What do you think is important to teach students about writing and representing?

“Boundaries preclude the small and surprising moments that are beyond our expectations of children’s abilities.”(p.354, Ghiso, 2011).

After reviewing and reflecting on the Integrated Resource Package (IRP), our text “Constructing Meaning” and the various articles and activities we have done in class, I can’t help but feel that the question for me is not what I think is important to teach students about writing and representing, but how I teach writing and representing. By law, students in British Columbia will have to learn the features of writing such as “a period marks the end of a sentence” (BC IRP Grade One – PLO C10 p. 54) or “correct noun-pronoun agreement,” (Gr. 4, PLO C11 p. 72) but in today’s classroom, the emphasis has shifted from learning language through conventions, to learning language for the purposes of communication and then developing strategies to meet these purposes. For me, the measure of an excellent writing teacher in today’s classroom lies in how effectively you can identify what is meaningful for the individuals in your class to communicate, and inspire them to explore these ideas through the varied purposes of writing and representing.

A case study entitled “Writing that Matters: Collaborative Inquiry and Authoring Practices in the First Grade” illustrates how a teacher was able to engage students by creating a writing environment where learning was inquiry based and student-directed. The article states that “structuring a writing time around the unplanned, around what matters to students, de-centers the teacher as the most knowledgeable member of the writing community, and offers opportunities for students to take the lead as they follow unexpected avenues in their inquiries.”(p. 354, Ghiso, 2011) This approach, where the teacher got to know her audience and followed their lead, supports my philosophy of writing instruction and is evidenced in the IRP under the heading of ‘Addressing Local Needs’ where “student choice”, “flexibility,” “examples that are relevant to their [the students] local context and to the particular interests of their students” (BC IRP, p.11) are encouraged.

The aforementioned case study continues by noting that “rather than leaving their stories and worlds outside of the classroom, students could use the writing time to ‘make their stories the work.’ This pedagogical decision built both writing and community.”(p. 347, Ghiso, 2011) The study then took the writer’s workshop one step further by finding common themes within class writing and using these themes to do a collaborative inquiry into social transformation. Moving from “individualistic descriptions of the way one’s world is” to opening “critical dialogue that questions such a world and envisions alternatives.” (p. 353, Ghiso, 2011) I found it rather amazing that grade one students would be capable of this sort of writing project, but framed in the right context, the teacher was able to use what many would consider obstacles with an underprivileged urban class, to student-led sources of insight and exploration, all while meeting numerous PLO’s, such as, “using writing and representing to extend their [the students] thinking.”(p. 54, BC IRP Gr. 1 – C8)

Creating a comfortable, supportive classroom community and a sense of connectedness to the subject matter seem to be the keys in any effective piece of writing. Pieces that are written from a place of familiarity, experience or genuine interest are where you will see young writers develop an authentic voice and a sense of ownership and pride in their work, versus perhaps the more contrived voice that would emerge from a more rigidly structured assignment. The student achievement section of the IRP supports the notion of ‘crafting an authentic voice’ as one of the twelve steps to ‘writing essentials for all grades.’ Reggie Routman suggests students “write in a style that illuminates the writer’s personality – this may include dialogue, humour, point of view, a unique form.”(p. 112, BC IRP) I feel that this point applies to teachers as well. The best lectures I have heard are on topics the presenter is passionate about, familiar with and has personally experienced. I particularly enjoyed the writer’s notebook exercise we did in class, identifying experiences that were memorable in our lives in order to generate a knowledge bank to draw from when authoring fictional work. As a teacher, you have a responsibility to model writing, be empathetic to the process, and help students identify and tap into their sources of knowledge so they will want to write, to communicate, and to explore their interests further. The challenge will be asking the right questions, and giving students the tools to formulate their own questions.

In Sharon Creech’s book “Love That Dog,” the main character, a young boy named Jack, was able to create a very powerful piece of poetry based on the emotional and personal experience of losing his dog. The fictional teacher in this story did an excellent job of facilitating Jack’s writing by exposing him to various authors, allowing him the space to explore his ideas and find different purposes for his writing, such as writing a letter to Walter Dean Myers, without pre-planning and structuring every writing opportunity. I loved that the journal was spread out over the year and allowed room for Jack to write at his own pace and without the pressure of always being assessed. This way, he was able to really find his voice, his style, what he like and didn’t like, and created some wonderful writing in the process. The authors of “Constructing Meaning” similarly advise that “in their instruction and assessment of student writing, teachers show respect for the idiosyncratic nature of the writing process and value both the written products and the writing processes of individual students.” (p. 345, Bainbridge, Heydon, Malicky, 2009) Another important aspect of respecting the writing process and creating a trusting relationship that was highlighted in “Love That Dog” was that Jack was able to display his work anonymously. By allowing anonymity, young authors will be more likely to take more risks with their writing, and therefore have a greater potential for improvement.

One of the suggestions in the article entitled “Structure and Freedom” was that “teachers should provide a regular time for writing.” (p. 68, Casey & Hemenway, 2001) While I partially agree with this suggestion, something that I appreciated about the Montessori teaching approach was that children had freedom in the daily structure of their work. I know that sometimes when I have a writing block, it is frustrating to be forced to sit and try to come up with something during a specified time period, while other times I can hardly write fast enough to keep up with my thoughts. As a teacher, I think you need to provide structure and freedom not only in the genre, subject and style of writing, but within class work time. On the other hand, I agree that “freedom to learn and grow does not occur in the absence of structure…true freedom occurs when choices are made within a structure that is stable, reliable, protected from distraction; focussed on the fulfillment ‘of activities we deem important and of people we know are unique.’” (p. 11, Marmé Thompson, 1995)

How then am I going to teach writing and representing? From what I have learned so far, the most successful approaches seem to be listening to what is meaningful to students, getting to know my audience, trying to provide a balance between choice and structure, creating a supportive environment and emphasizing purpose over conventions. As an educator, I feel that I will have a responsibility to expose students to as many different varieties of writing as possible, so that they can develop their own taste from a broad spectrum of resources. Ultimately, I want every author in my class to find their own voice, their own process and their own inspiration to express themselves through writing – while instilling some proper spelling, grammar, and revision skills along the way.

Sources

Bainbridge, J., Heydon, R., Malicky, G. (2009). Constructing meaning: Balancing elementary language arts, 4th Ed. Nelson: Toronto, ON.

British Columbia Ministry of Education. (2006). English language arts k to 7: Integrated resource package. Victoria, BC: Author.
URL: http://www.bced.gov.bc.ca/irp/irp_ela.htm

Casey, Mara & Hemenway, Stephen I. (July, 2001). Structure and Freedom: Achieving a Balanced Writing Curriculum. English Journal, pp. 68-75.

Creech, S. (2001). Love that dog. New York, NY: Harper Collins.

Ghiso, M. (2011) Writing That Matters: Collaborative Inquiry and Authoring Practices in a First Grade Class. Language Arts.
URL:http://www.ncte.org.ezproxy.library.uvic.ca/library/NCTEFiles/Resources/Journals/LA/0885-may2011/LA0885Writing.pdf

Marmé Thompson, Christine. (September, 1995). What should I draw today? Sketchbooks in Early Childhood. Art Education, pp. 6-11.