August Writing Institute 2017 Day 4

I bought my first coffee today. It was the most money I had ever spent on a coffee, but at least I got a little love.

Grades 4 & 5 stayed with Lucy today to learn more about information and opinion writing.

During small group, Katie took us through some more coaching moves when thinking about conferring. She is so sweet and smart in the way she delivers her coaching suggestions. This session really got me thinking about the kind of feedback teachers give students in conferences. Are they teaching the writer or the writing? Her feedback was so transferable. This type of feedback is going to keep our students moving in their writing, as we cannot get to every student, every day.

Mary Ehrenworth gave a choice workshop on Grammar! Inquiries, Demonstrations, and Extravaganzas. Her session was very thought provoking and I will be blogging about it in a separate post when I have more time to do it justice.

Our closing speaker today was Carmen Agra Deedy.  She has authored many children's books, including 14 Cows for America and The Yellow Star: The Legend of King Christian X of Denmark.  She is hilarious. She told us a descriptive story from her childhood that had us all laughing.

Lastly, I have stayed pretty close to TC, to say the least, this week. I have been focused on learning and a little nervous about heading out. However, this afternoon, Krista, was my guide as we toured Central Park on foot. This run was exactly what I needed. We followed it up with a yummy dinner. Thanks Krista!!

August Writing Institute Day 3

Day three was a blur. It seems like when my mind was not working, by body was.

It started with a run...

I love to run and see new places on foot. This morning I was joined by a Wisconsin colleague, Lisa.

Next it was off to large group with Lucy where we spent some time practicing small group work and analyzing student information writing. 

My small group leader is the brilliant Katie Clements. I was thrilled when I received notice that she was my small group section leader, as I admire her from afar on Twitter, and have learned so much from her already through #TCRWP Twitter chats. I have not talked about my small group sessions at all, because I am intending on synthesizing that work later, as it focuses more on coaching around the units of study. However, I wanted to share this tip we learned today. Katie reminded us that a 10 minute minilesson should only take 10 minutes to plan. She had us do this work today and she was right. She handed us a copy of a minilesson from a UOS book. She coached us through the process and then we taught the lesson. 

It worked! I look forward to sharing this with the teachers I work with.

In our choice workshops, I attended Audra Robb's section on Assessing Writers in Middle School: The Intersection of Assessment, Feedback, and Grading. She was real and gave us some great resources to consider as we handle the challenges of having 100+ students in our classes.

The closing for today was Daniel Beaty. He treated us to some of his solo play, Emergency, in which he plays 40 characters. It was brilliant. He also shared some of his childhood heartache and heroes that shaped him into the man he is today. 

Lastly, I headed down Broadway to see an iconic landmark. My husband is a huge Seinfeld fan, and hence I became one too. I had heard that Monk's (now known as Tom's Restaurant) was nearby. I found it.

August Writing Institute 2017 Day 2

Day 2 did not disappoint. The day started with Lucy Calkins in our large group session that was targeted for grades 3-5. She focused on the management of the workshop and the parts of the minilesson.

Management of the Workshop

We act as if management is something only the first year teachers worry about. Lucy says that management of her people is one of the hardest parts of her job.

• Way to signal to kids it is a way to signal to kids that it is workshop time.
• Bring kids to the meeting area (get kids to do this in 15 sec)
• Ss sit in their assigned seats at the meeting area with their partner (mixed gender, mixed ability-not the same in reading) Don’t put the high and low together
• Sit down when you teach (it must signal something different than traditional lessons)
• Have Ss always bring everything (pencil, notebook, etc)
• Give minilesson
• Send them off (link) “Off you go”
• Get started on their writing immediately, then whisper for them to go back to their seats one at a time, leaving the small 5 to gather a small group
• Back row go...next row
• Red table go…
• Those of you who are going to be doing...get started. Those who have no clue, stay here.
• Move around the writing space, and move from kids to kid to kid. Use your non verbals. Don’t start by having a conference right away until they all know how to get writing. Maybe by November, you can do this.
• Then small group work (mostly at the beginning of year), then conferring
• Midworkshop interruption: stand in the middle of the room.”Writers…” In the beginning of the year, this could be partner share time to help build stamina
• Share usually backends with the minilesson and it is shared with partner work. Sometimes it is a whole class share

For a choice session, I attended Cornelius Minor’s session titled Writing Workshop 2.0: Using Digital Tools across the Writing Process to Support Collaboration, Revision, and Feedback.

I have been following @MisterMinor on Twitter for a few years and enjoy learning from him long distance. I was thrilled that I had the opportunity to hear him present today. His energy is inspiring, and his love for teaching kids shined through his presentation. He really encouraged us to let kids use whatever tool works for them in the writing process, as the writing notebook is just a metaphor for whatever holds your ideas.

The Writing Cycle:

• Is not linear
• Can backtrack, zoom ahead, skip…
• Can be interrupted
• Can overlap or happen in parallel ways
• Changes depending on the purpose or audience
• Can happen without distinctions from phase to phase
• Can be repurposed to suit the needs of the writer

Remember there is no such thing as THE way to go through the writing process.

Lastly, we were all fortunate to hear Katherine Patterson speak.

She is the author of many books including...

I was in awe at her humble nature, quick wit, and openness to share some of her most devastating heartaches with us. Tears rolled down my cheeks as she told the story of her young son’s best friend’s death that came in the same year she found a lump, and how these two things in the summer of 1974 set in motion the writing of Bridge to Terabithia. Towards her close Katherine brought everything full circle. To know yourself loved by those who you thought you hated is a very special gift. The reason crimes are committed, wars are fought is because some believe others are disposable. We, as teachers, have an awesome opportunity to love our students.

