Teaching the Academic Essentials - Part 2

Top 5 take-aways from today:

1. "Discussion improves comprehension, increases engagement and enhances memory when it is structured, purposeful, meaningful, and constrained by time. Even one minute of effective classroom discussion shows measureable benefits to student learning." This was a nice reinforcement of what a CSETL Fellow has been sharing in her work with academic discourse, as well as a reinforcement of my belief that learning is social. While much of my learning during this workshop has come from the presenter, I have learned a great deal from those folks sitting around me, in part because the presenter has worked discussion into our day on a regular basis. It is a refreshing change from rushing through material. If I feel that way - I can only imagine what it will do for kids.

2. "You have the men you have - and it's up to you to make them into the soldiers you want them to be." This quote (or something like it!) was attributed to George Washington but it makes a great deal of sense about education as well. Whenever I hear teachers complaining that students don't work hard enough or won't do this and can't do that, I get a little angry. We should be teaching with the belief that the students in our classroom can succeed - or we have failed. I have always said that parents send us everything they've got - they aren't hiding the good ones/the smart ones at home! It is our job to teach each and every child that we are gifted with.

3. Most teachers, particularly those at the secondary level, don't know what we do when we "read" - it just happens to us. We, as teachers, need to be more explicit and transparent with our students and bring our process into the class. We did a great activity in the session today after reading a "complex" piece to chart visually our reading process - what we did when we didn't understand things, how we made connections to comprehend. This reflection was very helpful to me in thinking about how I have taught reading in the past - but also how I might be able to do it with teaching writing as well. I need to ponder this a bit - but you can bet there will be more to come!!

4. There are many different kinds of text and we use different strategies when we read them. I have known this - as I believe that each content area has it's own literacy. We read different things in social studies class then in science, math, and ELA. I needed to teach my kids how to "read" political cartoons, maps, newspaper articles written in the 1800s. Charting out what I do for each of these different texts will help me when I work with teacher and primary sources.

5. I don't like Yeats. I'm kidding - sort of! We did a great activity at the end of the session using "The Second Coming." The discussion around the poem and the strategies that we used were invigorating and inspiring. If I could open a school with the people sitting in that room today - the kids would be engaged and all see success. I am still tortured by the poem and what it means and the fact that I didn't get it the first three times we read it (not sure I still get it but I've read enough Internet reviews to fake it!!) Jim Burke made a great analogy today when we compared learning/reading to weight lifting. When you lift weights - you want to lift a weight heavy enough to cause fatigue. That allows your muscles to grow. If we don't challenge kids with difficult text - and teach them to navigate problems - they won't grow as readers. I might not like Yeats but I loved the discussion today!!



Cross posted on Grand Rounds.

Teaching the Academic Essentials - Part 1

I'm lucky enough to be spending the next three days re-charging by attending the 3rd Annual Reading Institute in Jamestown, N.Y. First - I need to say kudos to the folks who have organized this - it is impressive!! And an even louder round of applause for the over 200 teachers who are attending this session in the "shadow" of their school year (we just ended last Friday!)

The speaker that I was originally going to be spending time with had a family emergency and so I was cast adrift. Fortunately - my dear friend David charted a course for me. So I will spend the rest of the week with Jim Burke.

I hope this doesn't offend him but to this point, he has presented in much the same way that I do. If we are going to be spending time writing - we best be writing!! Too often - we want to sit and absorb information. If our brains click with it - we use it. If they don't - we discard it. But if we really engage in the activities, then we can determine how to make it our own, to make it work inside our own classrooms. I can understand how my participants feel when I make them do this - so I took some notes about what I can tweak in my own work - but I loved that I got to write, write, write today!!

Top Five from the session today:

1. "Graphic organizer" can be too limiting a term. Instead - we should be providing students with "tools for thought." I liked this idea - it was really about setting up a simple tool for students to organize thoughts and some guiding questions/prompts to start them on their way. We folded a piece of paper into thirds and simply labeled them to guide our reflections. Jim then led us in narrowing down what we had written about to reflect further - and then share with colleagues. For this exercise, we reflected upon what worked this year (or what didn't!)

2. Weekly poems. This was something that worked for Jim last year (yes, Virgina - even presenters share!!) He selected short poems (less than 30 lines) that students read each day for a week. Each time they read the poem - they reflected or reacted to something different (initial reactions, imagery, tone, etc.) so that at the end of the week, they had notes to use to write an analytical piece. These poetry pieces could be done in just 10 minutes of class time but certainly packed a punch.

3. "Well Words" These words come from Jim's Teacher's DayBook. We selected five words from the list of 52 that would have made an impact on our personal/professional lives if we paid a bit more attention to them. We then narrowed it down to one word and then developed 2-3 questions we might ask to prompt writing around that word. Finally - we wrote. GREAT STRATEGY that followed his "Academic Essentials Matrix" and had us "Bloomin' upward!" Careful! This strategy will be coming to a workshop near you soon!!

4. The emphasis on connecting to students!! And that without connecting to students - we'll never get them to learn (or see themselves as learners.) This was especially powerful to me - as I have spent a great deal of time thinking about this since last year's High School's New Face Conference. Jim read to us from my favorite coffee table book and had us reflect upon the connections we have made (or not made!) in the past year. Very powerful community building exercise for us!!

5. The idea of teaching and expecting students to be generative thinkers. The premise comes from the work of Judith Langer and seems to fit what I have felt all along. Students need to create their own knowledge - to seek out different viewpoints, to search to make their own meanings and connections. Much of what we did today modeled how to scaffold instruction so that students could practice this important life-long skill.

I left re-energized and with a million thoughts floating through my head. I can't wait for tomorrow!!

Cross-posted on Grand Rounds.

Flying High!

I've been spending some time recently in a district where year one of curriculum mapping did not go as well as planned. Probably lots of reasons behind it - and ones we are all familiar with - but one thing that stood out when the teachers talked was the need to have reading and writing integrated across all curriculum areas. What would that look like in a curriculum map?

I am not sure I have the right answer - if there even is one. Having worked on ELA maps in my own district, they are not easy nor are they ever done. And integrating reading and writing skills can be a complex task. Perhaps it is my bias - perhaps my background - but I still find social studies the easiest path to take.

For example - Orville and Wilbur Wright. Airlines have been in the news lately - with the high cost of fuel, cancelled flights, technology delays, etc. And many more kids are flying these days than when I was younger (Case in point- my nieces are soon to fly to Aruba for their third time and they are six and four years old!!) So it seems a natural connection to read about the famous flying brothers.

In New York State - this could happen at several points in the elementary social studies curriculum as we talk about transportation, our communities and other communities, world communities, etc. etc. In searching, I found this interesting book about the history of flight written from the perspective of animal characters.

I haven't read it - but it is a RAFT model. The story of the first flight is told through the eyes of the animal characters (ROLE), the AUDIENCE is young children of today, the FORMAT is a children's story, and the TOPIC of course, is that historic day in 1903 that "made the world a forever smaller place."

In addition to working on writing skills, this particular writing piece measures student comprehension of material as they are asked not to regurgitate it, but to synthesize it. RAFTs were my favorite thing to do with students - it helped them to pull apart NYS writing prompts as well as sneaking a little of that middle school creativity into the content. Win-win!!

