Workshop, Scaffolding & Strategies: Three Ingredients For The Best Writing Piece 🍰

 

“Writing is a process, a journey into memory and the soul.” - Isabel Allende
As we proceeded with the Writers Workshop, we were able to finally complete all of the group demonstrations. I must say there were a few concepts that I didn't quite grasp and I had to do my own personal research. Based on the seating, I’m not sure if you guys heard when I asked Ms. Quinn ‘when in the curriculum should we teach the writing process’ because at this point I was still a bit confused with the layout. A fellow classmate cleared things up a bit but I am still scratching my head trying to decide how I would implement it within my own Language lessons.


I decided to take a look at my Grade 3 Language Arts Curriculum to see how I could incorporate the Writers Workshop seamlessly and I somewhat have a better understanding. 

The first thing that stood out to me was “Use the writing process” (red). I have been teaching Grade 3 for two years but I swear to God this is the first time I’m seeing that note (teacher training must have granted me new eyes). Using the block method definitely allows for a better integration of the strands as many of the components can be tied into one lesson.
Here's what I came up with trying to integrate (part of) the Writers Workshop within the block method (and the literacy hour, bare with me), feel free to correct me/ provide advice.

Write a short expository paragraph (giving information) on given topics (yellow)
Topic: Carnival in Antigua and Barbuda

For students who may not have attended carnival before, I would make use of magazine articles and Youtube videos to provide them with a visual (this could be incorporated into the introduction of the actual lesson). I would also tie in ‘Listen to determine the purpose of a speaker's message’ (green) and even ‘ Listen to follow the sequence of events in a report given by a speaker’ with the video. Two simple questions for the students…
1. What do you think is the main purpose of the speaker's message?
-Students can respond: ‘To educate us about Carnival in Antigua.’
2. In order, what were some of the carnival events mentioned?
-Students can respond: opening of carnival, calypso monarch, …. Jouvert, T-shirt Mass, Carnival Mon & Tue for the costumes… (I would have to ensure that the video highlights all of the main events)

For the magazine articles, students can make use of  ‘decoding and word recognition skills to read new and difficult words’ (above purple) and even the entire section of vocabulary especially ‘Use a dictionary to check meaning  and pronunciation’ as they may be a few terms or ‘Carnival jargons’ they are not familiar with (ex: frontline, masqueraders, panorama etc.)

Focus Lesson
For this section I would provide students with a guide on how the process (workshop) would be structured, procedures and expectations, how to confer with their peers and provide them with a model of what constructive criticism looks like —> (here I would try to tie in “Use polite and appropriate tone in conversation’; green).

Pair Write
At this point, I would have utilized a few of the strand components and also the beginning of the Writers Workshop. For this section of the workshop, I would pair the students together and provide them with a list of topics or prompts that they can discuss among themselves, such as word choice, character attributes, and unclear sections and begin pooling ideas together for shared writing. Since the focus lesson is 5-10 minutes, I began wondering if I could utilise a graphic organizer after the ‘pair write’ since they would have shared ideas with each other. This would be a way for me to model what the paragraph should look like and also make use of the information they have based on their discussion. Or maybe I SHOULD include it in the focus lesson, so that they have an idea of how to address the pair writing??? What are your thoughts on this? Either way, I would integrate some form of quick write and allow the students to begin their first draft. 

Since Language Arts takes place everyday, I would try my best to allocate the components of the writing process while incorporating aspects of the strands for half of the language arts extent duration (1.5 weeks). The remaining, I would repeat the process, this time focusing on ‘Write a letter of invitation’ which may follow the same outline, however the publishing aspect will take a different format. 

I will definitely take more time to play around with the components of this Writers Workshop and I'm hoping that I will at least grasp or even master it by next January. Can you imagine  that we have to do this for the majority of our Language Arts lessons plans during practicum (and after)...... May the force (and the LORD) be with us!

The glossary we received as an activity,  I decided to place it in a table format. It provided me with a better visual of what the different steps entailed and when they appear within the writing process (workshop).

Before the second class even started, I knew we were going to be enticed by Ms. Quinn and her plethora of videos as she busted out the Ol’ Reliable Projector.


And of course, without missing a beat, reminding us to take notes of the information being covered in the video.


