The Learning To Write Process In Elementary Classrooms

This text models for teachers how to help children learn and write by establishing comfort with writing, building confidence, and developing competence. Several themes run through the learning-to-write-process presented in this text: * Writing is communication; * Writing is a powerful tool for learning; * How children feel about their writing and themselves as writers affects how they learn to write; * Teachers are coworkers with students; children from many backgrounds can learn to write together. The text sythesizes what we know about how children learn, how we write, and what we write into a process of teaching children to write. It is intended to serve as a starting place for developing theories of how to best teach writing.

Becoming a Teacher of Writing in Elementary Classrooms nurtures teachers’ identities as writers, connects to the realities of writing instruction in real and diverse classrooms, and encourages critical and creative thinking. This text is about writing instruction as a journey teachers and students embark on together. The focus is on learning how to teach writing through specific teaching and learning structures found in the Writing Studio: mini-lessons; teacher and peer conferencing; guided writing; and sharing, celebrating, and broadcasting writing. Pedagogical features include teaching structures and strategies, "Problematizing Practice" classroom scenarios, assessment resources, and a Companion Website. Because a teacher who views him or herself as a writer is best positioned to implement the Writing Studio, a parallel text, Becoming-writer, give readers space to consider who they are as a writer, their personal process as a writer, and who they might become as a writer.

The concept of writing as process has revolutionized the way many view composition, and this book is organized by the stages of that process. Each section begins with a well-known author presenting specific techniques, followed by commentaries which include testimonials, applications of writing techniques, and descriptions of strategy modifications all contributed by classroom teachers. The book includes the following sections and initial chapters: Section 1 (The Process): "Teaching Writing as a Process" (Catherine D'Aoust); Section 2 (Prewriting): "Clustering: A Prewriting Process" (Gabriele Lusser Rico); Section 3 (Prewriting in Different Subjects): "Prewriting Assignments Across the Curriculum" (Jim Lee); Section 4 (Showing, Not Telling): "A Training Program for Student Writers" (Rebekah Caplan); Section 5 (Using Cooperative Learning to Facilitate Writing): "Using Structures to Promote Cooperative Learning in Writing" (Jeanne M. Stone and Spencer S. Kagan); Section 6 (Writing): "Developing a Sense of Audience, or Who Am I Really Writing This Paper For?" (Mark K. Healy); Section 7 (Teaching Writing in the Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Classroom): "English Learners and Writing: Responding to Linguistic Diversity" (Robin Scarcella); Section 8 (Domains of Writing): "Teaching the Domains of Writing" (Nancy McHugh); Section 9 (Writing the Saturation Report): "Using Fictional Techniques for Nonfiction Writing" (Ruby Bernstein); Section 10 (Point of View in Writing): "A Lesson on Point of View...That Works" (Carol Booth Olson); Section 11 (Writing the I-Search Paper): "The Reawakening of Curiosity: Research Papers as Hunting Stories" (Ken Macrorie); Section 12 (Critical Thinking and Writing): "Reforming Your Teaching for Thinking: The Studio Approach" (Dan Kirby); Section 13 (Sharing/Responding): "Some Guidelines for Writing-Response Groups" (Peter Elbow); Section 14 (Reader Responses): "Dialogue with a Text" (Robert E. Probst); Section 15 (RAGs for Sharing/Responding): "Using Read-Around Groups to Establish Criteria for Good Writing" (Jenee Gossard); Section 16 (Rewriting/Editing): "Competence for Performance in Revision" (Sheridan Blau); Section 17 (Revising for Correctness): "Some Basics That Really Do Lead to Correctness" (Irene Thomas); Section 18 (Building Vocabularies): "Word-Sprouting: A Vocabulary-Building Strategy for Remedial Writers" (Barbara Morton); Section 19 (Evaluation): "Holistic Scoring in the Classroom" (Glenn Patchell); and Section 20 (Evaluation Techniques): "Some Techniques for Oral Evaluation" (Michael O'Brien). Contains over 100 references. (EF)

"The Handbook of Reading Research is the research handbook for the field. Each volume has come to define the field for the period of time it covers ... When taken as a set, the four volumes provide a definitive history of reading research"--Back of cover, volume 4.

Shows teachers how to meet the challenges of teaching literacy in today's classroom This book provides educators with the historical and theoretical foundations necessary for becoming a reading, writing, and literacy teacher and helps them understand the broader, more complete picture of the reading process and what it means to be a teacher of readers. It covers the major theories and application strategies of the reading process, and teaches how to organize for literary instruction in a classroom. As educators learn to recognize and draw upon the multiple literacies that children bring to the classroom, they will: become skilled problem-solvers as they work through real-world examples and study the classroom experiences of others; discover how to dig deeper into literacy instruction and decide on what actions to take; and explore ways to drive and teach literacy with such tools as children's toys and familiar characters.

This is an essential book for everyone who wants to write clearly about any subject and use writing as a means of learning.

Contains a collection of specific classroom strategies & suggestions for teaching writing to elementary school students according to an eight-stage process. Specific techniques for teaching each stage of the writing process & descriptions of proven approaches for using these techniques are also included. "A wonderful resource, a labor of love from a large & talented group of educators." Had its beginnings in the California Writing Project at the Univ. of California, Irvine. Best Seller! Illustrated.

Writing Workshop in the Elementary Classroom is a culmination of the authors’ work with students and writing for collectively over 35 years. Teaching writing using a workshop methodology can be exciting as it is an interactive approach to writing, but it can also be challenging as it is not the traditional teacher directed whole class lessons that many test preparation curriculums tout. The book takes the reader through the stages of the writing process in the first part, explaining what students are doing and thinking in each stage. In the second part, the authors explain how to manage students, materials, mini lessons, grading and other aspects that help writing workshop classrooms run smoothly. To help with the transition to a workshop method, readers are asked to keep a journal wherein they plan what they will do in their classrooms.