can begin with honest introspection. Will we be proud of the choices we have made as educators? Will we be able to say with unwavering certainty that the something we did made our instructional world a better place and afforded our children a brighter future within and beyond our school walls? I am grateful to our advocacy leaders, Cornelius and Courtney, for initiating the conversation that will illuminate our way as we bravely forge our own path along a shared journey of commitment to fiercely advocate for our students.
So I end with a final question that will ultimately define the impact we have had in this world and in the lives of our children…
How can we step outside of the tapestry of our own lives and embrace the Brilliant Tapestries that connect us all?
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Since this chat was about merging our collective voices, I would be remiss if I didn’t include other voices. Georgia Heard’s powerful words and Courtney’s eloquent response seems like a fitting way to merge our voices in an orchestra of shared commitment as we advocate that all kids have the right to “sing.”
When Vicki Vinton agreed to join #G2Great on April 27, 2017 to talk about her new book, Dynamic Teaching for Deeper Reading: Shifting to a Problem Based Approach, we knew her message would resonate. We knew her words would fill us up and give us the energy that would keep us going at a time in the year when we need it most. Her message speaks to the untapped potential as we strive to trust in ourselves, our students, and in the reading process itself. This is just what we do; we are teachers who try to see the good around each corner so we may add to the collective knowledge of our community, one where hope overflows. That is what Vicki Vinton did as she turned on a light and revealed how trust can transform our practice to dynamic teaching.
Why did you become a teacher? Each of us reading this post right now came to teaching in our own time and our own way. While there are so many paths that lead us to this moment in our careers, there are bonds that bind us together. When I think about the kinds of teachers who belong to the #G2Great PLN I am convinced that they are in fact dynamic teachers. The dynamic teacher seeks out and embraces the changing nature of our work and is constantly looking for inroads for progress. Whether we are just starting out on the journey, have been in it for a long time, or are somewhere in the middle, it is necessary to be wholly optimistic and trust in our abilities and in our students.
Trust as Self Awareness
Trust begins when we are self aware of our own learning process. If we can imagine what we need to learn we can begin to imagine what students might need. Then we can begin the work of forming strong relationships built on trust. If we want dynamic teaching to take root in our classrooms we consider what students know about trust. We model what relationships built on trust looks like, and act accordingly:
Trust as Decision Making
As we set up our classrooms we consider many important things such as: where our libraries should go, how to make tools accessible, or how to best use the space to create flow. Finding ways to encourage trust is just as important. Trust grows stronger when we appreciate student potential and learn to ask the right questions:
Trust as Process
Trust helps our students to take on challenges as opportunities for growth. We cultivate classrooms that run on trust through authentic relationships. When we take time to listen to our students and are responsive to their needs our teaching becomes truly dynamic:
Trust as Opportunity
Trust is the thing that helps the wobbly bike rider start off. Trust is the thing that allows the actor to speak on stage. Trust is the thing that helps the first grader read that book to a friend. Trust is the thing that lets the young writer tell a story. As you read Vicki’s beautiful words know that this happens every day in classrooms everywhere, but first there was a sense of trust between teachers and students:
Teaching is complex work. There is so much to consider and it would be easy to overlook how important trust is to the work we do with students. We are so grateful that Vicki began this conversation so that we would discover these four levels of trust. We are so grateful to have her in the lead, asking the questions that make us dig deeper so we can be the best most responsive teachers we can be, because our students are worth it.
Connect with Vicki Vinton
Dynamic Teaching for Deeper Reading: Shifting to a Problem-Based Approach (Heinemann)
On 4/20/17 #G2Great was honored to open our welcome door to guest hosts Dorothy Barnhouse and Vicki Vinton as we explored their co-collaboration gem, What Readers Really Do: Teaching the Process of Meaning Making (Heinemann 2012). From the opening tweet, it was evident that our #G2Great family wanted to be privy to what readers do. With our dynamic writing duo leading the way, we launched into a joyful exploratory venture Twitter style.
As I thought about the inspired chat dialogue, I realized that the same thing that motivated Dorothy and Vicki to write their book drove our collective enthusiasm. Through writing, they sought to understand the thinking students do in the course of their reading, motivated to ‘stalk the invisible’ for reasons reflected in a quote we shared at the beginning of the chat.
