Making Reading Thinking Visible Through Annotations

Our first major unit in English Language Arts is short story reading. At this point in the year, I don't know a whole lot about my students as readers. I've gotten some info about books they read (or didn't read) over the summer, and I have standardized test scores from the previous spring. However, knowing how they dive into a text and construct meaning out of it is a complete mystery at this point in the year. I needed some sense of these kids as readers before I forged ahead.

The unit started out with a pre-assessment during which students read a story new to them, annotating in the margins as they read (see my previous post about annotations as assessment), and then answered summary, theme, and literary argument questions. As I was surveying these assessments, I noticed a few things about the annotations:

1. Although annotating texts has been taught in previous years, and I emphasized doing it when I was giving instructions, about half of the students either did no annotations or they did minimal annotations.
2. The annotations that were done were often confirming literal comprehension or asking questions about places where they were confused. 
3. The story we chose, "A Path Through the Cemetery" by Leonard Q. Ross, has a twist at the end that is easy to understand if the reader is paying attention to details and can make inferences. Very few students caught the ending correctly and fully.
4. I got a lot of insight about students as readers from the annotations that I didn't necessarily get from the follow-up questions. I discovered who made inferences as they went along, who connected to other texts or the world, who did word fix-up work, and who was confused throughout (and didn't do anything to fix up their confusion).

There seems to be a logical cause-effect relationship in the above noticings: Without annotations, students didn't read closely enough nor pause in their thinking enough to understand deeper meaning. However, I still wasn't sure whether the problem was that students didn't see the point of annotating, and therefore, didn't stop to do it even though they were constructing meaning all along, or that they weren't digging deeply enough in their reading to construct meaning. Without annotations, I couldn't decipher the problem. 

image from Amazon.com

So I tackled both at once, and taught them a strategy I found in Dorothy Barnhouse and Vicki Vinton's What Readers Really Do: Teaching the Process of Meaning Making (Heinemann, 2012). They suggested a two-column note-taking chart that tracked what was said in the text, and what that text meant, or "subtext". The idea is that readers pay attention to not just the literal meaning in the text, but that readers also track the implications: character motivations; what the author is showing about mood, traits, relationships; tone; connections between events and characters, etc. Doing this work gets readers to the deeper levels of inferring and synthesizing that are necessary for more complex texts like those encountered in 8th grade and beyond. Here is an excerpted example from my Reading Notebook which I used as a model for the students:

Throughout the unit, I saw students doing more and more text/subtext work in their notebooks. Some were still using it as a way to restate the literal meaning, but more and more were making inferences from the details they captured. It became a great launching point for conferences because their reading thinking was visible to me.

By the post assessment, a repeat of the pre-assessment but with a new story, their annotations were much more complete and deeper, showing the subtext and not just restating what was already there. Many more students annotated than the first time as well. This allowed them to really dig into the inferred meaning, and their follow-up answers were much richer because of it.

My next step is to have them reflect on how doing annotations helped them understand stories better. I hope that will also bring home the purpose for stopping and jotting, so that they will continue to use it as we tackle more complex texts in English Language Arts, and also in Social Studies.

What strategies do you use to get kids to dig deeper into their reading comprehension? How do you make that thinking visible?

Anecdotal Notes: Still crazy after all these years!

Anecdotal notes-- AAAARGH! You would think that after 30 years of teaching, I would have this beast figured out! I want to capture the important stuff about kids as it happens, but I don't want to spend a lot of time doing it. I also need my system to be organized and easy to use. I want to track data about individuals as well as easily identify small groups with similar needs. Is there one system that can do it all?

I've tried the notebook approach: Each student gets a page in a notebook, and I take notes on that page when I confer or get a new piece of data (like a standardized test score or a reading goal) or have a parent conference. That works pretty well if I'm only going to focus on the individual and his/her progress. It's much harder to see trends across the class or pull together small groups.

I've tried an iPad app called Confer. It seemed like it could hold individual info as well as do the kind of sorting/grouping I was looking for. It also promised a way to match student information with the CCSS standards to track progress and help with standards-based grading. However, the set up took so long, inputting the CCSS and students, and typing on the iPad is so slow for me, that I abandoned that method as well.

For several years I used a card system that was housed in a folder. Each student had a card, but unlike the notebook idea, the cards were taped onto the interior sides of the folder in a tiered manner, so that one overlapped the other, leaving a small portion visible at the bottom. Student names were written on the visible part, and I could use that space to track how often I met with a student. Again, this was good for individual progress, and a better system for making sure I was getting to all students in a timely manner, but still not so good at pulling together groups of common needs. Also, handwriting is slow work!

So this year I am back to technology. Our tech coach suggested using Google Forms as a system. It's not slick and it's not fancy, but so far it's working out. I have a form that lists student names as a "checklist" of answers to "question", a list of my unit names as the checklist answers to my next "question", an open text box to answer the question of Notes, and a final open text box for the question of Items for Next Meeting. As I confer or get data, I select a student name and unit from the checkboxes, quickly type in my conference notes, and capture what next steps will be. This data, along with the date, is gathered in Responses, which can be viewed as a Google spreadsheet.

The advantage of the spreadsheet is in the sorting and filtering it can do that the notebook and flip cards can't. If I want to see all notes on a student, I can sort names alphabetically, and all responses for the student are clustered together.

