Common Core Writing: Writing That Lives Across

All Disciplines

Kandy SmithMiddle TN School ConsultantTennessee State Personnel Development Grant

Being a Writer…

Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life by Anne Lamott

On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft by Stephen King

Being a Writer…

PAGE after PAGE by Heather Sellers

Being a Writer…

What Did I Write? Beginning Writing Behaviour

Marie M. Clay

One recommendation

Pathways to the Common Core: Accelerating Achievement

Lucy CalkinsMary EhrenworthChristopher Lehman

(Heinemann, 2012)

“Rather than attempt to have the last word on the standards,

we’ve chosen to help you with some implementation on the front end of the curve.” (p. 2)

Writing Standards

CHAPTER SIX Overview of the Writing Standards

CHAPTER SEVEN The CCSS and Composing Narrative Texts

CHAPTER EIGHT The CCSS and Composing Argument Texts

CHAPTER NINE The CCSS and Composing Informational Texts

Composing Narrative Texts

Writing Anchor Standard 3: “Write narratives to develop real or imagined

experiences or events using effective technique, well-chosen details, and well-structured event sequences.”

Composing Argument Texts

Writing Anchor Standard 1:“Write arguments to support claims in an

analysis of substantive topics or texts, using valid reasoning and relevant and sufficient evidence.”

Composing Informational Texts

Writing Anchor Standard 2: “Write informative/explanatory texts to examine

and convey complex ideas and information clearly and accurately through the effective selection, organization, and analysis of content.”

Common Core

Reading Writing Equal

Partners

Importance of Writing

“…writing is assumed to be the vehicle through which a great deal of the reading work and reading assessments will occur.”

(Calkins, Ehrenworth, & Lehman, 2012, p. 102)

“Writing must become part of the bill of rights for all students.”

(Calkins, Ehrenworth, and Lehman, 2012, p. 111)

“Mostly, then, the Common Core writing standards seem utterly aligned to the writing process tradition that is well established across the states, with a few new areas of focus and a raised bar for the quality of writing we should expect students to produce.”

(Calkins, Ehrenworth, & Lehman, 2012, p. 112)

HOW DO WE BEGIN WRITING ACROSS THE CURRICULUM?

CCSS Appendix C

“…not the work that strong writers occasionally produce, but the work that all students should be expected to produce – and to produce regularly with independence.”

(Calkins, Ehrenworth, & Lehman, 2012, p. 102)

Rubrics Available

These are from Delaware.

Informational or Explanatory Text-Based Writing Rubric Grades 9–10

Who can/will assess?

(From Delaware’s rubric…)

Who can assess?

Who can assess?

Who can assess?

“The English Teacher’s Red Pen”

“One form of mis-assessment that lingers in our English classes is the intensive correction of student writing.”

(Daniels, 2005, p. 46)

WRITING

“The English Teacher’s Red Pen”

Meaning

Process

Mechanics

Back in the Day…

• Tennessee Tech• Writing folder• Harbrace• Students corrected errors, charted them on a

table (comma splice, fragment, capitalization of numbers, spelling errors, etc.)

Students We Now Teach

• Millennials (born 1982 – 2002) • Constructivists– Social collaboration– Writer’s Workshop

Students We Now Teach• Helicopter Parents– “most watched-over generation”

“Given this life experience of care and boundaries, Millennial Generation learners expect structure and mentoring in their learning environment. They desire specific guidelines (e.g., rubrics) that detail what is expected in their performance. They have become accustomed to someone else's setting parameters for their creativity, active engagement, and interactionfor their knowledge acquisition to be pursued.”

(Carter, 2008, p. 7)

IS CROSS-CURRICULAR WRITING POSSIBLE?

What Cannot Happen…

The High School ELA Instructor

Student Learning

“Students whose teachers were more able (high human capital) and also had stronger ties with their peers (strong social capital) showed the highest gains in (math) achievement.”

(Leana, 2011, p. 34)

Forms of Relationships in Schools

Four Categories

• Parallel Play• Adversarial Relationships• Congenial Relationships• Collegial Relationships

Barth, R. (2006)

Parallel Play

• No interaction• Self-absorbed• Totally engrossed in own work•Work in isolation

Adversarial Relationships

• Blatant• Other times, subtle:– Withholding craft knowledge

“Here at John Adams Elementary School, we all live on the bleeding edge.”

Principal speaking to a parent group

Sharing Craft Knowledge

“I’ve got this great idea about how to teach math without ability-grouping the kids.”

Big Deal. What’s she after… a promotion?

b

The better you look, the worse I look.

The worse you look, the better I look.

Congenial Relationships

• Interactive• Positive

•Personal•Friendly

•IMPORTANT

Collegial Relationships

• Hardest to establish

“Getting good players is easy. Getting ‘em to play together is the hard part.”

Famous Baseball Manager Casey Stengel

Signs that educators are “playing together”…

OBSERVING ONE ANOTHER

WHILE THEY ARE ENGAGED IN PRACTICE

ROOTING FOR ONE

ANOTHER’S SUCCESS

SHARING THEIR CRAFT

KNOWLEDGE

TALKING WITH ONE ANOTHER

ABOUT PRACTICE

Culture of Collegiality

• Talking about practice:–Professional Learning Community•Continual discourse about important

work–Student evaluation–Parent involvement–Curriculum development–Team teaching

Culture of Collegiality

• Sharing Craft Knowledge– Participants share about a front-burner issue• Something useful, important

– Institutionally sanctioned

– NEW TABOO: withholding what we know

Culture of Collegiality

• Observing One Another–Making our practice mutually visible•Never fully confident that we know

what we’re supposed to be doing•Never fully confident that we’re

doing it well•Never quite sure how students will

behave

Culture of Collegiality

“There is no more powerful way of learning and improving on the job than by observing others and having others observe us.”

Culture of Collegiality

• Possibilities:– Hold faculty meetings in classrooms• Teacher does “show and tell”

– Deeper, more instructive observations• AGREEMENT

Culture of Collegiality

• AGREEMENT:–Reciprocal visits:• You visit, I visit • Confidentiality•Mutual agreement: what I will attend to• Agree on day, time, length• Conversation afterwards

Critical Friends

Culture of Collegiality

“We can’t possibly do this because…”

TIMEADMINISTRATIVE FIAT (authoritative determination)

SOCIAL PRESSURE

Culture of Collegiality

• Rooting for One Another– Offering to help• Students, angry parents

– Each teacher vitally interested in front-burner issue of every other teacher.• Put relevant articles in mailboxes• Share effective practices

“We cannot order collaboration. This is not a dictatorship. Moreover, while shotgun marriages sometimes turn out surprisingly well, shotgun collaboration is a contradiction in terms. And no amount of artificial organization, no joint institutes, or combined reviewing committees, or joint directors, will come within the squirting range of a syringe of getting at the heart of the matter.”(Bush, 1957, p. 53 as quoted in Gunawardena & Agosto, 2010)

Final Thought

“Writing That Lives Across All Disciplines”

Possibly not cross-curricular as much as across the curriculum

References

• Provided on handout