The Big Fresh from Choice Literacy
October 24, 2009
A Killing Frost
Last week we had our first killing frost here in coastal
Maine. There were many nights recently when the temperatures
dipped low enough that they was a slight glaze on the plants and a
strong nip in the air by morning, but this was the first evening with
sustained temperatures below freezing. It's not
that we woke up to dead plants and a brown landscape - everything still
looked pretty lush and green. Yet within hours or days, many
of the plants and vegetables were done for the season.
The frost reminded me of an anecdote from Ralph Fletcher's classic
book, What a Writer Needs :
I know a woman who found
herself in the middle of a divorce. In January her
soon-to-be-ex-husband asked if he might use the house one last time to
throw a party. She consented, with one caveat: She
requested that he and his guests take particular care with her
plants. The house was filled with many species of tropical
plants from around the world. He nodded wearily; he knew all
about the plants. Not to worry, he told her.
She went away the
weekend of his party. An hour before the party, he brought
all the plants outside, in sub-zero temperatures. After the
party, he brought them all inside again. The plants didn't
look too bad when she returned home. But within a week every
one of them had died.
Ralph uses this story as a metaphor for "the chilling effect" that
happens when young writers switch to unfamiliar genres. But I
think it's just as useful for literacy leaders thinking through
structures in place in your classroom or school that once worked, but
now are all but dead.
Sometimes an activity fails over time gradually because it has run its
course - participants slowly tire of it, or have moved on to other
interests. Other times there is definitely a moment when a
change was made without a noticeable immediate effect. . .yet in
hindsight it was the killing frost. Maybe it was a switch
from a free choice of topics in teacher study groups to assigned
books. Perhaps it was a committee that was voluntary which
became required for all. Sometimes an activity like
read-aloud is so beloved by you and your students that you decide to
milk it for even more learning, injecting more (and more and more)
questions and instruction within that time.
What I often found is successful teaching structures and
activities aren't nearly as robust as they appear to be on the
surface. Introducing the wrong person into the mix, limiting
choice, changing the timeframe for an annual event. . .any one of these
things could serve as a killing frost, revealing just how fragile
learning and routines can be. Taking the time to note what's
going well, and why it's going well, gives you the information you
might need in the future when someone wants to change or co-opt your
work in a way that could ruin it. Many times I found that person was me
- not any boss giving me orders. When it comes to killing
frosts, we are often our own worst enemies.
This week we have lots of resources for refreshing your teaching of
revision strategies. Plus more as always - enjoy!
Brenda Power
Editor, Choice Literacy
Free for All
In Extreme Makeover: Revision Edition, Heather Rader finds
short text and shared modeling of revision strategies are just the
scaffolds students need to see the power of revision for improving
writing:
http://www.choiceliteracy.com/public/1005.cfm
From the Choice Literacy Archives, Suzy Kaback's Writing Strengths
Anchor Chart activity builds a sense of community and peer editing
connections in her middle school classroom:
http://www.choiceliteracy.com/public/283.cfm
Our Quote Collection on Revision has many choice quotes for launching
study group or class discussions:
http://www.choiceliteracy.com/public/310.cfm
Donalyn Miller, author of The Book Whisperer , finds she is having a "Boy Year" in her sixth-grade classroom. If you have ever had
a year with far more boys than girls on your roster (or even if the
boys' energy just makes it feel like there are more of them), you will
enjoy her positive thoughts on boys and literacy:
http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/book_whisperer/
This is one of those essays that sticks with you long after you've read
it. In The Defiant Ones published in The New Yorker, Daniel Zalewski
makes connections between the rise of popular children's books
celebrating characters who "revel in clever mischief" and parenting
styles which avoid any real discipline of willful children.
If you are seeing a rise in your school of children who just won't take
"no" for an answer, maybe it's time to rethink some of your read-aloud
favorites:
http://bit.ly/nIGb7
For Members
Only
ERP. The sound can't help but make you grin. It's
Heather Rader's acronym for Explicit Revision for Peers, a series of
one-minute kinesthetic writing routines to help students learn how to
help each other kindly during writer's workshop:
http://www.choiceliteracy.com/members/1006.cfm
Large classes? Little wall space? A secret weapon
for many teachers in teaching revision is the lowly foam board for
displaying anchor charts that can easily be moved and referred to
during writing workshop. Franki Sibberson in this week's
video from the archives demonstrates how she starts a writing board in
her intermediate classroom:
http://www.choiceliteracy.com/members/300.cfm
If you want to do more with readers' theater to promote fluency, but
can't afford one of those expensive kits, you'll enjoy this week's
booklist. Shari Frost has compiled her favorite Ready-to-Go
Readers' Theater Books - the text and illustrations are designed in
ways that allow students to easily use them in readers' theater:
http://www.choiceliteracy.com/members/1009.cfm
We've posted a new Choice Literacy Cluster on Moving from
Assessment Data to Classroom Practice, with contributions from Jennifer
Allen, "The Sisters" (Gail Boushey and Joan Moser), Clare Landrigan,
and Tammy Mulligan:
http://www.choiceliteracy.com/members/1008.cfm
Finally, you may have noticed we've added more features that
are compilations of resources on the site, like the Clusters and our
new Digests. If you are having trouble keeping track of
materials you plan to use in upcoming staff meetings, study groups, or
just to save to read later, you might want to take advantage of our "My
Favorites" bookmarking tool. It's an easy-to-use personal
filing and notetaking system included in your membership:
http://www.choiceliteracy.com/members/846.cfm
That's all for this week!
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Jennifer Allen
