Conferring with a focus on the writer, not the writing.

Our monthly literacy PD time this month was focused on conferring around narrative writing. We began the time by reflecting on how narrative writing changes as we move up the grades. Teachers shared what they noticed and commented on how beneficial it was to see the different levels of writing in one space.

Then we jumped into conferring. This summer Katie Clements was my small group leader at the summer writing institute. She immersed us in practicing our conferring language to focus on the writer, not the writing.

During a writing conference, we are not telling students how to “fix” their writing or what they should or should not do to make this particular piece better. Rather, we are aiming to teach them a transferable strategy they might use in any similar piece of writing. Give tips and teaching points that could push writers in all kinds of writing.

I used writing samples from the Units of Study, as well as, our teacher’s own student samples to practice this work. We reviewed the moves in a writing conference: Research, Decide, Teach, Link;  then we shared our compliment and our teaching point.

We looked in the If…Then book to help revise our teaching point to ensure it moves the writer forward, not just this piece of writing. For example:

Instead of… Your ending just drops off. You should tell more about how the boy felt when he found his mom.

Try… Sometimes it seems like your ending just trail off, and they aren’t as powerful as they could be because of that. Writers know that the ending of a story is the last thing with a reader will be left. Today, I want to teach you one tip for writing an ending that is particularly powerful. Writers ask, “What is this story really about?” Once they have the answer, they add dialogue, internal thinking, descriptive detail or a small action that ties back to the true meaning.

Instead of… You should reread to add paragraphs.

Try… A paragraph is a signal to our reader. It says, “Halt! Take a tiny break. Do you understand what is going on here? OK, keep going.” It alerts your reader to changes in scenes or new dialogue. I want to teach you that writers use paragraphs to indicate a new time event, a new place, a new time or when a new character speaks.

Calkins, Lucy. (2013) If…Then…Curriculum: Assessment-Based Instruction. Heinemann. Portsmouth, NH.

Our teachers took turns rephrasing their conferring language to mirror language from the If…Then book so that we were pushing the writer and not just fixing the writing.