Entry # 10

   " Giving students choice is something that we have talked about in class and a topic I've addressed in previous posts, however, this idea of passion and students having opportunities to write about things that they are interested in exploring connects to a writer's voice." While reading through my classmates blogs I found this quote in Jamie's entry.  It was he response to our other classmate Lindsay addressing students voice in writing.  This quote in particular struck me because every class in literacy that I have had so far has had some focus on student interest.  And the more time that I spend in schools the more I see how students choice can fall to the wayside in the rush to get everything else done. I think that student choice plays a huge rule in student engagement and motivation.  Think about it we have all had to do those assignment that we have not connection to but instead just do for the sake of the grade. I don't know about you guys but for me I didn't take away much from assignments like that, and I didn't put my best effort into my work either.  There was a lack of passion,  which Jamie address in the quote above.  How can we as teachers expect our students to learn as much as possible an engage fully with an assignment when we know full well how we have done in the past in our own educational careers?

     This idea of interest, passion and engagement all come back to the idea of authentic experiences with text.  Something that I had never thought about in depth before I got to graduate school. We as teacher have to create a classroom that allows students to interact with text in an authentic manner, meaning that it fits into the real world and their real lives.  This also comes down to writing that matches up with how they write and fits into the real world.  I think that this is where writing workshop really comes into play.  The way writing workshop and digital writing workshop are discussed in Hicks(2009) and Tompkins(2012).  Both want students to choose what they are writing about and work through the writing process at their on pace.  This will allow students to work on a piece and become truly involved with thier project not just do it to get it done.

   After listening to all the differnet genre presentions and seeing all the different ways that we can help kids to interact with and create text of all different types.  The more I think about it the more I think that the only way to achieve this is to create a writing workshop enviornment where kids want to work together and feel comfortable.  If students feel comfortable and understand that everyone is different and everyone is in different places in their writing process.  I have always known that for me creating the most comfrotable and safe enviornment for my students was my main goal when I start teaching and I think that is what sets the foundation for successful writing workshop as well as everything in the classroom.

   

Entry #7

Throughout the semester we have been working with all different types of technology that can be used as part of a digital writing workshop in the classroom.  The first thing introduced was this blog, I had never used a blog before this class and I am finding it to be an interesting way to reflect on what we are learning in class. Next Hicks (2008) introduces RSS feeders for doing research on the internet.  Again I have never used this before but I like how it can keep kinds considerate on the topic they are looking for and help them the narrow down information.   We were also introduced last class to the google sites.  This is something that was completely new to me.  I didn’t even know that google was capable of this.  Creating my own site was easy and the interface was very easy to work with allowing for me to upload files and include different hyperlinks.  This is something that I will definitely be using in the future whether it is a way to communicate with parents about the classroom or just to communicate with my family. 

            All of these technologies will be very helpful for me to create a strong knowledge base of a way to bring technology into my classroom when appropriate but I am still struggling with the idea of being able to use these things on an everyday basis like suggested in our class readings.  I also like the idea of having a digital writing workshop but I’m not sure how plausible I think that is. 

            While I see all of these different technologies as valuable things to know about and valuable skills to have I am having trouble figuring out how I would apply them in a primary grade classroom.  I know that students are very tech savvy and may already know how to use some of this stuff how can we use it with the younger students? Younger classrooms I have been in only have a few computers and getting time in the computer lab is hard because it is monopolized by the older grades.  I guess I am struggling with how all of this can be applied for students who are still learning the very basics of writing and don’t have the skill set yet to create published work in the form of blogs or websites. 

            I know that all of this makes me seem like a bit of a skeptic especially if you look back at how I feel about using RSS feeders and the issues that it raises in the classroom.  The use of internet changes how we teach and what we need to monitor to make sure the information is appropriate and relevant for our students. So I guess I am still having the same issue I was having with RSS feeders and online interaction as I think about how I would incorporate google sites as something my students would use.

Entry #4

This week for class we spent time discussing the use of blogs, wikis, and feeders in the classroom.  I have personally used wikis and blogs on my own but I haven't had the opportunity to use them with my students yet.  I am very excited after reading all about them in Hicks(2009) I now see that there are so many opportunities to use the wikis and blogs.  I like the idea of students being able to communicate and construct their own meaning online. This is a wonderful opportunity for students to work on a project online where they research and collaborate. 

I have never worked with RSS feeder or even heard of them for that matter.  But I think that the concept of students being able to choose topics they are interested in and have many different sources brought to their fingers tips is wonderful.  These many different sources can be used as a teaching tool for students.  The ability to figure out if something is a worthwhile piece of information is an important skill that they will always need.  I also like how the feeder can bring different points of view of the same topic to you,  it pushes students to think outside of their own worlds and learn about others and their experiences. I think that giving students the ability to use the RSS feeder is a useful teaching tool however; I do struggle with giving students so much freedom on the internet. There are so many things out there that are incorrect of misleading or inappropriate for students.  I’m just not sure how we give them this freedom while still keeping on top of what we’re doing.

I am very excited to introduce digital writing workshop but I have so many reservations of giving students that kind of freedom on the internet.  There are so many things on the internet that students can get into that I don't think that students should be exposed to.  The internet also creates an issue of anonymity that allows people to give their point of view or say things that they may not say normally face to face that could be hurtful instead of helpful.  I think that these are hurdles that we will all have to cross with the introduction of so much technology into schools.  I think that this will have to be a continued discussion as we experiment with our students to find out what works and doesn't work.

Entry #2

             With my limited experience in teaching being in a self-contained classroom as well as a sixth grade science classroom I haven't had much experience with writing workshop. For the writing assignments that what a part of the topic was chosen for the students and they had rubric that they were to follow as they wrote so that they knew what they needed to include and what needed to happen for them to do well. I also look back to my own experience as a student, I can't remember having such independence that this type of workshop creates. Hicks(2009) has students working in both a physical and a virtual classroom on projects that they have a lot of control over. They were able to choose their own topics, collaborate with the teacher as well as other students on their projects and then had the ability to choose how they were going to publish their work. These choices are what I see as independent and taking responsibility for their own work. Taking responsibility for their own work to me means that they aren't writing just for the grade but they have a purpose and they are using writing to create real meaning and sharing it with the world.
       Since I don’t have experience teaching writing workshop I have an ideal set up in mind that I would love to implement in my future classroom. It would start by tying into what we’re learning in science or social studies at the time so students could get experience researching. Within the broad topic that we are working on my students would have the ability to choose something that they wanted to learn more about and then create a writing piece about that would eventually be published and shared with the class to enhance the learning of the class as a whole. Once the topic is chosen students can research in books or on the internet and then start the prewriting process. There would be places in the room where they can work individually as well as consult with other students and myself.
       Once the prewriting, drafting, revising and editing stages are complete students would be able to choose how they want to present what they have written to the class. This is where the digital part comes in; they will have access to computers to blog, use a wiki, and create a brochure, PowerPoint, prezi, poster …..the possibilities are endless and I am sure that my students will have more ideas then me. After this final step students will share what they have created to the class and everyone will learn more with the broad topic that we started with. 
       I understand that this is a very idealized digital writing workshop but I would like to create a community in my classroom that fosters students independent, curiosity and a sense of ownership for their work instead of creating students that are just doing something just for a grade and not really learning or getting anything from the writing process. This is what I ultimately see as the goal of writing workshop and I was never able to experience this much freedom of choice in the classroom so I would like to create this in my future classroom.