I must say, I enjoyed the video as I wasn’t aware of all the scaffolding techniques I could use with my students. (Thank God for Moodle as I will definitely be making use of all the resources when I return to the classroom.) Quite a few things stood out to me while watching the video which I never really thought of before now:

- capturing the students thinking/ideas
-shortening the piece the students focus on instead of expecting whole pieces (intro, para 1..2..3, conclusion); I will definitely implement this strategy as I’ve been pushing my students to complete their entire piece in one sitting (the poor children, I was a monster and I didn’t even realize my wrong-doings lol)

-grading partial pieces; also a strategy I would implement in hopes of encouraging the students to complete the section before moving on

- appropriate tasks for where students are in the writing process; I liked this point particularly as I began thinking of interesting ways I could scaffold the students' writing without interfering with their process. The first idea that came to mind were checklists. Here’s a few I found online. 

I would turn this meme into a sticker lol


I’m proud to say I created this one myself.

Now I'm sure you guys remember this chart. I was actually surprised at how many strategies there were when it came to scaffolding my students (I’ve either been inside a box these last three years or I wasn’t doing enough research where my students were concerned, again thank God for teacher training). 

Six of the strategies that stood out to me were:
1. Visuals and Realia (well obviously) - for this strategy I would make use of graphics that would guide/prompt the students' writing. I also thought it would be an interesting way to help students to visualize an unfamiliar topic. For example, they may have to write a composition about snow. Some students may have never experienced snow, (sadly, I haven't either) therefore making use of an image, or even conducting a mini experiment on how to make snow (baking soda and hair conditioner) can provide these students with an idea of what it is like.

2. Use of first language - I never gave this strategy much thought until this lesson, and it holds a lot of weight. I can definitely see my students writing freely in their creole language as this eliminates the many restrictions of writing in Standard English.

3. Sentence Structures/Starter: this will definitely help students who struggle in the brainstorming process and also a way for them to generate ideas. For this strategy, I would try my best to make the sentence starters as vague as possible. In my opinion, the few examples I’ve seen online are too specific and may limit the students' flow of ideas when writing.

This  is an example of one I found. Unless my lesson objectives require me to narrow in on a specific outcome, I would not make use of this. The first thing that stood out to me was ‘To get home, I had to…’. In my opinion, that is already putting a cap on the students' writing as they are already focusing on solving the problem of waking up in the forest. I would have liked to see how the students described their surroundings and maybe even their reaction to encountering animals in the forest (but that's just my two cents). I am already mentally preparing to create most of my students' worksheets, at least that way I can focus on obtaining my lesson objectives and avoiding this…. whatever that paragraph structure is.

4. Connect to background knowledge: this strategy will always be a highlight for me. It allows for the students to share experiences and add a personal touch to their piece. In the three years I've been teaching, the stories I’ve heard from my students always had me on the edge of my seat. There is a vast difference between the childhoods of 90s and 2000’s babies. 

5. Graphic Organizers: now from my previous blog post you guys would realize I have a knack for creating things (tooting my own horn *toot toot* lol). I will definitely be utilizing this aspect to aid in my students sorting their ideas and paragraphs.

6. Modeling/Gestures: the minute I saw this, it brought me back to the strategies we learned in our Drama course (sorry Demante’, you missed out). This is a great idea for students to role-play or add emphasis to their ideas. I would utilize a few drama strategies such as:

Modelling: this refers to the involvement of students in shaping dramatic images by way of using only the body. Students use each other's bodies for the experience.
Tableau: a still image or depiction, recreating situations by using a freeze 

Thought tracking/ lending a voice:  the student is asked to speak for a character, creating the dialogue on the spot

At this point, I should write a book on the many strategies I plan on using when I return to the classroom, as something pops into my head each day. Overall, the more I delve into the components of literature, the more I realize that there are many interesting ways to teach and guide students' writing. As Benjamin Franklin once said (I’m about to sound like one of those teachers who wear outfits created by their students) “by failing to plan, you are preparing to fail”. I believe if we take the adequate time needed to plan effective lessons, maybe teaching Language Arts won't be as difficult.

Which scaffolding strategies will you guys be using in your classroom?

I’m sorry but this will NEVER be me! 😂😂😂