If I want to see which students need work on their close reading, for example, I can filter out only the Short Story Reading unit, and even find all responses that have the words "close reading" in them. Voila! A small group with similar needs!

So far I don't have many notes on kids because we are just getting started in school. I wonder if the spreadsheet will eventually get messy or bulky and hard to use. I may need to have one for semester 1 and one for semester 2. However, it has fulfilled a lot of needs so far.

Another tech tool suggested by the tech coach was Evernote. I haven't done much exploring with it yet because I'm kind-of into Google Forms right now. So I'm keeping that option in my back pocket as I see how Forms plays out.

What is your anecdotal note systems? Does yours handle multiple classes and large numbers of kids? Can you track individuals as well as filter/sort for small groups?

Assessment Shifts in the C3 Framework

About a year ago, I wrote a post about practicing argument strategies with an in-class debate structure called Socratic Smackdown during Social Studies. Well, here we are again, doing the same thing at the same time of year. However, this year we are also implementing the C3 Framework, so the unit was revised (see last month's blog about that). This prompted some re-thinking about the order that information was presented, the materials used, how to scaffold student learning, and how to assess.

image from wikimedia.org

Last year, students worked through the content information by reading textbook sections and answering the questions afterward. We discussed the information in class, worked with it during the Town Hall Meetings (using Socratic Smackdown), captured the information on a slick digital timeline (Timeline JS3, Northwest University, 2015), and watched part of The Revolution (History Channel, 2011). At the end of the unit, students took a test on their content learning. It contained 10 multiple choice knowledge questions, three questions interpreting visual primary source documents that we had discussed in class, and one constructed response synthesizing question. Students who studied the textbook did well on this test. 

This year, students looked for answers to historical questions using primary source documents. They used the textbook and video information from The Revolution to help them build the digital timeline, and section questions were optional. We discussed information in class and debated during Town Hall Meetings. They wrote answers to the supporting historical questions.

The C3 unit plan I used as a model, American Revolution (C3 Teachers), has this as its final assessment:

This is obviously very different than the unit test we used last year, and it prompted a long discussion with my teaching partner. First, the compelling question uses so much more evaluative and critical thinking than the test, yet students would need content knowledge in order to answer it. It also flows directly from the unit work we did, especially the supporting questions. We definitely wanted to keep the compelling question as the centerpiece of our assessment. 

Second, we talked long about the format of the assessment. Would a poster or mulitmedia presentation (what is that? a slideshow? screen cast?) give us enough to know whether students really understood? Would we have to add three days to our unit to accommodate the time it always takes for students to make a tech project? Would students who are not good writers be fairly graded if they wrote an essay? Do we want to take the time to grade 46 essays? What format would be engaging yet practical? Ultimately, we returned to the question: What have students been practicing? We decided that having small Town Hall Meetings was most logical because that is what they have been practicing throughout the unit, and it gives them the opportunity to show what they know without having to write long. Students would record their discussions so there could be four going on at once.

But what about those students who are not good speakers? How will they show their learning fairly? Part of the Socratic Smackdown rubric grades preparation, including text evidence and analyzing the evidence.

This is work we emphasized before each of the Town Hall Meetings during the unit. We decided that students should make an outline "that addresses the compelling question using specific claims and relevant evidence from historical sources while acknowledging competing views" on one day, and then use that outline during the final Town Hall Meeting discussion. This captures the thinking of our struggling writers and speakers, as well as making everyone's argument better. The outline would be graded as part of the final summative grade.

Third, we kept coming back to the prompt when it asks students to use "relevant evidence from historical sources". We knew we wanted students to move beyond memorized textbook knowledge and show us they could use primary and secondary sources to answer historical questions. We thought hard about the question, "What do historians do?" Yes, they have a lot of background information in their heads because they have studied it for a long time. But mostly they look at resources and try to put the various pieces together. We decided that students could not answer the compelling question by spitting back memorized textbook information. Therefore, we decided to give their work on the digital timeline relevance by allowing them to use it for the assessment. They could also access all of the primary source documents we worked with in class, as well as their answers to the supporting questions in their Social Studies notebooks. 

So here is the final result, our end of unit summative assessment for the Road to Revolution:

Day 1:
Was the American Revolution avoidable? Create an outline that addresses whether or not the American Revolution was avoidable. It should address the compelling question using specific claims and relevant evidence from historical sources (digital timeline, historical documents, and SS notebook only) while acknowledging competing views.

Day 2:

Was the American Revolution avoidable? Discuss the question in a small group Town Hall Meeting (record your discussion). It should address the compelling question using specific claims and relevant evidence from historical sources while acknowledging competing views (use your outline).

Curriculum implementation challenges my comfort level. It was easy to make, give, and grade the old test. The new assessment will be much harder. However, it is more authentic, meaty, and engaging, and it allows students with various strengths to show what they know and can do. And that is all good!

Using Technology to Grade Book Club Discussions

My school has taken the plunge into standards-based grading. Well, maybe I should say: my school has waded in up to its ankles into standards-based grading. We are grading and reporting on a small, manageable number of "categories" related to standards rather than each individual standard. For English Language Arts, we've chunked the standards into Reading, Writing, and Speaking & Listening (Language standards are incorporated under Reading and Writing). So far this semester I have given 3 Reading summative assessments, 1 Writing summative, and 0 Speaking & Listening assessments. 

