Entry #3- The Writer's Craft

This week, I have thought more about my role as a teacher when it comes to the writing process and writers craft. When thinking about the writing lessons I have done throughout my first year of teaching, there are a few things I would have done differently. As a first grade teacher, I spend a lot of time modeling writing skills and strategies, and often create collaborative writing pieces. After completing a few writing pieces of a particular genre as a class, the students then write their own independently. However, one aspect of our writing time that I would like to change moving forward is spending more time on mini-lessons. Oftentimes, I brush over that step and go right into modeling. After reading Chapter 3 of Tompkins, I now know how important that mini-lesson step is, even if there is limited time. I am wondering if I had spent more time on doing specific mini-lessons, and substituting a day of collaborative writing for a specific mini-lesson, then maybe my students' independent writing pieces would be stronger. 

One specific writing trait that I would like to spend more time doing mini-lessons on is word choice. I have noticed that my students often use the same words over and over again in their writing. I have also noticed that they use these same words because they know how to spell those words on their own or with help using their personal dictionary. In the last writing assignment I had for my students, as a class we brainstormed words that they might need throughout the writing piece. I wrote these words on a piece of paper, and projected them all on the screen for all students to see. This helped SO MUCH with the strength of my students' writing, as well as their ability to produce writing independently, since they weren’t asking for my help as often. In the future, I will be sure to do this with every writing assignment. This is similar to Tompkins suggestion of using a word wall. Richards and Hawkes (2011) also suggested a mini lesson that caught my eye related to word choice. The question is “what words or phrases grab your attention” (Richards and Hawkes, 2011, p. 371). I think posing this question to my students would encourage them to really think about how they can make words or phrases in their own writing stand out. By using a mentor text to showcase how powerful words or phrases can be, this would definitely help integrate stronger word choice in my students’ writing. 

Speaking of mentor texts, I want to utilize them more during my writing time and in my mini-lessons. I have used a few mentor texts this year, such as reading books on how a pumpkin grows when focusing on descriptive text. However, I think mentor texts can be very powerful when used correctly, and I am excited to utilize the suggested mentor texts from Tompkins in my future lessons.

References

Richards, D. & Hawes, S. (2006).  Connecting reading and writing through author’s craft. The 

Reading Teacher, 60(4), 370-373.