Welcome! Please sit with your grade level or job-alike group

1. Welcome!Please sit with your grade level or job-alike group

2. District Expectations 2011 Writing Initiative • Building capacity to teach writing • College and Career Readiness • 2009 D62 Balanced Literacy Recommendations • Materials and resources • Transitioning to the Common Core • D62 Writing Instruction Model • Observable Best Practices in Writing Instruction • Writing Assessment and Rubrics • Purpose of 2011 Writing Initiative

3. Observable Best Practices in Writing • Give students choice when choosing a topic. • Use mentor texts to promote examples of good writing. • Conference with students to provide specific feedback that reinforces good writing and identifies areas of improvement. • Utilize the District 62 Writing Instruction Model. • Model good writing and thinking about writing. • Expose students to the Writing Process and give them the tools to develop their own Writing Process when they are ready.

4. Key Components of Good Writing • Focus • Support • Organization • Voice • Word Choice • Ideas • Sentence Fluency • Conventions • Presentation

5. Hand-outs for the day • White Packet includes: Agenda, Observable Best Practices, Writing Instruction Model, Reflection Sheet, WIM Observation Sheet • Mini Lesson Packet (yellow) includes: Cover sheet, Mini-lesson suggestions, Mary Fink’s 3 student samples • Common Core Sample (blue) includes: Cover and example by grade level (K-1), (2-3), (4-5), (6-8) • Pink Strip Questionnaire – fill out as we are going along

6. Introduction of today’s format • Videos to demonstrate each step • After each video segment people will complete the chart provided • Review student work in job-alike groups • Assess and choose a follow-up mini-lesson and report out to group • Common Core State Standard examples will be supplied K-1, 2-3, 4-5, 6-8 • Show demonstration teacher’s video comment about what and how she chose to reteach

7. 1. Introduce Writing with a Mentor Text a. Explicitly inform students that you are reading an example of the type of writing they are about to do or that it is to generate ideas for their writing. b. Stop periodically through the reading to identify characteristics of the author’s writing. i. Does the author use exciting words that you think you’ll try to do as well when you model? ii. Does the author cite research? Use illustrations? Examples iii. Is there anything you don’t like about the text that you will not do in your piece?

8. 2. Show additional examples of good writing a. Find a newspaper, magazine article, online piece, or student samples to reinforce some of the good traits of writing that were shown in the mentor text. Ask students to identify specific examples and justify their opinions.

9. Common Core Standard ExamplesGroup Activity • Use student examples from CCSS Apendix C, and determine how would you use this as a mentor text? • Keeping in mind: Key Components of Good Writing, ISAT Rubric, CCSS, 6-Traits • What would you highlight about good informational writing?

10. 3. Teacher models writing and thinking a. Begin writing your own piece by demonstrating your brainstorming and organization process. Talk through it and explain why it works for you. b. During the actual writing of the informative/explanatory piece, discuss: • How and why you’re choosing words. • If you’re skipping a specific section and why. • Finding more information to support a statement and how you’re going to do that. • If you don’t like something and want to change it. Are you doing this because you thought of your audience? Why or why not? • Questioning yourself • Example: “Will my reader understand what I’m trying to communicate here?” “Does this word really emphasize the emotion I want to come through?” “Instead of describing, maybe I should cite a piece of evidence or use dialogue.”

11. 4. The group creates a piece of writing a. As a class, brainstorm some ideas to write about. Choose a specific topic and narrow, if needed. b. Begin drafting a class piece of writing. Assist the group in questioning themselves and being careful about their word choice. Discuss certain disagreements such as whether to use the word “unhappy” or the phrase “feeling blue” and come to consensus.

12. 5. Students brainstorm and write on their own a. Assist students individually and in small groups as they complete brainstorming. b. Allow older students to choose whether or not to brainstorm or begin writing so that they may develop their own writing process. c. Remind students about the strategies you used for yourself and as a group.

13. 6. Peer Editing a. Have students peer edit for one specific purpose. Only check for organization be specific in feedback they provide. b. When applicable, have students use a rubric.

14. 7. Conferencing a. Meet with students individually about their first draft. b. Ask students what they feel their strengths are in their piece. What do they want to improve on? c. State strengths of their writing; reinforce what they are doing well and be specific. d. Identify 2-3 goals for them to work on taking into account the students’ goals as well. Explain each goal, why you set it, and ask if they understand each one. Ask which goal they are going to work on first.

15. 8. Formative Assessment to determine instruction a. After conferencing with the majority of students, determine if there needs to be any re- teaching or a mini-lesson on an area of weakness that you saw the majority of student having (citing a source, providing examples, organization, etc.). b. Consider flexible grouping. If 4-5 students need help with organization, meet with them separately for the mini-lesson.

16. Group Activity • Look at 3 writing samples in your packet. • As a team, determine an area for improvement and focus on for a mini-lesson (not grammar) and rationale for decision. • Ideas for mini-lessons(Key Components of Writing).

17. 9. Re-teaching or Mini-Lesson a. Use 10-15 minutes to re-teach or give a mini- lesson. b. Explicitly tell students the purpose of the re- teaching or mini-lesson. i. Example: “After conferencing with all of you on your papers, I noticed that we have all done really well on organization. Great job! I would like to review how to cite sources though. Most of us described the facts instead of quoting them, which isn’t always the best choice. Let’s take a look…”

18. Personal Reflection • What writing pieces do I already have in place? • What writing pieces do I need to enhance in my classroom? • What surprised me the most after observing the videos? • How do I plan to implement one new thing this week? • Please bring this document to your afternoon session. • Thank you for your time & reflection! • Please complete and keep for your own records to use for the afternoon session.

19. CPDU’s and Evaluation • Please leave evaluation on your table • CPDU forms are yours to keep. • Afternoon meetings begin at 1:00 • Department meetings at specified locations. • Elementary meetings in home building.

20. Thank you to the following teachers for contributing to our Professional Learning Community: • JorgiaBreitzman • Amy Cengel • Mary Fink • Bridget Gazzolo • Lisa Kocis • Melissa Levy • Joanne Spachner • Leah Strom