Schedules can make or break curriculum

I really love my teaching schedule, and that's not something I've said very much in my many years of teaching. I teach both English Language Arts (ELA) and Social Studies (SS) to two classes of eighth graders, 8C and 8D. My class periods are back-to-back for each group. We have a 6-day rotation schedule, so I see my two classes at different times of the day across a week. I also teach "Oasis" which is our middle school advisory program. Here's what it looks like: 

 

I have chunks of planning time each day, which are the same planning times as my teaching partner and the math/science teachers. This is great for collaboration, but also gives me time to tackle some marking (though it is never enough time to get it all done in the school day!). 

Another advantage of this schedule is that I can be somewhat flexible in how I use my double blocks. Usually I teach one block per subject, as is shown here. That ensures that I give equal time to each subject so that students get a full curriculum. But I can also steal a little time from one to give to the other if we need it (for example, test or publishing days), as long as I remember to give it back at another time!

Next week we are launching our short story writing unit in ELA which will last about 4 weeks. In about 2 weeks, we will be launching our investigative reporting writing unit in SS which will last about 3 weeks. That means our kids will be juggling two writing units, with two different genres, over the course of a couple weeks where they overlap. 

I put my writing hat on and thought about that from the student's point of view. If I were them, how would I feel if I wrote furiously for an hour (ish) on my fantasy short story, and then had to switch gears in my head to write furiously for another hour (ish) on my journalism article? That seems hard to me. I predict I would still have my fantasy world swirling in my head, and it would be difficult to pull myself into the real world of informational writing. 

CC image by Samantha on wikimedia commons

I can't really move the units. The ELA units are set up so students read a genre, and then write the genre. We're finishing our short story reading unit this week, which puts short story writing next. The SS unit is centered around our Week Without Walls trip at the end of October, so it has to happen then. So... I'm a bit stuck.

But getting back to my wonderful schedule, I do have a way to make this work. If I were a student with two different writing units going on at the same time, I would want to stick to just one genre at a time and go with it for a longer period. I can alternate ELA and SS days, so that students write fantasy short stories for the double block, 110 minutes, one day, and then write environmental science investigative reporting articles for 110 minutes the next. I can do mid-workshop interruptions to tuck two mini-lessons into the time, while still giving them a big chunk of time to write write write. 

Both units will end up on the same date they would have if I had done single lessons each day. And students will be able to focus deeply on each writing piece on its assigned day. That sounds like a win-win to me!

What does your middle school schedule look like? Does it allow flexibility and long stretches of time when you need it? Do you have common planning time with your colleagues?

"Where is there a place for students to choose their genres?"

Last spring, our school hosted literacy consultants Stevi Quate and Matt Glover to work with our staff for the same week. Stevi was focused on secondary literacy (MS/HS) while Matt worked with the elementary teams on their literacy units. Near the end of their week, they sat down with team leaders and the curriculum director to look over reading and writing units from K-12. A colorful matrix was created, color coding the different modes (narrative, informational, argument) and types of products (literary essay, realistic short story, etc.). 

When the dust settled, Stevi turned to me and asked this question of our middle school writing program, "Where is there a place for students to choose their genres?"

I looked her in the eye and answered, "No where." 

It's true, we have controlled every genre in every unit. We also control the type of product within that genre. We allow kids choice of topic within the structured genre and product type, but we don't have an "open" unit.  To make that happen, we would have to drop a unit, and the only one that is moderately "optional" is our poetry unit ("optional" because it doesn't neatly fit into the narrative/ informational/argument CCSS modes). 

I know my team feels strongly that the poetry unit is essential to our middle school writing program. Year after year, we see middle schoolers pouring out their hearts about big important issues in their poetry. Our struggling writers love the loose structure and low volume that poetry offers. Our strong writers embrace obscure references and hidden symbolism. Shy students perform proudly in front of audiences. Drama queens and kings slam their poems with gusto. 

And when we implemented the CCSS and revised our units to meet the standards, poetry worked for many of the language standards, especially those that addressed connotations and denotations of words, the power of strong verbs and nouns, and understanding and use of figurative language. So we felt good about keeping poetry in our year-long plan. 

But here's the thing: I still have Stevi's question in my head. If we want our kids to be motivated and self-directed writers, they should be able to choose a writing project at some point. 

