Running Record: ELL VS Native Language Speaker

Before I begin the analysis of these running records, I must acknowledge my appreciation for completing this assessment! It was a good reminder of this assessment as a tool, and the process that goes into being a helpful tool. The students that were assessed are both 7th grade students, and have attended McAuliffe since they were 6th grade students. Both are enrolled in a grade level language arts class that meets every day for 80 minutes a day, and receive reading intervention every other day for 80 minutes.

Brian is an ELL student who's primary language at home is Spanish, and his overall rank on WIDA is Developing. Elijah's native language is English, does not receive any ELD supports, but both of his parent's first language was Spanish. Because of Elijah not being identified as an ELL student, he does not have a ranking on WIDA. I wanted to see the dynamics of two student's who could be both categorized as ELL students based on assumption, but are facing different deficits as young readers.

Brian is fluently reading at a 3rd grade level, so his reading teacher asked me to give him a 4th grade test for us to be able to dive into identifying next steps to support Brian. I gave him a Level V passage entitled, The Stroke of Genius, found on Reading A-Z. The passage is 285 words in length. Brian completed the reading in 4 minutes and 17 seconds, with 63 WCPM. As Brian read, it was clear that he knew how to break words down into phonemes, and would sound out unknown words to be able to pronounce them correctly. Brian's comprehension was impacted due to poor fluency and the fact that he did not know five of the words in written form, or their meaning when asked their meaning.

The words that Brian did not know are listed below. I wrote his pronunciation next to the words in parenthesises:

• vessel (release) 
• perceptions (persuasions)
• dire (dry) 
• stroke (strook)
• devoted  (revolved) 

Because of there not being one clear rule that Brian was struggling with I would want to think about the following for next steps for Brian: I would want to conduct this same assessment, but with images as supports, and practice previewing the text to activate his prior knowledge. He was able to identify that the doctor in the story studied brains and had to go to the hospital. However, he did not know what a stroke was, which is not a huge surprise for any middle school student, but I am sure he could have some information on this subject with the right preview activity. He could identify that the doctor got sick and then became interested in studying the left hand side of the brain. Because of where Brian is at with his ability I believe there needs to be some confidence built around what they know, and visual supports need to also be used whether in the reading, or with the preteaching of vocabulary. When I asked him comprehension questions, the more difficult the questions got, the more he relied on the text. I think this shows a good strategy because he knew where in the text to look, but I still think more prereading work would help with boosting his overall confidence. 

Thinking about his work with vocabulary, I think the best way to support his understanding, is work with the skills he already has. Since Brian is comfortable sounding out words, I would want to continue to work with him on phonemes, but also having him understand the rules that go along with why words are built the way they are. For all of the words that Brian had not heard before, there are very specific rules that go along with their pronunciation, so it would be crucial for him to understand the prefixes, endings, double letters, etc. that make up words. I would focus on a rule at a time, through multiple games and strategies, and target his ability to verbally explain why a word is pronounced the way it is. From there, we would work on being able to identify word meaning based on the build of a word or clues in a sentence. 

Moving onto Elijah, he was completely different as far as his reading skills and next steps. He read a 5th grade passage and has just begun confidently reading at this level. The passage was a Level Z on Reading A-Z and is titled, Microfinance: It All Adds Up. The highlight of watching Elijah read this passage was watching him go from struggling completely over the word Microfinancing at the beginning of the passage, to being able to pronounce it with no problems by the end of the passage. I know this skill occurred because of how aware Elijah is as a reader; any errors Elijah had, he was able to self-correct. All of the comprehension questions I had, Elijah was able to answer and did not need to refer to the text. He was able to read the passage of 295 words in 4 minutes and 35 seconds with 62 WCPM. Besides microfinancing, there were only one other words that stumped Elijah with pronunciation, and it was a word he had never heard before, and that was investor. 

Similarly to Brian, I would want to focus on working with prereading strategies to activate knowledge that he already has about the topic, but more importantly, teach Brian how to chunk the text out. As readers with Elijah's skills get more confident in their reading, I think it is important to show them how to be aware of the words and ideas they are reading in smaller passages. Because Elijah is a strong reader and very aware of what he is reading, I think it would be good for him to circle words that he did not know or struggle with reading. From there, we could work through the meaning and pronunciation of the words using a variety of strategies. Then, have him identify the main idea of the text within that smaller section. 

