When teaching writing, I will set my end goals for instruction under two categories: academic goals and personal goals. First of all, I believe that there should be visible growth in the academic area students are being instructed in. Notice that I said I want to see visible growth; I did not assign a letter grade that I thought would be appropriate for students to meet. Not every student is going to come into the classroom at the same level, so my end goal of writing instruction would be to see some sort of positive growth in my students. This does not necessarily mean I expect all of my students to be getting A’s on their writing assignments. I would also not be afraid to voice this to my students. My academic goals for students would be …show more content…
As the saying goes, practice makes perfect; writing is not exempt from this maxim. Writing frequently allows students to get a better grasp of the language in their writing, such as proper diction, punctuation, sentence variety, and organization of the artifact. I also believe that young writers should be writing as much as possible so that they have the time to discover their voice and how to incorporate that into their writing. On the flip side, frequent writing could also help young writers discern when they should leave their personal voice out of a piece of writing or when it would be inappropriate to include it. However, I believe that proponents of frequent writing in the classroom should pay attention to this caveat: frequent writing should be coupled with reasonable instruction. In other words, I do not think allowing students to write in whatever form they wish would be beneficial. I think writing should also be paired with a concept that I want them to be working on getting better at, which ultimately relates to my end goals of instruction of visible, positive growth in their writing. The meta-analysis completed by George Hillocks found research that supported that free-writing should not be the focus of writing instruction. This is not to say that free-writing is not beneficial to students, but …show more content…
Rather than just giving my students the assignment in class and leaving them to complete it by the due date on their own, I will devote plenty of class time to the writing process. Boudreau Smith also supports this technique, as she claims that “writers need process, not product” and that we should engage students in more writing in the classroom focused on the entirety of the writing process (71). Even though these students are in high school, they will still be novice writers, and some of them might not have written a complete essay, research paper, literature review, etcetera. Therefore, I will start by spending an extensive amount of time explaining the assignment to my students, going over expectations, and answering questions to make sure they feel comfortable with the task I am presenting them with before putting them to work. Then, I think that the beginning stages of the writing process should include a great deal of group work. I think group discussion is one of the most effective ways of brainstorming ideas and getting responses to those ideas in a positive, collaborative environment. Providing students with inquiry-based activities and assignments will engage them in productive, meaningful discussion that will produce learning that will be evident in their individual writing. Depending on the grade level I am
Authors Mayher, Lester and Pradl (1983) in their book titled, Learning to Write, Writing to Learn describe writing as a two goal endeavor. First, the only way one can learn to write is by writing. Second, “writing can be a means for learning.” The authors’ views of both goals of writing are not traditional views. Writing serves as an “engaging transaction through which the learner makes her own connections and builds her own meaning.” The addition of the writing standards for science from the Common Core standards mirrors the goals of Mayhner, Lester and Pradl (1983). Writing within the science curriculum allows students to make meaning and learning their own.
... more likely the students will write effectively. When they feel in control of their writing they will gain confidence and be proud of their achievements (Gibbons, 2002).
When going through life learning is an everyday occurrence as each day is constantly filled with information that is used throughout the course of your life. Each day we get stronger and stronger in whatever we decide to put our minds to, weather that be academics, sports, our jobs we are constantly learning and growing on a daily basis. This semester I have grown in English as I personally felt that through the English 102 course I have been able to grasp some key concepts and writing techniques that will better me for the future. In this class there was a list of goals and outcomes that the instructor felt would be achievable and the best way to learn throughout the course. In each goal throughout this process I feel like I have improved to some degree but there is other things that I do need to touch up on a bit more to further my writing education outside the classroom.
One quote that stood out to me was “I was struggling to express increasingly complex ideas, and I couldn’t get the language straight: words, as in my second sentence on tragedy, piled up like cars in a serial wreck” (2). This reminds me of when my parents would always tell me to keep writing during my younger stages. Sometimes, through my essays I would give up because the words that are in my head wouldn’t spill out. So, I would become stuck and would consistently ask for help. I literally felt like I was stuck behind traffic, and couldn’t get out until an hour later. However, one good point brought up by Bailey was “I believe that school writing and personal writing are completely different, where school writing can be right or wrong but person writing can be anything without any consequence.” I feel like school writing can play a big role in how one may decided to use their words. If there’s a big essay due; there is a high chance that expressing high complexed ideas would be a lot more harder; than through personal writing because the ‘A’ is a lot more important than actually understanding the context. Another quote I agreed with was, “developing writes will grow… if they are able to write for people who are willing to sit with them and help them as they struggle to write about difficult things” (2). This goes along with my
When writing a five paragraph essay, there are five steps one must fallow in order to attain perfection, these steps include understanding the question, brainstorming, writing a rough copy, revising, and creating a final draft. The first and most important step is understanding the topic. The topic of the essay is what the essay will be about and if this is misunderstood, the whole essay will be off course. The second step, brainstorming, will help organize thoughts and ideas so they flow amiably. There are many different ways to brainstorm, some of the most helpful are making a web of ideas, making a list of ideas, or creating a Venn diagram to compare and contrast the conviction. All these ideas will be related to the topic at hand. For example, if the essays topic is about how the earth is affected by global warming, then the brainstorming ideas might include the ozone lair being reduced or how global climate has raised. The third step when writing a five paragraph essay is creating the rough draft. The first draft must have all the features the final will, but does not have to be...