So I offered a compromise: an after school creative writing club. Those writers that want a time and space and some feedback on their independent writing projects can join me an hour a week and get words on paper (or screens). Twelve enthusiastic writers signed up, most of whom had projects started or had an idea they've been waiting to write. One has already published her ongoing story on a fan fic site and gotten several hundred readers. All but one are in 6th and 7th graders (hmmm... what's up with the 8th graders?). 

I'm pleased there is interest out there for this open-ended writing club. I wish there were space in the year to extend it to all kids, but I just don't see how that will happen without a massive curriculum review/revision. For now, it's baby steps.

How do you balance the demands of the CCSS writing modes with open-genre writing units?

Holding kids accountable to home reading: Reading logs?

To use reading logs or not to use reading logs? That is the question! 

Our middle school English Language Arts program has a commitment to lifelong reading habits, which means that we expect students to have a book going at home at all times throughout the year. We are also committed to holding kids accountable for that reading, because we know that our reluctant readers need some kind of accountability system to keep them going. What that accountability system looks like varies from grade to grade, and even from classroom to classroom. 

Over the years, we 8th grade teachers have tried many things, but we've always started the year with paper reading logs that track daily reading statistics, and a weekly reading response. Based on the Teacher's College Reading and Writing Project's (TCRWP) recommendation, reading logs that track title, author, time of day, number of minutes, and number of pages read each day can become a data source for students to reflect on themselves as readers. Am I only reading at night and falling asleep with my book? Is that the best time to do active reading? Do I read in 5 or 10 minute bursts, when I'm in the car or waiting for the bus? Do I wait until the weekend and read for long stretches of time but don't read during the school week? Am I reading at a good pace, or am I slow (is my book too hard?) or fast (is my book too easy?)? How do I want to improve as a reader?

We only ask for the daily log to be completed for a limited time-- usually during the first couple months of school. During those first months, students do some analysis to look at their reading habits and evaluate how well they are meeting their goals. Later, we back off and ask students to track number of minutes and number of pages read each week, which they report along with their weekly reading response.

Here's the thing: Kids HATE reading logs! The good readers hate them because they just want to immerse themselves in their reading and not bother with tracking their minutes and pages. The struggling readers hate them because it's tedious and it shows that they aren't actually doing the reading they are supposed to. Mostly, it just seems like busywork without purpose. 

This led my colleague and me to really re-think reading logs this year. Something needed to change. Either we make the value of reading logs clearer to students (as TCRWP explains, just like athletes keep stats to find what's working and what needs improvement, so can readers use these stats to become better readers), or we find another way to hold students accountable for their reading. 

That thinking led us to this question: What do adult readers do when they want to have an active reading life? As active adult readers, here is what we do:

• We keep track of the books we read on a social media site (I use Goodreads). I post up a book when I start it, and then review it when I finish it.
  
• We talk about the books we read with others. I have been a member of an adult book club for almost 20 years. Knowing that I have to discuss a particular book on a particular day (and have something to say about it) holds me accountable to reading and thinking about that book.
• We get suggestions for our next reads from friends, through social media (like Goodreads) or from Amazon.com ("Customers who bought this item also bought..."), or by exploring more books by the same author.

Here is what we don't do: Keep a daily reading log, even a weekly reading log, of minutes and pages. We log the books we are reading as we change books. We are held accountable because we have people in our lives that follow our reading and talk to us about our books.

Yes, but... middle school students do need a little more accountability structure than I do as an adult reader with well established lifelong reading habits. Our compromise:

1. Students need to read at least 100 minutes (about 100 pages) each week. They will need to track this somehow on their own. They can decide when those minutes happen, although I will recommend that it's not all one chunk of reading on the weekend (there is value to smaller but more frequent practice).
2. They need to think about their reading, and show that thinking in a weekly reading response. I am afraid that waiting until the book is finished will result in very little writing about reading for reluctant readers. Writing weekly will keep them accountable for reporting their reading minutes/pages, and having to say something about what they read means they have to have read something. I will give them in-class time to complete this for the first month.
3. Writing about reading is a pointless task unless you use it as a way to communicate your thinking to others. We are going to have kids get into small Reading Clubs (3-4 students) who will hold short book discussions on Thursdays. We'll ask them to write their response first, and then discuss their books with others. 
   