What Readers Really Do reads like a reflective diary of their efforts to confront this conflict. As the pages of their book unfold, we come to understand how they resolved their conflict through a thoughtful negotiation to new thinking that would ultimately change the way they approached reading. Through our shared conversational collaboration, we grew increasingly confident that their journey to new thinking would help us negotiate our own.
Since the book was motivated by troubling worries that may thwart our efforts to move toward new thinking, this seemed like a worthy place to start. Our first question asked teachers to name challenges they confront. Although challenges varied from texts to topics to mandates, each of these could be bundled under the umbrella of TIME! (This pesky challenge reared its ugly head on another #G2Great chat blog with Colleen Cruz)
Two early tweets from Dorothy and Vicki set the stage for tackling this issue by shifting our perspective from time as a challenge to time as an incentive. We still acknowledge time constraints we all face but adjust how we view time. We tackle this challenge by insisting on expending our precious available time in the most authentic and productive ways in spite of the inevitable challenges.
As I reflect on our remarkable #G2Great hour of wisdom with Dorothy and Vicki about what readers really do, the initial question becomes two-pronged:
What do readers really do and how can teachers create an environment that invites and nurtures readers to do those things with or without our support?
With this questions at the forefront of my mind, I perused tweets from Dorothy and Vicki and found that eightBig Ideas began to emerge. It is important to emphasize that each point is distinctive and yet inseparably interconnected. These Big Ideas can help us respond to the above question in ways that will move our collaboration from Twitter into the classroom:
Big Idea 1: Build a thinking bridge through modeling
In order to build a thinking bridge to independence, we begin by sharing the thinking that takes place as we read. By making our thinking public we are able to stalk our own invisible in order to make the invisible visible. Dorothy’s inclusion of the words “authentic” and “joyful” should be a reminder to us all to celebrate the authentic joyful spirit or reading and avoid reducing how we interact to student reading through a recipe of thoughtless sameness.
Big Idea 2: Start with the end in mind
An essential theme running throughout the book and tweets is the idea that we teach this thinking process so that students will eventually take ownership of that process. When our primary goal is to build identity and agency, we know that we must keep this goal in our sights from the beginning. We do this by offering support in the early stages but we are prepared to watch for the signs that will allow us to fade our support into the background as students assume increasing control of their own thinking.
Big Idea 3: Focus on building strategic knowledge
Making room for students to assume control of their own thinking is not about asking them to replicate our thinking. Rather, our thinking offers a supportive scaffold to help them construct their own meaning as they apply this process. This means that naming a strategy is far less relevant than helping them to be more intentional and strategic each time they engage in the thinking process. Over time and through practice, they will begin to internalize this thinking.
Big Idea 4: Be present in the teachable moment
In order to support the thinking students engage in, we must be willing to stalk their invisible in action. To do this, we must be present in students’ learning moments on a day-to-day basis so we can notice and celebrate the thinking that often happens when we least expect it. We adjust our stance from teacher to observer so that we can use our observations as stepping stones that will lead them to powerful new thinking opportunities in a wide range of varied text opportunities.
Big Idea 5: Celebrate the road to discovery
Teachers who are aware of their own thinking recognize that this process is a messy one. We know that the road to discovery can be littered with confusion, uncertainty, and possibility. Such a journey takes time so we must be willing to create experiences where students have time to linger a bit longer even when riddled with confusion, uncertainty, and possibility. This path Dorothy calls ‘huh’ to ‘oh’ is recursive rather than linear and so we support the unexpected twists and turns of thinking that can lead them from one discovery to another.
Big Idea 6: Use your noticings as next steps
We support this messy process as we become expert kidwatchers. Certainly our role as kidwatcher begins by noticing what students are doing as they read but we know that we must make them cognizant of our noticings. This allows us to support their efforts by exploring how we can use their reading to move them from where they are to where they could be. While increasing awareness of their own thinking as they read is an important part of this process, we know that awareness of NOW thinking must lead to purposeful NEXT thinking.
Big Idea 7: Gently nudge to new understandings
Noticing student thinking can help them take ownership of their own thinking if we are responsive to this process. We recognize that our responsibility is not to teach students to be compliant disseminators of knowledge by responding to preconceived answers but to pose genuine ponderings to help them to move to deeper thinking. Once we acknowledge their thinking we must then help them understand how they arrived at that thinking in the first place. This combined understanding moves them closer to agency, ownership, and independence.