For both boys, I see strengths and easily identifiable next steps to improve their reading and ability to access unknown vocabulary words, both through pronunciation and meaning, which will help with their fluency and thus, their comprehension. But to further my own supports for the students, I would like further supports with figuring out how to use the running records. I am easily able to identify the WCPM, but was struggling with figuring out the error, accuracy, and self-correction rates. I think that this is important to be able to identify what is truly impacting a students fluency. Overall, I think that this was an eye opening experience for me, and I plan on conducting this assessment more frequently to get better and more accurate with using this assessment because it does offer a wealth of information. 

Resources:
ReadingA-Z.com

How to Approach the Way Students Learn: Learning or Acquisition?

As educators, I believe it is important to know what it best for students when it comes to learning different information. For ELL students, it is especially important to know HOW they are learning, because of the different modes in which they need to learn. As I was completing this weeks survey on Learning VS Acquisition styles of teaching, I began to relate these methods to the SCIOP method of lesson planning in which you think of the I DO, WE DO, and YOU DO steps of teaching.  It is important to know what parts of our lessons needs need to be taught through direct instruction (I DO), what can be done together (WE DO), and where students are able to demonstrate their understanding (YOU DO.) With the Learning and Acquisition approaches to instruction, it seems that the Learning approach falls into the I DO and WE DO categories, and Acquisition demonstrates the students true application of what they have learned in the YOU DO phase of a lesson.

While looking at the survey, there were many of activities that were best done through the Learning approach and some that were clearly planned in the Acquisition phase of a students learning. Freeman & Freeman define Learning style of teaching as the method of teaching which produces who speak and understand language, where was the Acquisition approach enables student to use language for a variety of purposes.

With these definitions in mind, it is important to realize, that if it is our job to best prepare students to apply what they have learned to the real world, then we should be teaching ALL students using both methods of approaches, not just ELL students. Also, it is important that depending on a students level of oral language and reading skills, that adjustments will have to be made on what type of instruction they are receiving. This also began to make me wonder, can we easily break activities into only two categories if we are supposed to meet the needs of all students at their level of skill?

Below, you will see how I divided a series of activities that were outlined by Freeman & Freeman as potential Language or Acquisition approaches, or activities in which both approaches can be used together. Page numbers can be found in Freeman & Freeman's text Essential Linguisitics-What You Need to Know to Teach: Reading, ESL, Spelling, Phonics, Grammar.

Directions: Label each activity (L) for learning/word recognition or (A) for acquisiton/sociopsychololinguistic view. Some actives can have both labels. Be prepared to explain your choices. 

	Actions During a (L) Learning/Word Recognition lesson:	Actions During a (A) Acquisition/ Sociopsycholinguistic lesson:	Actions Using Both Types of Learning During Lessons
Student	Looking up words in the dictionary to write directions (pg. 28) Practice sounding out words (pg. 25) Read in round robin fashion (pg. 28) Ask the teacher how to spell any word they don’t know (pg. 28) Read a language experience story they have created with the teacher (pg. 25) Divide words into syllables (pg. 27) On a worksheet, draw a line from each word or sound to the picture that starts with the same sound (pg. 27)	Correct peers when they make a mistake during reading (pg. 25) Identify words on a big book page that start with the same sound (pg. 28) Group cards with classmates’ names by criterion on such as first or last letter (pg. 25) Write rhyming poetry then discuss different spellings for the same sound (pg. 26) Work in pairs to arrange words from a familiar chant into sentences (pg. 26) Make alphabet books on different topics (pg. 26)	Make a Venn Diagram to compare two stories (pg. 25) Being able to compare and contrast topics shows a basic level of understanding, as well as acquisition because students need to be able to formulate arguments to identify similarities and differences
Teacher	Has students segment words into phonemes (pg. 24) Uses decodable text (pg. 26) Has students meet in literature circles (pg. 25) Conducts Phonics drills (pg. 24) Uses a variety of worksheets to teach different skills (pg. 25)	Preteaches vocabulary (pg. 25) Does a shared reading with  big book (pg. 26) Make sure that students read only books that fit their level (pg. 25)  Sets aside time for SSR each day (pg. 25) Writes words for students dictate for a story and has students help with the spelling of difficult words. (pg. 25) Does a picture walk of a new book (pg. 26) Asks students to look around the room and find words starting with a  certain letter. (pg. 24) Chooses predictable texts (pg. 26)	Teaches Latin and Greek Roots (pg. 25) If students are using these strategies to identify unknown words independently while reading, then this application shows that students are using the strategies in a real world situation to help towards comprehending texts Teaches students different comprehension strategies (pg. 25) Because comprehension is the ultimate goal it is important for teachers to use a variety of approaches of learning to support a students access of a text