4. Their written responses will be on Google docs, which they will share with members of their group (and me), so they can go back and see what they each read if they need a next book suggestion. We used to use Shelfari, which was a super easy and attractive platform, but they have merged with Goodreads and are not in use anymore. Goodreads is not very student friendly, and Google docs is familiar and easy for the kids because we use it all the time.

We are launching this next week. I hope the social aspect of Reading Clubs makes their home reading feel more fun and purposeful (and hold them accountable for doing their reading). I was reluctant to give up class time at first (so much to do! so little time!), but if I value the home reading program (which I do), then I should devote class time to it. We can ease off of weekly Reading Club time, and turn it into monthly Reading Club as habits get established. 

What do you do to hold kids accountable for reading at home? How do you track what and how much kids are reading? Do you use reading logs?

How can I help at home? Parental Support Suggestions

I just finished meeting with 44 out of my 46 families during the two-day parent-student-teacher conferences last week. It was a marathon! Twenty-seven 15-minute conferences on one day, and 17 the next. Whew! Although exhausting, I was continuously impressed with the commitment shown by the parents to be involved in their child's education. 

image from room206lce.wikispaces.com website

One question kept coming up: How can I help at home? It's a tricky question for eighth graders. Most 13-year-olds do not want their parent hovering over their shoulder, "helping" them with homework. They know they can do it on their own, although some do need help with organization and time management. For those kids, we had a good chat together about structuring time, using organizational tools, and balancing homework and down time. Parents came away with some strategies to help their children with those needs.

What about the rest? And what about academics? Here are a few things I suggested:

• Help your child read by keeping books in his/her hands. This could mean giving time to get to the library, buying books at the bookstore or for e-readers, or suggesting books off of the family bookshelves.  
• Talk about what they are reading, not just summary, but questions about characters, author's craft, or theme. Compare this book to others: Do any of the characters remind you of any other characters in other books? If this is a book by an author you've read before, do you see a pattern emerging (is it formulaic)?
• Discuss the social studies content your child is learning. By "teaching" family members, students process and remember information longer. Asking clarifying questions, watching videos connected to the content, and looking at maps or other resources together enriches and deepens the information.
• Encourage authentic writing at home. I found this great chart that places best practices for teaching writing along side suggestions for teen writers (from Fleischer, Cathy and Kimberly Coupe Pavlock. 2012. "Inviting Parents In: Expanding Our Community Base to Support Writing." English Journal 101 (4): 29-36.). Here's an excerpt:

 

Parents want what is best for their kids, and they want to do what they can to help. Giving them tools that show them appropriate and authentic ways to support their children is a win-win situation. What other suggestions do you give to parents?

Disciplinary Literacy in History: Thinking Like a Historian

There has been a lot of buzz in the education community over the past year or two about "disciplinary literacy" as distinct from "content literacy". In a nutshell, disciplinary literacy is doing the work of the discipline, and teaching students explicitly how to do that work. By contrast, content literacy is learning how to read and write in the content areas-- a valuable skill, but not the whole package.

I am an English Language Arts teacher by passion and training, and a Social Studies teacher by default. I understand teaching reading and writing. I understand how to teach reading and writing in Social Studies. What I haven't understood is what historians actually do when they read and write (beyond what I was already teaching). I decided I needed to find out.

CC0 by shotput on pixabay

Just as I was starting to poke around last spring for a workshop to take over the summer that focused on disciplinary literacy, I saw an announcement by NCSS for a MOOC they sponsored called "Improving Historical Reading and Writing." Ta da! Just the ticket (and it was FREE!). This 15-module course opened up the world of historical thinking to me. Here are some big "ah ha's":

Historians gather multiple pieces of evidence about a historical question they have. If they don't know anything about the historical question, they start with a general secondary source to get a sense of the event. Next, they try to find several primary sources (journal entries, newspaper accounts, photographs or paintings, maps, inventories, etc.) that can dig down into the details from people who were there at the time. Historians want to piece together the puzzle and find their own interpretation of what happened in the past.

