The Words We Carry

Notes from the Classroom

shutterstock_323200592Sixteen years ago I wrote a book.

I was inspired by my then-three-year-old son, who asked the innocent question, “Won’t the school be lonely this summer?” That question sparked something in me and I quickly drafted a story about a new school being lonely over the summer. My children enjoyed it immensely.

A few years later, I went to a children’s book writing conference and I paid extra to have an editor review my story. I will never forget sitting across from her as she told me that the concept of a school with thoughts and feelings was “creepy.” She told me perhaps I should rewrite it from the perspective of the school’s friend, the janitor. I never did. It didn’t feel right. I put the book away in a drawer and deferred that dream.

Two weeks ago I began to gather books to do a Mock Caldecott unit with my students, inspired by a teacher’s blog I found through a Twitter post. Imagine my shock when I came across School’s First Day of School, a story about a new school that has thoughts and feelings. A new school who talks to the janitor.

I was dumbfounded. I thought, “This could have been me. I could have gotten my book published. But I quit trying.”

The takeaway for me was immediate: the power of our words. I let someone’s negative words stop me. I knew all of the stories about authors who were rejected many times. But there was something about her words that struck me and made me feel so bad about my writing that I just quit. As a teacher, it made me think: have I done that to a student? Have I ever said something carelessly, even jokingly, that has caused a student to quit writing, quit trying, to defer his or her dream?

I hope not. But I know now I will not.

The Power of Negative Thinking

Coincidentally, last week my principal showed us a video from Tedx, where Alison Ledgerwood talks about getting stuck in the negatives. The research is absolutely astounding about the power of negative thinking, and how negative experiences are often stronger than, and not offset by, positive ones. Wow.

I believe this experience came to me for a reason. Multiple reasons perhaps. But the biggest for me is this: I must always, always, find something good to say to my students. I must encourage them as writers, as readers, as people, so that they never defer any dream. I must find ways to help them not let the words of others get them down, as I did.

Perhaps I should blow the dust off of another manuscript I have in that same drawer and send it out into the world. Then keep sending it, no matter what. For now, I will pledge to myself and to my students to be the voice of encouragement and praise in their heads, one that will hopefully shout louder than any critic they will ever hear.

beth croppedBeth Rogers is a fifth grade teacher for Clarkston Community Schools, where she has been teaching full time since 2006.  She is  blessed to teach Language Arts and Social Studies for her class and her teaching partner’s class, while her partner  teaches all of their math and science. This enables them  to focus on their passions and do the best they can for kids. Beth was chosen as Teacher of the Year for 2013-2014 in her district. She earned a B.S. in Education at Kent State University and a Master’s in Educational Technology at Michigan State University. 

A Nanobot of Sugar

Notes from the Classroom

shutterstock_116283283Our annual return-to-school professional development this year was a lovely buffet of technology-themed mini-workshops to help us navigate the ever-expanding realm of ed tech. The PD was well received, and it also got me thinking.  

I’ve never been a technology skeptic, nor does technology make me uneasy.  That being said, I’ve also rarely been the type to let any particular app or site or device really transform my classroom in any particular way. I adore Google Classroom and the entire suite of Google work tools (Docs, Slides, etc.), but I still think of them as supplements to my normal curriculum and pedagogy, as opposed to transformative additions (though Google Docs comes close with regard to writers workshops).  

A Nanobot of Sugar

Lately, though, I’ve started to realize that tiny doses of technology here and there have a pretty transformative impact on how we help our kids. I’m not offering this up as a revelation, but it’s worth thinking about what kids need in an English class and how we deliver it to them. Virtual and augmented reality are knocking at the door–Pokemon and PlayStation have already invited them in!–so we’d do well to think about what roles technology has performed well in inside our classrooms.

I’d encourage you to slow down your busy lesson planning routine to take similar stock of how and where you’re implementing technology.

To Infinity and Beyond: Traditional Assessments

Here are a few tech forays I’ve made into advanced approaches to very traditional English stuff.

Reading comprehension. My old failing in this arena was my continual insistence that students demonstrate their comprehension in written form. As I began to trust graded discussions more, I discovered how many students actually had a rather robust knowledge of the texts we were reading. These students, though, lacked the writing sophistication to express that knowledge in the only way I had been allowing them to.  

Oh, the irony, technology, you sly dog! It turns out, given a “safe space” where kids are typing (also known as “writing”) to each other–instead of to me–they suddenly reveal that very sophistication in their writing that I had found lacking.  

Technology is the key. In class I’m really fond of GoSoapBox, which allows for things like instant polling in addition to longer responses. It will also provide a printable transcript of any conversation the class produces. Google Classroom has similar features, but apps with a polling feature allow for some very interesting on-the-spot data: turns out kids get pretty honest when they’re provided a formative (absolutely key) and anonymous virtual space to share their thoughts.