Resource: Freeman D., & Freeman Y. (2014). Essential Linguisitics-What You Need to Know to Teach: Reading, ESL, Spelling, Phonics, Grammar. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Children's Book: Cultural Relevancy and Comprehension

In my Social Studies classroom, I try and keep a variety of leveled texts in my room to support my students learning. The If You...series has been a great resource that I use for my ELL students and Multi-Intensive students who receive their general education time in my class. These books serve as a great source to build students background information and building of academic language. The second book I chose was a book that I use during my Constitution Unit and when I have taught the Electoral Collage during election season. Grace for President is not only one of my favorite classroom texts, but a hit amongst my students!

How I Would Teach: If You...Lived at the Time of the American Revolution 

by Kay Moore Illustrated by Daniel O'Leary

The first thing I would do prior to teaching this unit and bringing this text into my class would have students complete a KWL chart about what American Revolution. As silly as I think KWL charts are, with all of the information that students come into a secondary class with, I want to have a good understanding of what they already are familiar with.

Next, I would preteach the following words not only to support their understanding of the text, but to be able to gain their own meaning of the words in context of the book, to then later apply to the larger unit. The key vocabulary words are: colony, England, Native American, indentured servant, Patriot, Loyalist, and the French and Indian War.

Before beginning read the text, I would then provide a guiding question that the students should be able to successfully answer if they have comprehended the text. By allowing students to answer the question before reading, students can brainstorm ideas they already have and build confidence towards the subject. The question I would use to guide this lesson would be:

Do you think you would have been a Patriot or a Loyalist if you lived at the time of the American Revolution? 

Students would first answer the question independently in writing, and then share their ideas out with a shoulder partner. From there, I would have students complete a gallery walk of images showing images of the American Revolution, Patriots, and Loyalists. They would have to identify the groups , and argue who they believed had the access to power in the images. The last step would be to have students create their own working definition of Patriots and Loyalists based on the images. 

The last step would be to have students read the text and complete Cornell Notes answering the questions within the texts. Students would work with a skill based partner. I would have the Cornell Notes created for students so that they can focus on answering the questions at their ability level (one or two word answers or complete sentences.) After reading the text, in the summary portion of their Cornell Notes, I would have students independently answer the question using evidence to support their answer. Last, depending on time, I would have a class discussion on which side they chose, Patriot or Loyalist. The students would use evidence from the text to support their views in the class discussion and would be allowed to use their Cornell Notes as evidence. 

How I Would Teach: Grace for President Written 

by Kelly DiPucchio and Pictures by LeUyen Pham

I usually use this text in the middle of my Constitution Unit. Students have background information on the Three Branches of Government, Checks & Balances, the Constitution, Bill of Rights, and the role of a Democracy as a government. This text has been a great resource to show the way the electoral process works, and a way to provide a definition for popular vote and electoral college. 

To think from the lens of what all student would need in order to acquire these concepts, I would want to make them make personal connections to the role of our nation's president. Prior to any lesson on the Executive Branch,  I would have students brainstorm a list of what makes a good President/leader. Students would brainstorm the list individually and then we would share out as a class. Students would each share out one item on their list and we would keep going around the room until everyone had shared every idea out to the class. 

Using the list, we would then create an Open Sort where we would sort the list we came up with into four or five categories of leadership skills. This will allow us to have bigger over arching ideas of what makes a good leader, rather than a large list with WAY too many ideas. Before reading the book, I would provide students a t-chart with our categories listed on the top. While we are reading, I would ask students to record which student demonstrated that leadership skill. 