Now imagine RAFTs from another perspective - rather than telling the story of the first flight from the point of view of someone there - what if Orville and Wilbur were to view this video:




Students could then write from the perspective of Orville and Wilbur demonstrating how their invention has changed the world. Or about how the world and technology has changed since 1903. The possibilities - seemingly like flights! - are endless!!

Thanks to think:lab for the video link!!

Hook 'Em Danno!

"I have been accused of being anal retentive, an over-achiever, and a compulsive perfectionist, like those are bad things."

No - this is not a line from my diary!! Instead it is the first line from Millicent Min, Girl Genius by Lisa Yee. I don't own it yet - but with an opener like that you can bet I soon will!!

And I was hooked from the moment I heard the series of leads from YA literature on my long trek to work today being read on NPR. The complete listing of books and their leads are on the NPR website but even better is the podcast of what I heard!! Can you hear the passion of this librarian??

This is a great set of leads to hook young adult readers - particularly in the summer months when some might have a quota of 25 books to finish by September!! Even better - it is a great set of openers to share with students as they refine how they begin their own stories.

What's your favorite lead?

Half Full or Half Empty?

Waking up this morning - my glass was half empty. Comments from teachers about the ability of their students - particularly in writing are weighing heavily on my mind. Concerns about the fact that a district I am working with has a problem with writing yet many of the teachers continue to point fingers at each other and the kids make me wonder if anyone can change that culture, let alone me.

And so my post this morning was going to be venting that and trying to work out why some folks take such a negative view of student abilities. But I decided to open my Bloglines and read first. And now my glass is half full.

The Fischbowl shared some freshman projects from Learning and Laptops. Since links in blogs are meant to be clicked - I checked them out and soon became immersed in what these amazing teachers and students were doing. One teacher chose an essential question to examine for the course of the year: "What does literature say about human beings?" The students used this question as a lens for all reading that year and created collaborative projects in which the students not only had to answer the question, but to use modern examples to prove/disprove their answer. (I know I am not doing credit to the description of the project - please read the blog posting to get the full picture.)

Viewing the student work began to fill my glass. One requirement of the project was to produce a final multi-media project that was "creative, captivating, and thorough" - and these projects were amazing! Adding to very powerful voices throughout the pieces, the students selected visuals (and in some cases music) to capture what it was they were trying to say. In addition to summarizing and showing that they had read and understand the literature pieces, the connections the students made are original and very telling about the world our students live in now. A world very different from the world many of us grew up in.

I haven't watched all the presentations yet - but I plan to. I feel re-energized. I feel hopeful. I feel like I can use this teacher and her class as an example in my district of what we can accomplish when we tap into the potential that our kids have, rather than focusing on how we might think they don't quite measure up.

"What's amazing about human nature which is shown through literature time and again, is that through all the bad in life, we somehow manage to find the good." (Tana, Jessica, Elyse in "Experiences" from the project.)

Comma Abuse

Hello. My name is Theresa and I am a comma abuser.

Seriously, I never really mastered where commas belonged and where they did not in my writing. I think a teacher once taught me to put them any place that you would take a breath in your writing, which for those who know me, might never happen becauseIhavebeentoldthatItalkreallyfastsofastthatIdon'thavetimetobreathe. So, instead, I overcompensate, and tend to have what I affectionately call, "comma diarrhea" (gross I know, but I taught middle school!!)

And then, after I finally mastered the serial comma rule (you should have one less comma then the things you are listing) they go ahead and make that final comma optional!!

So - it was with great delight that I read over on Mentor Texts & More that NYC Teacher found a book that might help teach kids about comma abuse. It's My Big Boy Bed by Eve Bunting and here it how she plans to use it:

"It's a lovely book that tells the story of Donny's very first night sleeping in his big boy bed. Hardly a book for upper elementary school students, right? WRONG! I think it's an excellent book for teaching kids how to go beyond the traditional use of commas. Bunting's comma use throughout the story, especially in the story's dialogue is fascinating since she puts commas in places that I wouldn't have thought to put them. "

Now - I don't own this book (yet!) but I had never really thought to read books, particularly picture books, with the lens of teaching punctuation. Voice, word choice, sentence fluency - absolutely! But unless the focus of the picture book was about conventions (a la Punctuation Takes A Vacation) - I never thought about using it as a mentor text for commas!

Sigh! Guess I'll have to read my extensive collection of picture books all over again!! Good thing it's summer and Amelia will have lots of free time for read alouds!!

Writing Thesis Statements

From think:lab, I stumbled upon this guidance from Mrs. Trudeau to her students on writing thesis statements:

You've read about globalization, we've discussed the advantages and drawbacks in class, and you've heard from two individuals who are directly involved in their everyday working lives. Now it's your turn! Write a thesis statement that clearly identifies your viewpoint about this topic. Use the formula below to help you create your thesis statement, and post your thesis statement here on our class blog.


THESIS FORMULA:

SUBJECT + OPINION + SO WHAT?

Even more interesting are some of the responses from her students:

kugelmax said:
I believe globalization is advantageous because it creates more jobs and allows people to move companies across the country for cheaper prices.

rubelsarxox said:
I think Globalization is a good and bad thing. It's a good thing because it connects the U.S. to other countries and makes us closer. Also, It opens trade, gives good pay to foreign workers, and is less expensive to sell and buy goods. I think it's a bad thing because it makes American workers loose their jobs, and it harder to find a new job in the United States than in China, Depending on age.

klaukkir said:
I think globalization is a good thing becouse we get products for a cheaper price and it links the U.S together. It also gives jobs to people with a low income in china.

I see this as a rich blogging opportunity in just about any classroom. Why?

1. Students are focusing on only one aspect of writing - but a very critical one: thesis statements. It is short but easily assessed and rich mini-lessons can follow; spelling, grammar, stating one opinion, etc.
2. It is a quick assessment of whether students understood the concepts that were taught - can they synthesize them into an opinion that can be supported?
3. Because it is social, students who might not be sure can read the responses of other classmates to help them form their view point. (NOTE - I said form, not steal!)
4. I am not sure if the students ever had to support these statements in writing or a class activity - but what a great way to see if you are on the write track!!

Happy writing!

Slowing Down the Pace

It's the end of the school year and everyone is busy: final meetings, recording grades, interview for new staff. So it won't come as much of a surprise to anyone that the footwear above is what I ended up wearing Thursday morning. Of course, I didn't notice until I was well on my way to work!!

And my reaction was a bit atypical for me....I couldn't stop laughing!!

So my footwear fiasco helped to put things into perspective for me. I been running around trying to fit too much into my day and into my head. I am not stopping to do anything well - but I am getting it done. And it made me think (of course) about teaching writing.

There is most certainly a process to writing. We start with ideas that we get from somewhere: a conversation we overheard, a memory, our writer's notebook. And then we take that seed and feed it with more words and more ideas until we have a rough draft. For some writers - that is that. But for the rest of us - we need to weed out the pieces that don't fit and stake up others. And maybe then we'll have a productive final draft. Sometimes.....we just have to start all over again.

But lately - the conversations I have had and overhead with teachers seem to be about planting the seed, piling Miracle Grow on it, and then harvesting - without allowing time for something to grow into rich, productive fruit. Things like "I need to get them ready for the assessment" or "I don't have enough written pieces this semester for a final grade" lead me to wonder how much we are nurturing student writing, slowing it down, letting it grow.