• Historians do a lot of work before they even start reading-- a lot more work than ELA readers do. Historians consider the source: they search out the author, publisher, and date of the document first and consider questions of reliability: Who wrote it? Who published it? When and where was it published? Are these people biased or coming from a particular perspective? Can I trust this to be a reliable source? If not, can I use this source to gain an understanding of one particular point of view?
• Historians also access all the background knowledge they have about the context in which the document was published before they start reading. What was going on during that time? What background knowledge do I already have about this event or person that will help me understand the information? Adding this layer of thinking about contextualization also helps readers think about reliability, bias, and perspective.
• Historians do a lot of work while they read-- this is most like the work that ELA readers do. These days we call it "close reading." Historians are reading for the main idea and supporting details, but they are also watching the use of language to clue them into bias and perspective. They try to put themselves into the author's shoes to really dig into the human reality behind the writing.
• Historians do a lot of work after they read, comparing and contrasting the information they just encountered with what they already know. Is the author adding to or confirming what I already know? Is this information different than what I already know? If so, how does it differ, and why would it differ? Can I find any other sources of evidence that can help confirm or deny this information? This act of corroboration ensures historians are looking at the full story, not just the single story which can be distorted by time, selective reporting, or bias. 
• Historians tell other people what they found out so that their voice can add to the collective understanding of history. There are many ways to do this; book publishing is just one way. For students, this can mean debating issues, writing editorials, making public service announcements, starting or contributing to a social justice campaign, blogging, etc. 

image found on Wikipedia website

The Stanford History Education Group website has a lot of great resources aligned to this thinking process. I used their 5-lesson Introduction to History series last week, and my 8th graders loved it! Keeping my historical thinking hat on while I teach Social Studies this year will ensure that I am not relying on the textbook as my sole resource, and it will (hopefully) develop the critical thinking stance that students should take when encountering any source of information-- from the internet, the newspaper, advertisements, or even their friends. That is a valuable life skill!

"Here's my project! Hope you like it :-)" Adjusting Tone to Fit Audience in Email Messages

CC image by Guudmorning via flickr

As a one-to-one laptop school, and as an ecologically-minded person, I find that I am using technology more and more in my classroom. Students do much more writing within Google docs or Word documents than with pencil on paper. For example, at the beginning of our last writing unit as we were generating poems, I gave students the option to have an online writer's notebook using a Google doc which they shared with me, or to use their paper notebook. In one class I had a 100% online notebook return, and in the other, it was over 80%. Grades and homework are posted online for students to access whenever they want. Students email me with projects attached or when they have questions. Students are very comfortable with technology, I am loving the ease of feedback, and we are all saving a lot of trees in the process. Lots of wins!

As a one-on-one laptop school, we spend a lot of time guiding students on making good choices while using technology. We have lessons on multitasking vs. "single tabbing", using time productively, evaluating the source of information, detecting bias, how to cite sources for information and images, and note-taking and paraphrasing to avoid plagiarism. But one thing we don't do in eighth grade is talk about writing emails.

A few days ago, during spring break, I received this email from a student:

"How come my grade didn't go up after the revolutionary war test even though it was sumitive [sic].

I got a 83 on my first test and a 93 on my second shouldn't my grade be like 89"

That was the whole thing. There was no subject in the subject box, no greeting or closing, no spell check or editing for mechanics or grammar.

CC image by CollegeDegrees360 via flickr

I was a bit taken aback by the tone of this email, although I'd gotten others like it throughout the years. I read it to my (non-teacher) friend who I was visiting at the time, and she was shocked at the rudeness. She suggested that I write back with an instructive or corrective message, something like "I will answer your question when you can address me with respect." That was certainly tempting.

