Kieu's Graves CH 15-17

CHAPTER 15- How to revise for meaning.
I don't think I ever really knew the difference between editing and revising. I guess I figured they were the same process. So whenever I was asked to revise a paper, I would look for grammatical errors or some misspelled words. However, I am beginning to see the difference. Editing is looking for the errors that I just mentioned, whereas revising is to look back at the content of the writing. Revising is where I add or take out information and rearrange sections of my paper. Ah ha.

CHAPTER 16- How to listen to voice.
I did a modeled writing exercise with my fifth graders the other week and my teacher told me to make sure that their papers had "voice". The first two words that came to mind when I thought about voice were attitude and character, so I tried to explain to them that their papers had to have some kind of strong attitude that would entice the readers to continue on. My mentor gave me a student's example of an introduction without much voice and asked the class to all rewrite that same introduction, but with voice. I was amazed at some of the writings that came from that little activity! Some of the papers were better than some that I have read from classmates my age (not in our cohort, of course!). All too often, we try to write our stories and be professional at the same time, making it hard to have our true selves come out in the work. I'm trying to get away from that myself, putting as much of my attitude as I possibly can into any writing that I do.

CHAPTER 17- How to keep handwriting in perspective.
When did handwriting become such a complex topic?? Writing pressure? Placing the paper at a 45 degree angle? It matters where you place your arm on the table? Control? Holy cow! I think we put way too much emphasis on a child's handwriting, sometimes causing major setbacks in their creativity. My handwriting turns to chicken scratch a lot of times, especially when I have to copy notes quickly or when my arms gets tired. But again, I think that is because my arm isn't placed correctly on the table. :) In my opinion, as long as the writing is legible, then fine by me. Whatever writing style is comfortable for the person should be great. So long as the child is able to get their thoughts down onto the paper.

Kamealoha's Reflection

Chapter’s 18-20

I decided to do my reflection on chapter 18 “How to Spell to Communicate.” I really enjoyed this chapter because it made me think about my years in school. I was never really a great speller, but I tried my best. I remember every night before a spelling test, my mother would test me. It also made me think about the invented spelling. As a child I would do this all the time. I was always making up my own way of spelling words. I think that my teachers did a good job at correcting this. As a child I did not realize that there was only one way to spell a word correctly

As I was reading about the child Chris, who is a perfectionist, I thought about a little girl in my class this year. During writing time she is always raising her hand to ask how to spell words. When I tell her to sound them out and try her best she usually just sits there. She is a very smart young girl, but does not like to spell words wrong.

My mom has always told me that reading plays a big part in being a good speller. She said that by seeing how these words are used and seeing them regularly I would become a better speller. Well I am not big on reading. I like to read, but only materials that I think are interesting. I still find myself every now and then struggling on a word. I can recognize when I spell a word wrong, but I just can’t seem to spell it correct. When I am in this situation I usually look it up in a dictionary. I am trying to teach my kids that it is okay to look in a dictionary when needed. I have used the dictionary twice since I have been at Kapalama. I think that by them seeing me do this it will make them more comfortable to use it.

Coby’s Reflection to Graves Chapter 18-20

“What do I do with…?” is the question many teachers ask. In chapters eighteen to twenty of his book, Writing: Teachers and Children at Work, Donald Graves talks about how to help students improve in their spelling, catch up when they are behind, and reach their potential when they are not doing so. His ideas come from the observation of elementary age children in the writing process.

What do you do with children who cannot spell? In chapter eighteen Graves has an interesting idea to improve spelling. He suggests allowing the students to sound out the words and write with “invented spelling” while the teacher corrects the spelling of only five or six high frequency words. The students are also to receive spelling assessments at the beginning and end of a semester and to help them see their own improvements. Graves brings up cases that showcase common spelling problems such as perfectionism, apathy, conservative safety, and learned helplessness and talks about ways in which the solutions he gave could be used to help these students.

How do you help a child catch up? Graves has some suggestions about this topic in his nineteenth chapter. He first talks about the fact that a lot of the problems of children falling drastically behind are due to the fact that they develop a sense of hopelessness early on in their writing careers. For such a problem Graves suggests starting by pointing out to those students, in conference, what they are doing right. From there the teacher has to decide how he or she is going to get this child to start writing his or her thoughts down on paper. The teacher can use methods such as discussions, drawing, provide extra information sources, allow the child to write in a different format than what the assignment calls for, and/or choose experienced writers to conference with this student.

What if a child is not meeting his or her potential? Graves dives into this topic in chapter twenty. He first attributes this problem to the fact that many writer believe that they cannot write. Graves goes over cases that involve students who do not see writing as important, work unless their spelling is perfect, draft, and have a voice in his or her piece. For each case Graves says the key is to make the children see how important and helpful writing can be. Some of the solutions to the earlier mentioned respectively problems are giving the student a lot of audiences (teacher and peers), working on inventive spelling, getting more information and details into a piece, and encouraging some personally anecdotes.

These methods gone over by Graves are great methods but I have learned that they can only be done if the teacher is willing to do them wholeheartedly. These methods take time to payout and if a teacher is not willing to invest that time or gets discouraged if there is not a sudden improve and changes his or her mind then these methods will not work to their fullest. Some teachers are too complacent or afraid to try these methods. To win big one must bet big.

taras reflection for graves' chapters 18-20

I was reading chapter 18 and I saw some examples of how children begin to spell and I couldnt help but notice that one of my kids at kapalama writes like a child in stage II. this boy in my class is really behind in his writing and my mentor teacher and I try to help him get better but he doesnt seem to care when we try to help him. he just wants us to help him spell the word and then he'll spell it right but next time around, he will spell the word wrong. he always spells his words with the first and last letter. most times its hard to read his paper because he only has the first and last letters. for example, the word brother will be spelt br and indian will be spelt in. lots of times, I have to ask him to read his paper for me and he cant either. theres 0nly so much my mentor teacher and I can do to help him, we think he needs to make an effort to want to learn how. this boy also goes to reading emphasis classes where another teacher teaches him how to read and put words together to make a sentence. but hes not making enough progress. I guess I have to try harder.

Lit & Lit 1 - UH - Swim - F2006

Lit & Lit 1 - UH - Swim - F2006

Kia's Reflecton to Chapter 20 - How to Help Children With Special Problems of Potential

Up until now, I would have been a very praising kind of teacher. I did not realize the damage it could do on a child. I will definately be changing my ways now. I also did not realize that those, who we think write well, have problems in writing. I see what Graves is saying when he kind of desribes some of the student writer's as, in my own words, "robots." They have been told "this" is the way you are to form all of your writings, and so they do....losing their voice in the process.
I want to hear the voices of my students, so I am left with the same question I always have....How do you help those who do not write or speak....they just give you a blank look?
I hope there will be a chapter on this somewhere.

Lit & Lit 1 - UH - Swim - F2006

Lit & Lit 1 - UH - Swim - F2006

Kia's Reflection to Chapter 19 - How to Help Children Catch Up

I see this chapter as a very detailed follow-up to the last chapter. This chapter takes us into more detail and shows us ways to help children with these handicaps that start out as merely cosmetic, but later, create real hazards in writing. I think it is best to avoid these situation all-together when possible. This is something that has to be done in the early years of elementary, but does not only happen in school. As an early-elementary school teacher, I think it is important to make sure parents know how to best guide their children to make their learning as positive as it can be.
For many parents it can be difficult. Because every parent wants the best for their child, they expect their child to BE the best. They push them, sometimes excessively, in hopes of a positive outcome - better performance. That is not always the case. Some of the time, they end up hurting them in the long run, which is the kind of problems we see in this chapter.
When this happens the teacher has to do a reversal, try to figure out what the cause of the problem was in the first place and carefully change the way the child views himself/herself as a writer. It can takes months, but is worth it for the sake of the child.
I have a few students in my class who I think may benefit from this material and only a few short weeks with them, but I am going to use my new knowledge from this chapter and see if I can help them.