Luckily, we are finishing our novel unit this week, which includes their third Book Club discussion. This seems like a perfect opportunity to grade Speaking & Listening standards! But without "fishbowling" six discussions (and taking 2 or 3 class periods to do so), how can I fairly assess each group? Getting around and listening to six discussions for 5-7 minutes each may not catch the normally quiet student who said all their "good stuff" while I was with another group. 

image from commons.wikimedia.com

Technology to the rescue! Students recorded their first two discussions using either QuickTime or Garage Band, and uploaded the audio file into a shared Google folder. Last year we tried using the Photo Booth app on their Macs, but the resulting video file was too large to upload. We discovered that audio files are smaller and easy to upload, and really it's the audio we want anyway. 

The first two discussions were formative. Students received the Book Club Discussion rubric before they began so they were aware of what would be assessed. As students discussed (and recorded), I walked around and spent a few minutes with about 4 groups. I coded the discussion so I could have a sense of how it was going: NT- New Topic, Add- Added to previous comment, TE- used Text Evidence, I- interruption, etc. 

If things seemed dire, I would interrupt and prompt the group; for example, "I've been sitting here for a few minutes, and I've already heard three new topics. See if you can stick with one discussion thread for longer so you can really dig deep into your ideas." Then I would listen for a few more minutes and see if they could make the correction. In all cases, before I left I would interrupt the discussion and give feedback to the group: "So here is what I heard while I was sitting here: 'A' started a new topic about ___, and then 'B' added on with some interpretation, and then 'C' brought in text evidence. This was a great way to keep the discussion going. I also noticed 'C' kept talking and never let 'D' have a chance. Make sure you are giving everyone equal air time. That's everyone's job to monitor. If you notice someone hasn't talked, be sure to invite them in. If you know you've already said a lot, hold your thought until others have a chance to speak. If you know you haven't said much, make sure your voice is heard-- you have important things to contribute!" When the discussion time was finished, the group rated themselves and others for the four categories of Prepared, Quality of Speaking, Quality of Listening, and Behavior. They then made a group goal for the next discussion. 

During the second discussion, they reviewed their goal, and repeated the process. I made sure I sat with the groups I hadn't seen the first round, and went back to those that had the most trouble previously. Again, groups recorded their discussion, rated themselves and others, and made a goal for their final one.

Now that students have had practice in recording (we had some tech issues to resolve the first time around), are familiar with the rubric because they used it for reflection and goal setting, and have gotten teacher and peer feedback, they should be ready for the final summative discussion. On Monday they will repeat the process just like they did the first two times. I will walk around, but I will not interrupt or give feedback this time. I want this to be independent, but I can also get info about body language, preparation (do they have their books and notebooks with them?), and behavior which the audio recordings may not pick up.  

Then I can sit down with their self-rated rubrics and listen to full discussions from the audio files. I will be able to catch the quiet kid who is reluctant to talk when I am sitting with the group. I can hear the "good stuff" come up and not just judge the bits and pieces I overhear for a few minutes. Technology allows me to be everywhere at once, which means I can grade each student fairly.

How do you grade Book Club discussions?

Moving into Standards-based Grading and Reporting

Our school took the plunge into standards-based grading and reporting this year. Oh, we've had standards for years, and our UbD unit planning has ensured that we at least knew which standards connected to the unit. But until the grade book and report card demanded that we specifically connect a grade to a standard, we continued on our merry way hoping our assessments captured at least some of the standards, much like flinging a handful of pebbles at a target, hoping some will hit.

We took a middle road, though: we don't have to report on every standard, just on "strands". For English Language Arts, we settled on Reading, Writing, and Listening & Speaking. They make sense to us and how our standards are organized... until we get to those units where we are using our reading to inform our writing content (e.g., literary essay and research reports), or have cross-disciplinary projects (e.g., investigative journalism about environmental issues).

cc 2.0 by Colin_K on Flickr

So this is our first Professional Learning Team (PLT) investigation: How can you use one assessment to grade and report on more than one standard strand?

There are a few sub-questions here: 

• Is it fair to "double dip" (in other words, can one assessment be counted twice)?
• How specific should we be about dividing up the assessment into "strands"? Could we just use one holistic score and put it in two strands? Or do we have to identify which section goes into which strand and keep track of it that way?
• Do we even know which specific standards are being assessed on the assessment? If we were called on by a parent or administrator, could we justify the grade based on the standards assessed?
• Does going to standards-based grading and reporting mean that we have to create more assessments, such as "artificial" tests and quizzes that get us away from our authentic assessments, so that we have enough evidence for the grade in a particular strand?

My inclination is to go for specifics, analyzing the assessment to identify where each standard is assessed and then tracking those parts for depth of student learning. This would be possible with a fairly simple template, though it would take more time before and after the assessment. Doing this kind of analysis would ensure that all the standards got assessed (and yes, we may need some more assessments, or expand the ones we have, to include all standards) and that the grade reported is actually reflective of achievement on the standards.

cc by ePublicist on Flickr

As our PLT moves through our cycle of continuous learning, we will be wrestling with these questions and others that come up. I hope we will be able to look at some models from other schools and settle on a system that makes sense for our school. 

We would love to hear feedback about what has worked in other schools. If you have a suggestion, please leave a comment!

