Ch+8+-+Susan+S

I agree with Pam and Susan so far. I really liked this chapter, it reinforced things for me that I was worried about letting go of - such as grading everything. I liked the coaching tips, and the idea of wearing the coaching and judging hats. I also like that your work with the student is while they are writing, which seems to be the most effective time to me to be working with the student. Minimizing comments at the end works well for me, too. I did go on to Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory website and explored a bit. The stamps are a bit prices, I thought, but they are very dedicated to amping up writing in schools. The audiotape I think would work better in high school, I can't picture 8th graders sitting down and listening to their teacher's voice! Finally, I like the idea of helping students to develop their own quality writing, but also guiding them to their own responsibility to work well with themselves and with us, their teachers. I also need to add here that probably one of the most important statements in this chapter for me was on page 130, last 2 paras in Thinking About Assessment section. "If you are a harried content teacher with plenty to do, ...no one expects you to take up the English teacher's workload." That has been in the back of my mind during this whole class, because we have so much to cover for testing. I liked how he suggested "practical methods of response for times when you do have breathing room for assessment", because I can't picture being able to have students writing for me and revising, and still getting in all of the content. Sigh...

Karin: I hear you Susan. I feel the same. I am wondering how I can take a student even from level 1 to level 2. Level 3 is out for me this year. I have a few ideas in mind for larger writing projects but I fear, with the work ethic my students have, it may be fruitless to try. I have one class of 17 and only 7 do their homework now. I have been working on this all year but the buy in is tough. Other classes do better but we also have to give 1 hour of homework nightly between 4 subjects. That means a 15 minute allocation. With the regular work to do I can't see assigning something large for home. I think it would be fun to have the two hats and I think the students would like that. Again the problem with all this is "time".

Jen: From your reading, Susan, I hear that finding that balance between the writing and the content is a challenge. A "lay reader program" ends those last few paragraphs you identified. Have you ever heard of such a thing? Finding volunteers, training them in responding to writing, and assisting teacher paperwork load, this is something I have never heard of before. Imagine that another avenue of help. This notion scares me. What's next? I wondered about the audio recording portion as well. How many of our students have cassettes? My guess is none. This seemed to date the approach. I could almost see the option within a word document to record a brief comment or explanation, but a whole tape of a teacher thinking aloud seems silly. I wonder if a content teacher needs to go to the Level 3, Karin. If so, perhaps just once a year or once a course. The product would have to be meaningful for the students--perhaps high stakes, perhaps NECAP prep. I wonder...

Susan I: Susan, I hear you saying that time is always an issue and now there is such a big emphasis on test preparation. I don't know how you feel, but somethimes I feel like some of the science questions they ask students really isn't something the student needs to be concerned with in their current grade level- it's above what they should need to know. I wonder if the audio part could be brought into current time if a computer has a microphone and student comments could be attached to a student's personal space like Ning or email. Maybe it could be helpful then. I do agree that older students will be abe to apply the feedback better than younger students. If only there was more time....

Mark: Susan, I believe that is the essence of this course or at least I hope it is. That we learn strategies not only to cover what is in our curriculum, but what we need to do make sure we are using cross curriculum strategies. We may only pick one or two that will work for us, but that is one or two more than we had in our bag of tricks before. For what it is worth we all feel the same pressure.