Lit & Lit 1 - UH - Swim - F2006

Lit & Lit 1 - UH - Swim - F2006

Kia's Reflection to Chapter 18- How To Spell To Communicate

Spelling is something I remember being drilled in since the beginning of time. I t was not only pushed by the teacher, but I had the drive to become the best speller on my own. I was no Akeelah, but I got my share of practice. I played school with my sisters, of course I was always the teacher. I don't know where my love for spelling came from, but I'm sure glad I had it.
It is something I think we (those who can spell well) take for granted. Just like in our "How To's," we don't realize the process that is involved, because we don't conciously think about all the steps involved.
I see the relation between this problem and my student John, but I am not sure if this in fact his handicap in writing. His may simply be getting the information from head to paper, as in not knowing where to start, what to say first, or how to get the audiences attention. As you can see, John is my project. I feel that if I can find John's solution, I can help others. It's just a little hard when I am offered no information from the student. I just get shoulder shruggs still. Okay, enough of that.
Spelling is very important, but I agree with Graves, it should not take the place of having more content. If you can get the ideas flowing from the children, you can later help with spelling on a slower, more relaxed pacing, as not to overwhelm the student.

Kendrah's Reflection for graves ch. 20

I was assigned to read and reflect on chapter 20, How to Help Children with Special Problems of Potential. I found this chapter to be very beneficial. I know that many teachers come in contact with children who have the potential to do many things in school but don't care to try. Sometimes teachers don't know what to do and this chapter describes actions that can be made to help. Graves writes about scenarios throughout the chapter that deal with children who have potential but avoid learning and doing. The overall point of this chapter is that the process of helping children realize that their speaking or writing is worthwhile, will be a slow one. Some children find it hard to make a change or adapt to something new. First, the teacher must give less praise. Instead of prasing a child heavily with "good job, keep on working, fantastic" and more, it is better if you let the child come to you and say " I think this is good because...". Children have a voice. Also, children are afraid that their work on paper may be less than acceptable. "A specific teacher response to their writing, the provision for publishing, and the response of other children gradually convince writers they have something worthwhile to say." It is important for teachers to not rush the child but let them take enough time to feel comfortable with their learning. Graves writes that there is no hurry but there is a need for persistent observation and listening in any subject.

Kendrah's Reflection for Graves ch. 17

I found chapter 17, How to Keep handwriting in Perspective, quite interesting. This semester I was able to attend parent teacher conferences in my field experience classroom. I noticed that my teacher emphasized to the parents that they must constantly work with their children on their handwriting. For example, capitalization, spaces between words, beginning sounds, etc. Graves writes that children show us the nature of their journey through appearance of their letters on the page and their use of space. Graves also write that children develop their handwriting by acting on the page. They move through the space on a paper making letters. The examples shown reminded me of the kindergartners I work with now. This is a good chapter to read especially when working with children who are just learning to explore letters, sounds, and handwriting. The chapter continues by describing handwriting disability, writing speed, appearance of handwriting, and more.

Reflection to Graves Chapters 15-17

In chapters fifteen to seventeen of his book, Writing: Teachers and Children at Work, Donald Graves talks about helping children revise for meaning, bring out their voice, and work on their handwriting. He talks about how necessary it is for a writer’s work to have a sense of order to it before they can even think of revising for meaning. Once the order is determined then authors can begin to decide on whether the amount of information they have is enough, too little, or too much. From there they will be on the right track to adding more meaning to their pieces. Graves tells teachers that they need to learn how to listen for their students’ voices in their pieces. A voice, like in a speech, is what helps the readers to know who wrote the piece they are reading. It is a teacher’s job to bring out that voice in the students’ works. Graves completes this section with a chapter on handwriting. He talks about the different aspects that make up handwriting. Through this chapter one can also pick up ways in which to correct certain handwriting problems.

I like the way that Graves encourages students to have a voice in their pieces and purpose for them. In my school I see so many students who write just because their teacher tells them to. Because of this they do not really care about what they are writing. As long as the piece is good enough to get an ME it is good enough for them. Some students aim even lower than an ME and if they get what they want it is good enough for them. I find this very sad and I hope that someday more students in elementary school will be inspired to actually care about what they are writing because they value it and not just because they want a good grade.

Megan Gilbert's Reflection- Graves chap. 18-20

I decided to write my reflection on chapter twenty. This chapter discusses some of the drawback some children experience in the writing process. It takes you through four different cases and explains how the teacher tried to appeal to each child’s strengths. I think this chapter is important because it is a great example of how we as teachers need to be flexible and able to change lesson s in writing to play to an individual child’s strengths. It also teaches us that as teachers we should all be working together, gather information and advice from each other in order to find the best solution possible for the student.

Sei's Reflection to Graves (18-20)

Graves Chapter 20 Reflection
How to Help Children with Special Problems of Potential

In chapter twenty, Graves addresses common problems found in children that show an inconsistency between their high potential and actual performance. Along with common problems, Graves also discusses approaches that teachers can use to reach out to these children. He takes his readers on a journey with four children that show potential that is exceeding average, yet show little performance in the area of writing.

I enjoyed reading this chapter because I could relate a few of my students at Kapalama to a certain case. I’ve learned that whatever the case or the child, there’s a solution. I think sometimes teachers become restless and hopeless, forgetting why they became teachers in the first place. When students are ruled hopeless, their future becomes darker and their situation actually does become hopeless. There are children like the four discussed in this chapter. There are children that are extraordinarily brilliant, yet don’t reach up to their full potential in their work. Whatever the reason, it’s the teacher’s role to find a solution. “Where there’s a will, there’s a way” and with the guidance of a good teacher the high potential of students can be met with great achievements.

Andrew-Age 9
Andrew is an extraordinarily brilliant child. His tests scores are above the average of his peers and he shows great intelligence with his spoken words and through his work in every other subject, but when it comes to writing, “his sentences are barely legible, cryptic, and filled with numerous misspellings, though syntactically well-developed. Andrew does know answers, reads voraciously, defends positions, but he views [a[er and pencil activities as superfluous acts since he already knows his answers.
The best approach to helping Andrew is get him writing everyday. He needs to find that “writing works” and needs to realize the power of publishing.

Patrick-Age 7
Patrick is a child that is afraid to make mistakes due to his upbringing. His parents are intolerant to mistakes and expect error-free first drafts, which have made him hesitant to put anything on paper. He puts most of his energy into his detailed artwork at the top of his papers. When asked about his drawing, he can provide detailed information about the subject. Although he knows much about his pictures, he is hesitant to put that knowledge onto paper because of his fear of making a mistake.
The approach to this case is getting Patrick writing and helping him realize that he can always go back and correct. He should be encouraged to “spell ‘as best he could’” and he can later get help with the words that he has circled. In this scenario, parent participation is crucial. Patrick’s parents must be able to realize that he must be allowed to make mistakes in order to learn.

Heidi-Age 10
Heidi is a brilliant writer because she comes from a “strongly literate background.” Heidi is able to produce quality and perfected writing without any effort. Because Heidi is such an excellent writer, her teacher feels as if there is nothing more that he can teach her.
In Heidi’s case, “growth comes when Heidi sees discrepancies between her intentions and what is in the piece: growth is the central issue in Heidi’s learning situation.” In order to help Heidi realize these discrepancies, her teacher must receive her work and provide positive feedback while asking questions about her initial intentions for that piece.