Before reading the text, I would show students the over, and ask them to write a prediction on a whiteboard based on the following question: 

• What do you think the story is about based on the front cover?

I would ask students to use the following sentence starter to answer the question:

• I predict the story will be about_______________because of ____________ on the front cover. 

After we read the text, students would share out and debate who believe they demonstrated each of our leadership skills. Next, I would take a class poll of who they would have voted for in the text. Lastly, students would answer the following comprehension questions with their shoulder partner : 

• What kind of president is Grace running for?
• Why would boys only vote for boys and girls only vote for girls? Is that right?

The last scaffold I would provide in this lesson would be a personal connection that students could not only use to relate to the story, but to the role of our nation's president. Students would answer the following questions however they see fit; this could be in an essay, a poster, a collage, Prezi, etc. 

• Would you want to be president of the United States? Why or why not?
• What would you do if you were president of the United States? Of your classroom?
• If running for class president, how might you convince others to vote for you?

Strategies to Work Through An Unknown Text

The great thing about being married to a Biochemist is there are many texts lying around our apartment that make absolutely NO sense to me. The fact that I can even explain to people what my husband does and is studying in class is a success. "When you go to the hospital and you have blood drawn or a test run, he is the guy in the lab that will run the tests." Beyond that, I am clueless. When I asked my husband which text would be "easiest," my husband choose something that was "easy" and would be "straightforward." I even clarified with him, "No, I need to pretend I am an English Language Learner, so it is okay if I struggle through it," (in retrospect I think that was my own way of giving myself an excuse in case I REALLYYYY struggled with what I was reading.)

So, the topic of my reading was: Gram Staining 
As he handed me the text, he said "This is something every microbiologist HAS to know."

Before I began to read, I used the strategies that I use whenever I teach my students, and that is to preview the headings, pictures and captions, so that I could try and get a grasp for what gram staining.

Below, you will see the first caption I read. Right away, I knew that there were going to be questions. But, I see that the text has bolded key ideas, and plenty of visuals to support my understanding.

As I began to read, I had a pretty good understanding of the importance of gram staining after finishing the introduction. I decided I would continue on, and just read through text one time through. However, because of how few words I knew, I began to get distracted. I made sure that I would keep my focus, especially because there were words that did stand out to me, like lipids, (thanks biology teacher for allowing me to always remember that lipids are fats,) and Staphylococcus because who doesn't love food poisoning!

After reading the text one time through, I understood this basic information about gram staining:

• In order to run a test on cultures, they need to sit for 24 hours or less for your best results
• Gram stains that are under decloroized or over declorized will not allow for an accurate read
• Cells that appear purple are positive 
• Cells that appear pink are negative 

Even with this information, I do not feel confident, at all about what gram staining is. So, I turned to trying to understand what some of the bolded words were in the text. Assuming this was like any other textbook, I turned to the back of the book to find the glossary. SURPRISE! There was no glossary. 

Next, I tried to break the words down to see if I could come up with meaning:

• Decoloraization: Removing color of cell? With alcohol or acetone? 
• Primary Stain: Crystal violet (in text clues)
• Mordant: Something that holds something together, like mortar? 
• Crystal Violet-Iodine Complex: ?
• Counterstain: Safranin is the counterstain, but I still don't know what it does. 

Before turning to my teacher and the Internet, I dove further into the images and captions. However, I began to not feel any more confident in my understanding of this process. 

When I Googled gram staining, the definition below came up: 

This helped me a little bit to understand that the gram stain test was used to distinguish between two bacteria groups, and depending on their color after the test is ran, the bacteria was either Gram positive or Gram negative. Now, what in the heck is Gram positive and Gram negative?

At this point, I reviewed with my husband the above information and he said I was on the right track, but then he said, "That book is missing a major component of what gram staining is. So you can either google the procedure for gram staining, or look at this other book." Keep in mind, this book was 1076 pages long, and I was told to only read one small paragraph. 

Within this paragraph I got the definitions for Gram positive and Gram negative bacteria, and the loose ends for what this procedure was used for, and it turns out my knowledge of lipids was good background information to have after all. Would I be able to perform this procedure in a lab? No! But, I feel confident that I have enough understanding to explain to someone else what gram staining is.