Writing Feedback

I’ve written at length about the joys of audio feedback, which I began exploring last year using turnitin.com. This year I may explore other apps that provide kids a verbal walkthrough of their writing. My frustration has been that technology in this case was only addressing one side of the process–it’s great that I can talk to kids about their final product, but it seems almost MORE important for them to talk to ME.

toplogo2xEnter “Flipgrid,” a new app I discovered at a conference recently (thanks, AssisTechKnow!) that allows students to respond to a prompt with 90 seconds of video. If I can give them three minutes of summary about what I thought of their writing, it seems reasonable that they could give me half that amount in reflection on some area of the rubric I ask them to consider more closely. We’ll see how this turns out, but I’m surmising that speaking into a camera lens might have a sobering effect that traditional forms of reflection (“Fill out this self-reflection sheet–and be honest!”) simply do not.  

Exit Slips

Exit slips involve a bit more application of the same technology I’ve mentioned above, at least for now. I think Join.Me will play a role here too, eventually, allowing my students to share to the classroom’s center screen right from their seats. For now, though, I’m looking at smaller ways to gather fast, impactful formative data from my kids.

Right now it’s mostly online discussion or polling spaces, but there are apps out there that will allow kids to, say, take a photo of a page in their book and then annotate it with a drawing tool before submitting it to me on their way out the door. Imagine the usefulness of snippets of focused annotation from a struggling reader in response to a question–without having to photocopy a thing!

Like I said–nothing groundbreaking. Worth thinking about though: Are you using technology to fill gaps or to rethink failures…or are you just using it because it’s all the rage? I, for one, welcome our robot overlords…but that’s because I feel pretty good about all the toys they’ve brought.

Michael Ziegler

Michael Ziegler (@ZigThinks) is a Content Area Leader and teacher at Novi High School.  This is his 15th year in the classroom. He teaches 11th Grade English and IB Theory of Knowledge. He also coaches JV Girls Soccer and has spent time as a Creative Writing Club sponsor, Poetry Slam team coach, AdvancEd Chair, and Boys JV Soccer Coach. He did his undergraduate work at the University of Michigan, majoring in English, and earned his Masters in Administration from Michigan State University.  

What’s Your Vision?

Notes from the Classroom Oakland Writing Project

shutterstock_193135235I am lucky to have a new job this year as a Curriculum Coordinator for English Language Arts and Social Studies in a new school district. Since I am new to the district, I found myself at New Teacher Orientation. At these sessions, the upper administration focuses on the district’s vision, and how the new teachers are going to be a part of that vision. Having progressed through the ranks with a lot of time in classrooms, administrators tend to share anecdotes about times when they helped to develop this vision, or instances in which they found satisfaction in keeping this vision.

Subsequently, I buy in.

They say good things, they’ve done good things, and I nod along as I listen. I know that this is what’s good for kids, and that I can be a part of this work.

In these initial days, I have also worked with several groups of teachers. Here, I have had the opportunity to learn about their visions and what their classrooms look like on a daily basis. I see the beginning-of-the-year excitement and the true belief that they can do good things for kids. I believe in these teachers too.

This raises a question for all teachers: As the year progresses, and demands increase, and yes, you get a little tired, what visions of your classroom will you support no matter what comes your way? What will you fight for because it’s good for kids?

A Vision for Literacy Instruction

I’d like to promise that I will uphold these beliefs in my new role:

shutterstock_115746919Kids should be given an opportunity to write consistently. This writing should be varied and open to student choice. This choice may be in the strategy they use to produce writing, the length of the writing, the topic of the writing, or even the genre of the writing. Why is this important? Students who write and make choices about writing develop critical thinking skills needed in our world.

Kids should be given the opportunity to read every day. Reading can be a collaborative process. It doesn’t have to be silent and individual. As teachers, we have to expose kids to texts they may not have chosen on their own. This can look like strong mentor texts that guide writing and reading, as well as genre-specific texts that mirror student interests. This is important because students who read consistently and with variety do better in school.

Reading, writing, word study, and grammar are not separate entities in literacy instruction. They interact together and should be taught together. Students who can make connections between these topics are exposed to more real-life opportunities and will be better able to transfer these skills outside the Language Arts classroom.

The most effective tool for developing the reading and writing abilities of kids is feedback. Feedback or conferencing should be connected to standards, and should offer skills to increase the depth of the work produced. Feedback should guide students toward mentor texts and class materials that will assist them in high-quality achievement. As with all of my vision statements, students should have a choice in the feedback they take and the action-steps they enact after feedback.

These are a few of the beliefs that I will fight for in literacy instruction. What are yours?

pic 2Amy Gurney (@agurney_amy) is an ELA and Social Studies Curriculum Coordinator for Walled Lake Schools. She has a Master’s degree from Michigan State University in Educational Administration and is currently pursuing an Education Specialist in Educational Leadership at Oakland University. She is a current Galileo Leader. She worked on the MAISA units of study and has studied reading and writing workshop practice and conducted action research.