Big Idea 8: Support a meandering path to meaning
When we acknowledge thinking as a process we must also acknowledge all that this implies. The dictionary defines process as a series of actions or steps taken in order to achieve a particular end. We do not view their thinking in terms of a product to be gathered at the end of reading but as a process to be supported each step along the way. Vicki celebrates this view by referring to thinking as a process of drafting and revising. We expect thinking to grow or even change and so we nurture the winding path to understanding.
After the chat ended, a final tweet with Dorothy afforded me an opportunity to make a shameless book plug.
At #G2Great we see ourselves as professional cheerleaders committed to doing our best work for students. In the past few months, we have celebrated authors who share our passionate commitment to students. We spotlight their books at #G2great because we know their words have the potential to transform every classroom into the learning spaces our children deserve.
And thus my shameless plug. We don’t just celebrate new books at #G2Great because we worry that amazing books like What Readers Really Do may be missed simply based on a 2012 publication date. We are on a mission to put books, old and new, into teachers hands because the advice of amazing authors is truly “forever young.” But rather than taking my word for it, download a free chapter of this exquisite book also available as an ebook.
Thank you Dorothy and Vicki. Your words exemplify forever young and will continue to inspire us to do this important thinking work with our students now and in the future!
On April 13, 2017 #G2Great welcomed Ralph Fletcher as a guest host to share ideas from his newest book, Joy Write: Cultivating High-Impact, Low-Stakes Writing. In his book, Ralph invites us to take on what I believe to be the most important lens when it comes to writing. Ralph guides us by suggesting, “We must strive to see the writing curriculum through their eyes, as they experience it, from their points of view.” All too often we view the teaching of writing through our own perspective, making instructional decisions through that lens. If we stop and switch the lens to view the learning environment from our students’ eyes we can clearly see the essentials that lead to real growth in writing. Student-centered classrooms where students have autonomy and choice in writing open up opportunities for students to write about what is personal to them and the topics or issues that they are passionate about.
We began the chat with a discussion around critical characteristics of a student-centered writing classroom. Ralph reminded us of the importance of low stakes writing, and when you have the lens of the student, you realize how critically important it is to have students engage in writing in an environment where students do not feel high stakes pressure. They need to feel safe to take the risks that a writer takes as they play with language and grow their writing. Providing students with choice and time in order to engage in writing connected to their passions and interests creates the environment where students will experience the most growth.
When Ralph led us through a discussion around choice, he pointed out so many aspects of choice in writing that extend beyond the just choice of topic. Check out his tweets below and be inspired to create ways in your classroom to open up opportunities for increased autonomy.
I am especially intrigued by Ralph’s idea of inserting open cycles of writing in between our units of study. These open cycles provide students with a wider option of choice than what we generally allow and are beyond the topic choice. There is value to working in a shared unit of study, as a community studying a particular type of writing and learning together, however there is something so simple and appealing about dropping in an open-cycle between units. In this open cycle students choose topic, genre, audience and really everything in the writing process. Ralph urges us to see this is truly the way writers grow. Below you can see some of Ralph’s tweets on this topic and you can think a little bit more about why and how you might institute open cycles in your classroom.
Stating with your core values, sustained writing – everyday. This essential ingredient is the one we must hold closest to us and never stray from. The time we dedicate to writing provides the time for students to engage in the writing process and grow as writers. Ralph tweeted that everything else after this is negotiable. This tweet really helped to send the message home. In this new book you will want to learn more about his new idea of “greenbelt writing,” a type of informal writing that is raw, unmanicured and uncurated. It is through this writing environment that Ralph shows us that students can demonstrate not only tremendous, but JOY in writing.
On Thursday, April 6, 2017 #G2Great began a conversation with Patty McGee about her new book Feedback That Moves Writers Forward from Corwin Press. Teachers enthusiastically delved into the topic and the conversation sparkled with brilliance and optimism. I think @TeachWriteEDU captured the #G2Great experience beautifully with her tweet:
I am filled with complete gratitude because as @TeachWriteEDU put it, “there is so much goodness here…” this chat spurred me to think about some questions we all can ask ourselves.
How does feedback influence our writing identities?
