Making Writing Workshop Work

Last Friday was an extremely frustrating day, academically. The third nine weeks unit in my district for ELA is research. Along with teaching the research process, we spend a great deal of time in this unit teaching aspects of logic.

On the Wednesday and Thursday of last week I taught deductive and inductive reasoning. I feel pretty confident that my students could take a test on the material I taught and do well. I taught them a mixture of verbal cues and hand cues to remember that deductive reasoning goes from a general idea to a specific idea, and that inductive is the opposite. I know they could tell you that.

Deductive
All dogs have tails.
I have a dog.
That must mean it has a tail.

Inductive
I have a dog.
It has a tail.
That must mean all dogs have tails.

However, the way it is tested on a standardized test is completely different. On Friday, I showed my students a question that tested this standard on a TCAP sampler, and none of the cues I taught them would help answer the question. The question is awkwardly worded and difficult to answer.

In this same class period, I introduced false premise which is pretty much what happens when reasoning fails:

I like the color pink.
I am a girl.
All girls like the color pink.

I tried using an activity where students walked around the room singing their name on posters that held statements. If the statement was true for them, they signed the poster. Some questions were "I like to go to the mall everyday" to "I am a student at NEMS." When they finished, I tried to come up with on the spot examples of conclusions I could draw from those who put their name on the paper. In my first class, it worked beautifully. I would give a statement and they would tell me if the reasoning was logical or a false premise.

Student A says she likes going to the mall everyday.
Student A is a girl.
All girls like going to the mall everyday.

They could identify that this is a false premise.

In my advanced class, I didn't have as much success. They think outside the box. They found a loophole and a way to disagree with each example I presented. Most of the time, they were correct. Because of this, I wasn't getting my point across.

I started getting frustrated. They didn't understand the lesson. I couldn't blame them. I felt helpless that I understand something so well, but I wasn't able to explain it better to them.

I decided to put this concept to the side, reflect on it, and come back later.

I moved on to something different this past Monday. My students scored low in identifying and fixing run-ons and fragments on their last benchmark test. I have been re-teaching this concept and will retest this week.

In an effort to reteach this standard and hit another use of commas I consulted a book my mother gave me for Christmas. It's called Everyday Editing by Jeff Anderson. This book has changed the way I look at grammar instruction.

I don't teach out of my grammar text book. In fact, I use my text book as a form of punishment. I had to use it as a discipline tool several times last semester. Thankfully, my students hate doing work in the book SO MUCH that I haven't had to break it out as a tool since the fall.

I don't get isolated grammar lessons. I knew that grammar should be taught with writing, but I wasn't exactly sure what it should look like or how to do it. I have tried MANY different approaches this year. Some have been a success and others have not. In fact, a lesson on run ons and fragments was going so badly, that I stopped in the middle of the lesson. We got out books and read instead.

This book, showed me what a grammar lesson should look like. After an introduction, the book is pretty much set up into lesson plans. I tried one of the first ones in the book: teaching subordinating conjunctions.

Saying the words subordinating conjunctions makes me nauseous. Believe me, when you say it to a class of 25 8th graders it makes them nauseous, too.

Well, at the very least it goes in one ear and out the other. But, using this method of teaching made my students excited.

Here's the gist of the lesson:

I put a sentence on the overhead using a subordinating conjunction. I used a sentence from the novel we are reading in class, Slob by Ellen Potter. It wasn't hard to find an example. I scanned about five pages.

Anderson suggests making lists of good sentences from literature that use the items of what you want to teach.

I can't quite remember the exact sentence but it was something along the lines of "When he lunged forward, his body moved in a cockeyed way."

I then "invited the students to notice." I asked them, "What do you notice about this sentence?" I didn't probe or push. I let them talk. Some, thinking they knew what was up my sleeve, answered the way they thought I wanted them to.

"It uses vivid verbs!"

Some thought there was something wrong with it.

"They put a comma in the wrong place!"

For both of my classes (keep in mind an average and an advanced) it took about 6 students offering answers before someone got warmer.

Finally a student says, "It has commas."

Me: "Sure. What else?"

Another student: "If you didn't have the comma, it would be a run-on."

Me: "Very good. What else?"

And another: "If you stopped the sentence after the comma, it would be a fragment."

And another: "The first part is one of those things. The one with the anchor." (a visual aid to remember a dependent clause's comma is like an anchor holding on to the dependent clause.)

A kid shouts out: "A dependent clause!"


Pleased with the direction of the conversation, I asked the students to repeat after me, "AAAWWUBBIS!!!!!!!!"

After chuckles, attempts to keep repeating it, and side conversations about how silly it sounded, someone asks what it means.

I showed them what the letters stand for:
As
Although
After
While
When
Unless
Because
Before
If
Since

I then show them the sentence from Slob again. I tell them to write the dependent clause on their paper, and I do the same:

"When he lunged forward,"

Then I fill in the rest, making it an original sentence.

"When he lunged forward, his pants split in two." I read the sentence aloud and say the word COMMA when I see one.

I then ask the students to do one for themselves. I reminded them to write the comma and make sure the half they write is a complete sentence that can stand on it's own.

I give them a chance to think. When the chatter picks up, we share. The students have to read their sentence and say COMMA where it goes. Their sentences are pretty good.

Then, I put up the lyrics to "if I had a million dollars" by the Barenaked Ladies and they listen to the song.

When the song is over, I ask them where the comma would go, and then we write on our papers "If I had a million dollars,"

I tell them to fill in this sentence. Then they have to do it four more times. After sharing with me a few times and sharing with their neighbors, I ask them to pick their favorite. With the favorite, they have to write a paragraph explaining why, but they have to start each sentence with an AAAWWUBBIS.

It's hard at first with my average class. The advanced breezed through it. The average wrote strictly in fragments with the exception of the first sentence:

If I had a million dollars, I would buy a monkey. Because they are cute. Since they eat bananas. If they will sleep in my bed.

After seeing this several times, I choose a student who will not mind if I use their writing. I put it on the overhead, and point out the fragments. We talk again about WHY it is a fragment. On the board, I begin writing their fragments. When I put the comma and need to make it complete, they shout out ways to fix it. They then go back into their paragraphs and fix them.

For the rest of the period, I tell them they can't talk to me unless they use an AAAWWUBBIS word.

They like the challenged.

"Since we are about to leave soon, may I put my book away?"
Because I am thirsty, may I go get a drink of water?"

The next day we talk about thesis statements and take a few notes. Then we begin practicing writing them. This lesson spilled over onto today.

At first, they had a hard time with thesis statements. Today went better. Given a class topic, I wanted them to write their own thesis statement using an AAAWWUBBIS word. This time, no one left fragments.

We did need help with making their thesis statements more specific. They would try writing one, then give it to me to look at. I would ask a few questions, and they ran back to their desks to fix it and change it.

I told them to stop erasing and to instead, write the revision below the one before. I want them to have a visual of their thought process.

The past several days has been the first time writing has been fun for these kids. They are excited for me to look at what they've done and want to fix it to please me.

I have students that hate writing beam at me when I tell them good job after they have revised and composed a beautiful thesis statement.

If this is what teaching is, I'm all in.