Writer's Workshop

and Conferencing

What is it?

Class time to create/work on skills taught
Class time to work towards a polished piece of writing
Class time to discuss work with your peers and teacher
An opportunity to solicit and give feedback
Polished pieces of your choice will be submitted in Google Classroom prior to the midterm and final report card

Welcome to Writer’s Workshop

Tips for Writing Workshop

Find topics and purposes that matter to who you are now, who you once were, and who you might become.
Create and maintain your territories as a writer in your writer/reader notebook: the ideas, topics, purposes, genres, and poetic forms you would like to explore.
Make your own decisions about what’s working and what needs more work in your drafts. Learn how to step back and read yourself with a critical, literary eye and ear.
Attend to, ask questions about, and comment on your classmates’ drafts in ways that help them move their writing forward.
Take notes on mini-lessons in your binder. Keep them in order.
Recognize that a reader’s eyes and mind need writing to be correct and predictable in terms of spelling, punctuation, capitalization and paragraphing. Work towards making your writing look like the writing you see in books.
Experiment with the approaches and techniques that I show you in mini-lessons, that we discuss in conferences, and that you glean from reading other writer’s poetry and prose.
Take care of the materials, resources and equipment I’ve provided for you, as well as your writer’s notebook.
Each reporting period, work towards significant goals for yourself as a writer.
In every writing workshop, take a deliberate stance towards writing well. Try to make your writing literature, and use what you’ve been shown to help you get there.
Work hard as a writer. Recreate happy times, reconcile to sad ones, discover what you know about a subject and learn more, convey information, play, explore, entertain, argue, apologize, advise, analyze, sympathize, criticize, interview, observe, imagine, remember, reflect, celebrate, express love, show gratitude, and reveal yourself on the page.

From: Atwell, Nancie. Reading in the Middle. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 2011.

Expectations for Writing Workshop

Save everything. It’s all a part of the history of a piece and your history as an author. Use Google Docs so that we take a look at your revision history over time, or keep a copy of your drafts in your portfolio. Your final evaluation will be based on your growth as a writer over the semester, so it is really important that you keep everything to demonstrate that growth.
Always skip lines if you are writing by hand. On the computer, always print double-spaced. Be aware that professional writers do this too.
Get into the habit of punctuation and spelling as correctly as you can while you’re writing. This is something else professional writers do. Use Grammarly.
Understand that writing is thinking on paper. Do nothing to distract other writers. Don’t impose your words on their brains as they’re working to find words of their own.
When you talk with me about your writing, use a voice as soft as I do: whisper.
Talk with a classmate about your writing when you have a reason to - when there is a specific problem that could benefit from a specific friend’s response. Move to one of the conference areas to work. If you are conferring, complete a peer conference form, and record your reactions on the form so that the writer leaves the conversation with a reminder of what happened and a plan.
Write as well as you can. Work hard and make literature.

From: Atwell, Nancie. Reading in the Middle. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 2011

Writing Workshop: Guidelines for Responding

You have two roles as a responder to peer work:

To really hear what the writer is communicating, to listen well, to consider and respond to the thinking in the piece.
To help the writer communicate the story with as much grace as possible, which might mean to correct and suggest and help with conventions.

When your work is under discussion:

Ask for the specific feedback you would like (either at the beginning or end).
Make notes on your copy as people talk—even if you don't agree with them.
Tell us what stage of the writing process you are in, but without saying how bad it is.
Don't explain why you wrote it; this should become evident.
Remain silent and listen as people respond to your work. Try to really hear what they are saying without defending your piece or trying to explain.

When responding to someone else's work:

Try to see the potential of each piece. Try to build on what is working rather than pointing out what isn't—this is much more useful for the writer and more difficult to do.
Express your response in terms of the piece's effect on you, the reader; avoid sweeping judgments and generalizations.
Articulate your response as clearly as you can. It is not enough to simply feel something. A good response depends on conscious, articulate responses.
Tell the writer what you remember most clearly.
Tell the writer where you lost attention or were confused. For this part, use “I statements”. For example, “I didn’t understand how your conclusion ties into your thesis.” Or, “I wonder if another example paragraph would drive your central point home so that there’s no doubt that the reader would get it.”
Tell the writer what you liked, what moved you, what you can still see or feel-- be as specific as you can.
Be respectful of the writer. Do not criticize in a belittling way.
Keep the focus on the piece you are discussing. Avoid telling stories of your own experience. This is not about you.
Refer to the "I" character as "the speaker" or "the narrator" rather than "you". Even though this may be personal writing, the writer has, in effect, presented him or herself as a character in the piece and should be referred to in this way. Also, we are here to discuss the writing and not the writer.
Allow the writer to retain ownership. Do not try to make major changes or rewrite the piece for the author. Your job is not to impose your own view, but to help the writer convey his or her view more powerfully.