 

Learning from My Mistakes

Notes from the Classroom

One of the best parts of being a teacher is that I’m always learning. Every year, I learn more about pedagogy, reading, and writing, so I know with one hundred percent certainty that I am not the same teacher I was when I started. I love the learning process and I wouldn’t change it for a thing, but every once in a while I can’t help but think that if I could travel back in time, I’d love to share some much-needed guidance with myself as a first-year teacher.

1. Don’t Take Home So Much Grading

I’m surprised that that first year (and for many years afterward, actually), I didn’t drown in a sea of grading. I would usually grade the quick stuff first, and then I’d tackle the dreaded essays. And, oh, those essays. I would carefully read each one, correcting grammar and mechanics, and commenting on word choice, style, and content. Then, when I finally passed them back, I’d be so frustrated that my students barely looked at what I’d written. I tried different protocols for having students review their feedback and set goals, but ultimately it didn’t make much difference. So, the argument I’d make to myself back then: you should stop.

Now, stay with me here. I’m not advocating being lazy or leaving students’ work without feedback. Quite the opposite, actually. The students wouldn’t read my comments and feedback because it was too late. They’d already felt like they had finished the project and moved on to the next unit. All of that precious feedback just seemed like criticism. Now, I still give my students all of that good feedback, but I try to do more of it before they ever turn the final draft in.

This has been a huge shift in my mindset and my instructional planning. In the past, I would teach a series of lessons, which the students would practice through carefully crafted assignments (most of which I’d created). Once I felt they were ready, I would present them with the final project or essay. This model creates more problems than it solves, though. First, the lessons are disconnected from the ultimate goal, so it’s no surprise that the kids aren’t always very motivated. And second, I had double the grading: first the assignments for practice, then the essay that they completed at the end.

Now I try to frame our instruction around our end goal. We have plenty of time to work together in class, and the mini-lessons are grounded in doing that well. Students have the opportunity to apply these lessons and practice in class, which gives me a chance to read their work and give them feedback as they go. And the best part is that they’re actually using that feedback!

2. You Don’t Have to Be the Expert

Again, this sounds counterintuitive at first. You’re the teacher, and they’re the students.  Of course you’re going to be the “expert” in most regards, but as a Language Arts teacher, I took this to the extreme too often and, as a result, failed to use some great resources and opportunities.

I believe in writing with my students. I always have, and I probably always will. It’s important that my students see that I, too, am a writer and that we are all learning. I know the power of modeling the process, but in my first years as a teacher, I thought this meant that I always had to provide the models. Creating model writing for everyshutterstock_269516258 skill we learn? That’s exhausting – and unrealistic! If I want to enforce the idea that writers are always learning, why on Earth was I always expecting myself to write the “how-to” examples of “good” writing?

Now I know the value of mentor texts. I’m still writing alongside my students, and I still model the process, but now we pull our wisdom from great writers. When I need to teach a lesson on writing leads, instead of preparing a list of types of leads, then teaching them to my students one by one and modeling each one as we go, we study texts that we like. We pay attention to what hooks our attention and what doesn’t, and we use these texts as tools to teach us how to do it better.

So, if I could travel back in time, I’d never shortchange myself the opportunity to learn most things on my own, but I have to wonder where I’d be in my learning journey now if I had learned these two revelations a bit earlier.

MKortlandt2Megan Kortlandt (@megankortlandt) is a secondary ELA consultant and reading specialist for the Waterford School District. In the mornings, she teaches Language Arts at Durant High School, and in the afternoons, she works with all of Waterford’s middle and high school teachers and students in the Curriculum, Instruction, and Assessment department. Additionally, Megan works with Oakland Schools as an instructional coach for AARI. She has presented at various conferences including the Michigan Council for Teachers of English and Michigan Reading Association annual conferences.

Sing (err…Speak) Their Praises!

Literacy & Technology Notes from the Classroom

shutterstock_352223126A funny thing happened as my students were wrapping up their narrative journalism papers a couple weeks ago on the shiny new Chromebooks I’d reserved for the assignment. As I was reviewing a few formatting details with them, it suddenly dawned on me that my deadline for a hard copy of the paper–the end of the hour–was physically impossible. There is no printer attached to our Chromebook carts.

After panicking momentarily and shrugging off the realization in front of the kids, I remembered a lovely feature of Turnitin.com. I told my students to submit their papers to Turnitin as usual, and that no hard copy would be necessary. In place of the normal written feedback on their papers and on an attached district rubric, my juniors would be getting three minutes of my silky-smooth voice walking them through their writing, using Turnitin’s audio feedback feature.

“Pass me the mic”

You should know that there are lots of educational tools out there for providing audio feedback to students. If all else fails, the phone app Voxer will let you share voice memos with anyone who “friends” you in the application (which can be done without revealing your actual cell number).

