401 Reading Response 5

In chapters 6 and 7 of Writing Workshop Fletcher and Parotalupi the writing cycle and adding literature in a writing workshop.  The writing cycle relates to reflecting genuinely as possible on what the writers go through as they write.  Teacher need to not teach the child the writing process but rather guide them into discovering their own way to write and discovering their own process.  Writing workshop can guide children into the process.  Children will learn the difference between drafting and editing by creating a rough draft and revising it later in the process.  After they finish revising then they will proofread.  The difference between revising and proofreading is that proofreading is looking for mistakes where revising is making any writing changes they feel just.  After this is all completed the writing can be published.   Literature in the writing workshop is important.  "Reading aloud builds community. It helps glue the relationships between teacher and students" (p. 75).  Reading literature is important int he classroom because it allows the entire class to share common experiences.  Reading as a class also allows the teacher to gain insight on their students and what they are thinking and what they understand about the text.  Independent reading can also tell a lot about a student.  There are different types of readers whether they are a book hopper or they like to read the same book over and over again.   Reading can fulfill writing workshop.  A key aspect of literature that is helpful during writing workshop is that is can be used to teach lessons about structure and writing.  Teachers can use books to teach new ways of writing and teach basic skills necessary.  Having children read gives them a chance to understand the new concept being taught.  Writing is a very important part of a child's development by allowing them to create their own process and supporting them by adding in other medias like literature teachers will be able to guide their students to succes in writing workshop.


-Chapter 8
When talking about writer's workshop, we fail to realize that it's everything put together to create a master piece of writing. You don't have to go through the process of brainstorming, outlining, rough draft, edit, and final draft. As teachers, we are to guide the students and slowly give the students more and more responsibility. We are to praise the students for their writings, answer questions, edit writing, teach new material, and meet with the students so that we can give them a little push forward in their writing. Writing is supposed to be set in your schedule for 45 minutes a day for four days, according to Regie Routman. For a good setup in picking a writing topic, I think back to our visit at Park Forest. The teacher had a chart of different topics for the students to pick from. This way, it gives the students the option to pick a topic that they want to write about or pick a topic that will inspire them to write. At some point in our lives, we have all made a web or an outline, but it is said that making those tend to make students more confused. There are other ways to explore a topic that they want to write about. Talking out loud, taking some notes, thinking to themselves, and maybe even drawing pictures. A key point from Routman is to include writing in every subject rather than just writing. 

-Chapter 5
Shared writing is when the teacher groups together with the students to write something together. This allows every student to participate and it allows them to gain in writing. Having the whole class (or smaller groups) paired with the teacher allows some room for guidance and explanation. The teacher still has the power in what goes on, but the students are able to be free. Shared writing also really benefits with having English Language Learners. This allows the ELL's to take all the information in and maybe even have the opportunity to talk aloud. ELL's can also add in their culture and everyone else can learn something new from the ELL's background; something they never knew about before. There are so many strategies that are used to help students in shared writing. Shared writing allows the students to expand their thinking and help each other out. All in all, shared writing can only be beneficial, because everyone is a part of it and everyone is contributing in one way or another.  


This link provides another view point of reading and writing together.  They give example syllabus and even how to help teach reading and writing together. http://www.hws.edu/academics/ctl/writes_reading.aspx

This link talks about how they prepare for shared writing. It is really interesting to see how they do it compared to some others.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Vcrd4LXpB8