Archive for March, 2009
Letter to the Editor
Tuesday, March 17th, 2009 | Uncategorized | 1 Comment
Chapter 6: Teaching Audience and Voice
Informal Response
This chapter talks a lot about teaching students how to write for an audience. The book started off the topic by giving an example of a graduate student who struggled to find and write for an audience in his work. I think this is a very common problem among writers of all ages. This problem fits hand in hand with motivation. If a student does not feel there is a purpose for his or her writing they will lack motivation, which is why knowing one’s audience is so important in terms of motivating students. Students need to feel there is a purpose to their writing. Neman gave a few examples of activities to help students to find an audience and write for a specific audience.
The first activity she provided was having students write to a pretend audience. An example would be to have students reply or respond directly to a character in a book. Not only would this help the student to find their audience but it would also allow them to analyze the text and formulate an opinion. I think this is a good idea to use once or twice during the year but it would depend on the age group of the students. I think the pretend audience assignment would be more exiting and helpful for younger students such as middle-school age. However, I think a high school student could potentially find this boring or unrealistic.
In my opinion high school students would benefit more from Neman’s other activity which was finding an actual audience. This would include letters to the editor. I have always found activities like this to be very motivating and fun. For example, when I was in high school we were asked to write a letter to a company, government official, newspaper or whatever we wanted. We had to write to a complaint letter about something that we genuinely felt strongly about. Some people wrote to the city about the potholes in roads, some wrote to shoe companies about problems they had with their merchandise and much more. This was one of my favorite and most memorable assignments because we all took it very seriously. We perfected to letters, postmarked them, and sent them to their respective places. I think it was so successful because people cared about what they were writing about and they wanted to be taken seriously so they worked very hard. It was really cool because surprisingly a lot of students got a response back. One student in specific that wrote to a shoe company received a letter and a gift card.
The reason I like the letter to the editor activity so much is because it gives the students a sense of purpose and it allows them to become very motivated and invested in their work. This opens a lot of doors for us as teachers because the students are willing to listen because they want their work to be the best it can be so it is taken seriously. I plan to use this assignment in my classroom someday and I hope that companies respond so I can keep the letters to show students as motivation to write well.
Red Pen
Tuesday, March 3rd, 2009 | Uncategorized | 222 Comments
Meg Richardson
ENG 484
Dr. Nickoson-Massey
March 3, 2009
The English Teacher’s Red Pen:
Response Question
I have always been a firm anti-red pen believer. Growing up I hated the red pen, it was always embarrassing to get back a paper I had worked hard on, filled with red marks you could see from across the classroom. Chapter 16 begins by talking about the bad rap English teachers get. It discusses the dilemma between too much feedback and not enough. It gives examples of how we become obsessed with correcting, however it never really tells us how we can go about changing our “bad reputation.” If we English teachers are so dreaded like the text describes, how do we change people’s opinion? How do we become effective teachers and still do our job without “overcorrecting” or becoming obsessed with making things correct? I want to be perceived as a fun teacher who helped kids grow as writers but how do I do that without getting the typical English teacher reputation they describe in the chapter?
Workshop 8
Tuesday, March 3rd, 2009 | Uncategorized | 59 Comments
Meg Richardson
ENG 484
Dr. Nickoson-Massey
February 24, 2009
Workshop 8: Teaching the Power of Revision
Informal Response
This video was about the revision process and its key role in the writing process. Like the other videos we have viewed for this class this video took a look inside the classrooms of middle school teachers and it showed a variety of different revision techniques that teachers use in their classrooms. Each classroom that we looked into was working on different types of essays but they were all focusing on the same aspect of revision. I was surprised to find some themes that we have discussed in class reappear in this section. For example, we have talked about the importance of building a safe learning community several times in class and that idea was brought up once again as an important aspect of the revision process. Another strategy that was talked about was modeling. We have talked about modeling behavior, writing, and other habits and it was interesting to see that some of these ideas and practices are transparent through different aspects of the writing process.
One of the featured teachers in this video was Velvet McReynolds. Velvet was one of my favorite teachers shown in a previous video. In this section Velvet talked about how revision is at the heart of the writing process. She said revision is, “where the magic happens.” Velvet did a similar exercise to one she did in a previous video that I was very fond of. She created a “celebration circle” where the students went around and shared their work. In relation to the revision process she had the students share the before and after versions of their work. I think this is a great idea because it allows the students to see how their work has improved as a result of the revision process. I also believe that sharing the before and after with the class is helpful because it gives the work that the students do more meaning. If they are sharing it with the class and they feel comfortable they will be more compelled to improve their work. Violet has been my favorite teacher throughout these videos. I think she has the most creative ideas and her students seem to be so comfortable and they also have the most fun.
As I said before, one of the key themes talked about in the revision process was creating a positive environment. They stressed how important this was to the revision process. In this safe and positive learning environment trust, respect, and encouragement are all necessary for successful revision. The importance of feeling comfortable to write and share writing with others without the fear of rejection is key. A lot of revision activities include sharing one’s work with their peers or their teacher. It is crucial that the student feels safe and comfortable enough to share their work. Respect also plays a role in revision because in order to give or take advice from someone you must first value and respect their opinion. For example, Violet did a great job of creating a safe and comfortable learning environment in her classroom where the students were willing to share their work with the class. The “celebration circle” was a perfect example of this as well.
Another teacher, Mary Cathryn Ricker took another approach that I think is affective. As the students were working on revising their work Mary Cathryn worked her way around the room meeting with each of the students individually. She raised critical questions and helped them come up with details that would help them revise and expand on the ideas they already had. I think meeting with students one on one during the revision process is important. It gives them a sense of where to go and it also promotes ownership in their work. It also shows that the teacher cares about their work and is willing to help while still guiding the students to make their own revisions. This is the most effective when the students respect the comments and ideas of the teacher.