If getting ahold of a recording method isn’t a problem but the huge shift in how you provide feedback is, then I’d ask you to consider why conferencing remains the most impactful method of improving student writing. Kids listen when you talk to them one-on-one. Even the reluctant writers.

In fact, The Writing Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison suggests that the best feedback for student writing “mirrors conversation with student-writers.” Though speaking your thoughts aloud falls one voice short of a “dialogue,” it certainly allows you to imitate the key elements of a good writing conference: your supportive tone of voice, the context for your criticisms, and clear guidance for how to move forward.

Talk Them Up

shutterstock_406788406Let’s consider briefly what written feedback tends to look like when you have 100 essays to grade.

You can use a coded system that reduces full ideas to symbols (that your lowest readers will ignore), you can write slightly longer phrases in the tiny margins (which your kids may not be able to read), or you can attempt to provide a full-bodied paragraph of feedback at the end of each essay (which will eventually give you carpal-tunnel syndrome and break your spirit completely…oh, and many of your lowest writers won’t bother to read it.).

I want to suggest to you that audio feedback solves ALL of these problems. In place of countless marks and comments about a student’s grammar, for example, you can now make one supportive, constructive observation. Here’s one hypothetical piece of feedback about possessives:

“One area you should be focused on in future essays is knowing when to use the possessive versus when something is plural. You confuse the two twice in your first paragraph. You use some really interesting syntax throughout the piece, so this small punctuation issue is holding back the power of how great the rest of your writing is.”

See how I softened the blow of the feedback by connecting it to a reminder of something done well? That’s a lot harder to do in the one-inch margins of the essay itself.

What’s more, you can tell them a sort of “story” about their writing. In place of fragmented ideas like “weak intro” or “explain this better” you can walk them through a coherent examination of their paper’s successes and struggles:

“Notice how your thesis is ambiguous about character X? Now look at how much your second body paragraph struggles to make a clear point about how X behaves in the final scene. Your vagueness in the introduction is keeping you from maintaining a clear focus in your body paragraphs.”

And really, that’s the big advantage to audio feedback: isolated, pragmatic written comments peppering the margins are transformed into a comprehensive walkthrough of their writing. If your department uses a standardized rubric, the structure of your feedback is even provided for you.

Students Want to Listen

I’ve found that even my reluctant writers and apathetic learners are intrigued by the idea of a few minutes of audio just for them. If you keep the tone friendly, they’re especially interested. It feels personal–like you’ve set aside time to speak just to them.

If you aren’t so sure your kids will be as eager about it, save the score of their paper for somewhere at the end of the audio file–make them listen to what you have to say in order to arrive at their score. I promise you won’t have to provide such enticement the second time around if your audio is done right–they’ll be happy to listen.

Michael Ziegler

Michael Ziegler (@ZigThinks) is a Content Area Leader and teacher at Novi High School.  This is his 15th year in the classroom. He teaches 11th Grade English and IB Theory of Knowledge. He also coaches JV Girls Soccer and has spent time as a Creative Writing Club sponsor, Poetry Slam team coach, AdvancEd Chair, and Boys JV Soccer Coach. He did his undergraduate work at the University of Michigan, majoring in English, and earned his Masters in Administration from Michigan State University.  

Write. Revise. Read. Repeat.

Common Core Notes from the Classroom Oakland Writing Project

 

shutterstock_283334561When I think back about why I wanted to become a teacher, I remember an ambition I had to make a difference in the lives of others. A want to share my passion for the books that I loved. A desire to help people express themselves in new and powerful ways. These are ideals that I still hold after twelve years of teaching, amid different political landscapes and ever-changing initiatives.

So, when I asked our blog editor for some topics to write about, I was taken aback by one of his suggestions: Can beautiful (or good) writing be taught?

Of course! I immediately thought. What kind of a reading and writing workshop teacher would I be if I didn’t believe this, deep in my heart?

Practice and Feedback

“Practice does not make perfect. Only perfect practice makes perfect.”
– Vince Lombardi

I believe that the first thing you need to carve out and protect in your classroom is deliberate writing practice, coupled with feedback from an expert. An expert, as Penny Kittle reminds us, need only be a teacher who is a little bit better at writing than a student.

Logging practice time in writing is important and necessary for getting all of the ideas out, but it is only the first step; teachers are only as good as the feedback they give to student writers, and feedback in the moment of writing is always the gold standard.

Revision

“Throw up into your typewriter every morning. Clean up every noon.”
– Raymond Chandler

Teaching and encouraging revision are also necessary components to the writing classroom. Modeling revision in your own writing shows students how to mine their writing for rocks, and how to polish these rocks into gems.

Penny Kittle talks about taking photos of your writing work, which shows students the revision process in action. This also helps students to recognize that it is in small changes to our writing that we learn to get better.

Learning through Mimicry

“Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.”
– Charles Caleb Colton

shutterstock_284746478Recognizing, naming, and even copying good writing are all important pieces in the quest to shape good writers.