Cheryl-Age 11
Similar to Heidi, Cheryl is also an extraordinary writer. “Her papers are visually appealing: words are placed on the page as if by machine, lettered precisely, with correct intervals, accurate spelling and punctuation.” The problem in Cheryl’s case is that she lacks voice in her writing.
To help students like Cheryl, the teacher must ask for specific details about their writing. The teacher is not doing this to question or interrogate their knowledge, but instead wanting them to “trust [their own] vision, to hear specifics coming through in her own voice through the conference sharing".

Sei's Reflection to Graves (15-17)

Graves Chapter 17 Reflection
How to Keep Handwriting in Perspective

Like a true writer, Graves starts chapter seventeen with a simile and metaphor:
“Handwriting is the vehicle carrying information on its way to a destination. If it is illegible the journey will not be completed. Handwriting, like skin, shows the outside of the person. But beneath the skin beats the living organism, the life’s blood, the ideas, the information”.
By this, Graves means that handwriting and information go hand-in-hand. Although we live in a society that places great emphasis on the physical appearance of one’s handwriting, the reality is that “it pale[s] next to the substance they carry”. As readers, we must be able to look past handwriting and see the information that is trying to be conveyed. And as writers, we must be able to master the craft, making it an automatic process so we can concentrate on conveying the important part- the information, thoughts, feelings, and ideas.

As a future educator, this chapter provides me with useful information that helps me to understand the process and importance of handwriting. Although the appearance of handwriting is important, that shouldn’t be the sole emphasis on children’s writing. Even though a child may have messy handwriting, a teacher must be able to understand a see the message that the child is trying to express. If not, that child may feel discouraged and feel like his ideas are not good because his handwriting isn’t good. If I see the importance of the message and the ideas that the child is trying to express, the child won’t be so fixated on consciously perfecting his handwriting. The handwriting of the child will improve on its own when that child is provided with enough writing time and he/she is able to write about whatever is important and of interest to him/her.

Graves reviews the general phases of a child’s handwriting development:
Get-it-Down Phase: This is the phase when “just putting the words on paper is enough” for the child. When they first come to school, children are determined to write, whether it’s words, letters, numbers, or pictures.
First Aesthetics: “From the beginning, children show their concern for aesthetics when they reshape a letter or a word”. They also show their concern for aesthetics when they “clean their pages”, which is when they brush a piece of paper from top to bottom before they start writing. Oftentimes beginning writers erase a mistake so much that it makes a whole in the page. For this reason, beginning writers should be supplied with a durable writing surface.
Growing Age of Convention: “Toward the end of the first grade many children want their writing to appear conventional.” In this phase, the children become meticulous about things that were oblivious to them before-things like, margins, spacing between words, and writing in the lines. This is the stage that children start to look back at their writing with a critical eye and they want to do things the “right way” so “content now takes a backseat for many”.
Breaking Conventions: This is the phase that teachers need to show their students that rewriting is necessary and the first draft doesn’t need to be perfect in appearance. “Young writers need to learn a whole repertoire for ‘messing up’ their paper to deal with new information, reorganization, and adjustments.”
Later Aesthetics: “It is a significant moment when a child decides to line out instead of erasing an error [because] this immediately signals that the paper is only a draft, that the text can be reworked, and further copies made that will be much more pleasing”.
Time and Topic: “When children have a well-chosen topic, their urge to express so dominates the activity that they lose track of the conscious aspect of handwriting to focus more on the message.”

Could I have the definition? ch.18

I don't want to brag, but in elementary school I won the fifth-grade spelling bee. Though it may not seem like a big deal to most people, I was very proud of myself and it caused me to want to continue to be a better than the average speller. (Do they even have that anymore?) One of the things I can remember doing in elementary school is when I got home, I would get started on my homework right away. I'd get my spelling book and write out my list of words for the night before going out to play. However, I don't know why this helped me or if it's even the reason I did so well. After reading ch.18, I discovered that there are many things that takes place in the development of spelling.

Since I'm in a kindergarten class, I have been able to see the process of writing or the stages children go through in becoming writers. The stages listed in the chapter were so dead on that it was scary. Now that I know these stages and how I can help my students, I will have a better sense of expectations. For some reason, the bar for my expectations are set at an extremely high level. Getting the information from this book and class is showing me that I must always take into consideration the age and grade level of my students. I think the hard part about it is knowing what the students should know for every grade. Especially since we won't know where will end up after graduation and if we haven't had a certain grade, what are we to do?

My question may be as easy as 1, 2, 3 because the obvious answers are to ask another teacher, do some research, or not to worry about that sort of thing. Personally, I'm just finding out that there are many differences amongst grade levels as far as the knowledge they are to gain in our classrooms. To me, it's a freightening thought to not know how to help a student because we simply don't know how.

Jaime S. Reflection (Graves Ch. 18)

Can you really blame a child for having difficulty with spelling? The English language is one of the hardest languages to learn. Why can't we just write the sounds we hear in the words? Forget all the rules: 'i' before the 'e' except after 'C', drop the 'y' and add 'ies.' I remember my EDEP professor telling our class that if you grew up a poor speller, you're LIKELY to remain a poor speller. It doesn't mean you're not intelligent. I don't know how true that is but Chapter 18 does state that poor spelling is not correlated with intelligence. In fact, Presidents, professional writers, doctors, and other professionals have trouble with spelling.

This chapter states that spelling is important because the writer will be able to focus on the content of the writing rather than a few misspelled words. At Kapalama, my fourth grade students have Spelling homework every week. They have to write 12 different words five times. Then the following day they have to alphabetize, then write the definition and then finally use the words in sentences. Even after writing the words five times, the children still misspell the words in their sentences. One thing my mentor does, that I will try and do in my own classroom, is when they revise their drafts, they have to circle the words that they think they misspelled. I think that's a better idea than having the teacher correct the spelling with a red pen.

Stuck on Chapter 12

Breaking old habits can be a difficult task. There are times when we become stuck in a routine that we forget the reason we are doing it in the first place. For me, if I don't remind myself about why I'm exercising, then I will just go through the motions and probably not gain anything from it. Even though it's in the back of my mind, I must remind myself so I don't lose track of the main goal which is to stay in good body/mind shape. Changing one's ways is an extremely tough battle. I know that I am set in my way of thinking for a number of things. However, for our students sake, we must always be ready to adapt.

The children in our classroom have many things to teach us. If I am not able to roll with the punches and adapt to the ways of my students, I will never learn from them. In no way should I think that I am the only teacher in the classroom. That wouldn't be fair to them or me. There is not a living person that knows everything about everything, but we can become better at the things we choose. The only way to do that is if we continue to ask questions and learn. In a world where no one asks questions equals a world stuck in their own ways.

