Writing Conferences

My only concern with having writing conferences in a typical ELA classroom in a public school is that there might be not enough time to spend as much time I'd like on writing conferences because there is a list of things that teachers are required to teach in ELA class for the year.  Despite the time limit, however, I think it is important to let the students be exposed to writing conference experiences at least because writing conferences can do multiple things like it did to me.  I had my first writing conference when I was a freshman in college.  The professor who held these writing conferences for us still remains as my favorite English teacher till today because he helped to spark my interest in studying English--reading and especially writing.  He helped me see and realize what first drafts are supposed to look like, how revising should be done, and how revising is different from editing, and what I need to pay attention to when I am revising to prevent both mistakes that most people make and mistakes that I personally tend to make.  He also allowed me many opportunities to look at writings of different levels through peer-review sessions and helped me develop the skills to distinguish "good" writing from "bad" writing.  I am glad that I had this professor in my freshman year, and I am also appreciative that I got to experience such a living model of a productively and effectively run writing conference before it's too late because I know and can envision what  a good writing conference should look like for my own classroom.

Rough Draft of Case Study Paper

1. Section One: General Information

•    Interview:

-          Name: Jamal

-          Grade: 7^th grade

-          Age: 12 years old

-          Family: 4^th child of 6 siblings

-          School background: transferred from Hillsman Middle School this year.

-          He reads about 2 hours a day everyday and finishes a book/week.

-          Favorite Genre: Sci-fi

-          Favorite Book: The Harry Potter series, Percy Jackson series.

-          He usually checks out books from the school library; he usually checks out one book a week.

-          He’s not involved in any extra-curricular activities, but he is taking Family/Consumer Science, P.E., and Spanish for his Connections.

-          He prefers reading to writing.

-          His family doesn’t read as much as he does, but his family reads a little bit.

-          Favorite Subject: Social Studies

-          Favorite Teacher: Ms. Barr (ELA teacher, “because she is fun and plays cool videos”)

-          Least Favorite Subject: Mathematics

-          Least Favorite Teacher: (not comfortable answering)

-          He likes to and often does read any kind of texts like cereal box, prescriptions, milk carton, etc.

-          Why do you like reading? “I just like to read.”

-          Why do you not like writing? “Because I’m bad at writing.”

-          Do you see any connection between those books that you read outside of class and stuff that we read within ELA classes? “how the background is in the future?” –it seems that he either didn’t have any distinguishing line established between books outside of class and those inside of class or had hard time making the connection between the two.

-          What do you think can make your ELA class more interesting and engaging? “more activities like games and stuff.”

-          I asked him some questions about the writing assessment he had to do last week, and I asked him what about writing he thinks is the most difficult because he did very poorly on it—barely a paragraph.  “I think I get distracted easily” by people around him. 

•     Observation:

-          The student is larger in size compared to the other average middle school students, and he is a bit overweight. 

-          He is very quiet and usually shows calm, or a bit unmotivated, attitude in class.

-          He enjoys interacting with students who approach him friendly and smoothly, but he seems to lack confidence in approaching other people first.

-          He just transferred to BHL from Hillsman this year, so I think he is still in the process of getting used to the school and making friends.

-          On his record from 6^th grade, he scored 900 out of 930 on the CRCT.  However, I haven’t been seeing the same level of writing proficiency on his writing assignments.

-          I’ve seen him eating lunch alone at the cafeteria on the reward day, which means that students can sit wherever they want with their friends.

-          Despite his usual calm attitude, he was once with the principal all day for hitting somebody he doesn’t even know because the kid wanted to play with his pencil box without his permission.

2.      Investigate the Literacy Background and Current Literacy practices of student.

• ·         An event involving your student that gives us insight into your student’s attitudes towards reading 

: I was walking down the hall way to the buses after the classes were all finished, and Jamal came up to me and asked “did you know Humpty Dumpty was an egg?” And, he told me that he found out about it from reading milk cartons that morning. 

• ·         An event involving your student that gives us insight into your student’s attitudes toward writing

: This would be just about every class period where he needs to do some kind of, or any kind of, writing.  He would be very much engaged in class activity which has to do with reading, but he would be completely disengaged and unmotivated to follow any instruction if that activity has to do with writing regardless of the amount of writing. 