Using mentor texts is one way to help students read like writers. Another way is to look at student writing samples, select the best as models, and then go through a process of naming what is good in that writing, as Ron Berger from Expeditionary Learning suggests.

A paramount exercise for any student is to notice an author’s craft and imitate good writers. This can mean inviting students to “copy change,” compose sentences, or keep a notebook of favorite lines from books they’ve read.

Practice, Practice, Practice

“The writer’s secret is not inspiration – for it is never clear where it comes from – it is his stubbornness, his patience.”
– Orhan Pamuk

Student writers need to realize that good writing comes less from talent and more from repeated practice. And teachers of writing need to remember that good writers can be guided with deliberate practice and teacher modeling.

 

IMG_3075Caroline Thompson (@TeacherThompson) taught middle school ELA for twelve years in Lake Orion before becoming a stay-at-home mom. She supports AARI teachers for Oakland Schools as an independent literacy consultant in the areas of digital media, professional development, and non-fiction resources. Caroline is a Reading and Writing Workshop advocate, a 2008 Oakland Writing Project Teacher Consultant, and a 2009 Oakland County Outstanding Teacher of the Year Nominee. She has a BA in English from Michigan State University and a Masters in the Art of Teaching Reading from Oakland University.  She lives in Berkley with her husband and their two year old daughter.

#nozeros and the Growth Mindset

Notes from the Classroom Oakland Writing Project

shutterstock_125746187Research reveals that a score of zero, in a 100-point grading scale, is pretty difficult for a student to overcome. For example, if a student gained a zero for not having turned in work, he or she would have to turn in nine assignments, earning 100 points each, to overcome the impact of that zero score.

Many teachers just excuse the task, rather than assigning a zero for no work done. But this suggests that the tasks themselves are not valuable, and that the student should not have a grade that represents their learning.

To avoid the zero mark, teachers should take another approach: providing an additional opportunity for students to show their work.

#nozeros

To act on these ideas, I started a lunch routine called #nozeros. (The name came from a kid’s suggestion for a classroom assignment, and it helped to entice the kids to the event.)

Here’s how it works. When students don’t turn in an assignment in class like a monthly reading log, I give them a lunch pass with #nozeros written on it. This requires them to spend a lunch in my classroom.

At first, students came reluctantly when they were given these passes. They expected a punishment-type lunch with the teacher.

Instead, they came and realized that I just wanted to give them a score on their work, and that I would help them if they liked. They could also work alone if they prefered.

If, for example, the missed assignment is a reading log, students write a claim about something that happened in their book. This task shows me that students have read the book, and it takes about a minute to complete. Students can leave when they finish, though some choose to stay and hang out.

These lunches have become something fun, and as my husband, a self-described average student, observes, “It’s not that they don’t want to do the assignment or can’t do the assignment. It’s that they forgot at night or don’t want to do it at home. They love this option because it gets their work in.” For me, the lunches make sense because I get work and students get a viable alternative to show that work.

Now, I have no zeros in my grade book and a lunch routine of openness and growth with my students.

The Growth Mindset

This kind of routine is part of my conscious effort at establishing a growth mindset in my classroom. I want students to realize that they can do their best work—and that sometimes this takes multiple attempts.

amy 2

Exemplars of achievement levels

To help establish the growth mindset in my classroom this year, I also started modeling the work for my current students, and modeling work at all levels of achievement. All of my students’ work can be revised and resubmitted for feedback.

In addition to the #nozeros meetings, I opened my classroom at lunch time to offer kids one-on-one help if they desired.

One student, Matt, became a weekly participant, with a goal to increase his level of achievement on our weekly narrative writing piece. At these lunch sessions, we worked to increase the elaboration in his weekly story, and to grow his craft in areas like character creation, dialogue, passive voice, and modified structure. My descriptive feedback, which connected directly to his writing, allowed Matt to be successful.

As we continued to work on the assignment in class, I would gently encourage him to name the skills we worked on at lunch, and remind him to make use of them.

After several weeks, Matt, smiling, announced that he got a 4 (a mark of excellent achievement)—because he worked to get it. He wasn’t bragging, though, when he said this to our class. He was encouraging others to put in some work to grow their achievement. I smiled.

From these experiences, I’ve learned a few things as a teacher:

  1. Students are honest evaluators of their own work.
  2. Students will strive to meet expectations you set when they trust that you care about them and their work.
  3. Student can gain confidence through achievement on meaningful tasks.

It’s important to allow kids to do their best, even when the methods to achieve this may look different.

pic 2Amy Gurney is an 8th grade Language Arts teacher for Bloomfield Hills School District. She was a facilitator for the release of the MAISA units of study. She has studied, researched, and practiced reading and writing workshop through Oakland Schools, The Teacher’s College, and action research projects. She earned a Bachelor of Science in Education at Central Michigan University and a Master’s in Educational Administration at Michigan State University.