Procedure

1. Each person takes a turn reading their work aloud to the group. Feel free to give some background information where absolutely necessary. Depending on what stage of revision this is, the writer may want to ask the group to listen with a particular issue or question in mind. The writer can state this at the beginning, before reading, or ask the group later (see #3).

2. As the person reads, each person in the group writes down three things (post-it notes): See below for sentence starters/further ideas.

a. Praise: What did you like about the piece? As you listen to the essay, write down things that stand out to you in a positive way.

b. Ponder: What did this essay make you think about? What questions emerged for you as you listened? What questions do you still have?

c. Polish: What concrete suggestions or advice can you give that may help the writer as he/she revises?

3. The writer now takes the opportunity to ask the group any questions they have about the piece and to solicit specific advice.

4. Everyone says ‘thank you’ - the writer to their response group for listening, and the response group to the writer for sharing. Students should give the post-it notes to the writer.

5. Repeat 1-4 until everyone in the group is finished.

Praise - Respond with positive comments. Tell the reader something you liked or noticed.

Be Kind

I really liked the way you…

I thought ____________ was effective...

The most successful thing about this was …

I enjoyed reading this because…

It was especially good when you…

I loved the line where you said...

Ponder - Ask the writer a question.

Be Specific

I am confused about ________. Could you by _?

I think _____________ may have been out of place?

Do you think _____ needs more focus on/could include more_?

Was your sentence/paragraph about __________ because_?

Is there another way to ________?

Can you tell me more about________?

I’m not quite sure I understand _________.

Polish - Give the reader a piece of constructive criticism/useful comment.

Be Helpful (refer to success criteria for the writing task)

You might consider adding…

Don’t forget to…

To improve your ____________, try…

Perhaps you could…

This reminded me of…

I could relate to this because...

Takeaways of Peer Response

Peer response is authentic. It’s what writers do in the real world.
Peer response builds community.
Peer response puts students in charge of their own writing.
Peer response makes students better listeners.
Peer response allows students opportunities to read more mentor texts―each others’.

Elaboration Revision Strategy: Question Flooding

What Good Peer Response Look Like.pdf

Revising your work:

Right: The White House released a photograph by Pete Souza of President Obama working on his second inaugural address in 2013.

Crappy First Drafts of Great Books from Psychology Today.

Assessment of Writer's Notebook

Marcie Stears, Stratford District Secondary School

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Writer's Workshop

and Conferencing

What is it?

Class time to create/work on skills taught

Class time to work towards a polished piece of writing

Class time to discuss work with your peers and teacher

An opportunity to solicit and give feedback

Polished pieces of your choice will be submitted in Google Classroom prior to the midterm and final report card

Tips for Writing Workshop

Find topics and purposes that matter to who you are now, who you once were, and who you might become.

Create and maintain your territories as a writer in your writer/reader notebook: the ideas, topics, purposes, genres, and poetic forms you would like to explore.

Make your own decisions about what’s working and what needs more work in your drafts. Learn how to step back and read yourself with a critical, literary eye and ear.

Attend to, ask questions about, and comment on your classmates’ drafts in ways that help them move their writing forward.

Take notes on mini-lessons in your binder. Keep them in order.

Recognize that a reader’s eyes and mind need writing to be correct and predictable in terms of spelling, punctuation, capitalization and paragraphing. Work towards making your writing look like the writing you see in books.

Experiment with the approaches and techniques that I show you in mini-lessons, that we discuss in conferences, and that you glean from reading other writer’s poetry and prose.

Take care of the materials, resources and equipment I’ve provided for you, as well as your writer’s notebook.

Each reporting period, work towards significant goals for yourself as a writer.

In every writing workshop, take a deliberate stance towards writing well. Try to make your writing literature, and use what you’ve been shown to help you get there.

Expectations for Writing Workshop

Always skip lines if you are writing by hand. On the computer, always print double-spaced. Be aware that professional writers do this too.

Get into the habit of punctuation and spelling as correctly as you can while you’re writing. This is something else professional writers do. Use Grammarly.

Understand that writing is thinking on paper. Do nothing to distract other writers. Don’t impose your words on their brains as they’re working to find words of their own.

When you talk with me about your writing, use a voice as soft as I do: whisper.

Write as well as you can. Work hard and make literature.

Writing Workshop: Guidelines for Responding

You have two roles as a responder to peer work:

To really hear what the writer is communicating, to listen well, to consider and respond to the thinking in the piece.

To help the writer communicate the story with as much grace as possible, which might mean to correct and suggest and help with conventions.

When your work is under discussion:

Ask for the specific feedback you would like (either at the beginning or end).

Make notes on your copy as people talk—even if you don't agree with them.

Tell us what stage of the writing process you are in, but without saying how bad it is.

Don't explain why you wrote it; this should become evident.

Remain silent and listen as people respond to your work. Try to really hear what they are saying without defending your piece or trying to explain.