And ultimately - it comes down to our hopes for our students. Do we want them to to well on the state assessments or do we want them to be better writers? Are they mutually exclusive?

Writing Collaboratively

One of the things I am pondering now is how we can teach kids that writing sometimes needs to be done collaboratively in order to communicate to a wide audience. Things like mission/vision statements or group goals or even a position statement that represents a group, rather than an individual.

I say this because our team is heavily involved in doing all of the above together and it is not easy. We all have very different styles and have different ways of expressing how we feel - yet someone we need to create a document that express us all. Making choices between saying "valuable contribution" or "invaluable resource." Deciding whether we like (or can live with) bullets versus a paragraph. Agreeing on a common definition for collaboration - one that is shared by the writers and the readers.

We have a handle on how to teach writers to express themselves and find their voice - but what about those very real situations where their individual voice needs to meld into a collective one?

Teachable Moment

Photo from The Daily Telegraph

As a writer I just couldn't let this one go!! I am sure it is not Hillary's fault - but she should have been the final eyes on this one!! The worst part - she was telling folks that she was a "high tech" candidate!! Spellcheck anyone?

It made me think about the difference between revision and editing/proofreading - one that many of our kids miss and sometimes causes a problem on the editing passages of our NYS Assessments. Here's what the Hillary camp should have done for each:

Revision:Finding the final version by changing words, sentence structure, etc.

Technology: Our Future
Technology Jobs: Our Future
New Techonology: New Tommorrow
New Jobs for Tommorrow


Editing: Reviewing for publication - checking spelling, grammar, punctuation, etc.

New Jobs for Tommorrow

New Jobs for Tomorrow!!

Back in the Saddle Again!!

In case anyone out there is just as behind in their Bloglines as I am and hasn't noticed - I've been a little absent from my blog lately. It started with a week of no television - as imposed by my first grade niece - and then morphed into some self-reflection about why I blog in the first place. I mean - if a tree falls and no one hears it........

Anyway - I'm back and while not 100% re-entergized, I am on my way!! I began this blog for two reasons. One - to get my passion about writing (and my writing) out in the open. I've always talked about why writing was important to me but I never really wrote about it. Pretty ironic.

But I was challenged by someone I care deeply about - basically, "who cared what I had to say and who was I to impose my feelings about writing on others, especially kids?" In his experience, you couldn't inspire someone to write. They loved it or they didn't - and no teacher was going to make a difference.

Now remember - I care deeply about this person and what they said hurt. And I know that deep down inside he is wrong. But I began to think that maybe, just maybe, I was alone in this!! I mean - I don't get a lot of comments on my blog and maybe no one reads it. Or maybe they read it and have secret conventions of the anti-writing society and because they are anti-writing don't post. Regardless - I did feel a bit alone.

But then I remembered the second reason I started this blog - to find and build a community of teacher writers. My hope was that if I shared this blog during my workshops on writing, one or two like minded folks might read it and post. And they might challenge my thinking a bit - as I hoped I challenged theirs. And we would all learn and make the world a writer friendly place. (Well - I exaggerate a bit but you get the point!) And I realized that there are a few folks who read and sometimes post (Thank you Karen and NYC Teacher!!) and that maybe I need to start small and stay firm. And maybe there are things that I could do differently in order to build this little community. And maybe it's my growth as a writer and a teacher of writing that I should be measuring instead.

So - nearly a year after I began this adventure in blogging, I begin again.

Tin Woodsman: What have you learned, Dorothy?
Dorothy: Well, I - I think that it - it wasn't enough to just want to see Uncle Henry and Auntie Em - and it's that - if I ever go looking for my heart's desire again, I won't look any further than my own back yard. Because if it isn't there, I never really lost it to begin with! Is that right?

Writing and State Assessments

We recently hosted a two-day session with Lois Easton on Powerful Designs for Professional Learning. She is one of my favorite consultants to bring in as she really adapts to meet the needs of the group and has so much knowledge that she can do it on the fly!!

We engaged in a protocol that I use pretty regularly - the Tuning Protocol. I was in a group where a very brave local teacher brought in student work to share. Specifically, reader response journals. She wanted feedback on how she could comments in their journals to promote deeper thinking and writing beyond retell. As an aside - she wondered whether she should do something differently to promote the skills that might be needed on the NYS English Language Arts assessment.

These journals were amazing!! Students were to reflect upon what they had read each night and mark how long they had read (20 minutes, 30 minutes, etc.). The teacher provided a list of open ended prompts in the beginning of the notebook and also asked for a drawing/quick sketch page as she believed that the pictures would help to generate details in the writing (I agree!). And in several of these journals - I could really see the growth of some reluctant readers/writers over time. Isn't that the best part of having kids keep journals?

As we started to give feedback, the members of our group who came from a local charter school began to hone in on the piece of her questions about state assessments. They made some suggestions that I think were really good: practice some timed writing so that students can gauge how long they write and the quality they produce, exchange journals with students to practice editing passages. But then, the conversation turned to prompts. "Provide the students with writing prompts that more closely mirror the state assessment" was the advice.

This was where I really began to struggle. I don't enjoy prompt writing but recognize the need (due to assessments) that we need to practice them. But as I listened to the teachers talk, I thought about all the creativity and voice we had seen in the student journals. And in my heart - I knew that we would lose that if we forced prompt writing at this juncture. The reading the students were doing and the reflection afterwards would become another routine in a class where assessment is a four-letter word and soon, it would no longer be enjoyable for anyone: student or teacher.

So I try to practice caution when it comes to writing - I love to write and I want students to love to write. It isn't punishment and they should always have an outlet to be creative and give their opinions - in short, stretch their wings. We can't always make it be prompt or assessment driven or the heart of the writing will disappear. As Susan Ohanian said (with apologies to Carl Sandberg):

"Ordering a child to write a CTB/McGraw-Hill writing prompt in the narrative, informative, or persuasive mode is like commanding a pregnant woman to give birth to a red-headed child."

Visual Writing

It's April - it's freezing - and my furnace broke!

Normally I would be a bit more upset but since my beloved Sabres begin their quest for Lord Stanley's Cup today and I begin my quest for peace, quiet and a tan on Sunday - things could be worse!!

So I am catching up on some Bloglines and have lost myself creating a Scrapblog. This free site allows you to take pictures and create virtual scrapbooks (complete with stickers and voice bubbles) that can be posted online. My sample page using two of the books I have mentioned on this blog is below.



The site is pretty simple to use and it made me think about students who need to visually map out a story before they write. Imagine them taking photos from their own collection or from Flickr and using the scrapbook pages to create a storyboard! Then sharing that story board and getting comments on it!! It would teach them organization and voice!! They would have fun!! They would still be writing!!

iPod Grammar

I've been investigating the use of podcasts lately and was thrilled to stumble across the Grammar Girl's Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing, again via Choice Literacy.

Now - grammar is not my forte, and in all honesty, neither is auditory learning. I found that I needed to write as Grammar Girl was talking in order to see the grammar piece (I was listening to a lesson on run-on sentences.) But -the tone of her voice was friendly and easy to listen to, as was the content. I could see this being a nice library for mini-lessons or an opener for class. (Oh! And I found out at the end that a transcript of the podcast is available!!)

But more than that....I think it is a great model for the podcasts that some of the great writing teachers I work with could write.