The Value of Reading Conferences

Formative Assessment Notes from the Classroom Oakland Writing Project
IMG_3665

Notes from a reader’s conference

Feedback is a part of every great formative assessment. And a lot has been written about how to give effective and meaningful feedback.

But nothing has solidified the effectiveness of meaningful feedback for me more than the daily conversations I now have with my two-and-a-half-year-old. She is constantly refining her understanding of syntax and semantics, solidifying her understanding of the world around her, and building her self-esteem–all through the words that we exchange.

These kinds of conversations with readers–hearing their thinking and asking them to clarify what they mean–help them in the moment of their understanding. Nothing is a more powerful tool for student learning and growth.

Conference Starting Points

Everything I learned about reading workshops and conferences started with Nancie Atwell and Lucy Calkins. They are the workshop gurus that you should turn to for all of your burning questions. But even if you aren’t ready to jump into a workshop, you can still use conferences in your classroom.

The basic structure of a reading conference is:

  1. Gather data about the reader
  2. Compliment the reader
  3. Teach the reader something new
  4. Jot notes about the reader’s thinking and how you pushed him/her; plan your follow up

In a conference, you can use questions to get at the heart of a reader’s confusion or difficulty:

  • What questions do you have as you are reading?
  • What in the text makes you think that?
  • I noticed… I wonder…?
Response Journal 2

A response journal entry

Depending on the student, I might have them read part of their book aloud to me, and then ask them a question. I may also read their response journal over their shoulder, and then ask them a question about it, or ask a big question (What is the theme of your book?). From here, I can scaffold if they aren’t getting to this (What are some of the important moments of your book? What are some things that the characters are learning?). In a conference, I can also look back at an exit ticket and ask students to clarify what they meant by something they wrote.

Logistics

In a good week, I could confer with five students a day. So I would usually allow myself two weeks to get to each student in a class. Sometimes I would have to make daily quick returns to those needy students until they got on track. So, three students a day, over the course of two weeks, is 30 students. This translates to 15 minutes of reading or independent practice that the other students are working on, while you make your rounds conferring with each student for three to five minutes.

While planning conferences, I would meet with students randomly. If there were a pattern, my students would become complacent. And I liked to keep them on their toes.

It’s important to note, too, that conferring has its own special way of keeping students on task. You are among the students. And your proximity to them makes them stay focused. You can move to different sides of the room between conferences, when you are taking notes, and therefore can quell whispers.

IMG_3664Another benefit: your notes are a cheat sheet. Doctors take notes, in order to help them remember what they talked about, what’s happening in your personal history, and why you are there. Teachers can do the same thing. I’ve used a clipboard with student names, and I’ve also used my iPad with Evernote and a page for each student. (A sample note is listed on the left.)

Even if you aren’t using a workshop model, you can incorporate conferring with readers. (But, no matter the grade level you teach, you should really consider workshops! You can learn more about workshops HERE or HERE or HERE or HERE and especially HERE.) You can do so while students are working on whole-class novel reading or working on questions or starting their homework.

The Benefits

Conferring really helped me to become an effective teacher. I was connecting with students on a personal level and felt like I knew each and every one of them like never before. Students were also held accountable for their reading and thinking, and started to take more ownership over their own learning. And by meeting with students individually and then talking to the class as a whole group about emergent patterns and provocative statements, I was able to help connect readers and create community.

Caroline Thompson

Caroline Thompson (@TeacherThompson) taught middle school ELA for 12 years in Lake Orion before becoming a stay-at-home mom. She supports AARI teachers for Oakland Schools as an independent literacy consultant in the areas of digital media, professional development, and non-fiction resources. Caroline is a Reading and Writing Workshop advocate, a 2008 Oakland Writing Project Teacher Consultant, and a 2009 Oakland County Outstanding Teacher of the Year Nominee. She has a BA in English from Michigan State University and a Masters in the Art of Teaching Reading from Oakland University.  She lives in Berkley with her husband and their 2-and-a-half-year-old daughter.

Standards-Based Grading (Part 2)

Formative Assessment Notes from the Classroom Oakland Writing Project

shutterstock_180805136In writing about standards-based grading, I’ve described how grades should reflect learning, and assessments should be connected to standards. Rick Wormeli, an expert on the subject, also reveals that in order to coach a student to achieve academic standards, we must use descriptive feedback.

Descriptive feedback tells students what they accomplished toward a particular standard, and what else they need to accomplish to meet the standard. This feedback should be given consistently to all students, and it holds the role of formative assessment (tasks completed on the path to mastery) in education.

Continuing my work with the Galileo Leadership Consortium, I met another expert on the subject. Dr. Ellen Vorenkamp, from Wayne County RESA, helps me use formative assessment in my classroom. Formative assessment, I’ve learned, should be aligned with data. And it should always be planned and used timely and purposefully.