Chelsea's Reflection on Graves (Ch. 18-20)

I have chosen to reflect on Chapter 19: How To Help Children Catch Up
because I feel that I could use what I have read in this chapter in the
future. This chapter is mainly about helping children with their spelling
to lead them to feel more confident in their writing. In the class that I
observe, there is a boy who is always complaining about his handwriting
and sometimes his spelling. When I read this chapter, it reminded me
of him. He is a really smart boy, but doesn't like the way he writes. He
is always telling me that his handwriting is ugly, and that he writes too
small. In writing, he seems like he doesn't really enjoy it, and after reading
this chapter, I was thinking maybe it's because he doesn't like the way he
writes. He thinks its ugly, and probably thinks that whoever reads his
paper is not going to like it because his handwriting is ugly. There are
also a couple of students in the class who constantly ask me how to spell
certain words for their writing pieces. Sometimes I just tell them how to
spell it, but I have realized that I really shouldn't tell them how. They
should just spell it the way they think it is supposed to be spelt, and find
out if that way is correct later because they are just in the drafting stage.
This chapter explained two scenarios, and a few ways in which a teacher
could help a student in that situation. I like where it says to give the child
a word bank on different words that could be used in their writing
depending on what they are writing about. For example, the teacher
provided a word bank on words used in fashion shows to help Debbie
write her paper. I didn't know spelling could be such a big deal for
children when they are writing. I didn't think that spelling words wrong
would have such a big effect on writing. Spelling is a big part of writing,
but it's interesting to know that children are pushed away from enjoying
writing because of the fact that they feel they need to spell the words
correct at all times. I think teacher's should teach their children that
spelling is not a big factor when in the beginning stages of writing. There
will always be a time towards the end of the writing where the child can
find their mistakes in spelling and fix it at that point.

Jaime S. Reflection (Graves Ch. 17)

Long ago, when I was in elementary school, writing legible was very important. I remember receiving letter grades for having legible handwriting. I'm not sure if all teachers realize the importance of having neat penmanship. Students will have to take the HSA writing test and if their writing is illegible, they'll receive a low score. One of my students at Kapalama has really bad handwriting and during his parent conference, my mentor told his mom that he will need to write neater otherwise he'll do poorly on the writing portion. The "scorers??" (people who score the tests) will not try and make out the words like I do, they'll just give him a low score.

I think children need to realize the importance of writing neatly. They need to know that when they write something, the first thing the reader will notice is the script. If the writing is messy, the reader might assume that it's not a good paper or that the writing is not worth reading. I volunteer in my daughter's kindergarten classroom and I was shocked that some of the students couldn't hold the pencil properly. Her teacher has them use the grips and it seems to help them. Her goal was to have them off the grips by the end of the year. (I'm not sure if she meant this year or the end of the school year) But I hope they'll be able to write without the grips by the end of this year.

Let the Children teach Us c/12-14

In chapter 12, it discusses that as educators we should let children lead conferences. It mentions that children have many different things to teach us. It reminded me of parent teacher conferences we recently had. At the school I do my field experience at, they are trying to involve the students more and let them lead the conferences. However, I wasn’t able to experience it but I know that teachers are preparing children to lead conferences. This chapter was written so that teachers will know how to help children speak and ask relevant questions.
In the following chapters, they also discuss why conferences are important to be conducted. It mentions that when the child talks, the child will learn. Also, when the child talks, the teacher can help. The chapters also contain ten common questions asked about the conduct of conferences. One of the many questions that interest me was “what do I do when the piece had major problems and the child thinks it is good the way it is?” I learned that the teacher must first ask the child why he or she thinks its good. It is important to understand what the child has written and why it was written the way it was. If it still has problems then perhaps the teacher should say that he or she doesn’t understand a certain part. It will help the teacher and student produce a better piece by working together.

"Ta Da", You Can Write Ch. 17

Before I began my observation and practice, I had many assumptions about the way children learn to write. My assumptions were so broad that I thought all children could pick up a pencil and either copy words or trace them and then like magic, "ta da", they could now write fluently. However, I was completely wrong and there is more to writing than tracing a bunch of words. Some of the important things that I never knew about writing for young children is how you hold the pencil and paper, hand strength, and knowing how to do basic strokes like the pull down and the backwards/forwards circle. All of these are aids that help assist students to become stronger writers.

When I went to my mentor's class for the first time, I felt like he had low expectations and didn't really challenge the students. It seemed like everything he did was in tiny steps. For example, inside of the students journals, he would have them write what they could and we would write in what they really wanted to say. I guess I thought like this as a teacher with standards and all that crap on my mind. Yet again, I had to sit back and just soak up this new information because my beliefs were taking over the facts. The more I am in the classroom, I am understanding that no matter which grade I teach, I must learn what my students are capable of and what they should be capable of and push them as often as possible.

jaimie k's reflection to graves ch. 17...

I never realized and never thought that there are so many variables to handwriting. I simply saw it as something you learn to do when you’re young and it’s something that comes rather naturally. I know everyone starts off with really horrible handwriting, but I guess I assumed that with practice, everyone just gets better with time.

There are so many things you have to think about and focus on when you’re writing. It seems that they are things you would never think about correcting when trying to improve your writing. Such as, you’re large and small muscles, your grip, arm and wrist placement, etc. I didn’t know that the angle of your paper mattered so much, or even having your arm and wrist on the table. Grip is one thing I know that can affect your writing, but I didn’t know the angle of your pencil affected the amount of pressure on your writing.

I thought handwriting was something that was mastered at least by fifth or sixth grade; but working with the fifth graders at my elementary school has proven me wrong. Some of their handwriting is okay, but others’ are messy and crooked. Sometimes it’s almost illegible. They even write too close sometimes so that it seems like there’s no spaces between words. Some of them also write really huge. I don’t know if they’re just trying to fill up the paper, or if that’s just how they write. Maybe we have to go over all this stuff with them again.

Sei's Reflection to Graves (Ch. 12-14)

Graves Ch. 12 Reflection
Let the Children Teach Us

In Chapter 12, Graves discusses the beauty of educators learning from their students. It shouldn’t be assumed that the sole role of teachers is just to educate. Yes, teachers are there to guide their students and stimulate their minds with a motivating, challenging, and knowledge-saturated curriculum; however, teachers must also learn because “when teachers learn, the children learn”. There are countless things that teachers can learn from their students. Not only can they learn about different teaching techniques and methods through their students, but also information about daily life.

Graves goes on to state that teachers must inhabit much discipline during conferences with their students-a skill that needs to be learned. Teachers must be disciplined enough to let the student lead the conference and “teach and to understand how to develop his own text”. It’s simple-sometimes we teach by learning and sometimes we learn from teaching. As educators, we tend to think that it’s our job to teach and the students’ job to learn, but we must keep in mind that it’s essential for us to learn through our students as well.

This chapter is very enlightening and eye-opening. It’s so ironic, yet beautiful, to think that we, as teachers, think that we’re doing the teaching, but in reality, we’re learning from our students. I’ve had firsthand experiences with learning through my students. I’ve been teaching the youth group at my church for a couple of years now and there are an endless number of things that I’ve learned from my high school students. One child is just a whiz that is so much more knowledgeable about politics than I am. He started asking me all these questions once and I was a little taken back because I didn’t have a clue on how to respond to him. After being stumped by my own student, I took more interest in politics and it’s motivated me to learn more in order to teach more. In the following years, I’m sure that there will be several questions that I may not hold the answers to, but that’s okay. It’s okay to not know everything as long as I make the effort to be knowledgeable of the facts that are important to my students.

Sei's Reflection to Graves (Ch. 9-11)

Graves Chapter 10 Reflection
Help Children Speak First

In this Chapter, Graves discusses writing conference techniques that educators can utilize to encourage their students to speak and open up about their writing. A writing conference not only enables the teacher to assess the writing abilities of her students, but also learn about their interests and background. There are many factors that help constitute a successful writing conference, whether it’s the conference setting, nonverbal gestures, or techniques used to ask questions.

The setting of the conference is crucial to making the child feel comfortable enough to speak about his/her piece. An ideal setting for a conference is at a round table, which enables the student and teacher to work comfortably. In a conference, the teacher should sit near the child, which displays that the teacher cares about the writer and his writing. Instead of standing next to a child that is seated, it’s ideal to get “as close too equal height as possible” because towering over a child will imply an authoritative setting. Maintaining eye contact with the student implies that the teacher is interested in and cares for that student. Without saying a thing, a teacher’s actions can say a whole lot so it’s essential to create a comfortable and beneficial conference setting and attitude.

