Workshops and In-services provide the "How To Teach" the traits of effective writing and tie them to the demands of proficient writing and state testing programs.
Using the vocabulary of the 6 +1 Traits of Writing, Teach the Traits in-services review the "what to teach" and tackle the "how to teach it". The "how to" includes sentence fluency, word choice, ideas, organization, voice, conventions, and presentation. Included in ideas and organization is an updated version of power writing's effective numerical approach to thinking, writing and reading.
Our sessions are not lectures. We involve participants in hands-on activities that involve them in the program. The size of each group is limited, allowing us to interact, monitor the progress of each activity, provide feedback, and have fun together. Teachers leave the sessions with a fresh, clear understanding of the strategies needed to produce successful writers. They leave with complete, ready-to-use lesson plans. And, they leave energized, having been a part of an experience that will become an important part of who they are as teachers.
Introductory Day Long In-services include the following:
Part I: The "Language" of Reading
and Writing
(sentence fluency, word choice and conventions)
Learn ways to:
- Develop sentence variation.
- Use literature to teach children to understand the difference between sentence variation and sentence fluency.
- Develop vocabulary - rich, precise word choice.
- Address conventions - punctuation, spelling, and paragraphing.
Part II: Voice
Learn ways to:
- Teach the basics of descriptive writing using the Show Me, Don't Tell Me elements of Mood.
- Use Show Me, Don't Tell Me strategies to eliminate passive voice in student writing.
- Use Show Me, Don't Tell Me techniques to add voice not only to narrative writing, but also to expository writing.
Part III: Expository and Informational Writing (ideas and organization)
Learn ways to:
- Provide structure for student writers, including those who struggle the most.
- Use graphic organizers.
- Organize ideas with clear support.
- Use power writing's numerical structure to eliminate the ambiguity of organization.
- Explore cross-curricular applications.
- Learn how to add vitality, voice, and creativity to structured writing.
Kindergarten - First Grade
Kindergarten and first grade writing can also be explored in a separate hands-on
session. Mastery of the creeping, crawling stages at this level allows students
to walk and run in their writing by the end of second grade.
Teach the Traits Session Two
This session quickly reviews the "what to teach" and the "how
to teach it". It then explores concepts designed to show teachers how
to develop into the next stage of writing including the mini-lessons that
need to be taught. Day long in-services include the following:
Part I: The "Language" of Reading and Writing
(sentence fluency, word choice and conventions)Review and explore new ways to:
- Develop sentence variation.
- Use literature to teach students to understand the difference between sentence variation and sentence fluency.
- Develop vocabulary - rich, precise word choice.
Part II: Active vs. Passive Writing
Review and add new mini lessons for:
- Descriptive writing using the elements of Mood and Show Me, Don't Tell Me strategies. These strategies are designed to eliminate passive voice in student writing.
- Revision and conferencing as a means to provide individual help for students.
Part III: Expository and Informational Writing (ideas and organization)
Review and discover additional ways to:
- Provide structure for student writers, especially those who struggle.
- Organize and add ideas with clear support.
- Add details to expository writing.
- Add vitality, voice, and creativity.
- Examine cross-curricular applications.
Part IV: Support State Writing Expectations
6+1 Traits of Writing In-services and
Workshops
Participants will become familiar with the dimensions of Ruth Culham's 6+1
Traits of Writing:
This model will be used to build a learning community that shares a common vocabulary and vision of quality performance. Using materials from the Culham Writing Company, clearly defined scoring rubrics will be introduced to examine and assess examples of "emerging" to "established" student writing.
Poetry In-services and Workshops: Pancakes,
Pickles, and Protoplasm
Unlock student creativity and use the 6+1 traits of writing with original
and imaginative poetry.
Learn:
- How poetry fits in the curriculum.
- How poetry improves writing and thinking skills.
- How poetry can be used across the curriculum.
- How to familiarize poetry as a genre in thematic text sets.
See creativity blossom in struggling students as they are unleashed from the structure of the paragraph.
Bibliographies
Teach the Traits is an effective "How To" program.
Join us for writing success and fun!
"Children deserve
to be explicitly taught the skills and strategies of effective writing, and
the qualities of good writing. This teaching will be dramatically more powerful
if teachers are studying the teaching of writing and if they are responsive
to what students are doing and trying to do as writers. Children also deserve
a teacher who demonstrates a commitment to writing."
- Lucy Calkins,
A Guide to the Writing Workshop