Reflection and Strategies Used: 

I am so thankful for going through this process! I have been taught how to support ELL students on how to access a test, but I have never had to work through the steps myself. I think this was also important to realize that if we practice skills enough, students can take them on when they are not in the classroom, and really utilize the strategies on their own. 

As I laid out above, the strategies I used varied depending on what I was trying to figure out when I was reading. I would narrow down that the concept of gram staining became more clear through the following scaffolds: 

• Previewing the text by looking at the pictures and captions 
• Defining bolded words using context clues and breaking the word apart (prefixes, suffixes, rootwords.) 
• Looking for key ideas that I had background information on (lipids, Staphylococcus)
• Identifying the most important who's and whats that stood out to be
• Summarizing  the ideas with a partner (my husband,) to make sure that I was on the right track 
• Using multiple texts/levels of texts to support my learning (google definition and two text

Sources:

Mahon, C. (2000). Textbook of diagnostic microbiology (2nd ed.). Philadelphia: Saunders.

Leboffe, M., & Pierce, B. (2011). A photographic atlas for the 3rd edition microbiology laboratory (4th ed.). Englewood, Colo.: Morton Pub.

Gram Staining. (n.d.). Retrieved January 14, 2015, from http://serc.carleton.edu/microbelife/research_methods/microscopy/gramstain.html

Connection: Oral Language and Reading for ELL Students

When I think of how to teach my ELL students in my classroom, I often wonder when the students are able to fully access everything that we are teaching them? The only time I have put myself into a position of learning a language was when I took German classes from Kindergarten through my Junior year of high school. However, in the classroom environment, I wasn't having to translate everything I heard from German into English all day long. It was only during that hour block each day that I had to exhaust my brain with constantly thinking about what I was hearing and saying, and being able to identify what I did not understand. For our ELL students, there is no turning on or off their having to translate what they are hearing, saying, reading, and writing.

A second experience I have that I try to think about when teaching my ELL students, which again was very brief, was when I spent time in Sweden visiting friends. I have never felt so completely lost or helpless. As someone who has never been completely surrounded by another language and culture before, I now knew what it was like to be completely helpless. Yes, my friends could speak Swedish for me, and yes when I was not with them all of the Swedes would speak English to me, but without their ability to change for me, I could not have done anything for myself. There was no need for e to try and learnthe language, because they adjusted to my native language. Thinking about how our school system works, we are really not changing much for our ELL students. Sure, we make a word wall, or provide supports, heck, even translated documents, but are we doing enough for students to become confident in the English language?

So, in our classrooms, how do we best support our ELL students with making the skills we teach them apply to multiple modes of learning?

The easiest way for us to support students, is to teach oral language and reading together. By supporting students with the development of their language skills in both of these modalities together, we are enabling students to know that their is a variety of ways to use language. With my own teaching experience, I see that students are not provided the opportunity to develop their skills in this manner, until they are on the Developing range of the WIDA standards. WIDA Standards
Prior to students being in this range, students are taught, much like I was in my German classes at the beginning of  my own learning, with things in small chunks.

Essential Linguistics: What You Need to Know to Teach identies the following as ways ELL students are taught in a traditional classroom: 

• Readers break language into component parts are taught each part (prefix, suffix, root word)
• Students perform drills and exercise to practice the language
• Teachers correct errors to help students develop good language habits 
• Each part of language is taught directly (pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary) 
• Students practice their language in small groups or in pairs to enforce the grammar and vocabulary they have learned 

If we want to support our ELL students better, we need to teach them the way native speakers are taught, and that is practicing skills through speaking, reading, writing, and listening with skills together, not individually;  Essential Lignuisticis identify this type of support as aquisition teaching.  Students can be supported by first being asked to listen and read in order to build on their language. Because students have exposure to their native language, we must first allow them to feel comfortable with their new language and make connections between the words and ideas they already know in their native language. A simple way we can support students with this is by providing them with texts that have a predictable patterns and pictures to support their understanding. ELL students should be able to see a word and make a connection to what that word means when they say the word. Think about the students in your own classroom  who realize they know the meaning of a word, but did not know what it looked like in print? This "lightbulb"  moment occurs because students get more practice with their verbal language than reading language due to their peer to peer interactions they have through out the day.  It is essential that we set up our classrooms to allow the langauge we are teaching them be understood verbaly, in print, in writing, and when heard so they are succesful learnings at all times.