It is said that “patience is a virtue” and it can also be applied toward successful writing conferences. When conferencing with a child, one must “be prepared to get used to silence”. According to Graves, children may not be able to answer the questions right away, “but the child knows the silence means it is his time to formulate a response…and he does”. It is crucial to give the child time to think about what was asked and feel comfortable enough to answer with ease instead of trying to rush through conferences.

The teacher must “follow the child” during writing conferences. She must focus her attention on that child’s writing and what that child is saying. “What teachers say should usually be based on what the child last said. This requires intensive listening by the teacher”, but it’s important to receive the child’s work and statements. The teacher should regurgitate the information stated by the child as to show her attention and interest to the piece.

When asking questions, the teacher should start off with asking ones that they are sure the child would know the answer to. According to Graves, this gives the child the “momentum of expressing information”, which is key to get them talking. If the child is initially asked a question that he doesn’t know the answer to, he may feel discouraged about not only the conference, but also about his writing.

Once again, Graves has provided me with insightful information to successfully teaching my future students. I absolutely love reading Graves because he always makes sense. His techniques seem somewhat idealistic, but isn’t that what we, as educators, should be shooting for in our classrooms? I found this chapter to be really interesting because a lot of times adults don’t find the time to listen to children. Graves states, “listening to children is more a deliberate act than a natural one”. The moment I read this line, I felt the truth behind it and also felt ashamed. It’s sad to think that we have to make a deliberate effort to listen to children. Whether they’re our own children, our younger siblings, or our students, we have to make the time to listen to them in this fast paced society. Many times, grown adults assume that children have nothing to say, but we couldn’t be anymore wrong. Children have important things to say if we just take the time to listen.

Sei's Reflection on Graves (Ch. 6&7)

Graves Chapter 7 Reflection
Surround the Children with Literature

As stated in the title, Graves emphasizes the importance of “surround[ing] the children with literature” in this chapter. According to Graves, “the children need to hear, speak, and read literature. Literature provides more than facts. It provides drama, problem solving, and precise language”. It is important to encourage students and provide them with the opportunities to “live the literature”, whether it’s through storytelling, role-playing, or talking about their favorite authors.

Graves also takes his readers on a journey of surrounding students with literature through classroom scenarios with Mr. Lopes, Mrs. Andersen, and Mrs. Peckrull. Mr. Lopes immersed his twelve-year-olds with literature by having them write daily for four weeks followed by receiving and questioning “favorite authors’” works and later even their own. Mr. Lopes went as far as even asking a local author to come and speak with his class about a favorite piece and the thought/writing process that went along with composing that piece. Mrs. Andersen surrounding her seven-year-olds with literature through poetry and storytelling. Mrs. Peckrull reached out to her students by role-playing and answering the students’ questions as if she was that certain author.

My immediate reaction after reading this chapter was that to be a teacher that surrounds her students with literature, I must enjoy literature myself. Not only must I adore it, I must be well knowledgeable of it in order to teach my students well. I know that I can reach my students through mediums that I’m comfortable with and I enjoy so when I read Mrs. Andersen’s approach about teaching them through poems and storytelling, I felt eager to try that technique. I’m glad that there are so many different ways of immersing children with literature because it gives teachers a wide range to choose from. For instance, working with poems and storytelling would be really exciting for me and I’m hoping that my students would be able to sense that eagerness and enthusiasm and approach literature with that same attitude. After all, I’m sure students can tell when their teacher isn’t eager or confident about teaching a certain subject. I’ve also concluded that I must be willing to take the time and effort to not only read and analyze books, but to also research authors and their writing techniques.

TARA's reflection for Graves' Chapters 15-17

I wanted to write my reflection on Graves' chapter 17 on how to keep handwriting in perspective. this chapter tells us i guess how to write correctly. this chapter goes over 5 phases of development for the child to be good in writing. reading these phases and this whole chapter in general made me think of a couple of kids in my class at kapalama.

i have this boy who doesnt hold his pencil correctly. he has four of his fingers on the pencil with his thumb on the underside. because of the way he holds his pencil, his handwriting is not so nice and it is not really legible. my teacher has told him he needs to correct the way he holds his pencil but its kinda hard because that is the way he learned. she gave him a pencil grip, the one where it has grooves so you know where to put your fingers but he doesnt like to use it. she put pencil grips on all his pencils but he takes them off. i see now these days he has learned to sort of hold his pencil correctly and he shows me so that i dont put the pencil grip back on but he still needs some help. he is willing to learn and im glad. there is another boy in my class who presses really hard when he writes. he writes really slow because of it so we try and make him press a little lighter when he writes. but again, it is a learning process and it will take time.

Megan Gilbert’s Reflection- Graves chap. 15-17

I wrote my reflection on chapter seventeen. This chapter addresses handwriting development. This chapter was very interesting to me because I have always been told that I have nice handwriting, but I hold my pencil wrong and I should correct that because I will be writing in front of my students. I don’t want to be an example of any bad habits in writing, but I’ve found that trying to hold my writing utensils correctly is much more difficult than I thought it would be. This chapter helps explain to me why that is. I have been developing different muscles in my arm as I learned to write the way I do. In order to change this, I have to develop a different group of muscles and that will take some time.

Anyway, the chapter starts out by viewing handwriting as an assessment tool. Course and progress of development can be shown through handwriting. It is dependent on pressure and control of the hand and arm muscles. It also discussed the five different phases of handwriting. They are the getting-it-down phase, the first aesthetics phase, the growing age of convention phase, the breaking conventions phase, and later aesthetics phase. I enjoyed reading this chapter because it not only taught me something but it also informed me of how I can better teach my students so that they will not repeat my bad habits.

Jaime S. Reflection (Graves Ch. 12-14)

I chose to reflect on Chapter 14 because I'm certain that I will be conferencing my students in the future and this chapter does a good job of answering some questions relating to conferencing. Most of the things mentioned in this chapter were things Greg already talked about in class. But I think it is still worth reading about again.

One of the questions I know will be useful is about what the other children should be doing during conferencing. Children interrupt teachers during conferencing for three common reasons. They don't realize the significance of what they are doing, what is expected of them from the teacher is unclear, and the terror of the blank page. At Kapalama, I've seen students interrupt teachers because of the first two reasons. Most of the times its because they were not paying attention to the teacher so when it was time for them to write, they weren't sure what they were supposed to do. One thing Greg mentioned that the book didn't was that during conferencing, we should situate ourselves so we're facing the class. That's a really good point, especially for the little ones. Another thing I learned from this chapter was that there will always be a few students who will not handle conferences well. As teachers, we shouldn't decide whether our conferences are successes or failures based on them. We should continue to work with the students who are benefiting from conferencing and for the students who aren't benefiting from it, we could always try a different approach.

Chelsea's Reflection on Graves (Ch. 15-17)

I have chosen to reflect on chapter 16, and skimmed through 15 and 17.
Chapter 16 is about how to listen for voice in a writing piece. The chapter
mainly gives examples of four different types of people, all different ages.
It explains how each person uses their own voice in their writing. I find
using voice in a writing piece very interesting. It makes the reader feel
like they are right there in the conversation. My mentor is always
reminding her students to use voice in their writing, and they love using it.
They add all kinds of exciting words, and lots of details to their writing,
which adds more excitement to their paper. I think I use voice when writing
my papers, and I've never really thought about it before. When I get to writing
a paper, my thoughts flow right a long in my head. Whatever is going on in
my head is what I usually write down on my paper. Isn't that using voice, even
though I don't always speak aloud while writing? Using voice in writing a paper
is great. I want to teach my students to write using voice. I'm sure all teachers
do. The kids I observe enjoy it and have fun with it.