Instead, I thought about what it was that bothered me about this email. Here's what I came up with:

1. Tone: The student did not adjust his writing style to reflect his audience. The casual tone of this email reflects the way he talks to his friends, and is the kind of writing he does in a quick message. I am not his friend; I am his teacher. I expect a more formal tone.
2. Structure: The lack of subject, greeting, and closing make this email feel aggressive and angry. When writing a letter, especially to someone in authority, it is customary to include formal structures and social niceties. 
3. Care: This student obviously wrote this email in a hurry and sent it off. He did not take the time to edit or re-read before sending. This shows how little thought he put into the message, that he did not really care whether the message reflected the level of concern with which he intended it, and that he didn't consider that his reader deserves to read a well-edited message. 
4. Misunderstanding: This student does not really understand how the grading system works. Yes, the two tests he is talking about are summative, and therefore go into the same category in the grading system (weighted 65% of the total grade). However, the first test was 83 points out of 100, and the second was 18.5 points out of 20. Since one has 5 times the number of points, it also has 5 times the weight on the grade. If I took 30 seconds to tell him this, he would probably say, "Oh, OK" and move on. However, if he actually looked at the grade book, he could figure this out himself. Instead of taking the time to do this, though, he would rather shoot a quick email to his teacher to get it sorted out.

The student is an eighth grade boy, a category of humans well known to be impulsive. He lives in a world where quick text messages and quick queries yield quick satisfactory answers. As a person, I know him to be a hard worker, a thoughtful friend, respectful of adults, and generally a nice boy. O don't think he intended to be rude; it just happened. So rather than sending a reprimand, I think I should view this as a little teachable moment for me.

I never established my expectations for how to address a teacher in an email at the beginning of the year. I never taught the required structure or tone. Although I give instructions like, "Use academic language" when blogging or during tests (and have explained what I mean by that phrase), I never applied that to email messages. If this is a battle I want to take on, I should approach it in a serious manner, teaching the conventions of email messages to adults just like I teach the conventions of essays or poetry. In the best case scenario, I should do this at the beginning of the year when all class routines are established. However, even now, I can teach it with an eye toward high school: "Your high school teachers will expect you to address them in a formal way when you write to them. It's important for you to practice this skill now so that it becomes a habit that will carry you through high school, onto college, and even into the workplace."

And I should also review how the grade book works, as well as how to see how the grades are calculated (there is a .pdf report option that shows how the grades work out). This will calm students down and help them see where the magical percentage number comes from.

In the fast pace of our lessons, I often get attachments without messages, or at most, "Here's my project. Hope you like it! :-)" I haven't worried about it in the past. I'm not going to go on an email rampage with my students now. However, it is a life lesson worth teaching, and obviously most students need to learn it, not just this one. And if I don't teach it, who will?

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?

Questioning the Labels for the Units of Study in Argument, Information, and Narrative Writing

Last week we had a professional development day that was dedicated to writing curriculum. This was a much needed pause from the day-to-day hustle of the classroom, especially as we are trying to understand and implement the CCSS and the new Units of Study in Argument, Information, and Narrative Writing (Heinemann, 2014). As a department, we agreed to tackle our final writing unit of the year. At the 8th grade level, this was the Position Paper unit, which the TCRWP authors labeled as our "Informational" writing unit.

Since we use the Understanding by Design (UbD) unit planning process (Wiggins & McTighe), we started by unpacking the CCSS informational writing standard, examining what it looked like for the years before and after us as well as what is new and unique to our grade. As is the case with Narrative and Argument writing, there are only a few new things in 8th grade compared to 7th, usually bumping up the level of abstraction or depth of support. The implication, though, is that the grades before us must do their job in order for students to be ready to add the new piece at our grade. This is the only way the spiral will work.

We then went to our Rubicon Atlas mapping site to continue our UbD work: identifying enduring understandings and essential questions, including knowledge and skill objectives based on the demands of the standards, revising assessments and rubrics. All this was done fairly quickly, as the unit focus wasn't changing much from what we'd taught before.

Finally, we were ready to tackle the Learning Activities. We opened the "Informational" unit, Position Papers, and double-checked our list of standards against the list provided in the back of the book. Wait, what? The only genre-specific standards listed in the book were argument standards. I thought this was our "Informational" unit, so where were the informational standards?

Next we started digging into the lessons. Indeed, the focus of this whole unit was arguing one side of an issue and backing it up with evidence and explanation. It is a great unit, full of focused strategies and engaging topics, but it sits firmly in the argument arena, not informational. Yes, there is a component of research to find evidence to back up your side of the argument, and to find counterarguments, and yes, that research would have to be explained  in an informational way to readers who may not have the same background knowledge. But the thrust is still to argue one side. How am I supposed to assess the informational standards?