Formative feedback and identity are essential to growing as a writer. Feedback is like a continuous story that we tell our students to extend meaning making. Feedback maximizes a learning stance from a position of strength. Feedback is an invitation for students to know that we hear them, we see them, and that together we are authoring their unique writing identities. This is big work. This may be how students decide what writing will mean to them. How will it will fit into their lives? Through feedback we strive and to help each student to find an original voice and influence:
With Patty in the lead, we all focused on how specific feedback builds a writer’s identity with our students:
In Patty’s book she recounts an experience she had during a workshop with the incredible Ralph Fletcher: “In a writing workshop by the inspiring Ralph Fletcher a few years back, Ralph asked the audience of hundreds of teachers to raise their hands if they considered themselves readers. Most hands went up. Including my own. He then asked, ‘How many of you consider yourselves writers, or even like to write?’ I looked around, oddly comforted by the fact that I was not the only teacher who seemed to be doing their best to fake the love of writing for students.” (p 5)
What experiences formed your writer’s identity?
As I thought about these question, my thoughts turned back to the story of my childhood that had a lasting impact on my own writing identity…
Yellow sunlight streamed in through giant panes of glass, warming us as we sat around the kitchen table. Coffee cups steamed darkly in contrast to the brightly painted porcelain cow creamer. Her mouth, forever frozen, in an open circle of surprise. There I was drinking actual coffee with my father! No longer just a gawky twelve year old girl. No, now I am a writer. I am one of two writers, drinking coffee, and thinking deeply. My dad leaned over my paper, loosely holding pencil in hand and laughing at the funny parts. A swell of emotion filled me and I became light headed. I don’t know if came from the caffeine or the pure elation at his response to my writing. That experience marked the beginning of a lifelong love with writing… and coffee.
A Call To Action – A #G2Great Community of Writers: What’s your story?
We invite you to reflect on the experiences that have shaped your writing identity. Blog about it, so that we may leave each other feedback that elevates our practice. If you leave your links in our Comment Boxes we can continue to examine who we are as writers and practice giving feedback that pushes writers forward. We can generate writing experiences for ourselves so we may lift the level of writing for our students.
Since our #G2Great chat launch on January 8, 2015, I have come to know each member of our remarkable #G2Great family as an unstoppable force. These passionate educators demonstrate their steadfast commitment to teaching each week, refusing to let anything stand in the way of professional excellence. On March 30, 2017, #G2Great explored unstoppable with guest host Colleen Cruz, author of the incredible book, The Unstoppable Writing Teacher: Real Strategies for the Real Classroom. (Heinemann, 2015)
The dictionary defines unstoppable with descriptors that any teacher would be proud to possess including indomitable; unbeatable; invincible; inexorable; uncontrollable; irrepressible. Certainly these are all professionally desirable characteristics, but it was two particular descriptors that spoke to me personally:
I have been privileged to know many unstoppable educators over the years and I am convinced that inextinguishable flames of educators ON FIRE is the fuel that drives them to move along a pathway in a life-long professional journey to unstoppable.
In the foreword to Colleen’s book, Lucy Calkins asks us to name our fears as we linger in ‘uncertainty and doubt’ where hidden opportunities reside. Calkins is the very definition of unstoppable, so we began by asking our #G2Great family to identify their fears in the form of challenges that can thwart our efforts to become the unstoppable writing teachers our children deserve.
Colleen led this discussion by highlighting a challenge that was reiterated in one form or another in tweet after tweet.
With so few precious minutes allotted in each day and so much to accomplish in those precious minutes, TIME was the clear challenge winner. Not surprisingly, our winner seems to have a trickle-down effect that directly or indirectly impacts many challenges that plague teachers:
But we only identify challenges so that we can discover hidden opportunities that elevate our work and enrich the writing lives of students. Challenges we face in the teaching of writing can feel overwhelming, but Colleen reminds us what matters most in a Heinemann video, Writing as a Tool for Thinking:
“We can’t solve all the problems we’re faced with in writing instruction but we can choose how to respond to them. And our responses will make all the difference.”
As I look back on #G2Great tweets, seven essential stepping stones began to emerge that could help us as we maneuver our way from challenges to opportunities on our journey to becoming unstoppable writing teachers:
Follow Your Passions
Teachers who make writing a daily priority would be first agree that choice is a critical factor for developing as writers at any age. Colleen reminds us that all writers gravitate toward topics that reflect their passions. Through our passions we stand to learn a great deal both about our topic of choice and the process of writing. Unstoppable writing teachers on fire know that choice feeds burning embers of desire in ways that inspire us to put words on paper in the first place. Choice honors writing as a personal venture.