Check out Grammar Girl - free from iTunes!!

(Chocolate comma shown above available at Chocolate Lady Treats!!)

Let Go of the Rice!!

I have a million posts running around in my head - but not a one has made it to my blog. Some are on scraps of paper, others just notes jotted in the margins of what I have read. I have tried to set up a schedule for blog writing but somehow my own internal deadlines have not helped.


I've learned recently, through some team building exercises, that I am a "Gold" - practical, sensible, organized, dependable. Not a news flash to those who know me for more than an hour. But something I have come recently to doubt about myself. These are my strengths - I should not apologize for them, nor should they be my crutch. It is me and I must know it and embrace it. Orange - risk taking - was my lowest color.



I think this internal color spectrum represents what prohibits me from writing - or at least writing as often as I would like. I do like to take sensible risks - and I certainly have opinions about writing. But I use this blog with my workshops and in those cases my role is different. I am a facilitator, a trainer, a guide on the side. Members of my organization read this blog on occaision - do I need to be mindful of what I say? Where do my provocative questions fall?


My weekly email from Choice Literacy arrived and it has me thinking about this quandry. Brenda Power writes about a metaphor from one of my writing mentors, Ralph Fletcher:

"If you're scrambling to find time for what needs to be done, consider
the story of the monkey's hand. Writer Ralph Fletcher uses a wonderful
metaphor to describe how we get trapped in certain ways of working or
thinking. In South America, monkeys are caught by an ingenious means. The
traps used to capture them are filled with rice. In order to get the rice,
the monkey places her hand through a small opening in the box. Once she
grasps the rice, her hand can no longer fit through the opening. She is
trapped, because she doesn't think to let go of some of the rice so that she
can free her hand...

The monkey holds on because what's in her hand has value. But if you
free up just a bit of your time by giving away something of value, you may
discover new uses for your time, or new ways of thinking about your time, that
are even more valuable."

I've always had a strange affinity for monkey analogies - just ask my students! - but this one in particular has hit home. I think you'll be seeing some changes around this blog - ones that I hope of are of value. Not sure what they are quite yet - but Easter seems to have brought about a renewal in me as a writer and an educator. So, dear readers, hold on!!

Vacation Reading

Spring Break is upon many of us - if not this week, then next. For me - in addition to seeking sun and a beach, break has been about a suitcase full of books to read. It seems to be the only time I have to tune out work and lose myself in a good book anymore!!

So I thought I would share a book that I just finished and won't be accompanying me on my trip to Aruba - but it might be one you want with you. The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield has been the first book in a long time that I could lose myself in. A ghost story, a mystery, a riddle wrapped in an enigma.....this book was fantastic!!

It starts with a young bookseller's daughter who has been lost in books her entire life - and has been living in the shadow of a twin who died when she was young, but who has never been spoken about by the family. She makes her living as a biographer of persons from literary history. She is invited by Vida Winter, a world-famous author, to complete her biography. A daunting task as Ms. Winter has told at least 19 versions of her life story.

In telling the tale of these two women and the mystery of a publication missing the last story - the author's remarkable style draws you in and makes the book hard to put down. Here are two of my favorite excerpts:

"I never read without making sure I am in a secure position. I have been
like this ever since the age of seven when, sitting on a high wall and reading
The Water Babies, I was so seduced by the descriptions of underwater life that I
unconsciously relaxed my muscles. Instead of being held buoyant by the
water that so vividly surrounded me in my mind, I plummeted to the ground and
knocked myself out. I can still feel the scar under my fringe now.
Reading can be dangerous."

"I used to think that I loved rain, but in fact I hardly knew it. The
rain I loved was genteel town rain, made soft by all the obstacles the skyline
put in its path, and warmed by the rising heat of the town itself. On the
moors, enraged by the wind and embittered by the chill, the rain was
vicious. Needles of ice stung my face and, behind me, vessels of freezing
water burst against my shoulders.

Happy birthday."

Not a beach read - but certainly one you can get lost in!! What are you reading this break?

Crawl Before You Walk

An interesting thing came up as we scored math assessments these past two weeks. Time and again, we saw that the good teaching practices we all use to help students learn the vocabulary in our content areas was working. Students are able to provide the witty sayings or the clever acronyms we teach them to remember the vocab - but they don't know it.

For example, in working with a graph where students were asked to give the coordinates of a point - most of them got it. When they were then asked to explain how they got that answer - things went downhill quickly. The students could repeat "crawl before you walk" or "throw up" but they couldn't give additional details to describe HOW they arrived at their answer in a way that showed they understood the concept. Without showing that understanding, students could not receive full credit.

It made me think about Mr. Bloom and his taxonomy of thinking. If we teach students to find the way to get the right answers - and it always works - do they need to understand WHY it works? I think the math teachers in the room would say "YES!!" And I think I agree.

This is where writing is so important in all content areas. Writing - and having the correct words to convey your thoughts and feelings - is powerful. Without knowing the vocabulary or being able to explain yourself well - no one will really know what it is you know. So it follows that those who write well are powerful and those who cannot write well are not.

Teaching writing is the responsibility of every teacher - not just English Language Arts teachers. In fact - writing is the responsibility of every teacher. If we are not practicing and modeling our writing with our students - how will they learn that no one creates a perfect draft the first time. That we need to play with our words and the order of our words before we publish our work. That there are glimmers of ideas for our writing everywhere - it is up to us to give them the unique slant and perspective that create our voice.

In a random sampling of asking teachers during scoring how many were teaching their students to write out the explanations to many of the problems we saw on the assessments - few were pushing their kids to do so. Those who were taught other subjects beyond math and were primarily elementary school teachers. We know these are the types of things on our assessments - why are we surprised that our students do poorly on them if we are not asking them to provide the same work in class?

Perhaps we need to all practice the writing crawl - introduce writing in small bits that the teacher and the student are comfortable with - so that we can model for students that writing has power and should be used in every subject. Teachers won't need a degree in writing but can learn these writing strategies from colleagues - which will open the door to the collegiality that our profession desperately needs. And slowly - they'll begin to toddle, then walk, then run with writing in their classrooms. And so will our students.

Curses and Verses

We have spent this week scoring the NYS Math assessments and I look forward to another weekend of scoring DVDs so that we can complete the scoring next week. Now - I have to admit that this is one of my least favorite times of the year. First of all, I am terrible at math. I don't balance my checkbook and know that I am horribly ill-prepared for the retirement that awaits me in the year 2031. (At least I know that number!) Second, while I love a challenge, understanding why some things are mathematically correct is one that I wouldn't mind skipping. Fortunately, I have a colleague who is just passionate about it, so I only have to keep the peace at scoring. Finally, there is no creatively in math (see my second reason!). Don't get me wrong - the students are very creative in how they approach some problems, but generally the answer is very black and white. So unlike writing!!

Following closely on the heels of math is science. I appreciate folks whose minds can work in ways that do these subjects justice. Mine is just not one of them - and the big, fat F that haunts my colleage transcipt in Organic Chemisty is the proof!! (Hey - at least I tried! And bless that tutor who tried as well!)