Thinking about a topic to write about is not always easy, and sometimes the process of writing can end up being difficult. Jennifer Jacobson discusses strategies to overcome the struggles that young writers can encounter while writing. I was interested in her book No More “I’m Done!” Fostering Independent Writers in the Primary Grades because I feel like as a future teacher this could be a frequent problem among students. From reading this book, I hoped that I would learn useful strategies that I could use to help students overcome their problems with writing. After reading this book, I do believe that Jacobson has provided me with plenty of methods to use. I was surprised at the depth that she goes into in her text. There is a vast amount
Debates on how a subject such as college writing should be taught is a multi-angled argument encompassing all sorts of opinions. Should college writing be taught and how? If we teach it, what should its main goals be? These are the questions that seem to have too many answers. Statistics, facts, research, and history will help us find those few, specific answers. I believe the goals of college writing should be to enhance a student’s literacy with the involvement of all forms of technology in a multicultural environment. A student must understand all forms of communication, negotiate under diverse perspectives and eventually come to their own set of beliefs. This can only be accomplished with a student’s exposure to and interaction with all forms of literacy.
I believe that if students are being pushed to their full potential when it comes to writing in high school it can make a huge difference. For example, if students are expected to understand more about their writing and understand where the issues are it can help with critical thinking abilities and prepare people for real life experiences. This way they aren’t learning how to get out of understanding their writing. However, I do understand that writing is a big part of school, but maybe writing concepts should be focused on more as well. Therefore, I conclude that if students worked hard on their writing in high school it would result in them achieving lots in
In our focus groups, teens said they are motivated to write when they can select topics that are relevant to their lives and interests, and report greater enjoyment of school writing when they have the opportunity to write creatively. Having teachers or other adults who challenge them, present them with interesting curricula and give them detailed feedback also serves as a motivator for teens. Teens also report writing for an audience motivates them to write and write well. (Lenhart et. al.
I’ve never been in a classroom setting that expected us to discuss our writing assignments. Such as discussing our journals to the class and in the assigned groups in every class. I was skeptical of the idea first, but now I have learned to appreciate the class and group discussion idea. Besides sharing our reactions and ideas, I have developed more personal relationships with my classmates from this. Being closer to my classmates enables me to have engaging and enjoyable conversations with
Writers face several hurdles when it comes to writing projects, for both formal and informal purposes. Not only that, but each writer may face different hurdles. What one person may consider a challenge, another will find simple. The challenges I find most difficult are finding a way to condense broad topics into something easily discussed. Even once I am able to condense a subject down, I find it challenging to separate it into different topic areas.
Writing is an important part of everyone’s life, whether we use it in school, in the workplace, as a hobby or in personal communication. It is important to have this skill because it helps us as writers to express feelings and thoughts to other people in a reasonably permanent form. Formal writing forms like essays, research papers, and articles stimulates critically thinking. This helps the writer to learn how to interpret the world around him/her in a meaningful way. In college, professors motivate students to write in a formal, coherent manner, without losing their own voice in the process. Improving your writing skills is important, in every English class that’s the main teaching point; to help students improve their writing skills. Throughout my college experience I have acknowledge that
Writing has always been a major part of my daily life. Starting as a middle school student I would write daily journals about my life situations. Once I started high school I continued to write and learned how to write essays and journals, but after leaving high school my level of interest slowed down tremendously. During the twenty years of being out of school and still to this very day I write the majority of what I have seen or done and some examples of my writing is taking notes at church and now in college. I also feel writing at work is important to me, as far as documenting tasks I have completed.
The ability to write well is not a naturally acquired skill; it is usually learned or culturally transmitted as a set of practices in formal instructional settings or other environments. Writing skills must be practiced and learned through experience. Writing also involves composing, which implies the ability either to tell or retell pieces of information in the form of narratives or description, or to transform information into new texts, as in expository or argumentative writing. Perhaps it is best viewed as a continuum of activities that range from the more mechanical or formal aspects of “writing down” on the one end, to the more complex act of composing on the other end (Omaggio Hadley, 1993). It is undoubtedly the act of
...o accomplish. A supportive process is more likely to breed success. Students will have different styles, hidden talents, and unique creative processes. Some will love to write and bring these elements out on their own. Others need special prompting. Ultimately I feel that students will always have something to say. Each person has elements of their lives’ that they enjoy, and those are subjects for writing. Each individual has elements that bring them pain, frustration or sadness, and those are subjects for writing too. Getting kids to want to write is not necessarily outlined in my process, and that will be a challenge that I will have to learn even as I teach. I think the key to successful motivation will be to spark the ideas that motivate a student. Maybe even more important is that if that spark is hard to find, not to give up, but to keep seeking it.