Acknowledge the Inevitable Struggle
Once again, Colleen speaks about writing from personal experience. Any writer would tell you – even one working on book 10 – that writing is a struggle into the unknown. If we want our writers to be willing to lean into that struggle and emerge victorious, we must first acknowledge that it exists both from their perspective and our own. We share how we meet this struggle in our own writing and then support students as they move through the muck and the mire that every writer knows exists. When we show our student writers how we face and move past the struggle in those moments when it rears its ugly head (and it will), we are showing them what it means to be “totally a writer.”
Make the Writing Process Visible
It is simply not possible to teach writing well without an insider’s perspective. This means that as professionals we immerse ourselves in the very process we are teaching by making our own writing a daily priority. With that first hand view of writing and the struggle that comes hand in hand with our commitment to writing, we can then make each aspect of what it means to be a writer public at all stages. Making our own thinking visible gives students a front row seat to what we do as writers so that we can then offer them opportunities to apply this thinking in their own writing – first with support but then ultimately on their own. This is the SHOW don’t tellspirit at its finest.
Put Writers in the Writing Driver’s Seat
Colleen’s tweet was a celebration of students as teachers from Jenn Hayhurst and Jill DeRosa. We model the process of writing and offer support to build a strong foundation of understanding, but then we step back so students can put their new learning into action without us. This stepping back gives our writers room to assume a lead role as we encourage independent problem solving. We have the courage to let students spend more time in the writers driving seat than out of it so that they will have the real life opportunities to meet the inevitable struggles that come with writing as they assume increasing control of their own writing life.
Know the Writer in Front of You
Since we can’t teach writers we don’t know, we draw from a wide range of formative assessment practices. These day-to-day opportunities fill us with the knowledge about our student writers we can then use to support them in the course of their own writing. Colleen highlights kidwatching as a powerful knowledge gathering process. Once we step back and put our student writers in the driver’s seat, we then have the freedom to enjoy the view as students actively engage in writing – both within and beyond the struggle. With this freedom to become an observer comes understandings that will inform our next step efforts.
Create an Instructional ZOOM LENS
While whole class writing instruction is one component of a powerful balanced writing design, we must also create varied structures that will allow us to meet the needs of unique learners. This differentiated support affords us time and space to meet those unique needs. To accommodate these support opportunities we need instructional frameworks in place, making side-by-side and small group support designs essential. These targeted support opportunities allow us to address the specific challenges writers face in their own writing as each writing opportunity is a springboard to support the writer in front of us.
Build a Supportive Bridge
Colleen’s exchange with Tara Smith reflects that unstoppable writing teachers support students on their journey to becoming unstoppable writers. Colleen reminds us that this risk-taking only happen within a safe learning environment where writing risks are both invited and honored. This supportive environment of risk-taking in great volumes, benefits both the teacher and student on their personal journey to unstoppable.
As I close my reflection on an amazing #G2great chat with guest host Colleen Cruz, my initial definition of unstoppablecomes back into focus. These seven stepping stones to unstoppable bring to mind classrooms where both teachers and students are ON FIRE and those flames are inextinguishable when we make it a priority to celebrate the writing and writer from all sides – ours and theirs.
Thank you for supporting our personal journey to UNSTOPPABLE, Colleen!
On March 23, 2017 we welcomed Jennifer Serravallo as a guest host on the #G2Great chat to talk about her most recent book, The Writing Strategies Book. The thing about this book and the sister to this book, The Reading Strategies Book (Serravallo, 2015) is that they are full of real and practical strategies that proficient readers and proficient writers use. These strategies make visible the work of proficient readers and writers so that students can begin their journey in developing independence in literacy. In creating a useful resource for teachers Jennifer takes these strategies and organizes them by goals to support student writing. It is through these goals and strategies that we can lead our students to become independent writers.
The Goals
Through a hierarchy of goals Jennifer provides a pathway for teachers to guide students to develop, work towards and reach specific goals. This hierarchy of goals helps teachers to decide where to begin in setting goals and teaching strategies with writers. This provides answers to what most teachers struggle with when teaching writing. It provides answers to the questions and struggles about time and focus. During the chat teachers reflected on their struggles with knowing what to focus on when it feels as though there is so much to teach and never enough time. Jennifer’s hierarchy of goal puts teachers and students on a pathway that will allow more time for practice on specifically targeted strategy within identified goals. Investing time up front with students, observing as they write, meeting with them in conferences and studying their on-demand writing will allow you to know your students well enough to choose an appropriate goal.