On-demand Performance Assessments vs. The Grading Load

One of the things I love about teaching writing with a Workshop approach is the opportunity to support students as they are in the midst of independent projects. This just-in-time teaching allows for differentiation, re-teaching, stretching, and confirming. There are often “ah ha!” moments. Workshop also allows the opportunity for creating a community of learners: peers helping each other, sharing with partners, small groups, or the whole class. Taking a risk in such a supported classroom feels do-able, and students make big growth. Often as I grade final projects, I can see the tracks of my teaching—both whole group and individual—reflected in student work. This is very satisfying as a teacher.

CC0 image from pixabay website

On the other hand, as I grade final projects, I wonder how much of the work is their own. How well can they actually do the things I am asking them to do without all the support they get? Where is the line between scaffolding the learning so students can grow, and expecting them to show their learning independently?

Our new units from the TCRWP staff recommend on-demand writing both before and after a unit is taught. Before-unit writing allows the teacher to see what skills students already have and areas for growth. After-unit writing shows what students have learned from the unit. In-between these on-demand writing pieces is the workshop: self-selected independent projects supported by directed teaching, individual conferring, and peer sharing.

Jay McTighe and Grant Wiggins advocate for performance assessments that show transfer of learning goals. In an Understanding by Design (UbD) white paper (ASCD, 2012), they explain the third of their seven key tenets: “Understanding is revealed when students autonomously make sense of and transfer their learning through authentic performance. Six facets of understanding—the capacity to explain, interpret, apply, shift perspective, empathize, and self-assess—can serve as indicators of understanding”.  The words “autonomously” and “apply” jump out at me. They seem to be agreeing with the TCRWP staff that on-demand performance is the only way to see true understanding and learning.

So what do those ideas mean for me as a teacher? And how does grading intersect with these ideas? Although ideally I’d like to teach and assess without putting a grade on a piece of work, I know that is not the reality of school. Grades are supposed to show how well students are achieving the learning standards. We are obligated to communicate a student’s achievement on report cards, and at our school, that means assigning a grade to their work.

If I take McTighe & Wiggins’ and TCRWP’s suggestions and meld them with my grading obligation, ideally my unit should look like this:

1. Before-unit on-demand writing to pre-assess student learning. This would be used by the teacher to inform upcoming teaching, as well as by students to set learning goals.
2. Three to four weeks of workshop during which students work on self-selected independent projects supported by teaching and feedback.  This would be filled with formative feedback as students practice their new skills within the supported environment.
3. After-unit on-demand writing to assess mastery of learning standards and transfer of understanding. This would be a summative grade that goes on the report card.

I have a few questions about this “ideal” unit assessment scenario. First and foremost, I wonder if students will put their full effort into their weeks-long processed workshop piece knowing that it doesn’t “count” toward their grade. Right now, most students will pour over their writing product with a fine-tooth comb, comparing their work to the rubric descriptors, asking questions of peers and me to fix it up to meet the standard. What’s the point in putting in all that effort if that piece of work doesn’t “count” toward a grade?

Second, what if the post-unit on-demand assessment falls on a bad day for the student? This is one of the big caveats to relying on standardized testing data to define student ability: it’s just a snapshot of one day, and maybe that was a bad day for that student. How can one day’s work define the learning of a whole unit? What if the students know more than the assessment allows them to show?

Third, who has time to score three pieces of writing for every unit? I spend hours evaluating student writing as it is, and I’m not doing all the on-demand pieces. I’ve asked this question in workshops, and get the answer that the on-demands (especially the pre-assessment) shouldn’t take all that long because the point is to just get a “sense” of where the student is, not examine it with a fine-tooth comb. Well, maybe that works in elementary where writing is brief, but give an 8th grader 45 minutes to write an on-demand piece and I get two pages typed—single spaced, size 12 font. Just reading the piece takes at least 5 minutes, and then another 5 minutes or so to score, multiplied times 45 students, and I’m looking at a minimum of 7.5 hours. If I’m assigning a summative grade, as I would for the post-unit on-demand assessment, I would probably double that because I do need to examine the writing with a fine-tooth comb.

Could there be a compromise? What if…

1. Only the student uses the pre-assessment on-demand piece to make goals for the unit? Once the student shares those goals with me, I can use them to guide my conferring, and possibly whole class instruction as well if enough students have the same goals. Once the unit gets rolling, I would focus on the work in front of us and not the on-demand anyway when I am conferring with students. This would take one of the 7.5-grading-hour commitments off my plate.
2. The processed piece and the post-unit on-demand each count 50% of the summative unit grade? This would give enough weight to the processed piece that students would want to work hard on it over the three-four week unit, and also show what students can do independently.  It would honor the long-term work as well as the one-day snapshot. I’m still looking at double the grading time, though. That’s still a problem.

It seems there is a disconnect between the “ideal” and the reality of the day-to-day life of a teacher. I’m not sure how to resolve this. Any thoughts out in the blogosphere? How do you handle on-demand assessments? How do you find time to evaluate multiple pieces of writing for the same set of learning standards?

"Is this graded?"

After three heavy weekends of grading and reporting, I can finally come up for air. Oh yeah, of course I still have some work to do-- it's never ending-- but this weekend it's about feedback and not about grading, and it's only about 3 hours' worth instead of 10 hours' worth.

