A Day with Katie Wood Ray

On August 11, 2011, Katie Wood Ray came to our school and spent the day working with a group of teachers from Early School, Lower School, and Middle School on writing workshop. The morning focused on preschool through lower elementary and the afternoon on upper elementary/early middle school. Many of us stayed for the whole day, as the presentations and discussions were relevant to the work all of us do with our students.

Those who have read my blog before know that I regularly draw ideas and inspiration from the work of Katie Wood Ray. The past two summers I have attended two-day institutes sponsored by Heinemann featuring Katie and Lisa B. Cleaveland, with whom she wrote my favorite writing workshop book, About the Authors: Writing Workshop with our Youngest Writers.

Highlights on the 11th included exploring ideas and routines for Units of Study, working on strategies to use when conferencing with students, and expanding our understanding of the idea of approximation, which helps us have appropriate expectations for our students. We loved seeing video of conferences, especially seeing Katie tackle a particularly difficult one with a reluctant writer. All of us have been challenged by this kind of student and admired the patience, care, and tenacity that Katie brought to this conference.

The day did not disappoint. It was a perfect way to feed my excitement about the coming school year. Oh the many possibilities that await my students and me in Writing Workshop!

Poetry Study

Our most recent Unit of Study has been poetry. For my lessons I draw from resources such as Regie Routman's Kids' Poems: Teaching First Graders to Love Writing Poetry, Lucy Calkins and Stephanie Parson's Poetry: Powerful Thought in Tiny Packages, which is part of Units of Study for Primary Writing: A Yearlong Curriculum, and my frequent source of inspiration, About the Authors: Writing Workshop with our Youngest Writers by Katie Wood Ray with Lisa B. Cleaveland. I love Regie Routman’s emphasis on reading and talking about poetry by children. From Lucy Calkins and Stephanie Parsons I draw mini-lessons that help the children focus on specific aspects of poetry such as how to decide on line breaks. From Katie Wood Ray I get the basic structure I use in our study as we read various examples of poetry by both children and adults and discuss what we notice the authors doing in their poems. I also incorporate lessons of my own that I have developed over the years.

As always, some students “catch on” to poetry more quickly than others. Often some of the students who are most prolific with prose writing can be hesitant about poetry. Working together we help each other learn some of the ins and outs of this kind of writing. We talk about how important it is to read our poems out loud as we write them to get a feel for how they sound. As one students said, “I read it and it sounded more like a story so I changed it to make it sound more like a poem.” Another student talked about making her poem sound more “poety.”

At the end of our unit each student chose one poem to put in our group’s poetry collection. I also got to choose one poem written by each student for the collection. We then edited and revised the poems using peer conferences and student/teacher conferences. The booklet of poems was ready in time to share on Grandparents’ Day with our visitors, which made it extra special.

Structure Study

In January we’ve been doing a Unit of Study based on the structure that authors use in their books. We have looked at some books where the structure is a clear, repeated pattern. We also have looked at some books that have a traditional story pattern, such as describe a problem, tell some unsuccessful ways to solve it, then solve it. One student described this in one book as “the character’s happy, then sad, then still sad, then happy again.”

When I conference with them, I am asking them about the structure of their books. It is easier for some to be aware of and articulate this than others. I am hoping that as we analyze more books and as I share examples of what classmates are doing, all the students will become more aware of structure and more intentional in the use of structure in writing.

Illustration Study Celebration

Not long before Winter Break we celebrated the books that the students published as part of our illustration study. At our celebration each student told about his/her book, read a selection, and talked about how illustrations added to the writing. We toasted our efforts with brownies this time.

Illustrations that Enhance Our Writing

Our latest Unit of Study has been focused on the question: What smart illustration decisions do author/illustrators make in their books? This study was inspired by Katie Wood Ray’s latest book, In Pictures and In Words: Teaching the Qualities of Good Writing Through Illustration Study. The children have been wonderful at looking at books and noticing the smart things being done in the illustrations to communicate information, feelings, character, storyline, mood, point of view, passage of time, and more. I have recorded a lot of their “noticings” on a chart. We are also using the chart to note when one of us tries something we’ve seen in the books. We keep the books we are using for the study in a basket where students can refer to them as needed. After Thanksgiving break, students will be asked to choose books they have written to publish. Each choice should be a book that can go into the basket with our study books, because of interesting illustration choices.

Celebrating Our Writing Work

We have wrapped up our Unit of Study on Where do writers get ideas? Each student chose one of the books he/she had been working on to publish. The students read over their choices carefully, checking to be sure they had not left out any words and that Word Wall words had the Word Wall spelling. Then each read the book to a classmate to be sure it was "reader friendly." Last week we had a celebration. Each student showed the published book and either read a selection or told about it. Each also told where he/she got the idea for the book and why he/she wrote it. We “toasted” our efforts with apple slices to finish up our celebration.

Just Right Books

I most often use this blog to write about our work in Writing Workshop. We also do a lot of reading work in our group. Just as in Writing Workshop, I do mini-lessons that focus on different aspects of reading. One of the first lessons I do is on choosing “Just Right” books, the kinds of books that will help the students’ development as readers the most. A Just Right book is one in which a student is interested. It is also a book that the student can read almost all of easily, figuring out the few words that he/she does not already know. And it is one that the student can understand. It doesn’t leave the child wondering what it was about.

This doesn’t mean that it isn’t helpful at times for children to read, and re-read, and easy book. Easy books support the child’s ability to read smoothly and with expression. Re-reading also allows a child to notice details that may have been missed the first time through. And, of course, children will often be attracted to hard books, especially if the topic is one that is compelling or of particular interest. Those are great books to read with a parent, teacher, or partner to help.