If teachers want to make the writing process visible and tangible to students then we need to share with them the strategies that writers use. Of course, writers do these things often with automaticity, however with guidance and practice in these strategies students can begin to employ strategies independently. Jennifer Serravallo has captured and organized strategies for writing in narrative, informational, opinion/persuasive and poetry. These strategies often can be utilized in more than one type of writing, during more than one stage of the writing process and across more than one grade level or developmental levels of writing. The organization of strategies by goal allows for you to carry goals across many differents types of writing or units of study and will ensure practice and ultimately transfer in writing skills.
Teaching the Writer
When students can transfer what they have learned to another piece of writing they are able to make decisions about what their own goals are and what strategies they need to employ in any new piece of writing they engage in. Teaching the writer rather than the one piece of writing is the way to develop independent writers. This begins with goal setting and it involves teacher feedback, self-assessment, and reflection.
Our overall goal in teaching writing is to teach students to be independent writers. Jennifer Serravallo has created the ultimate tool in The Writing Strategies Book to support teachers and their writers as students move toward becoming proficient writers who are learning multiple strategies through the writing process as they engage in multiple units of study with opportunities to publish in many different structures. Of course, no writing process is complete without a publication and celebration. Jennifer includes an appendix in her book that is specific to the publishing and celebrating that helps writers to write with the end in mind. Always remember that writing is hard work, and it is good work, no not just good, it is GREAT work that deserves to be published and celebrated.
Have you ever had an experience that was so powerful it lingered long after it was over, intermittently tapping you on the shoulder to remind you it was still there? Well that happened to me November 2015, long before we brought my memory to life on #G2Great. March 16, 2017 is now a contributor to the growing memory in my heart as high school teacher Jason Augustowski and nine remarkable ninth and tenth grade students known as #BowTieBoys were our guest hosts. Ryan Hur, Ryan Beaver, Jack Selman, Dawson Unger, Spencer Hill, Sam Fremin, Sean Pettit, Joe O’Such, and Kellen Pluntke extended their reach across the Twittersphere.
I first learned of #BowTieBoys when I happily found myself in a session at NCTE 2015 led by Lester Laminack and Jason Augustowski. Hearing high school students speak so eloquently with such profound understanding of teaching made it clear I had witnessed something spectacular. I experienced that impact once again at NCTE 2016 and was so inspired that Sam Fremin became our first #BowTieBoy guest host June 9, 2016. I have since become a self-appointed #BowTieBoys cheerleader, a role I take very seriously.
Since Lester and Jason introduced the Bow Tie Boys to the world, it seems only fitting that they also introduce them to #G2Great:
When I asked the Bow Tie Boys to host #G2Great, there wasn’t a moment of hesitation. Wholeheartedly embracing the opportunity, students wrote their own questions based on personal educational interests and on chat night Jenn, Amy and I took a backseat to soak in #BowTieBoys wonder in a #G2Great version of side-by-side learning. Although this inspiring group has grown dramatically since 2015, it brought back the intense memory of our first meeting – and I was inspired anew!
From the moment #BowTieBoys took the #G2Great helm, professional enthusiasm exploded into colorful fireworks of collective enthusiasm that persists days later. Even though this was the first experience with a Twitter chat for many of them, they approached it will a spirit of enthusiasm. That enthusiasm was captured by a picture Jason took of nine students sharing their passion for educational excellence – and we were all charmed from the start!
As I look back on our amazing #BowTieBoys chat, I want to spotlight each powerful questions individually since these pondering offer essential messages that should remain at the forefront of our educational dialogue. (Do yourself a favor and follow them on Twitter and on their blog listed with their question)
Nine Lessons Learned from Remarkable High School #BowTieBoys
As the #G2great clock struck 8:30 EST, #BowTieBoys words of welcome flooded the Twitter screen in what one of our chatters described as ‘the most welcoming chat ever.’ Ryan reminds us to ensure that all students feel heard and appreciated just as we felt heard and appreciated. We can only develop a positive bond within a respectful and supportive community of learners that invites students to ‘the most welcoming classrooms ever.’
I doubt that anyone would argue the tremendous affect personal interest can have on the learning process. The Bow Tie Boys’ questions and blogs are fueled by their educational interests and this has resulted in incredible learning opportunities that are driven by hard work and effort. Ryan reminds us that when we celebrate interests, we can awaken curiosity that in turn leads to more learning. Student interests and personal passions then become ripple their way to increased learning.