Our middle school faculty is doing a book study of Thomas Guskey's Answers to Essential Questions about Standards, Assessments, Grading, and Reporting (Corwin, 2012). We have been having a lot of discussion about formative assessment: what it is, what it looks like, what to do with it once we have it. We are not new to the concepts of formative and summative assessments. We did a lot of work around those ideas about 5 years ago and have been working with it since. It's pretty surprising, then, how much variety we have as a faculty in our understanding and use of formative assessments.

Five years ago, our middle school made a decision to make our grade books consistent by having two categories of grades: formative (weighted as 15% of the whole grade) and summative (weighted at 85%). This change definitely made a big difference in helping our students and parents understand how grades were being calculated. Before this change, some teachers were counting homework as 85% and tests as 15%, others had standards-based categories (for example, world language teachers had categories for Speaking, Listening, Reading, and Writing-- each weighted as 25% of the total grade), and others had categories that included participation and collaboration. The 85%/15% weighting keeps us teachers focused on using grades to show achievement of standards, rather than behaviors (like participation), and keeps the grade reflective of how well the student can achieve on his/her own (summative assessments like tests and performance tasks and in-class projects) rather than practice opportunities (like homework).

This system has been good for teachers and parents, but we are starting to question the value for students. Students have become "trained" to ask, "Is it formative or summative?" when an assignment is given. Teachers infer that students use the answer to gauge how much effort they should put into completing the assignment: not much if it's formative, quite a bit if it's summative. It makes sense, considering the weighting categories, and our students are not fools. They do what they need to do when playing the game of school. (You can tell I am in the midst of a poetry unit! I may be a poet and not even know it!)

According to Guskey, formative assessments are supposed to give feedback to students about how well they are meeting the standard (and hopefully some information about how to get closer) as well as giving feedback to teachers about how to adjust instruction based on where students are in their learning. Bottom line, formatives shouldn't be graded because their purpose is practice and feedback. 

So our conversations about formative assessments have two sides to them: we understand and agree to the concept that they shouldn't be graded, yet we wonder if students will take them seriously if we don't slap a grade on them (even a small one like 15%). 

I think we can get away from grading formative assessments if we do more work re-training our students to view them as learning opportunities in which they get to practice a skill or strategy and get feedback about how well they are doing before the summative assessment. To that end, I have been watching my language when I make assignments and get the inevitable question, "Is this graded?" I am using the phrases "learning opportunity" and "get feedback" more and more often. 

It's been interesting to see how this response affects students. The students who "get it" really do use the feedback to improve their work. I saw this very clearly when I was grading fantasy stories last weekend (one of the 10-hour work weekends I've been having): students who used the rubric to self-assess and make goals asked for help from peers and me when they got into trouble spots, and made improvements based on that feedback. Their summative assessment results placed them squarely in the A-B range. Those students who went off on their own and disregarded my feedback, did not get help from peers, and didn't see the rubric as a tool to improve their writing, sat squarely in the C-D range. 

I have a selfish interest in the "no grades for formative" debates too-- less grading for me to do! I still need to hold students accountable for doing the practice pieces (homework, in-class activities), but a complete/incomplete designation in the grade book can take care of that. As for "formative feedback", that is work I am glad to take on as long as students use it to make improvements before their summative. 

Now I have to get back to giving feedback on poetry analysis annotations. They will want to use it when they write it up for their summative poetry anthology project.

Using Checklists for Self-Reflection, Goal-Setting, and Formative Feedback

We are in the final week of our first CCSS-aligned writing unit: Literary Essays. Throughout the unit, I have been using the student checklists provided by the Units of Study in Argument, Information, and Narrative Writing (Heinemann, 2014). The only modification I made was that I took off the grade level indicator from the top of the checklist. Since we are in the first year of implementation, I did not want students to feel stupid because they were not yet working up to the Grade 7 CCSS expectations at the beginning of eighth grade. Instead of the grade level indicators, I labeled them Semester 1 (Grade 7) and Semester 2 (Grade 8). We will use these checklists again at the end of the year with our Position Papers unit.

CC image from pixabay

I first had students assess their on-demand argument writing piece using the Grade 7 Argument Writing Checklist. They rated themselves as "Not Yet", "Starting To", or "Yes!" for each descriptor under the categories of Overall, Lead, Transitions, Endings, Organization, Elaboration, Craft, and Mechanics. I had also rated their on-demands using the checklist, but I did not share my scoring with them-- I wanted them to think honestly about what they saw they were capable of achieving and where they saw their writing had gaps. I noticed that the students were fairly accurate in their ratings, although they tended to rate themselves higher on some of the more complex areas than I did. I think this is probably because they didn't have a good sense of what the target was yet.

Once that was done, I asked them to choose 2-3 of their "Starting To" areas, and write goals for the upcoming unit. I asked them to target the "Starting To" areas because those were skills they felt they had some competence with, and those were areas that they could see immediate progress and success. Goals that are baby steps-- that lift the level of current writing-- are more motivating than trying to take a giant leap into the unknown and hoping you get there, uncertain where to even start. 

The first bend in the Literary Essay unit focused on writing a Theme Essay. Over the course of seven lessons, students analyzed short stories for theme, wrote their thinking in their reading notebooks, made a plan for the lit essay, drafted the essay, and revised for strong topic sentences, making evidence logical, adding counterclaims, and learning more about internal punctuation. During the course of the daily lessons, I conferred with students, and often used their goals as a starting point for the conference: So, how's your goal going? Can you show me the work you've been doing to improve ___? This helped the students to keep focused on the goal and to keep ownership in the learning process.