This is not the first time I have questioned the labeling of the TCRWP units. The 8th grade "Narrative" unit is Investigative Journalism. As I taught that unit earlier in the year, the teaching points were mostly about getting your information across in an interesting way-- AKA Informational writing. We taught fantasy short story writing as our Narrative writing in English Language Arts, so I felt solid about meeting those standards through that unit.

My 7th grade colleagues also ran into a labeling question. The 7th grade Literary Essay unit is considered their Informational unit; they also have Realistic Fiction for Narrative, and The Art of Argument for Argument units. Our Literary Essay unit is labeled as our Argument unit. What makes a Literary Essay more informational vs. more argumentative?

Perhaps we should rearrange the labels of the 8th grade English Language Arts writing units this way:

• Literary Essay: Informational (work with 7th grade to see how they did it as an informational piece and add our 8th grade bits onto it)
• Fantasy Short Story: Narrative
• Position Paper: Argument

I suppose we could leave the Literary Essay unit as an argument unit, knowing we are covering informational writing in our Week Without Walls Investigative Journalism unit in Social Studies. As long as the students receive the teaching, it is not so important that it happens during ELA. Besides the Week Without Walls project is outside the Social Studies curriculum, so it's already in a gray area.

I respect the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project staff and the work they do with curriculum. The units are demanding and full and vertically articulated. My colleague thinks the middle school units were thrown together hastily to get something out on the coat tail of the elementary units of study. I don't see that within the content of the units themselves, but perhaps she's right when it came to labeling the units to meet the CCSS modes of writing.

At the end of the day, as long as the students are being taught how to write in those various modes of writing, does it really matter how the units are labeled? Now I've got to go back into my Atlas Rubicon unit plans and adjust the standards. I don't think Jay McTighe would approve.

Learning About Fantasy Writing with Eragon

Winter break fell smack-dab in the middle of the fantasy writing unit. I am taking advantage of this opportunity (look at the sunny side!) by asking students to read a fantasy book by the end of the break in order to keep their minds on the genre. When we return, I'll ask them to do some reflection on their reading based on the genre definition we constructed at the beginning of the unit. Then I'll have them apply those ideas to their fantasy story drafts to ensure they are writing in the genre. 

image from Amazon.com

In keeping with my do-what-the-students-do philosophy of teaching reading and writing, I am reading fantasy over the break. I picked Eragon by Christopher Paolini, a book I have heard about for years from students and my own children, but one which I haven't felt motivated to read. At nearly 500 pages, I knew it would take me some time and stamina to get through it. Besides, I am a little tired of the traditional magical fantasy genre-- after Lord of the Rings, what else is there to the hero's quest story? 

But if I only read young adult books that I knew I'd like, I would be missing a huge opportunity to connect with students who like to read other things (like quest-based magical fantasy books). So I packed it into my backpack along with my journal as I set off for my winter break travels. 

One week later, and I'm on page 440. Here are some things that I noticed about Eragon as a fantasy book (spoiler alert-- I may have to reveal certain plot events to make my point):

Luke & Obi Wan from pinterest

• Eragon and Brom are like Luke Skywalker and Obi Wan Kenobi (Star Wars): novice and master, orphan and substitute father figure, novice thrust into adulthood before he's ready when the master dies.
• Eragon and Murtagh are like Frodo Baggins and Aragorn (AKA Strider) (Lord of the Rings): The young hero is suspicious of the unknown and seemingly dangerous stranger at first, but is in a situation where he must rely on him for survival and help. As they journey together, they learn trust and respect, even brotherhood.

  

  Aragorn from wikipedia.com

• The idea that True Names have power (every being has a True Name which is not the everyday name that is used in the world-- when one knows another's True Name, they can control the other) is in a lot of books, but I think Ursula K. LeGuin did it first in her short story "The Rule of Names". 
• Dragons and Dragon Riders communicate telepathically was seen in Anne McCaffrey's Dragonrider series. It is a convenient device, however, so that Eragon and Saphira can "talk" things through without those around them listening in on their conversation. 
• Eragon's world is like medieval times, a common fantasy setting. People ride horses as transportation, the cities are filthy with no modern conveniences, food is meat cooked over fires and bread with few vegetables, weapons are swords and knives and bows & arrows (and magic). 
• Anything goes. I guess this is a basic tenant of fantasy. Eragon becomes an amazing swordsman in mere months. He learns magic and is incredibly powerful with very little training. He and one other defeat deadly fierce Urgal creatures with only bruises and scrapes to show for it, although they are outnumbered. The good guys show up to rescue them just in the nick of time! Whew! Eragon meets the girl of his dreams (literally) after only a short search.