Coby's Reflection to Graves Chapter 13

In chapter thirteen of his book, Writing: Teachers and Children at Work, Donald Graves gives an example of how a teacher should spend his or her time in the classroom during a writing block. He suggests that the first five minutes or so should be used to do quick visit conferences like what we have been practicing in Greg’s class. The children who are talked to during these quick visits are not chose randomly, rather a review of their work the night before shows that they would benefit the most from a visit. After the quick visits are over a small group of about four children who can be anywhere in the writing process will be chosen to have a small group conference. These children are each given a chance to have one-on-one attention with the teacher while the others either write or help each other out. Meanwhile the rest of the students are working alone or conferencing together. When this is over the teacher holds a fifteen minute special conference that is more like a seminar on a specific subject. He or she invites five students who he or she thinks will benefit from this seminar and allows anyone else who wants to come to join in as well. The final ten minutes is an all class sharing period where three or four children share their writing with the class. They can either: read their writing, ask for help, or state how they feel about it. After this is done the lesson is over for the day.

This is a nice way to work with students, keep control and guidance over them, and allow them the freedom to be at any stage of the writing process. Not everyone will go at the same rate and it is really nice to have a method that will allow everyone to go slow when they need to and to speed up when they want to. I look forward to one day using this method in a classroom.

Coby's Reflection to Graves Chapter 13

In chapter thirteen of his book, Writing: Teachers and Children at Work, Donald Graves gives an example of how a teacher should spend his or her time in the classroom during a writing block. He suggests that the first five minutes or so should be used to do quick visit conferences like what we have been practicing in Greg’s class. The children who are talked to during these quick visits are not chose randomly, rather a review of their work the night before shows that they would benefit the most from a visit. After the quick visits are over a small group of about four children who can be anywhere in the writing process will be chosen to have a small group conference. These children are each given a chance to have one-on-one attention with the teacher while the others either write or help each other out. Meanwhile the rest of the students are working alone or conferencing together. When this is over the teacher holds a fifteen minute special conference that is more like a seminar on a specific subject. He or she invites five students who he or she thinks will benefit from this seminar and allows anyone else who wants to come to join in as well. The final ten minutes is an all class sharing period where three or four children share their writing with the class. They can either: read their writing, ask for help, or state how they feel about it. After this is done the lesson is over for the day.

This is a nice way to work with students, keep control and guidance over them, and allow them the freedom to be at any stage of the writing process. Not everyone will go at the same rate and it is really nice to have a method that will allow everyone to go slow when they need to and to speed up when they want to. I look forward to one day using this method in a classroom.

Christina Lim
ITE 313

GRAVES: 9, 10, 11
I enjoyed reading these chapters because they address the questions both students and teachers have about writing. One part of the chapters that stood out to me was in chapter 9, when the book states that teachers red line a child’s first attempts to write. I think that this relates to me, because I remember always trying to write my perfect paper, and thinking it was just right, but when I got it back it would be all marked up, and I would feel like my writing was a piece of junk. I also enjoyed chapter 10, the part about the conference settings; how and where you sit makes a difference. Another part of the chapter I enjoyed is the, ask and wait section. I would have never thought to give the child more than a few seconds to answer a question, I always assumed that if the child doesn’t answer after a few seconds, then he or she just doesn’t have any answer at all; not that they are formulating their answer. Chapter 11 is also very informative; I like how it deals with questions that teach both the teacher, as well as the child

Jaime S. Reflection (Graves, Ch. 9-11)

I enjoyed Chapter 9 because it answers some common questions that we, as future educators, will encounter in our classrooms. I'm sure some of us may have already experienced some of these problems. The first question in Chapter 9 was about children who only want to write about one topic. Graves makes a good point that teachers need to get more information before making judgments on the students topic choice.

Under the heading Teacher Practice, the question was asked about how teachers find the time to publish children's work. I think it's a great idea for children to publish between 30-35 books per month or for a 1st or second grade classroom to have 350-450 hardcover books in a year. I'm just wondering, where are the teachers getting the money to publish all these books? I'm sure the supplies needed for publishing don't cost much but it still adds up. Considering that teachers are already paying for a lot of things from their own pockets. I would have parents donate cardboards and supplies for the classroom or I would suggest having these supplies added on to the students supply list. I like Graves idea about holding a workshop on how to make a children's books for the parents. This allows parents to get involved with their children and to see how publishing helps the children.

Lit & Lit 1 - UH - Swim - F2006

Lit & Lit 1 - UH - Swim - F2006
Kia_Ch. 13 Working with Children at Different Draft Stages

In this chapter, we almost feel as though we are going through a reading/literacy class with Mrs. Altmann. I needed this step-by-step demonstration. I always thought, "How do I tell a child he has mispelled words without crushing the ego?"

This is a good approach...letting the child do the talking. The only thing I am left wondering is, "What do you do to help the child who will not talk, whether it be in spelling, ideas, or anything else for that matter?"

How do you pull a child out? I think for some children, it is their culture or even just their personality. They are just shy and/or quiet. What do you do? How do you help the child who doesn't talk? (by choice)

Lit & Lit 1 - UH - Swim - F2006

Lit & Lit 1 - UH - Swim - F2006
Kia-Ch. 11 Ask Questions that Teach

This chapter focused on helping us as teachers to ask students open-ended questions that will help the students to become more independent. It will help them to be able to ask their own questions later to solve their own problems in their writing. The different types of questions were:
1. Opening Questions
2. Following Questions
3. Process Questions
4. Questions that Reveal Development
5. Questions that Deal with Basic Structures
6. Questions that Cause a Temporary Loss of Control
I feel like I use all of these, except the last one, Questions that Cause a Temporary Loss of Control. I don't know if any of my students could handle this. I would be afraid it would lower their confidence. (unless I am totally misinterpreting this kind of question.) Any suggestions?

Coby's Reflection to Graves Chapters 9-11

In chapters nine to eleven of his book, Writing: Teacher’s and Children at Work, Donald Graves answers the most common questions that teachers have about his methods. He also talks about how to run a conference with students and what to ask them.

Chapter nine, the questions and answers section, shows that Graves has really thought about these problems. He looks deeply into many of the situations that are mentioned and realizes that the causes are usually apathy or fear. Graves talks about children who do not revise and states that they are usually apathetic about their topic and need help choosing a good one or they are such perfectionists that they are afraid to be seen revising their work. This stuck out in my mind because I have been on both sides of the spectrum before. In elementary school I would have to constantly revise and I thought that those who did not have to were smarter than I was. I never thought that they might have been too afraid to revise. In college I had a good English 100 professor and since then most of the papers I have scored high marks on were either revised once or not at all. This led me to stop desiring revision, not necessarily for reasons of shame or pride but, because I wanted to focus on projects for others classes. The long term effects are that I have a hard time getting myself to reread my work which has stumped my progress in writing as a hobby. Graves also makes me think of when I am in a writing slump and how that normally ends my interest in writing for anywhere from a few months to a whole year.