On the day the Theme Essay draft was due, students received a new checklist: the Grade 7 and 8 Argument Writing Checklist (the two checklists are side by side, so students can see where they need to go next-- like a continuum). Again, they scored their Theme Essay draft using the checklist, and used it to write some goals to carry them forward to the next half of the unit. I also asked them to do some reflection on their first set of goals by completing this sentence: I used to _____, but then I learned how to ____ by _____. Interestingly, most students chose something that was brand-new to them (e.g., adding a counterclaim, or using logic in their body paragraphs) rather than reflecting on the success of their goals. I guess these were their big new "aha!" skills.

Bend II: The Author's Craft Essay. Last week, students collected author's craft analysis entries in their reading notebooks, and created a plan for their next lit essay draft. They will write with flying fingers on Sunday, using all they learned from the theme essay section in their next draft. They will work to lift the level of this draft by keeping their goals in mind.

But now it's my turn to work with the checklist. I believe that timely, specific feedback does big work in moving students forward. I don't want to wait until their final draft and the summative rubric to give them feedback about what they are doing well and what they need to improve on. I also don't want to tell them "what to fix" in their Theme Essay. As Lucy Calkins reminds me, "Teach the writer, not the writing." My feedback needs to be useful to them as they move into the next essay (and all the rest across this year in all subjects, and beyond) rather than dwelling on the last essay. 

So this weekend I am reading Theme Essay drafts with the self-assessed Grade 7 and 8 Argument Writing Checklist in hand. I am marking with green highlighter what I see they are doing, and where I see they fall in the "Starting To", and "Yes!" ranking, for each descriptor. I am marking 3-4 descriptors as "Not Yet" or "Starting To" with pink highlighter where I think they need to do some work to lift the level to where it should be. Then I am writing next to that descriptor how to do it (if they already knew how to do it, they would have done it already!). I tried to pick descriptors that I knew I'd already taught into, so that I could send them to a chart or model as a scaffold for using the strategy. For example, if I highlighted Transitions, I would write "Use the Thinking Prompts sentence starters as transitions to link your reason, your evidence and your analysis." My feedback on the checklist will also be the starting point for conferences and small group work over the course of Bend II.

The Literary Essay unit ends in five more lessons. By the time they turn in their finalized, self-assessed (yes, once again) essay, they will have used the checklist at least three times: before the unit to set goals, mid-unit to reflect and set new goals, and at the end to reflect on their growth as writers over the course of the past four weeks. I will have given each student two pieces of written feedback (I also wrote comments on each early draft regarding their thesis and topic sentences) and several verbal conferences. Between the descriptors on the checklists and the model texts, students have had a clear target to shoot for, and feedback to guide them along the way. I am fully expecting to see significant growth in their essay writing skills in their final essay.

Jumping into Scoring On-Demand Assessments

I am about to jump with both feet into the hard work of analyzing student work to make my teaching better. This work is made harder because I am using a new tool, the rubrics in the Units of Study in Argument, Information, and Narrative Writing (UoSW) for grade 8 (Heinemann, 2014). These rubrics are written as a continuum of skills along categories that match the CCSS writing standards' performance indicators. There are categories for leads, endings, transition words, organization, elaboration, craft, mechanics, and an overall category. Although these are things I evaluated using our modified Six Traits rubric for the past four years, the wording is different and open to interpretation in places. 

Rubric excerpt from Units of Study in Argument, Information, and Narrative Writing (Heinemann, 2014)

I now have 43 on-demand pieces of argument writing to analyze before we jump into our literary essay unit in a couple of weeks. Because the rubric is so unfamiliar, however, I am looking at this stack with trepidation. I feel unready to tackle this task without a better understanding of what I'm supposed to look for. I need a plan.

I already tried out the rubric once with my department team members, as we collaboratively scored a seventh grade student sample. It didn't go well. We had so many questions like, "How is 'clearly articulated' different from 'logical' evidence?" "The rubric jumps from one thing to another. Is it supposed to be a progression?" We were definitely not comfortable with the tool, nor did we come to any clear understanding of how to use it with any grading consistency. 

I think I need do one more "training" exercise before I try to score my own students' writing. The UoSW provides annotated teacher-written exemplars that meet the grade level standards. I think I need to sit down with the grade 6, grade 7, and grade 8 exemplars as well as the rubrics, and try to match them up. Where the annotation says this is the "clearly articulated" evidence, what does that look like? How can I see it in my students' writing as well? I want to have all three levels in front of me because I know my students will be all over the place depending on their past experiences and their developmental levels. Even my better writers may be at a sixth grade level in some areas, and my struggling writers may reach the eighth grade level in others. In general, though, I expect I will see mostly seventh grade writing, which makes sense because we are just starting eighth grade!

By getting a clearer image of what the rubric descriptors look like in a writing sample, I hope to do a better, more consistent job scoring my students' writing. I also hope that once I get on a roll, I will start being more efficient with my time. I expect the first few (5? 10? 20?) will take about 20 minutes each as I work through the descriptors and make judgments about what I'm seeing in front of me. Getting that down to 10 minutes each would be much more comfortable.