I am not sure how all these noticings will help my short story. I guess the message is that it's OK to borrow elements from other texts as long as they are remolded into your own story. After all, the stories we are writing during our writing unit are a way to practice narrative writing techniques. The goal is not to be the most creative or original with our ideas. If a young writer (or an old one like me, but one who needs the scaffold) needs to start with a familiar plot line, that's OK. We are still learning how to do all those other narrative things like writing dialogue that reveals character traits, and structuring the plot either chronologically or with flashbacks, and using inner thinking to help get the message of the story through to the reader. If, along the way, a creative and unique idea emerges, then that's cause for celebration and wonder! 

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.

Investigative Journalism: an integrated Science/Social Studies/Language Arts Unit

As you know, dear reader, if you have been paying attention these last few months, we are implementing the CCSS writing standards in middle school this year. As part of the implementation, we bought the Units of Study for Argument, Informational, and Narrative Writing (Heinemann, 2014) developed by the staff at the Teacher's College Reading and Writing Project.

The grade 8 kit includes these three units: Unit 1: Investigative Journalism (Narrative), Unit 2: Literary Essay (Argument), and Unit 3: Position Papers (Informational). My teaching partner and I sat down with these units at the beginning of the year, and laid them out next to our existing units. Literary Essay-- check! A very close match. Position Papers-- We did a research-based argument essay, so we definitely see how a Position Paper would be an extension of that, so... check! Investigative Journalism-- ?? Our narrative writing unit was fantasy short stories, a really fun writing genre for eighth graders who had been writing realistic fiction short stories since third grade. We were reluctant to give it up, although Investigative Journalism did sound like an interesting unit. Hmmm... could we do both? If so, how?

Step in my Math/Science colleague. After returning from the NSTA conference last spring, he was very keen on doing an integrated Science/LA project this year. He suggested that Science could work on the content side of a project while LA could work on the writing side. Interesting suggestion... especially when he proposed doing it with the unit focusing on human impact on the environment and discovering solutions. All of a sudden, the geography theme of Human-Environment Interaction emerged from Social Studies. And how could we apply that to our Week Without Walls trip to Thailand, which we do a project with in SS anyway? I know you know where this is going...

Image of deforestation from Shutterstock via inhabitat website

So here we sit, my teaching partner and I, gazing at the Investigative Journalism unit, and with the integrated unit suggestion in my back pocket. Couldn't we have them write investigative science news articles that explained the human impact problem and the proposed solutions that they had already researched in Science, layered on an application piece of "What does this problem/solution look like in Thailand?" through more research in SS, and finally add in the field research piece of interviews, photos, and experiences while on our trip? They could write it all up using a journalistic style and publish the articles on an online science news magazine website that they would design (did I mention technology integration?). Voila!

Image of Asian elephants found on wikipedia

We are leaving out an important element of the original Investigative Journalism unit by teaching this way. The first "Bend" of the unit is about finding stories around you, living life like a journalist, noticing the everyday dramas that can turn into news stories. I understand the purpose behind this: helping kids lead a wide-awake life, keeping kids connected to the topic through choice and relevance, making it more authentic to what real journalists do. There is certainly value in that. Perhaps we can address a little part of that while we are on our trip, helping them see the connections between their experience and their news topic, helping them find the drama and personal angle to be highlighted within the story.

In any case, students will be exposed to a way to write information that is engaging, informative, and concise. Our job will be about teaching the writing skills (LA) and making a connection to another culture (SS). And we still get to do our fantasy short story writing unit (with a bit of revision to make sure we are lifting the level to meet the CCSS narrative writing standards)! Win, win!

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! 

Members of the Reading Club

image from openclipart.org

Finally! We are approaching the last two weeks of school. In eighth grade, that means students will be reviewing content and skills to prepare for final exams, taking exams, spending the last week of school filling time with end-of-year wrap-ups, games, and the all-middle-school field trip to the water park, and finally, 8th grade Commencement. There's not much time for teaching in there!