Research has long informed the critical role dialogue and collaboration play in the learning process. Our weekly #G2Great chat illustrates the power of talk week after week as educators clamor to join a social media form of collaborative discourse. Jack reminds us that the end product of learning is not assignments or contrived questions. Rather, the goal is to actively engaging students in the process of learning that is elevated through meaningful talk that revolved around the learning. Engaged collaboration rises from a respectful community of shared learning where talk moves from the teacher to students.
Dawson’s question focused on gifted and special education students, but his message was about so much more because it illustrates our responsibility to meet the needs of every student in our classroom. Dawson reminds us that we can only meet this ethical and professional responsibility when we truly know our students. As we gain deeper day to day knowledge that occurs only in the trenches of learning we cam then generate differentiated instructional experiences that take students from where they are to where they could be when our teaching is student-focused.
Just as our students are wonderfully unique from an instructional perspective, they are also wonderfully unique in the level of engagement they each bring to learning. As we address the instructional needs of students, we also address their emotional needs. Spencer reminds us that choice and passion are extraordinary contributors to this process of maximizing student engagement in learning. There is a big difference between assigning and engaging and the impact of this distinction can be quite dramatic – for better or for worse.
Our wonderful #G2Great family shows up on Twitter week after week, and Sam is a long-time member of that family (yes a high school student has been part of our #G2Great conversations for some time). Sam is committed to social media and the powerful role it can play on the learning lives of teachers and students alike. Yet, in spite of an escalation of technological advances and broad learning opportunities, many teachers and students still avoid it. Sam’s question is worth posing in every school, “Why limit student interaction?.”But this requires teachers to embrace it.
Sean raises an issue many educators have also posed that questions the value of five-paragraph essays. Sean reminds us that when we shift our focus away from rigid rule-based writing to the creative thinking that is a critical aspect of writing, we can then increase the quality of that writing. We can achieve this important shift by designing a learning environment that encourages students to find inspiration around them. Student interest can spark the creative thinking that could teach students as much about the writing process because it is inspired by that thinking.
Joe’s thoughtful merging of “humanity” with teaching to the test is an important one in a day and age where test scores hover over educators like a dark cloud. Joe reminds us that student success rather than test scores is the ultimate goal. His suggestion to offer individual learning opportunities that put learning back in the hands of students allows us to keep them at the center of our practices. I can’t imagine a better way to achieve Joe’s belief in teaching with “humanity” than to keep professional humanity inseparably intertwined with our efforts.
Homework has regained attention in educational discussions so Kellen’s question is a timely one. With so much time-wasting homework assigned in schools across the country, Kellen wisely reminds us to allow student voices to enter the conversation. We can elevate homework experiences when it supports and extends instruction while highlighting student passions. When purpose and passion join forces, the homework discussion changes in both direction and potential for impact. This message is sorely needed in many classrooms.
This bonus question is inspired by high school teacher Jason Augustowski (blog) who participated in the entire #G2Great chat alongside students. As the resident #BowTieBoy cheerleader, I’d like to pose a question in their honor.
Jason is a model for what is possible when we trust students to lead the way. In Jason’s words, that begins by creating classroom where we model our unwavering commitment to students. Jason was in the sidelines all the way, yet always allowing students to remain in the #G2Great drivers seat by posing and responding to their own questions. He set the stage for this amazing chat experience while keeping students in the spotlight so they would shine in a powerful side-by-side supportive journey to a powerful new experience.
As I reflected on conversations that rose from these questions, I realized that certain ideas were woven throughout the tweets like an intricate instructional thread of importance. These repeated concepts inspired me to create a visual reminder of the impact nine students and a teacher had on our thinking.
I’d like to end on a personal note. For several years, I’ve had a nagging concern that we’re missing the obvious in a constant quest to become the educators our students deserve. Thanks to the #BowTieBoys inspiration, I am now more convinced than ever that this missing ingredient is students. I’m not sure that we can ever become the teachers we hope to be until we open more teacher-student conversations.
Our #G2Great family values professional growth but #BowTieBoys illustrate a new layer of our life-long quest for understanding. If we are willing to hold up a looking glass of our teaching from students’ perspective, we can see our work through their eyes. And those are very wise eyes indeed.
So in honor of their continuing impact, please do me a favor. When you go back into your classrooms tomorrow, look into the eyes of your students and ask them about your teaching from their side….
because you’ll never know the wonderful places their responses can take you until you ask.