However, I took GREAT delight in the two books I recently purchsed that focus on these subjects. Of course, it doesn't hurt that they are by Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith (Stinky Cheese Man, The True Story of the Three Little Pigs, and of course my favorite, Squids Will be Squids). The first, Math Curse, actually reminds me a bit of what happens to my brain during regional scoring: "You know, you can think of almost everything as a math problem." Those words from her teacher creates a curse with the narrator in which she cannot escape math - from simple problems like how many quarts are in a gallon to the funniest multiple choice question on fractions I have yet to see ("What is another way to say 1/2 of an apple pie? a. 2/6. b. 3/6. c. la moitie d'une tarte aux pommes") this book helps make math relevant, and dare I say it, FUN!!

And of course, since Mr. Newton observes at the end of the book that "You know, you can think of almost everything as a science experiment" it only goes to follow that the Science Verse is equally amusing. In this case, there is poetry to be found in science. From evolution to the water cycle to the scientific method - these are great rhymes to help students remember some tricky parts of science. However, my absolute all-time favorite is "Dino-Sore." this little ditty tells the tale of Dinosaurs - often retold year after year after year. In short a curriculum nightmare:

"It's still a mystery, scientists say,

Why the dinosaur went away.

But I know why they couldn't stay

(And it wasn't meteors).

It was creatures - yes, those teachers -

Who did the work of fifty wars

And bored to death - DINOSAURS."

Mr. Scieszka does a fine job ending the book with his "Observations and Conclusions" in which he honors the great poets and poetry that his work is based upon. All in all - not a bad curse to have!!

Van Gogh Cafe

We had a brief (too brief!) glimpse of spring this week. Two near 60 degree days in a row - then snow again. I'm used to it living in Western New York - but it was just enough to remind me that this world is full of miracles. The snow melts away and exposes the earth and flower buds to sunshine, which stretch and awaken brightening the dull colors of mud. Before long, the branches that have been weighted down with snow will be uplifted with glorious blooms. The air smells cleaner, fresher, newer. And people emerge from their homes to walk dogs, jog, bike. We see our neighbors again and stop to talk. In general, everyone just seems happier.

The Van Gogh Cafe reminds me of these miracles. A somewhat lesser known book by Cynthia Rylant, it tells the story of a small cafe in Flowers, Kansas run by Marc and his 10-year-old daughter Clara. The cafe is the site of a former theatre - which is what makes the cafe magical. The story of a possum, the power of a lightening strike, magic muffins that feed children in a snowstorm, and wayward seagulls are among the stories that give life to the Van Gogh cafe. Each tale weaves into the next, with the mystery revealing itself in the last chapter.

This is a wonderful book to teach about ideas - but more importantly to remember the magic that surrounds us.

Some musings on voice!

Not thinking, I called a friend a bit late the other day. Normally - she is quite the night owl, so it never crossed my mind that she would be sleeping!! Her voice was groggy (as was her mind I am sure) but she gave it a minute and then boom!! There was the upbeat tone and laugh in her "Hi!!" that I have come to rely on.

I have another friend who has some interesting voice inflections - ones that we tend to unconsciously mimic at work whenever we want to respond to a situation as she would. We can even make our facial expressions match hers - much to our delight. But today, she received upsetting news and her tone was very different as were her facial expressions. She spoke much faster and in the same tone, speaking so fast that she often chose words that she wasn't sure she wanted to use.

Voice is an amazing thing - and it is even more amazing when we can hear it in writing. But voice is difficult to teach without many, many examples. Reading a variety of authors and styles is the best way to help writers find their voice. One of my favorite authors for this is Sandra Cisneros - you can practically imagine yourself in the scenes she writes!! I think that is why I have come to over-rely on "Eleven" each time that I teach voice in a workshop.

I have had the pleasure of working with an amazing fifth grade teacher and blogs lately. She has hooked her students on mysteries with her very first blog. Her most recent post asks students to share their "peaceful corner of the world" and boy can you hear their voices!! Even more importantly - you can hear her voice (as well as her powerful teaching) in the comments. Unlike any other blog I have read (and I read a lot!), Mrs. Sager responds to each and every comment, often subtly pointing out the edits that would make their written work even better. I continue to be amazed by this class - be sure to check it out and comment on their work!!

This teacher embraces and encourages voice in her student's writing. However, I have often had teachers tell me that voice belongs in stories and not in the content areas, and certainly not on state assessments. Of course- I disagree!! I have participated in regional scoring of ELA and Social Studies assessments and in all instances, those papers that were engaging and had a sense of voice scored higher than those that did not. The content could have been exactly the same - but voice puts it over the top each and every time. The trick is to teach that the voice needs to be appropriate to the audience. For this - I loved using RAFTS in my classroom. The students became engaged in their writing, really learned the content and more importantly learned the importance of knowing their audience. It was fun for them - and honestly, much more fun for me to grade as well!!

It is amazing the voice in those around us. As Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, "A man's style is his mind's voice. Wooden minds, wooden voices. " We just need to take the time to listen to them.

Engaging History

I love history. I'm not sure why but reading about how people lived and what motivated them has always been my passion. I always hoped that when I taught Social Studies, I could inspire my students to see the same. So it is always refreshing when someone writes a book to inspire children. John, Paul, George, and Ben by Lane Smith is just such a book.





Beatles fans will love the subtle (and sometimes not so subtle) references to the Fab Four embedded in the book - with good old Tom (Jefferson) as the fifth lad who was "always off doing his OWN thing." History fans will love the history woven into the very entertaining character sketches of these founding fathers - although some liberties have been taken with the past. These liberties are nicely cleared up with the humorous "ye olde True or False section" in the back. And writing fans will love the voice and word choice provided in the book.





Each of the five lads are described with gripping adjectives and stories to support those descriptions: John is bold, Paul is noisy, George is honest (of course!), Ben is clever and Tom is independent. After describing each in their "youth," the book wraps up with how these character traits led to the men to historic actions.





The book is also organized in such a way that using it to help students with two-column notes would also work. You would have to take some time to separate the fact from fiction - but again, that goes towards the organization of the book and it serves as a nice mentor text for organization.





If you are looking to inject voice into the social studies classroom - this book is a hit. In addition to the stories, the illustrations and fonts used support this engaging tale. The book is written on parchment-like paper which lends a nice historical touch.





Overall - the book will entertain adults and students alike. It won't be your founding father's social studies class!!

Nobody Knows.....

Been having trouble with Blogger lately - or maybe it is just my computer and the Internet connection at home. No matter - I'm just posting Friday's book post a bit late and hoping for the best this time!!

I've been spending a great deal of time in local districts with writing. Some are Step Up trainings, some are Six Traits, and some are a magical combination of both. I don't think there really is one right answer with respect to writing - there are so many variables to deal with!! First and foremost seems to be the comfort level of teachers with teaching writing. In fact, so much has to do with whether or not teachers view themselves as writers!!

But the bottom line is that we need to start pulling together and working with our students on writing. There is power in the ability to express your thoughts clearly - and we have an obligation to teach our students how to be successful in writing. Some are naturally gifted and will buck at the thought of constraints - others need to have very specific guidance to write well and may never progress beyond basic organization and word choice. But we need to teach them.

Curriculum Design for Writing Instruction by Kathy Tuchman Glass provides a nice key for districts looking to develop a writing curriculum. While it is grounded in the Six Traits, it is the process that is key in this book.