Fortunately, I was able to wiggle things around early enough this year to carve out three days last week after the heavy research-based argument writing unit and before the above-mentioned madness begins. I needed to find the perfect balance for those days: something interesting enough to keep them going, but not heavy or boring (or something needing feedback or grading for my sake!), and also not too fluffy or they would quickly descend into off-task, summer-fever-brained adolescents (oh the horror!). 

I settled on Looking Forward, Looking Back: Setting Up for a Summer of Reading. On the first day, I talked about leaving a legacy for the incoming 8th graders. The current 8th graders are now experts at what 8th graders like to read, and the new 8th graders need some guidance. I asked them to look back through their Shelfari shelves and think about all the books they've read this year, both in school and out, and choose one book (yes, only one) that they could label The One Book Every 8th Grader Should Read. There was quite the buzz of excitement as they jumped into that task: "Which one should I choose? I can't decide!" "Oh, you're doing Ender's Game? Well, then I'll do Ender's Shadow." "Can we choose nonfiction?" It was interesting to see the range of books chosen, from Alex Rider to City of Bones to Goal! to Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy to The Fault in Our Stars.

Next, I went over characteristics of book reviews, looked at some student-written reviews published in Voices from the Middle (NCTE), and the students noticed how they matched up with the list of characteristics. Finally, they wrote a book review justifying their choice, and published it with a book cover graphic (properly cited). Once printed out, they became my end-of-year bulletin board display, and will become my beginning of the year display in August.

The second day bridged Looking Back and Looking Forward via a mini author study. I asked them to choose one of their favorite authors and to think about patterns across their work. Do they write about the same theme, moral, or lesson in all their books? Do they use the same elements: same setting, same kinds of hero/ine, same plotline, same genre? Do they have a unique style of writing that is seen across all their books? I showed them Laurie Halse Anderson's webpage (she was our visiting author this year-- we're so lucky!) as a way to introduce them to the idea that authors had webpages (who knew?). Laurie's has book blurbs, video book trailers, reviews, a blog-- lots of great stuff! I invited them to add books to their Shelfari shelf if they came across new books by their author that they wanted to read. Their exit ticket was a write-up of what they noticed about patterns, which they added to one of the author's books that they had on their Shelfari shelf (either one they'd read previously, or one they just added to read later). 

Again, there was great excitement and a lot of buzz: "What? Orson Scott Card has a whole other series focused only on Bean? I'm adding those to my shelf!" "I noticed that John Green always has love in his books and that at least one of the characters is damaged in some way." "I wish Ransom Riggs wrote more books. I loved Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children! I guess I'll have to choose another author..." "I don't know if I should read The Heroes of Olympus series. I read the Percy Jackson series and I'm a little tired of those characters, and the plot is always the same. I might try his Kane Chronicles since it deals with other characters and other gods."

The third day was purely a Looking Forward day. I talked about the value of summer reading, and the dangers of a summer without reading (summer slide!). I mentioned that lifelong readers always have a book on the go and know what to read next. I reminded them of the book reviews on display on the bulletin board. I showed them how to use the tags on my Shelfari shelf and the librarian's to look for recommendations. I encouraged them to go to their friends' Shelfari pages and see what they had read. I showed them how to use Amazon.com's "Customers who bought this book also bought..." as a source of recommendations. And I gave them a variety of outside sources that recommended books for young adults. I challenged them to get at least 5 books on their "to read" shelf by the end of the period. Then I let them loose.

The book talk was golden! "Have you read (insert name of book)? I really liked it. You should read it." "I read (title), and I should probably finish the series." "You added that book? You should talk to (name) because she loved that book." "I'm looking up biographies of athletes because those are the kind of books I like to read" (fair enough). "I've already added 20 books! Should I stop now?" (NO! Keep going!)

To be honest, there were a few (struggling, not interested) students who did not get into this work. However, by approaching them as if they were members of the reading club, with a little nudging they at least thought about books they liked, authors they were interested in, and they added a few books to their shelf. Who knows? Maybe when boredom hits in the middle of July, they will pick up one of those books and start to read. That will count for something!