Sources:
Freeman, D., & Freeman, Y. (2004). Written and Second Language Acquisition. In Essential linguistics: What you need to know to teach reading, ESL, spelling, phonics, and grammar. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

English Language Development (ELD) Standards. (n.d.). Retrieved January 8, 2015, from 
https://www.wida.us/standards/eld.aspx

Teaching ELL's: My Philosophy

In the first part of my teaching career, that really is not very long, I taught at a school where 60% of the students were ELL students. The remainder of the students I had in my classroom were underperforming students who majority, came from poverty. With this blend of students in the classroom, teaching an ELL student was a  best practice for ALL students. It was common to hear the following suggestions, or have the expectation of these school wide practices:

• Word Walls
• Translated Texts
• Visual Supports
• Analyzing WIDA/ACCESS test data
• Breaking down words (Rootwords, Prefix, Suffix, Cognate, etc.)
• Summarizng, etc.

There was never a discussion about whether or not we believed ELL Students could or could not learn, it was more around, what are WE [teachers] not doing, to best support the students we have in our classroom.

Now, that I am at a school who's ELL population is 8.9% (exactly 64 out 722 students,) there is a different viewpoint of ELL students and how to support them. I have heard from a few teachers the things that make a teacher cringe, about "these kids." So, to better understand the philosophy of ELL students, I decided to enter a teacher who has been at the school since its founding.

"I think what makes it [teaching ELL students] distinctive is we must teach cultural literacy in addition to cognitive literacy of language and writing. The challenge is the cultural literacy component, but it is the most important because learning the culture of language provides more opportunity towards a better education." 

So then, what is the culture we are trying to teach students through literacy? In a world full of district assessments and high stake state testing, is our focus on supporting our students, like this teacher said, to be able to access a language, or be able to perform academically, so students believe that they truly educated? Meaning, are ELL students taught within our system that it is more important to know if the are scoring Unsatisfactory on a test rather than, that they have the ability to read, speak, write, and think in English?

Thinking about the many differences in both of the schools I have taught in, the one thing they both had in common was the fact that ELL students (and students who are behind in reading) are all able to tell you their ranking on a proficiency band of their skills, rather than finding value in the new language they are acquiring.

Writing Instruction: Different Expectations and the Lasting Impacts

"It appears that children don't have to be taught language the way they are taught to button a shirt. But what about written language? -Freeman & Freeman Essential Linguistics: What You Need to Know to Teach Reading, ESL, Spelling, Phonics, Grammar 

Before I begin reflecting on the type of writing instruction I received in school, I want to be transparent that without my father and the support he gave me as a writer, I do not believe that I would be the writer I am today. My father was a middle school language arts and reading teacher, and he ensured that I was prepared as both a strong reader and writer starting as early as I can remember. His success in preparing me to be a strong reader and writer was by simply allowing me to read and write as much as I wanted to, and learn the skills as they came to me. This belief is known as aquisition learning.

This philosophy is reflected in the text by Freeman & Freeman. Both suggest that there are two types of writing: The learning view and the acquisition view. By simply looking at the definitions provided in the texts Essential Linguistics: What You Need to Know to Teach, I began to wonder, "Can you really teach one way of writing, without the other?"

"From a learning point of view, writing, like reading, must be taught directly. From an acquisition perspective, writing, like speaking, is a form of output that reflects the language competence an individual has acquired. Teachers from both points of view include writing in their language arts curriculum, but several aspects of their instruction are different," (Freeman & Freeman, 29.) 

However, once I began to dive into the differences in teaching writing with these different methods, I began to reflect not only on the writing instruction I received, but the differences in writing instruction I have provided in both lower and higher performing schools. In my experience, it seems that there is not only difference in the types of instruction provided under these two writing philosophies, but a very obvious difference in the groups of students who are learning writing versus acquiring writing.

