Is Writer's Workshop Appropriate for All-Ages?

I am one of the biggest fanatics when it comes to writing. I believe that students should be allowed to write about whatever they are excited to write about. Does it matter if their story is about last week's awesome soccer game or that one time that they got a high score on their favorite video game? In my opinion, if the writing is well done then the student should have the freedom to choose a topic that interests them. So many young boys dread writing-- or should I say, they dread writing 3 pages about Thanksgiving Dinner, using descriptive writing about smells and textures to put the reader right at the dinning room table. But allow them to write about that amazing hiking trip they went on with their dad over the summer and watch the descriptive text form naturally as their excitement leads them to describe just how awesome the hike was.

Writer's Workshop facilitates this freedom. And for that reason, I am a fan of the general concepts involved in Writer's Workshop. However, I feel that maybe too much freedom is being delt out in the wrong places. The program requests an hour of writing, generally speaking 'free-writing' every day. Then each day, the student is introduce to one new concept to incorporate into their story. One day it is "how to make a list" another day it is a new prewrite style. And this is all good... almost.

My biggest problem with Writer's Workshop is it's massive attempt to unify how writing is taught across the board-- across schools, districts and grades. And here inlies my issue. How should a fifth grader and a kindergartener be learning the same thing? Some writing skills are transferable, like pre-writing styles. Others are simply not. Teaching a kindergarten how to edit their story when they cannot even form complete words just is not helpful. I understand the idea is that they will be intoduced to these concepts early on in their education and become more comfortable using them as their skill progesses, but it seems overdone at times. Kindergarteners who have a very pre-emergent writing level (as in "I went to the park" reads "Wt to t pk") usually cannot recall what their story says a week later (as opposed to when you ask them about it when they are in the middle of writing it). Having them return to a piece they wrote a month ago and asking them to edit it, is really in a sense having them make a carbon copy of a carbon copy. They basically retell a story with less memory and detail as the original, and we as teachers are supposed to tell them that that makes them a better writer?

I like Writer's Workshop, I just wish that it was used as a guideline (like in some schools) rather than a god-sent cirriculum like the schools I have been in. It has very good concepts that can be (and should be) easily adapted the proper age group. All in all, I wish districts would trust their teachers enough to offer them the tools and allow them to use them to their discretion.

Ideas in Kindergarten

Reading in kindergarten was always a bit of a mystery to me. Some kids come in able to breeze through story books, while others are struggling to learn a handful of letters. I feel like the reading achievement gap is most extreme among all students during this first year of school. You have the handful of kids that spent a year or 2 in a highly academic preschool, others who have spent their whole lives in daycares. Some have a stay at home mom or dad who reads with them daily, others spent their early years running through sprinklers rather than reading books. There is not really any way to tell where a student will be at academically either. It's their first year in school-- no records, tips and samples sent up from last year's teacher, and no way to prepare for the new year's class.

When I first walked into my kindergarten classroom in Ballard, I didn't quite realize this spectrum of learning. I assumed everyone read, all at slightly different levels but all able to get by. When one little boy asked me what color he was supposed to color in the number pattern, I instinctly told him to read the directions. He looked at me like I was dumber than a doornail and stated so incredibly matter of a factly, "I can't read!" I had never worked with someone who was in elementary school and incable of reading (either English or their native tongue). So I decided I must focus in on some of my teachers literacy teaching techniques.

I noticed that she often color codes things and draws little sketches next to very simply written instructions. For other things that students don't necessarily need to be able to read, like the daily announcements, she will write them out and read them aloud with her finger tracing over the words. This way, students with some letter and word recognization skills will be able to become familiar with more words. At the same time, students with little or no reading skills are not left in the dark and recieve the same message in addition to word recognization practice (depsite the lack of comprehension).

When she reads stories, she chooses a mix of simple story books and longer, more detailed stories-- some with beautiful illustrations, others with minimal doodles. When she reads simple books, she traces the words with her finger. More difficult books she will often model "good reading" pausing to show the pictures after she reads the page. I think that it is important for her to keep a variety so that kids do not get bored, either for lack of understanding or becuase the material is too easy.

These are simple strategies that are easy to incorporate into any classroom, but I feel like it is necessary to intentially spot them out to ensure that students at all levels of the literacy spectrum are provided with an education fit for them.