In the end, I will have a bank of data that can lead me into making better teaching decisions during the literary essay writing unit itself. I can plan whole class mini-lessons to target general needs. I can plan small group work where I see clusters of need. I can confer with individuals to move them from where they are to where they need to go. I don't need to guess or wait until mid-unit when I look over drafts. 

I can also ask students to use this writing sample as a way to set some goals to work on during the unit, identifying a few areas to really pay attention to and work to improve. The process of reflecting on oneself as a writer, identifying needs and goals, and working to improve is an act of self-actuality. It puts the responsibility to learn and grow as a writer actively on the students' shoulders, instead of passively waiting for the teacher to tell them what to do. Isn't this the goal of becoming a lifelong learner?

So. Big work ahead, but good work. Important work. Work that will strengthen my teaching and strengthen student learning. Deep breath! 

Matching Data, Kids, and Books

My professional goal this year is to set up my classroom library as a teaching tool to support students into reading more complex texts. I have already done some work on this (and blogged about it): completed inventory with guided reading/lexile levels indicated when available, book ladders developed in several genres based on TCRWP lists, and a home reading expectation with regular accountability check-ins. A couple weeks ago I took the next step.

I was home for a sick day, one of those days where you're not all that sick, but you know going into school would be a very bad idea. I decided I would use my long quiet day to do some work with my new book ladders. I had three data points to work with: January MAP Reading data (especially suggested Lexile range), January reading log via Shelfari (www.shelfari.com) which allowed me to identify the book(s) students read during the month, and my knowledge of the kids at this point in the year.

After I captured the MAP data and the Shelfari books, I took a look at my book ladders to make a suggestion for a next book to read. This is where my knowledge of the kids came in. 

image from goodreads.com

I noticed one student who scored relatively low on the MAP was reading books like From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler (Level S, Lexile 700) and Charlotte's Web (Lexile 680). His MAP score suggested he should read books in the 897-1040 range. It seemed to me that he was a kid who is not very confident in his reading, and is relying on books he'd read in the past, or felt comfortable to him. If I look purely at the Lexiles of these books, I notice he's actually not too far off of his recommended range (at the lower end). So putting books in his hand that are not a huge jump up in complexity (to maintain the comfort level), but that are more 8th grade appropriate, seemed the way to go. Since From the Mixed Up Files is a mystery, I thought he might like to keep going with that genre. I suggested he read Silent to the Bone (also by E. L. Konigsburg), which is Level V, Lexile 810. This gives him a jump up in level and maturity of text, but keeps him with a familiar author and genre. 

image from paperbackswap.com

On the other end of the spectrum, I noticed one of my best readers had been reading Scorpia Rising (Lexile 780), and I Am Zlatan Ibrahimovic (unrated). His MAP suggested he read books in the 1275-1425 range. My knowledge of this boy along with this data tells me that he is a huge soccer fan, reads nonfiction as well as fiction, is interested in current events because we had a long conversation about Nelson Mandela's recent death, and would prefer to do other more active things than read. My suggestion for him was Nelson Mandela's biography No Easy Walk to Freedom (X/990). Although the guided reading level is low for him, the Lexile gets him closer to his suggested range. I also know that he is not going to independently read something that is at his suggested high Lexile level, usually either classic texts or primary source documents. He needs something interesting or he'll put it down in a hurry.

I did this for each student, and sent each of them an email with my suggestion. A few wrote back and said they'd already read it. Others thanked me and said they'd been looking for something new to read. And for the next few days, books were flying out of my classroom library.

Granted, this process took me several hours. I don't have the time to do this every month. However, if I can keep some of my lower kids reading (priority #1) more complex books (priority #2), this should support their progress across the year. In addition, if I can help my higher level kids read books they find interesting AND challenging (most books at the 8th grade level are around the 700-800 lexile level), their more advanced reading skills can be challenged as well.

Some Take-Aways from Amanda Hartman's Workshop on Writing Continuua

Last weekend I traveled to Muscat, Oman with my 7th grade colleague to attend a weekend workshop led by Amanda Hartman of Columbia University's Teacher's College Reading and Writing Project (TCRWP). This workshop focused on using the new CCSS-aligned continua for writing as a tool to study student work. Since Amanda is a primary level expert, most of her examples were from the early elementary grades, although she did bring in a few upper elementary examples, and she tried to address some middle school concerns for those of us in the audience.

By the end of the weekend, I had a few take-aways:

1. The collaborative work we have done over the past four years in middle school around reading and writing workshop has paid off in a cohesive, vertical spiral. This take-away is a result of the many conversations I had with my 7th grade colleague around the student work samples we each brought, the thinking we shared around what we do with students, and how much we trusted each other to voice concerns or issues in our classes. Although I am less confident with the sixth grade program because those teachers are newer, I know that the flow from 7th to 8th is a smooth progression. 
2. Having tools aligned to both the CCSS standards and TCRWP units of study can save us a lot of time and energy. The assessment rubrics we use now were developed collaboratively within our department. There was value in that, especially through the discussions we had around what we were looking for in writing at each grade level, and how to write a good rubric. As we shift to the CCSS next year, though, it will be nice to have the rubrics, checklists, continuua, and exemplars already made for us. Of course we will gather our own exemplars as well, but having some on hand as we jump into our revised units is great.
3. Breaking out some of the discrete skills from the continuum and turning it into a "mini-rubric" can make those skills more visible. For example, one of the more important skills on the writing rubric is the ability to elaborate. Last month, I gathered a Social Studies essay from my students that showed very little elaboration (or, according to the instructions, "explaining"). I decided I would break down what "explaining" was at 4 levels of complexity, including an example for each. When I returned the essays, I asked the students to compare their level of explanation to the rubric and evaluate where their essay fell. Most could see they were at the 1 or 2 level. I then asked them to pick one thing they would do differently next time they needed to explain something, and write that goal at the bottom of their rubric. Throughout this next unit, they have been practicing explaining ideas to their partner, using the Explaining rubric as a reminder of what is expected. My hope is that there will be a jump in their elaboration on the next essay.
   