Looking back to my earlier years, 

I believe that my writing instruction reflected more of what was described in the traditional classroom, rather than the process classroom. Teachers modeled the most basic skills: handwriting, spelling, punctuation, and organization, especially in elementary school. I remember an emphasis on handwriting and spelling, with an immense amount of feedback surrounding my handwriting and whether or not I knew how to spell the weekly list of words. These skills carried on throughout middle school, with the culminating research paper in 8th grade with the focus on our ability to write a five page essay. The topic was of our choice, but we were mainly assessed on the steps leading up to our paper, and the skills, rather than content, that made up our final paper. However, it was during this research paper, that the writers workshop began to be used more, and I really remember giving my fellow students feedback for the first time.

Once I entered High School, teachers of all subject areas, focused less on the form of our writing, and more on our content. We were allowed to choose the way we wrote to share our ideas, and began to support our fellow classmates with feedback as a way to improve our writing. I remember our language arts  teachers would pull us for individual and small group instruction on skills, rather than receiving whole group writing lessons. I also remember loving language arts classes more in high school because we got to read more, and then write about what we had read. It seemed to make a lot more sense, and it taught me how to become a better writer through reading great literary works.

Now in my own classroom...

I have had the opportunity to teach in both a low performing and high performing school, and it is very obvious that there is a difference in the type of writing instruction that is expected for students. In the lower performing school, the learning view was a school wide expectation for students. Programs like Step-Up to Writing were expected, and we were always discussing how we could teach our students to write in order to do well in district interim and state tests. We gave monthly timed writing pieces in Social Studies classrooms as a way to monitor growth, but students never received feedback on their writing, we always chose the topics that they wrote to so we could compare students across the board on their writing skills. When I graded papers, the students handwriting was always very legible and neat, but I was always so bogged down in spelling and mechanics, that it was often difficult to give feedback on their content.  Our school believed it was important that EVERY piece of writing was corrected so students could see how to "improve," their writing. Thinking back on this process, I wonder what gains students would have had on writing, if we had focused on a writers workshop philosophy. 

Now that I am at a school that is high performing and students are at grade level with their reading and writing, it is amazing the amount of freedom and trust given to with their writing. Students handwriting is mostly terrible, but they are given time to write freely in all of their classes, and express themselves in a variety of writing styles. Peer editing is encouraged, and students are given time to revise, redo, and turn in writing until they are proud of the pieces they have completed. In language arts classes, students write weekly pieces based on the type of writing the authors in their novels are using. An example being, when students read Of Mice in Men, students wrote their own narratives that were either fiction or non-fiction.  

It is this ability to trust students and allow them to simply write which I believe allows students to be successful. With my own experience as a student and now in my classroom, I believe the best way to teach writing, especially at the secondary level, is through the beliefs of acquisition. 

Source: Freeman, D., & Freeman, Y. (2004). Written and Second Language Acquisition. In Essential linguistics: What you need to know to teach reading, ESL, spelling, phonics, and grammar. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Who Is Able to See This...

And, do they want to read it? 

As an educator, I have often found myself reading other teachers blogs, especially with the advent of Pintrest. As I am reading, I usually find myself thinking, "Wow! I wish I had their kind of time!" Or, "What a fantastic idea! Thank goodness for people like this who take the time to share their ideas!" I think as a student of the 21st century, I have a good grasp of how to implement this blog, and I think that it will be a great tool for me to become one of those teachers who is able to share my ideas and lessons with other educators via a blog. But now that I have begun to create this blog, I am wondering, who is going to want to read my ideas or what I have to say? I think that this will serve as an excellent way for me to put my own ideas out into the world for me to reflect upon, but is anything I have to say worth while?

Besides my own insecurities on wondering whether or not people would care about what I wrote, I am also wondering about who is going to see this blog? If I am able to access all of these blogs with ease, who will find my blog? Since I have started writing this first entry, I have had 12 views! Who is looking at this non published blog? I think that is where I begin to wonder about technology, and by wonder, I mean be skeptical of. Where I think that innovations in technology have really improved our world, I am still very weary of many things, mainly the ease of being able to access in and all information from anyone in the world.

For the seven of you who will be reading this blog, I hope that it is everything that you wanted...and let me know if you too, have worries about your blog.