In a nutshell, here are her curriculum design elements:

1. Identify grade level content standards for writing: What do I want my students to know and be able to do?
2. Create a teacher rubric witha clear set of criteria for
writing assessment: What are the key criteria for achieving these
standards and assessing students?
3. Craft a student checklist to guide students through the unit and
help them state objectives and self-assess: What do students needs
to know and learn as they progress through the unit and how will they be
assessed?
4. Design lesons to achieve standards: How do I guide
and assist students to achieve the criteria?
(p. 4)

Now - these may seem simple and obvious to some, but I have yet to work in the district that has done this and used it across all grade levels. Note that many have tried to accomplish this but actually using the rubrics and sharing them openly with students and using them as guide for lessons in writing is not something that I have seen. (If you are doing it - please comment and tell us what is working!!)

I am excited because I have been working with a district that I think is on the cusp of developing just this. They have a solid plan and they have extremely dedicated teachers - I guess only time will tell but I am keeping my fingers crossed!

Story Squared

Starting a story is probably the most difficult thing for me to sit down and do. I have many pages in several notebooks of story pieces but having to actually sit down and weave them together is something that I try to avoid. When it comes to writing I have great ideas (at least I think so!) but it seems that I can't string together 800 words that would matter to anyone.

I am now hooked on Story Squared but I need friends who will play along. I picked on my friend Jenn because I have faith that she will humor my new found technology and will allow me to play a bit with this new site. But I see a real application for writing in our classrooms.

You see - while I was in middle school, I co-wrote a serial drama with my friend Mary. It was called Dr. Mare's Hospital and it featured players loosely based upon our own social life. Of course, Dr. Mary and Dr. Theresa had throngs of men available to them and we found ourselves in many prediciments that bested those of many soap operas. It was all in good fun - although I do recall a time or two that it got us into some hot water. We wrote the notes when we should have been paying attention in class and passed them in the hallway. I found a small stash the other day - and laughed out loud at how simple our life seemed then. I didn't throw them away - but I don't think they'll be published soon!!

So I guess I have always been a better social writer than a solitary one. This is where Story Squared comes in!! This wonderful site allows you to start a story and invite friends to join in to continue it. You can limit entries to a sentence, paragraph, or page and even set a time limit for friends to respond. There are even pubic stories that anyone can add to.

Try it out! And don't forget to invite me!!

Whew! The vacation that wasn't!!

As you can probably tell by the date of my last post, the snow and my life finally caught up to me. I owe you all two great books to feed the writer within you and many, many thoughts on writing!! But I took some downtime - which really wasn't!!

You see - I spent the past week caring for my 84 year old grandmother while my parents celebrated their 40th wedding anniversary in Florida. In her prime, my grandmother was a tough Polish woman who proudly survived the Great Depression and saved every scrap of tin foil that entered her house. She told you how it was and there were no arguments. At least we always knew where we stood!!

Three years ago, she was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. For those of you who have experienced it, this disease is the most devestating thing that I have ever come up against. Her body remains healthy - her mind does not. And the worst part is that she can sense that her mind is failing her.

What is interesting is that my grandmother has always done those things that the doctors will tell you will help ward off this disease: she plays cards, used to do word puzzles, read everything she could get her hands on and walked almost two miles a day. Her mind was always stimulated!! Instead, I think the disease snuck in when she was her most vulnerable - right after my grandfather passed. Ironically - eleven years ago this week.

So, I have been off of work and away from my blogs, but hardly on a vacation. And what does this have to do with writing? EVERYTHING!!

In teaching social studies, I always encouraged my students to interview their relatives as a means of getting their family history. What personal stories did they have about the events we were studying? Few took me up on this extra credit offer!! But I was reinvigorated by reading a recent Will Richardson post on how his daughter made some YouTube videos by interviewing some older relatives. Imagine the history we could preserve by engaging students in the new technologies available to us: podcasting, streaming video!!

It seems that the Internet and social networking spaces are preserving the present - how can we help to preserve the past? In the spirit of capturing the wisdom of our fathers and mothers, some links for oral history projects:

What did you do in the war, Grandma? is an oral history of Rhode Island women in World War II conducted by a high school honors English class.

The Oral History Project: A Culture and Heritage Exchange Initiative is a streaming media project in partnership with the Library of Congress that captures the histories of Vietnam Veterans, Native Americans, and African Americans.

Tell Me Your Stories contains an oral history curriculum which is fairly comprehensive in providing resources for developing an oral history project for your classroom.

And of course, American Memory has a remarkable set of materials for teachers and students interested in preserving our social history. These are sets of DBQ like resources using oral history as references and can help spark the historian in most students. (A personal bias here as I used this site often in the classroom.)

These stories are important - how can you help to capture them?

Two Heads are Better than One!!

As I look out my window, it seems that the snow will never stop. Shovel every night, wake up to a new blanket of snow the next morning. But despite Mother Nature and her lake effect, two flat tires, and white out conditions - we finally completed the scoring of the Grades 3-8 ELA assessments this week.

Not that it was without controversy!! It never fails that despite the precautions we put into place, we get complaints from teachers that "their district" was treated unfairly. And of course, the inevitable complaints about the assessment itself. But in the end - everyone is collegial and the evaluations always indicate that they have walked away learning something.

But I worry each year that this is the last time the teachers will come together collaboratively to look at student work. We have to score these assessments - but there is so much more to see than the number that has been assigned and even the final score. Are our writing programs working? What are my instructional next steps? Do I need to get out those grammar books? What happened to those graphic organizers I have been teaching for the past 4 months? Those questions aren't answered with a number!!

So the book for this week veers from the traditional picture or chapter book to a professional book that has helped open my eyes to the power of what students write. I had the privilege of attending a pre-conference session at NSDC several years ago which was facilitated by Georgea Langer and Amy Colton, who with Loretta Goff authored Collaborative Analysis of Student Work: Improving Teaching and Learning. It was during this session, and in reading the book, that I began to develop my own protocols for working with teachers to mine the rich data that comes from analysis of student work.

While I have not been able to have as sustained a project as is described in the book, the times that I have worked with teachers to analyze student work have followed essentially the same model and provided powerful information. Tapping into the wealth of experience and expertise sitting around the table discussing what we see in student work, sharing what has worked in our classrooms, bringing fresh perspectives to how we teach writing - all valuable by-product. Why by-products? Because without fail, teachers report that the most powerful result of these meetings has been the increase in student writing skills that they see!!!

So, within the next few weeks, we'll relax a bit about the assessments. That's the time to bring those student papers out again and review them with new eyes!

Duck for President

At last count there are ten candidates for President in 2008 from the Democratic Party alone. Why not let Duck throw his hat into the ring?

In the amusing Duck for President by Doreen Cronin, Duck gets tired of having to do chores around the farm and decides to hold an election to replace Farmer Brown. He rallies the support of his fellow farm animals and wins!!

Soon, he tires of the hard work of running a farm and runs for higher office again. And again. And again. Eventually - after running a campaign kissing babies and playing his sax on late night television - Duck wins the highest office in the land. PRESIDENT!!

We don't get to experience much of his presidency as Duck soon decides that this job is also a bit much and he retires to the farm to do his chores and write his autobiography. A presidential library can't be too far behind!!

I use this amusing story (with wonderful illustrations that adults will love) to teach about the structure of stories: beginning, middle, end. Students will be exposed to having to take notes for the ELA assessment from stories and this structure seems to help students to take better notes during the listening passage. Whether they take notes by drawing and adding text later or use text immediately - teaching students what to listen for seems to be the first step. I like to share various plot diagrams and story maps, as well as a modification of a basic Step Up to Writing organizer to help students make connections and predict what might happen next with teachers to assist with this process.