• ·         Data collected that revealed information about the student’s literacy background/past experiences, literacy attitudes

: 6^th grade CRCT score (900/930); his writing assessment (his sentences); observations (he is ALWAYS reading or carrying a book in his hand)

• Current ability to relate to literacy and learning in and out of school
• Assessment of this student’s current reading abilities and struggles
• Assessment of this student’s current writing abilities and struggles
• Assessment of how reading and writing transact with one other for this student

: Based on his writing assessment (prompt: school uniform choices), there seems to be a distinct gap between his reading level and his writing level.  He seems to be able to understand the writing prompt, but he struggles with coming up with his own ideas and examples and organizing them effectively. 

Based on his ‘Body Biography’ activity in which he had to describe how/what a character’s each body part symbolizes and support his symbolisms with textual evidence, it seems that he understood the story of the book, The Giver, but he didn’t finish the activity because there was much writing he had to do.  He drew the character, and he spent most of the class period drawing, picturing the character, and just chattering with a friend who sits next to him.  

3.      Revelations and Recommendations

• ·         For reading

-          how the student’s reading level is reflected through his/her activities

-          the teacher needs to not only encourage students to read inside and outside of class but also teach them how to read/analyze/close-read what they read because reading a lot doesn’t seem to guarantee a depth of reading comprehension.

-          For students who already enjoy reading, but probably only for their own pleasure, I think it is important to explain why it’s important to close-read and it might be even difficult to engage those kinds of students because they might be disengaged in the reading activities for being engaged in reading on their own.

• ·         For Writing

-          Reading and Writing do not transact automatically.  Reading would greatly help Writing, but they require different teachings. 

-          Writing lessons for Jamal- teaching writing for low-level writers; building confidence as writer.

-          I wonder how these avid reader students feel about standardized writings since they have seen various types of writing through books.

-          Do teachers need to emphasize different types of writing depending on their students’ literacy culture/background?

Case Study Section Two

Section Two: Investigate the Literacy Background and Current Literacy practices of student.

            I’m thinking about changing the student I want to do a case study on because I found another student who seems to be an avid reader but shows more interesting behaviors in and outside of class. So, I am going to do the first part of this case study with him later.  His name is Jamal, and he is always reading in and outside of class.  Unlike the previous student that I had chosen to do my case study with, he seems to be engaged in the reading that he chose to read only.  He loves reading, he said.  And, he reads for hours at home too.   However, he doesn’t participate in class very much, or should I say at all.  According to my MT’s description of the student, “he is just not motivated.”  

            My first encounter with him was in the hallway after the last school bell rang in the afternoon.  When every other student was running out the door to go home, he came up to me and said “did you know that not a lot of people know Humpty Dumpty is an egg?” So I told him “Yeah, I realized that recently too.  I just didn’t come to that realization when I was younger for some reason.  How did you come to that thought by the way?” And, he answered, “Oh, I was reading a milk carton this morning.”  I found it really interesting to hear his answer especially after I did a small activity in my Teaching Reading class in which we talked about ‘what is a text.’ And, he is always reading whenever I find him.  He is reading during lunch in the cafeteria, and he is reading even during class.  He seems to be very much engaged in reading activities when we are reading a class assigned book in ELA class, but he doesn’t seem to be equally engaged in other activities that are not reading-involved.  So then, he would go right back to reading his own book.  

            I saw him reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows a week ago, and he was half way done with it.  And then, I saw him a couple of days ago reading Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.  So, I asked him why he is reading backwards, and he told me “I’ve read this book before, but I’m reading it again because I like this one.”  So, he’s even REREADING! I’m just fascinated to find out more about him, about his writing and reading, about his life, about his personality, about his interests other than reading, about how he feels about other things and why he reads, etc. 

(I couldn’t gather all the data I need for this second session because I chose to go to my placement on Wednesday and Friday this week, but I will figure out how to find the time to ask him all the questions I need to ask for the first session and the second as well when I go in this Wednesday.)