Vorenkamp offers five pillars of formative assessment. These pillars help me to assess what  methods I am already using, and what methods I need to add in my classroom. They are:

  • Pillar I:  Clear Learning Targets
  • Pillar II:  Effective Questioning
  • Pillar III:  Descriptive, Actionable Feedback
  • Pillar IV: Students as Self-Assessors
  • Pillar V:  Students as Peer-Assessors

How This Looks in My Classroom

In my classroom we write claim (thesis) statements for argumentative and informative writing. I will focus here on argumentative writing.  

For 8th grade, the academic standard is, “Introduce claim(s), acknowledge and distinguish claim(s) from alternate or opposing claims, and organize the reasons and evidence logically.”

Pillar I, the learning target, is: Students will write a claim statement that includes the main topic of the argument, a summary of evidence, and an opposing side.  

Students are introduced to this task with a learning chart and examples from me and amy 3past students. They then write a claim statement and turn it in. This is a great spot for formative assessment. I read the students’ statements, and I offer them the stages of development toward this learning target, as well as student samples of each level. And from earlier work in establishing a growth mindset in my classroom, students understand that they can update their work to show more mastery of that standard.  

The stages of development in my rubric, along with descriptive criteria, are:

  • 1 (working to meet standard)
    • unknown topic or argument
    • written in question form
    • includes extraneous or unrelated information
    • argument is not logical
  • 2 (mostly meeting standard)
    • straightforward – includes topic and evidence but no opposing side OR
    • represents both sides equally
  • 3 (meeting standard)
    • includes topic, evidence, opposing side – needs some word clarity
    • includes more details than is necessary for a claim
    • creative structure (evidence first)
    • multiple pieces of evidence listed for supporting side
  • 4 (exceeding standard)
    • includes topic, evidence, opposing side – clear
    • includes multiple pieces of evidence for both sides
    • argument is clear

Here, I have taken my instruction and student practice through Pillar I: assigning a clear learning target, Pillar II: effective questioning by clarifying the difference between levels of achievement, and Pillar III: descriptive, actionable feedback by telling students what they have accomplished and what they still need to accomplish.

The Use of Exemplars

A shift I made is to make these levels clear to students with student examples of each level of achievement. With this shift, I can take on Pillar IV: students as assessors, as they assess their work compared to the achievement levels and exemplars I have shared.

With this learning target, I still need to add in a Pillar V: students as peer reviewers. So I now give students my own work. Here, students are asked to apply the rubric to my example, and to give me a step to improve my work. Students indicate my score by holding up their fingers. Quickly, then, students discuss with a partner their reason for this score, and a next step for my work.

By practicing the work of peer assessment in this way, students can gain comfort with the practice. Later, students can move comfortably into the roles of self- and peer-assessors, with clear targets for achievement, because they know that these formative assessments are not a judgement, but rather a process to guide their learning.

All of these steps are just a small shift in my classroom. Yet they allow better achievement of academic standards. What small shift will you make to address all five pillars of formative assessment?

pic 2Amy Gurney is an 8th grade Language Arts teacher for Bloomfield Hills School District. She was a facilitator for the release of the MAISA units of study. She has studied, researched, and practiced reading and writing workshop through Oakland Schools, The Teacher’s College, and action research projects. She earned a Bachelor of Science in Education at Central Michigan University and a Master’s in Educational Administration at Michigan State University.

Triathlon Swimming & Formative Assessment

Consultants' Corner Formative Assessment Professional Learning Research & Theory

I titled this blog post not to try and get your attention, well, all right, partly to get your attention, but really because I have been struggling with the swim leg of a triathlon. Floundering is perhaps more accurate description. At the same time, I became enthralled with the possibilities of formative assessment. Later you will see how I linked the two.

shutterstock_154806206For my first triathlon, actually my only triathlon, I swam with a snorkel. Yes, you are allowed to do so, however you can not win. Being the disciplined athlete I am I was unencumbered by this restriction as I wheezed around the course.

Another indignity; triathlons start in waves. The Elites begin first and, as field thins and the triathletes thicken, the older folk start last. You may be surprised to learn that I am neither an Elite triathlete, nor extremely youthful. Consequently I started from behind and fought to maintain this stellar ranking.

There is another indignity in a triathlon. They write your age on your leg. This does not worry me, I saw it more as an explanation of my performance. However, it is embarrassing to be passed on the run, by a pair of calves boldly emblazoned with the number 74!

To be honest I finished about midway between the Elites and the DNF’s. (Did Not Finish). I wanted to do another tri,  faster and sans snorkel. Enter formative assessment, if it works for kids, it should work for me, and hopefully before I am 74. Formative assessment could help,  it was unlikely to harm my performance, what did I have to lose?

The Theory
Let me clarify what I mean by formative assessment. From my understanding, it is a planned process where one assesses where the learner is in terms of learning (triathlon swimming in this instance). Based on the assessment/s, the instruction continues as is or is modified.

There are three questions that focus the formative assessment process:
1.Where are you going?
2. Where are you now?
3. What do you do to close the gap?