Oh! And the book fits nicely into Social Studies as well!! It takes students through the various levels of government and can serve as a nice springboard to elections and campaign activities. I ran into this very clever and funny blog that highlights Duck's campaign. After all, what is a campaign without a blog these days?!?!

If you'd like to see the story - check out this link to YouTube.

Zen Shorts

Zen Shorts by Jon J. Muth is a nice reminder this time of year of what matters. Resolutions for the New Year have long fallen by the wayside, teachers (and students)are caught up in the assessment craze, and everyone seems a little on edge.

This story - of three children meeting a giant panda - contains within three Zen meditations told by the giant Panda to the children and that relate to their individual stories. Uncle Ry and the Moon helps to remind us of what really matters in life and The Farmer's Luck reminds us that sometimes, it's all a matter of perspective. But my favorite is A Heavy Load - which serves as a reminder that in order to move forward, sometimes we need to let some things go.

Also by the same author is one of my favorite books - The Three Questions. I have given this book to people who mean a great deal to me, most recently to a friend who is going through a particularly rough time with work and family medical issues, yet somehow remembers to do things for others!! The Three Questions is based upon a short story by Leo Tolstoy and has Nickolai searching for the answers to three questions, which he believes will help him to always be a good person: What's the best time to do things? Who is the most important one? What is the right thing to do? The answers to these questions don't come to Nickolai from his friends, but from wihin himself.

Both stories are a great way to show writers that stories can have an important meaning and message to send. And both stories are strangely calming to read and reflect upon.

Musings on Writings

NPR never fails me - particulary on a Monday morning!! Here are two gems I thought I'd pass along!

Well - at least she is writing!!
A 25 year old hotel employee actually wrote herself out of a job by keeping a journal. Seems when her supervisor told her to stop writing on company time, she switched over to the computer. When her supervisor found the new journal on the work computer - she was fired for misuse of company time. Last week, a judge denied her request for unemployment benefits.

The topic of her journal? How to avoid work!! Listen to the podcast!



Writing for the future.
It seems there is a website out there called Future Me that allows you to create an email for anyone (yourself included) and send it to them at any point between tomorrow and the year 2037. Future Me will deliver the contents on the specified date.

This intrigues me!! As of this moment, there have been 365,722 letters written to the future and counting... I know I sent myself a birthday message for next year!!

Which Way? Sunday Funny

So Few of Me!

In my current line of work, this is the busiest time that we have. We have distributed assessments, answered questions, and begun to prepare for regional scoring of ELA assessments. Now we have the pleasure of watching scoring DVDs to prepare for three straight weeks of training and scoring the ELAs. We'll catch our breathe for a few weeks and start all over again with Math.

On top of that - life still must go on and districts still want trainings in writing and data and curriculum mapping. And I am still trying to keep my New Year's resolutions of no work email after 5 pm and hitting the gym at least 5 times a week. (Keeping the first and falling behind on the latter.) No small wonder that I wish sometimes I could clone myself (only thinner!)

And that is exactly what Peter H. Reynolds does with Leo in So Few of Me. This creator of The Dot and Ish is among my favorites - I'd line up for his grocery list if he published it!!! I never fail to find inspiration in the simple stories and wonderful illustrations. (See my previous posts on his work for more about this wonderful author.)

In this tale, Leo is a busy lad. Like most of us, no matter how hard he worked there was always more to do. So he makes a list. That list grows and grows and grows. So he thinks "If only there were two of me." (Sound familiar?)

Lo and behold - there is a knock at the door and another Leo appears. But as the two Leos work, there is still more to do. And eventually two Leos becomes three, becomes four, becomes TEN!! And still there is work to be done.

The original Leo is exhausted and takes a nap. He awakens to find the other nine Leos staring at him asking "What are you doing?" He smiles and answers "Dreaming" and slowly the other nine disappear. And Leo wonders, "What if I did less, but did my BEST?" One Leo would work - and he would have time to dream.

I think in our rush to make sure that we "cover" our course materials and ensure that students are prepped for tests, we forget that they are still just kids (even in high school!) There is life outside of school. And that is exactly why this book is so important - we need to decide what is really important, and teach that. We need to encourage our students to dream - to be creative - to explore and take risks. That is all part of learning too.

The message is simple but the writing is powerful - a great mentor text for us all in our multi-tasking world!!

Write for Your Life

The death of my grandfather almost 11 years ago is one of the moments in my life that has left an indelible mark. I knew instantly when my mother was finally able to reach me at work that something horrible had happened, although she never really said what. A giant black hole opened in my heart, that honestly has never healed.

My grandfather was a rock in my life - someone who encouraged me to be anything I wanted, who knew to just hold me when I had "that look" on my face, who loved me so much that he separated out the orange, yellow and green jellybeans into a separate container because I liked them least. Some people called me spoiled, I knew I was loved; absolutely and unconditionally.

But he left my life suddenly - fell over from a massive heart attack while sitting and reading in his chair. My grandmother had gone into the basement to do laundry and came up to find him on the ground - already gone. We didn't get to say good-bye, we didn't get to say "I love you," we didn't get to say anything.

That's when I started writing again. I was convinced that no one knew the pain that I felt, the sense of loss, the anger. So I wrote to get it out of me, to try to move through the stages of grief that everyone said was "natural." And after I wrote for me - I tried to write for others. To tell them what they meant to me or if they hurt me, to say I was sorry or to say "I love you."

The hole began to heal with the birth of my first niece six years ago. This amazing creature came into my life, with a middle name to honor my grandfather, and suddenly not much else mattered. Being able to see her grow and to experience life anew with her (and Sydney and Zoe and Brody who followed) has given me new reason to write.

So Anna Quindlen's column in Newsweek this week has ripped at my heartstrings. It covers the movie "Freedom Writers" (that I have yet to see but have it on my list!) but more importantly it talks about why we write: "writing can make pain tolerable, confusion clearer and the self stronger."

But we lose something in translation with writing - email gets misconstrued, people write in code and never say what they mean. People are afraid to put something in writing because it could be used against them. We write (or don't write) for all the wrong reasons.

Quindlen leaves us with a powerful message:

Think of all those people inside the World Trade Center saying goodbye by phone. If only, in the blizzard of paper that followed the collapse of the buildings, a letter had fallen from the sky for every family member and friend, something to hold on to, something to read and reread. Something real. Words on paper confer a kind of immortality. Wouldn't all of us love to have a journal, a memoir, a letter, from those we have loved and lost? Shouldn't all of us leave a bit of that behind?

Amelia writes every day. This thrills me beyond belief and I hope that she never loses that joy for putting her thoughts to paper. In the meantime, I write for her and Sydney and Zoe and Brody each and every day as well. They are not spoiled - they are loved.

What kind of English do you speak?

I never knew that I had an accent until I went to college in central NY. Growing up in western NY, everyone around me sounded just like me. Imagine my surprise when classmates made fun of the fact that I liked to drink "pop!"

Words can be funny.......take this test over at Blogthings so see what kind of American English you speak!!


Here are my results:

Writing Framework's Linguistic Profile:

40% General American English

30% Yankee

20% Upper Midwestern

5% Midwestern

0% Dixie

Sunday Funny: What's the caption for this one?