Chapters ten and eleven can be summed up with the words, body language, patience, and listening. These are the three things that Graves asks teachers to master as they grow in their conferencing skills. He also gives teachers different types of questions to ask during conferences with students. Personally I am glad to have examples of safe questions to ask students because I know from experience that one wrong question or statement will make a child’s face look grim and his or her head drift down in disappointment. Such a predicament is quite hard to get out of and the regret of those slipped words last for a while. My favorite part of this whole reading was when Graves said to grade children on their best revised piece and nothing else. This sure leaves a lot of freedom and flexibility in the teaching process while appeasing the assessment process.

All in all these are some great bits of information to know about when trying to utilize Graves’ methods in a classroom. I look forward to using these in real life.

jaimie k's reflection to graves ch. 12...

Conferences sound like an awesome idea, but Graves makes them sound so simple. He gives examples of how conferences might go with a teacher and a student; but the truth is that there are so many possibilities of how the conference might go. What if instead of answering the teachers’ questions, the student just replies with “I don’t knows.” In the first selection, Gregory writes about “wepins.” In the first conference the teacher asks him to read what he has and asks him what he’s going to do next. What if instead, he just says “I don’t know.” Then the teacher might ask him questions like in the next conferences, “where did you learn so much about the topic?”, “what did you have in mind when you first started writing this?” and so on. Still the student can answer with “I don’t knows.” Some students are like that. It’s hard to get a straight answer out of them. They might be shy or just not confident in their writing. It may take several minutes for them to finally open up to you. And every conference might start off like this. What do you do then?

Second of all, I know we aren’t supposed to “steer their topics” or “interrupt their writing,” but isn’t Gregory’s topic a bit violent? He wants to write about killing Germans; isn’t that extreme?

I hate to be a pessimist, but things can’t and won’t always go as smoothly as Graves’ examples in the book. Already I know we are all experiencing the difficulties of trying to apply what we learn at the university to our time in the elementary classroom. Everything seems and sounds so simple when it’s being explained to us. We learn how we’re supposed to do things, but it’s always a different situation in the real classroom. We can’t learn how to handle every circumstance; I guess we just learn from real-life experiences and we’ll continue to learn our entire career.

Kieu's Graves CH 10, 12, & 14

Chapter 10 - Help Children Speak First
I have to admit that it is incredibly difficult to get some students to open their mouths and talk, especially about their work. And this is even more difficult with children who are timid and introverted. Graves suggests giving the child ten to fifteen seconds to think before answering. Ten seconds can feel like ten minutes when sitting there, waiting. I would fight the urge to twiddle my fingers and let my eyes wander around to the rest of the classroom- and with my attention span being so short, I think I will have some trouble. However, I think I am pretty good with asking questions, questions that will lead them to offer more information.

Chapter 12 - Let the Children Teach Us
Quite frankly, we underestimate children because they are younger and we assume that means they are also less knowledgeable. However, in my daily interactions with children, I am becoming more and more aware of the fact that this assumption is totally wrong. I have been surprised by many conversations with kids- they talk about something that I had no idea about. My six-year-old nephew could teach me quite a few things about racing cars and drifting. I was amazed one night when we were watching tv and he pointed out that the cars we drifting.

Chapter 14 - Questions Teachers Ask About Conferences
This whole idea of conferencing challenges EVERYTHING I have known about writing and my teachers' roles in the process. I don't recall talking to any of my teachers about writing assignments that they gave us. All they did was assign and then correct for errors, whether it be spelling or punctuation. I do remember one event so clearly in my mind: In the sixth grade, my English teacher read my paper on bottled-nose dolphins and saw something she didn't like. The look on her face could only be described as disgust. In fact, from that point on, I found nothing I liked about her. According to Graves, though, we don't focus on these things. At the end of the chapter, he answers two very good questions with an even better answer. How can skills be taught in conferences? And why not do them in group settings instead? Teaching skills during conferences in relation to their own papers is much more effective and useful.

Lit & Lit 1 - UH - Swim - F2006

Lit & Lit 1 - UH - Swim - F2006
Kia-Ch.9 Answers to the Toughest Questions Teachers Ask about Writing

There were ten questions mentioned that are the most often asked during conferences:
1. What do I do when the child only wants to write about one topic?
2. What do I do when the child won't revise?
3. What about the child who is overly concerned with conventions?
4. What do I do when the child can't find a topic?
5. What do you do when the child won't complete his work?
6. How do I find time to teach writing?
7. How does a teacher find time to publish children's work?
8. How do I find out if the skills are taking hold?
9. How can I help my class to work better on their own?
10. How can I handle grading?
I found that reading all of the answers to these questions very helpful. Question number 5 really hit home for me, because of my student with the inability to approximate. This student is having difficulty in all subjects now, so I'm not sure if it is just approximation that is the issue. I want to help him, but he says nothing is wrong. I just remind him I am here if he needs help with anything. The other children seem to be fine, and don't seem to have any problems other than they don't have the freedom to choose their own topics.

TARA’S GRAVES’ CHAPTERS 12-14 REFLECTION

These three chapters are about conferencing with children. It tells us how to do the conferences correctly and what to say and how much to say. I think conferencing should just be two people talking about the work. I don’t think it should be certain questions asked unless the child has questions about his/her writing. Well, when I had to do class conferencing on Monday, I felt a bit awkward because I had to ask questions that I’m not used to asking. I mean, I’m used to talking story with my cohort members so having to ask pre-made questions made the conversation kind of awkward. I was more used to asking my own questions and just listening to what they had to say. I found myself constantly looking at the paper with the questions on it to see if I was asking the right questions. When I’m in my first grade class I walk around the class and ask the children questions about their writing and they’re more than willing to tell me about their writing. Now that I was given questions, I try to follow them and ask the kids those questions, but I feel like it’s being restricted to just those questions. I basically ask my own questions. Most times they fall along the lines of the questions that we got so thats good. I read on chapter 14 about teachers asking how they find the time to conference with their students. They should make the time I say. I mean, every time the teacher is curious and he/she starts asking the student about his/her writing, the teacher is doing a conference right there. So maybe the teacher doesn’t realize that or maybe they think it has to be more formal. I do agree that the conferences should be student lead and not the teacher talking all the time. Give the student some space to talk about his/her story and then maybe ask some questions about their writing. Then the teacher can step in and help the student with his/her problem whether it be spelling like the book mentioned or something else. It will make the relationship between the teacher and the student much better. I guess that’s all I have to say.

Modeled Writing, How to

By Greg Swimelar

Children need to see demonstrations of whatever it is that they are going to learn. It is very helpful to students if they can also see how a writer thinks when they are writing. Therefore, “Modeled Writing” is a teaching technique where the teacher shows how he or she writes. This is done in fron of the children and the teacher thinks aloud while doing it.

Children learn a lot from each demonstration. They see the direction the the words go on the paper. They see how letters are formed. The see that writing has to make sense. They see that the final draft doesn’t come directly out of the pen; that there is some struggling involved and that this is normal. The children see that first drafts do not have to be perfect. The see that writing can be fun, and that we can write about things that we know about.

How to do it –

Decide which part of the writing process you want to model:
Brainstorming, drafting, revising, editing, or publishing. Have a piece of chart paper or the chalkboard to use, making sure that every child can see the words that you write. Tell them what you want to do and tell them what your purpose is and who your audience is. If you do not know this, then brainstorm it in front of them. Remember to think out loud while you are writing. “Let’s see, what do I want to say here?” “Let me see, does that look right?” “Oh, I forgot to include the name of the city, let me stick it here for now.”