And then there is evidence that the learner (me) is making progress toward the goal.

There is also feedback. which, since I am too tight to pay for a coach, I am going to provide that feedback to myself. This brings to mind a quote from Abraham Lincoln: “He who represents himself has a fool for a client.” A bird-walk but you may see the relevance.

The Practice
shutterstock_113167474Swimming is challenging for me. If the swim leg of a sprint triathlon was 50 yards, I would be fine, but it is not. It is 1/2 mile, which is a long, long way for me. The ride and the run are OK; note I did not say easy, or enjoyable.

Back to the swim.

I have purchased flippers, snorkel, goggles, hand paddles, and even a clicky belt thing that gives feedback (with an annoying click) when you roll your hips. (I do like my toys). I have read books, studied videos, and crawled the web for tips and insight. I have had lessons, (see I am not that tight), and I have practiced in a pool and in a lake.

I practiced body rolling, arm strokes, getting my butt up, and bi-lateral breathing. I am better than I was. (I once read a T-shirt that said, “The older I get, the better I was.” I agree with the sentiment, but digress.)

So why am I not much, much better at swimming by now?

Formative Assessment Insights
Here is what I am learning, thanks to formative assessment insights:

1. I do reflect on my swimming skills ( I use the latter term rather loosely!).
2. I found I check how I am going quite regularly. I even make a mental note of my performance. In most cases, I think I should do a little more of this, say breathing, and a little less of that, say sinking.
3. I do understand the learning progressions needed to swim that distance.
4. I have clarified my learning intentions.

However, I think I need to look more deeply (an unintended pun).

Dylan Wiliam proposed five strategies for formative assessment:

1. Clarifying, sharing, and understanding learning intentions and criteria for success.
2. Engineering and eliciting effective evidence of learning.
3. Providing feedback that moves learning forward.
4. Activating learners as instructional resources for one another.
5. Activating learners as owners of their own learning.

OK, I’ve got #1 and #5. For me, #4 is hard ‘cause it is just me. So that leaves #2 and #3.

I do get some evidence courtesy of an expensive, and thankfully waterproof, Garmin watch. I can tell lap times, distance, and stroke rate. But … so what?

This evidence is also feedback, but it is limited and after the fact. I have to download it on the computer to get it. What I need is in the moment feedback. I know I could pay for this, but we have been here before. I am too cheap, so let’s move on. I still need feedback.

Interestingly, I just realized the pool gives me feedback, like when I swallow water instead of breathing air, which does make me think about the quality of feedback.

I am highly motivated. I have found that the possibility of drowning is great motivation, but I am hesitant to recommend it as an educational strategy.

What I am beginning to see is that if I address the three focus questions of formative assessment:
1. Where am I going?
2. Where am I now?
3. How do I close the gap?
It is evident that it is quality feedback that moves me forward, that links #1 and #2 to achieve #3. It is the ability to provide quality feedback, in the moment, based on evidence, that is most helpful.

What have I learned?
Well, I think Wiliam’s Five Strategies help me think about learning, be it for triathlons or teaching literacy. The three focus questions are pivotal to implementing the strategies.

Once the direction is known, then it is time to determine what sort of evidence is needed to ascertain progress towards the destination and when each piece of evidence is relevant. Evidence and feedback often appear related at this point.

For example, the number of strokes it takes to get to the end of the pool is useful to know. However, feedback on form while actually swimming with the form of a sunken log, is far more helpful. Effective feedback is what is needed, at that moment, to move me forward (not downward).  It is the immediacy of the adjustment which underscores a central tenet of formative assessment: formative assessment changes the learning while it is still malleable. James Popham‘s definition of formative assessment is:  “Formative assessment is a planned process in which teachers or students use assessment-based evidence to adjust what they’re currently doing.”

shutterstock_158438201Effective feedback, grounded in where the learner is in the moment, is critical. It would be helpful, though not always essential, to have feedback from peers and/or a more knowledgeable other. However, in the end, it is the learner’s (my) responsibility for success. Interestingly, this raises the issue of goal setting, which is something for another day.

In the end, Wiliam’s Five Formative Assessment Strategies embedded in the three Formative Assessment Questions, provide an effective learning framework that works as well for triathlons as literacy.

So to put this in a growth mindset, which is pivotal to formative assessment, I can’t swim 1/2 a mile comfortably, YET.

Les HowardPrior to coming to Oakland Schools in 2004, Les Howard worked as an independent consultant across the United States based in San Francisco. Les came to California in 1994 to help establish Reading Recovery in California. He has been an educator for almost 40 years, almost 20 years in Australia. During this time he has been an elementary teacher, assistant principal, and literacy consultant and district literacy coordinator. Les is also a trained Ontological Coach.  He believes coaching is a powerful process that empowers educators. He loves being outdoors and loves bicycling hiking, paddling, triathlons and adventure races, and trying to tire out his border collie. He and his wife enjoy traveling and camping.