4. 4. Amanda's recommendation of doing on-demand writing as a pre- and post-assessment for all three genres makes my head explode. My grading load is at a level now that I can barely keep up with it. One writing piece takes me at least 5 minutes to read, and then at least another 5 minutes to evaluate. Add in comments or noticings of student strengths and weaknesses, and there goes another 5 minutes. Multiply those 15 minutes by 45 student samples, and multiply those 11 hours by 6 on-demands plus 4 writing projects for grading, and there would be nothing left of my life except assessing writing. I understand the value: I can see what students can do on their own without any support or assistance. But to be realistic, there's got to be another way.

It's good to break away from the routine of teaching to examine our practices and challenge our thinking. I think the work of using the CCSS/TCRWP continuua to assess student work is not something we are ready for yet. However, as we launch into our revised units next year, they will be wonderful tools to have on hand, as well as a focus for more collaborative conversations.

Using Formative Assessments to Improve Lit Essay Writing

We are required, as part of our curriculum, to give a core assessment at the beginning and at the end of the year. This core assessment is supposed to show growth in the subject, and is used as one data point along with standardized testing (when available) and in-class unit assessments. For the English Language Arts curriculum, we ask students to read a short story and write a literary essay about it. We use the same Six Traits literary essay rubric that we use during our Lit Essay unit. For the past several years that I've been doing this, I whipped through the scoring, knowing that the students weren't going to see or use the information until the end of the year when they did a reflection about their growth as writers. I scored the essays for the data point they were, trying to minimize the time commitment they required of me.

And then I read this article by Nancy Frey and Doug Fisher in English Journal, "A Formative Assessment System for Writing Improvement" (103.1, 2013, 66-71). Frey and Fisher advocate for a documentation system in which errors on a piece of writing done early in the unit can be clustered together by type, and then follow-up instruction is easy to organize and implement. They provided an example chart that made their system clear. Their point is that spending time assessing, and then instructing based on the information gleaned, early in the writing process will improve student writing much more than the red ink explosion we often expend on the final piece and which students generally ignore.

This is certainly not a new idea to me, more like review than an "ah ha!" moment. However, sometimes these reminders come at exactly the right time to change my habits. This was one of those times. I was just about to sit down to score my core assessment literary essays. And we are in the early stages of our lit essay unit.

So using Frey and Fisher's example chart as a model, I made the left-hand column of my error analysis chart reflect the main points from the literary essay rubric (see below). As I scored the essays, I found I needed some sub-categories to be more specific about the types of errors I was seeing. I included these sub-categories in the right-hand column, along with the students' names that needed support with that particular skill (I removed the names before posting to preserve anonymity).

Error	Class 1
Introduction includes thesis statement that alerts reader to upcoming argument	No thesis: Expand: No intro:
Topic sentences link thesis to paragraph content	Topic sentence wording: No topic sentences: Body paragraphs connected to thesis:
Conclusion summarizes main ideas and includes a reflection/insight	No conclusion: Reflection:
Idea is supported by text evidence (quote or paraphrase)	Quotes: Paraphrase: Evidence supports topic sent/thesis: All parts of text:
Text evidence is explained for significance
Literary and academic words are used formally	precise words: Vocabulary building: Formal:
Sentences are fluent and grammatically correct	choppy sentences: concise: Verb tense shifting: Subject-verb/adjective-noun agreement:
Quotes are punctuated and cited correctly, including quoted dialogue
End punctuation is correct	end punctuation and comma splices: Clauses as sentences:
Editing tool used effectively	spell & grammar check:

Next, I looked at areas where a large number (a third or more of the class) had difficulty, and decided to make those whole-class lessons. For example, punctuating and citing quotes correctly is a skill that nearly half the class has not yet mastered. This will become a whole-class lesson. I will also do a whole-class lesson on introductions and conclusions. Since our 8th grade lit essay is focused on comparing two texts, a new structure for middle schoolers, having an introduction that sets up the structure for the reader, and a conclusion that goes beyond summary to a more generalized idea, are lessons everyone can learn. Within those whole-class lessons, though, I can still check in with individuals or small groups who need further scaffolding during conferring time. 

This system took about twice as much time as I normally spend with the core assessments. However, I think it is worth it so that my students can get targeted instruction that meets their writing needs when they will actually use it. Frey and Fisher suggest that time spent assessing early in the process means that teachers need less time assessing at the end of the process because we have already made our suggestions and recommendations. That makes sense too. 

Our next writing unit is short fiction. I wonder if I can get a quick fiction piece-- a pre-assessment as it were-- from students about a week before the unit starts. Getting the unit started with formative information already in place can help me know how to help my writers improve every day of the unit.