August Writing Institute 2017 Day 1 Keynote

I have been highly anticipating this week, since finding out I was accepted to the August Writing Institute. I have followed the learning from previous institutes on Twitter and was really not sure I would ever get the opportunity to be here.

The morning began with an uplifting opening by Lucy Calkins.

The theme of Lucy’s keynote was that writing is something we do as we breathe, as we speak. Writing used to be for the elite: NOW on average we send 125 texts & 75 emails a day. We are all citizen journalists, as we can all be heard through our writing. We teach people to organize the deluge of info coming at us all time. Now the teaching of writing feels less like curriculum and more like a mission.

Why write? Because it helps us author meaning, to make meaning in our lives. We make meaning by understanding that the writing process itself is a story; about a character who has big motivations to tell a story, to find something to say, and the character runs into trouble in the writing process; the fact that writing is hard does not mean we have to scaffold it with (dioramas, etc).

Writing is not easy and should not be. Emptiness is the starting point of writing. Feeling empty handed is part of the writing process. The character has trouble and then gets through it, and thinks, “I’m changing as I write this.”

And lastly writing puts us on the line and it scares us. But by being vulnerable and sharing the hard parts, we gain intimacy, that helps us to bounce forward.

Coaching for Impact with Samantha Bennett

I had the pleasure of learning from the highly engaging, super positive Samantha Bennett at my local CESA this week. I saw Sam speak at WSRA last spring and was thrilled to learn from her again. She did not disappoint.

We began the day by asking questions, making connections and reflecting on three learning targets Sam had for us. They were...

• I can articulate my beliefs about what matters most to teacher learning that impacts student learning.
• I can support my beliefs with best-practice theory/research.
• I can describe how my use of time aligns with my beliefs.
• I can use research to analyze a professional development experience.
• I can (re)design a learning experience for a teacher, a PLC, a school, or a district meeting that puts what matters MOST (backed by research) 'to work'.

We then spent some time reading pieces of articles and research that Sam has found helpful in her practice. She stressed the importance to know who "has your back". During the readings we looked for connections to our beliefs. I chose to read an excerpt from Professional Capital: Transforming Teaching in Every School by Andy Hargreaves and Michael Fullen. I had read this book when it first came out and enjoyed reading through this passage. What really resonated with me was the following quote, "The more the student becomes the teacher and the more the teacher becomes the learner then the more successful the outcome." We must think about who is doing the work. Our students should be working harder than us and we should be spending the majority of the time observing and coaching them.

Sam then walked us her learning lab experience. It involved 8 steps which we jigsawed. Sam begins the lab with a prep email and then the host teacher writes a context letter back to Sam. The next steps include an observation, a response letter, co-planning, day 2 lab in which a group of teachers comes in to observe student learning, another response letter, teacher reflection on lab experience and then ripples are hopefully occurring due to the experience. One key component of this work is to get the teacher focusing on spending 2/3 of the workshop time with students engaged in their work. 

I look forward to infusing Sam's ideas for learning labs with Diane Sweeney's ideas for student-centered learning labs next year as we continue to use them as part of our professional development.

Student-Centered Learning Lab

This week I facilitated my first student-centered learning lab with our 4th and 5th grade staff. I have been a part of learning labs before both as the host teacher and as an observer, but being a facilitator is very new to me.

In my previous experiences in labs, they were more of a model classroom set up. The focus was teacher centered and observers were observing how the host teacher was teaching and then would bring that implementation back to the classroom. This model classroom had received intensive coaching to ensure that they provided high-quality instruction to their students for teachers to observe.

I have been reading Diane Sweeney's book Student Centered Coaching.

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It has opened my eyes to a style of coaching that is less intrusive & judgemental. It's focus is on the students, which is why we are all in the profession. As Diane states, "The focus isn't on improving them but instead is on improving the achievement of their students." It also aligns with the way we discuss student writing by using the learning progressions with student on-demand pieces with the Units of Study. A perfect match!

Our district has offered three 1/2 days for work to be done around the Units of Study in Writing by Lucy Calkins. This was our second 1/2 day. I asked for volunteers to be the host, and I had one brave and curious soul come forward. I met with this teacher ahead of time to explain the procedure and to get her thinking of a focus for the lab.

These were our thoughts for the day:

• The focus is on improving the achievement of our students.
• Use student observations/evidence to determine where the students are in their learning.
• Build a community of teachers who are skilled at analyzing student evidence to make decisions that best support student learning.

We followed Diane Sweeney's protocol for student-centered learning labs to help guide our thinking, observing and discussing. We began with a prebrief where our host teacher explained what was happening currently in her room and what her goal was for today. The goal was, "How can writing partnerships be productive?"

Then we brainstormed "look-fors". In a perfect world, what would writing partnerships look like/sound like? Then we had time to review the protocol and our expectations for time spent in the room.

Our next step was to watch the lesson with the focus on writing partnerships. Our host teacher did a fantastic job setting us up for the day and preparing the lesson to maximize our learning experience. 

After the lesson we debriefed by using a "whip-around" procedure. In this model, the discussion moved along in an orderly fashion from one person to the next. I did give the option to pass, but no one did. We again followed Diane Sweeney's protocol for debriefing. In round 1 we discussed the student evidence/observations; in round 2 we discussed implications; in round 3 our host teacher responded to what was shared; and in round 4 each group member shared their next steps in instruction.

I was so pleased with how the learning lab went. I felt that all teachers were engaged and participated to their fullest potential. I also feel like our students are going to benefit from this experience, which is why we chose to use this format.