Summary

It’s a “think aloud” demonstration of the writing process. Learners can begin to see the possibilities and eventually emulate what the person giving the demonstration is doing. What are some of the parts of the writing process that can be modeled? Any genre of writing: poems, songs, narratives, notes, letters, lists, informational texts, or instructions. Stages of the writing process can and should be modeled: brainstorming, first drafting, peer conferencing, revising, editing, final drafting, publishing, and so forth. Other things to model are how to identify your audience and your purpose; how to write in a particular genre; how to get facts for a non-fiction piece; how to use ideas from books and other writing (the reading-writing connection); proofreading; getting spelling right, etc.

It is best to do it regularly and in all learning areas. It can be done with the whole class, small groups, or with individuals.

Planning: Determine the genre, audience, and purpose.

Explain what you are doing and why you will be thinking out loud. Show them how writers sometimes struggle; show them how you struggle with ideas, use of words, attempting to spell correctly, etc. This will show them what real writers do and it will encourage them to make approximations.

When you are modeling first drafts remind them that the emphasis is on meaning and not on spelling, punctuation, and other conventions. Show them how real authors cross out words and draw lines to show where they may insert text as they write. It can be a messy process.

Model often and don’t be afraid to let your students work in pairs when they are trying to get control over writing in a new genre, or attempting to get control over some new device.

Good luck! Don’t be afraid to “have a go” with this, and your kids will be willing to “have a go!”

Jaime S. Graves (Ch. 6&7)

After hearing about publishing so many times from our texts and from class, I was beginning to feel like I was so deprived in school because I never published anything. I finally realized while I was reading Chapter 6, that I did publish in the seventh grade. The sad part is that I threw away that book three months ago while we were moving. The funny part is that I still remember what I wrote in that book. It wasn't a story, it was just a sentence with a picture. I won't mention what I wrote because I think it's rather silly. But I do regret throwing that book away. Lesson for the day: Keep all your work!

Chapter 7 gave three different ways of surrounding children with literature. I enjoyed reading all three but I liked Mrs. Andersen's the best. Her second graders spoke, wrote, and listened to poetry from the first day of class. When she would introduce a poem, she would speak the poem twice then have the children recite whatever they could remember. After three repetitions the children knew about sixty percent of the poem and by the end of the week they memorized it all. I experienced something similar with my daughter. Her homework was to sing "You're a Grand Old Flag." I didn't know that song well enough to teach her nor could I read the music notes, so I went on I-tunes and bought 2 versions of that song. I practiced it myself then I sang it to her and then I had her repeat after me. We played the CD on the way to school and on the way home. It took her about 3 days to remember that song.

Megan's comment on Henderson's reflection

It was nice to read that some of the people in our class are already beginning to practice conferencing and are able to see the benefits of using it in the classroom. I know how discouragingit can be to get a paper back that has been hacked with a red pen. I can only imagine that the feeling is just as bad, if not worse, for a student who is just starting out in the writing process. I think conferencing is best for the students because they get one on one feedback and they can relate writing skills to their own personal writing.

Megan Gilbert's Reflection- Graves chap. 12-14

I decided to write my reflection on chapter 14 because it was the most resourceful to me. It was about frequent questions teachers have about writing conferences. These questions were split up into two categories, questions about ancillary, or setting, conferences and conference practice. The ancillary questions consisted of finding time to conference, how often to have them, what the rest of the class should be doing, keeping records, and how the teacher can tell if they are improving in their conferencing. Finding time for conferencing is done by not rushing and allowing the child to do most of the talking. Also, conferencing will become easier and shorter with time and practice. The number and frequency of conferences held varies with each student. The other students in the classroom are writing while the teacher is holding conferences. They are taught at the beginning of the year how to help each other and to not interrupt the teacher. Conference records should be short and simple. The teacher should be able to jot notes down on each child in no more than 15 seconds. Finally, improvement on conferences can be determined through several different techniques. Some of these techniques are tape recordings and video recordings.

The second category was conference practice questions. The first question was about how to start a conference. This is done best by concentrating on the child’s information. The second was about how to shorten conferences. This is done by teaching only one thing each conference. The third was about getting the children to talk more than the teacher. This is done by expecting the child to talk first and by not feeling the pressure of time. The fourth concerns the child realizing their piece needs revision. This is done through lots of questions directed toward the child’s piece. Finally, the fifth was about whether skills can be better taught in a conference or group setting. The book states that skills taught in the conference setting stick more because the child can relate it to their own writing. I enjoyed this chapter because I believe it will be an excellent reference for the future.

Chelsea's Reflection on Graves (Ch. 12-14)

I chose to reflect on Chapter 14: Answers to the Toughest
Questions Teacher Ask About Conferences because it was the
chapter I had most interest in. I enjoy reading chapters
similar to this because they are common questions asked
which means that one day I will be asking those same
questions. It's great to get my answers down now. I
haven't yet seen my mentor teacher hold writing conferences
with her students. When the students write in their language
arts block time, they usually just write until they have any
questions, which is quite often. When I am there to help, my
mentor usually sits at her desk and has little conferences with
her students as needed. She usually has them come up and show
her their work when they think they are ready to start on the
next step. I'm not sure if she has conferences in which she
asks her students to tell her about their story, but just helps
them with corrections that need to be made or if more detail
needs to be added. I think it is hard to have writing
conferences with students because you have to make sure that
they are well-managed in the classroom. If they are rowdy,
then you would probably have to wait a bit to hold a conference
with them. I would like to have writing conferences with my
students because it can be really interesting. Children can
write about the funniest things, which makes their writing very
interesting. Plus, you can also get to know your student much
more better than you already do.

Henderson Reflection - Ch 12, 13, 14 ~~Graves

The last three chapters of the section are all about conferencing. They all go together which makes it easier to relfect on. Conferencing, as I have learned in class, is very important to get kids going in writing. It lets you as the teacher know what the student has going on. It gives you ideas on how to motivate them for future activities. In one of the chapters, one of the teachers made the comment of conferencing taking the place of correction marks on the paper. I like that outlook. So many students get their papers returned with a gazzillion red marks that it discourages them from further writing. I do conferencing every wed. and thurs. It is not as in depth as what we have been practicing because I am dealing with 1st graders but I still go around and ask them different questions while they are doing their writing assignment. The students cannot turn in anything for a grade until it has all been corrected. They make serveral trips to my desk but at least they can correct through conferencing instead of seeing all the red on their papers.

Henderson - Reflecting on Reflections

Am I not getting the big picture with the reflections. Everyone's reflections are long and very insightful. Mine are short but I feel they say what I want to say. I know they are just my personal thoughts on the chapters but do I need more elaboration?

Henderson Reflection - Ch 9~~Graves

While I was looking through this chapter about answers to the toughest questions, one question drew me in : What do I do when a child won't complete his work? I just had to see what the answer was to this question. I know this is a book about writing but I have been asking myself this question ever since the first week of field study. There is one student in my class that never finishes anything. He just sits in class off in lala land. He doesn't finish anything. He is a very quiet student too. I found myself getting frustrated with him. The teacher has told me that the mom says the work is too much for him to do. So the teacher lets him only do half the work. He does not participate in anything. I have to sit by him and constatly stay on him to get finished. Most of the work that needs to be finished is in the literacy block. I don't like doing that but what else can I do?

Henderson Reflection - Ch. 6~~Graves

I don't think I can say this enough but, I never heard about publishing before. Maybe thinking back, I knew but it wasn't called pulishing. I think it is such a wonderful idea to have the students' works "published". I did not think anything of it but a couple weeks after I started my field work, the teacher had the children write about their favorite foods. All the students had to write what there favorite food was, tell when they eat it and draw a picture. She then took all the papers and made a little book. She had the cover laminated with a spiral plastic binding. The "book" is in the back of the room with all the other books. The kids are so happy to know that they had a book in the library.