Image and story from Engadget.

History of Writing

The book for this week combines my two great loves - history and writing.

Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See is set in nineteenth century China and is told from the perspective of Lily, a peasant girl from the remote Hunan county. Lily becomes a laotong ("old same") with Snow Flower, a very metropolitan girl by comparison, and by tradition the two are bound together in a life-long friendship. The story follows the girls as they grow into women - which includes footbinding and arranged marriage, motherhood and loss.

While the story itself is compelling and at time heart wrenching (it amazes me the pain that women endured to have their feet bound), it is the little know nu shu that I found fascinating. Nu shu was a secret Chinese writing form, believed to have been invented by an emporer's concubine to speak truthfully about the lonliness that surrounded her to her family at home. It grew into a method for women to find consolation from each other and was hidden in embroidery, weaving, and in paintings on fans. The author shares how she discovered and researched this remarkable language, long with great photos, on her website and also provides a sample chapter.

I know it sounds strange - but in many ways, thinking about nu shu made me think about the IM language that we all complain about showing up in our student writing. Chinese women were forbidden from using the written language of men and in a desperate need to communicate with family and friends, invented a code that they ingeniously hid within "women's work." Kids aren't forbidden from writing - but they have invented a language to find their sense of self and to keep things away from parents and teachers. We've all heard the stories about the trouble with social networking and parents everywhere seem to be afraid of IM'ing - but if we took a step back, perhaps we'd find that it's not so bad to have them writing in their own "language" (once in a while.)

An Even Better Contest

Via a Year of Reading, found the Lisa Yee's Bodacious Book Title Contest!!

Rules are simple:

1. Think of a title from a children's/middle grade/young adult book.

2. Change the FIRST LETTER of ONE of the words to make it into a whole new title.

3. Then add a sentence describing the new book.

I'm no celebrity judge but there are some great ideas in the comments section (I accidentally copied one of the first - so much for my close reading!!) Here's one of my favorites:

Fear Mr. Henshaw: After years of writing about his personal problems in letters to his favorite author, Leigh’s name winds up in Mr. Henshaw’s latest novel: The Stalker. (From Jay over at Disco Mermaids - another great blog!)

Enjoy!

Sunday Funnies

ELA season officially opens next week and kids all over NYS will be reminded to eat a good breakfast, go to sleep early and have the required No. 2 pencils sharpened and ready to go. In our region - erasers have become optional as students need only cross out the incorrect answer on the answer sheets. But I digress.....

In looking at the assessment data from last year, many districts in our region have started to notice that kids at all grade levels missed questions that required them to select the "best" answer. This is a question that requires some critical thinking and the bad news is that our students aren't doing too well.



When I think back to asking my students to brainstorm answers in class, I realized that all answers were accepted and written down on our graphic organizer. And I mean ALL answers - the ones that made me cringe, the ones that were duplicates, the ones that were literal, and the really good ones. I never made a point of distinguishing between the good and great answers - so that I could preserve their self-esteem of course!



So I have been discussing with the teachers in our region how we could start to have students determine the best answer. One strategy that we have come up with is to share pictures with the class and ask the students to brainstorm discriptor words or a caption. ALL answers would be listed - but then we would go the next step in asking students which suggestion was the best. Of course - any answer would have to be supported with details, details, details.



It seems simple but it might have some interesting results. Anyway - I thought I might share some of the funny photos I have collected over time each Sunday in order to help those who might want to try this strategy. And - as a means of getting teachers to write!!



I'll post the picture each Sunday - if anyone is reading, feel free to provide the caption in the comments section!!! Here's the first one:

Photo reference: http://www.comedy-zone.net/pictures/index.htm

Teaching with Fire!

As we all slowly ease back into our routines after the holidays, I thought I would share a book that not only inspires other writers but involves teachers writing about their inspiration from poetry.

I was first introduced to Teaching with Fire (edited by Sam M. Intrator and Megan Scribner) at a Step Up to Writing trainers conference in Fort Collins, Colorado about three years ago. Two wonderful teachers from California befriended me in that brief time and shared things with me that I have never been able to repay. One, Linda Toren, is featured in this book (page 204). She and a colleague email each other haiku and tanka once a week "to keep each other inspired and hopeful - to celebrate and commiserate."

They continue to inspire me (we have long since gone our separate ways) through this book they shared with me as it sits on my coffee table full of post-it notes and dog-eared. It is a poetry book - but each poem is accompanied by a brief story from a teacher explaining the significance of that poem in their life's work. You will hear throughout the book talk of writer's notebooks and poetry reads, of students and families, of joy and heartache. I promise you it will be a fresh read every time!!

I could go on and on about how this book could be used in the classroom, instead, I'll just share this:

You Reading This, Be Ready

Starting here, what do you want to remember?

How sunlight creeps along a shining floor?

What scent of old wood hovers, what softened

sound from outside fills the air?

Will you ever bring a better gift for the world

than the breathing respect that you carry

wherever your go right now? Are you waiting

for time you show you some better thoughts?

When you turn around, starting here, lift this

new glimpse that you found; carry into evening

all that you want from this day. This interval you spent

reading or hearing this, keep it for life--

What can anyone give you greater than now,

starting here, right in this room, when you turn around?

- William Stafford

Reference: Teaching with Fire: Poetry That Sustains the Courage to Teach. Intrator, Sam and Scribner, Megan (editors). Jossey-Bass, Inc, 2003.

New Year's Resolution

It has been a rough December. First a serious bout with a stomach virus - which ironically struck in the middle of a writing workshop. (How many different words can we use for the color green?) Then the mad dash thru the holidays - balancing family and sanity and high caloric foods. Through it all - I decided that I work too much. I can't say work too hard because I truly love what I do (most days!) but it has become all consuming.

However - having unburied myself from 563 work emails and over 265 personal emails (mostly listservs on this one - I'm just not that popular!) I realized that completely shutting down is not the answer. And I missed my blog!!

I don't make New Year Resolutions - I think they just set me up for ultimate failure. I mean ultimately - I fail to keep them. But I do make Previous Year Reflections. Here are some of mine:


1. Teachers who really care about kids are the ones I want my kids to have. No real news flash there but I have been honored to work with some great teachers this past year (and so far this year!) Ones who really push themselves to reach their kids for the right reasons. I miss my classroom - but I love when I am surrounded by these people! So thanks to Karen and Dana and Melodee and Sue and Nina and Lisa and Donna and Maria and yes, you Gene!! And to the countless others that I have forgotten to mention here!

2. Writing is risky business. And hard. And very, very scary. I know because my comfort zone is in teaching writing to others - and in coming up with ways to engage others in writing. But when pushed to write something meaningful of my own - I suddenly find cleaning my bathroom a most desirous chore!! And so....

3. I better start to practice what I preach. I teach writing - therefore I should be writing!! So I will be writing and submitting articles to educational publications and entering the writing competition in our local newspaper (historical fiction - that's me!!)

4. There is nothing that should come before friends and family. No matter the petty things we do to each other or say in moments of anger/stress/confusion/hurt - those people that we can count on in times of need are the golden threads that hold us together. You all know who you are and I can't thank you enough for all that you do and are to me!!

So have a wonderful 2007 everyone - let bygones be bygones - and don't work too much!