Chapter 3 Response

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My first year teaching I was not confident in my own writing abilities.  Therefore, how could I be confident in teaching writing to my students?  I made a point to model writing in front of my students though because I knew modeling is a strong teaching strategy.  Over the past couple of years after modeling writing for my students I feel more confident in my own writing.  I recently read Chapter 3 in “Writing Essentials” by Regie Routman which states that students should see your struggles with writing. 



Chapter 2 Response

I recently read chapter 2 in “Writing Essentials” by Regie Routman.  While reading chapter 2 I thought about how I begin writing in my classroom.  I have always had my students share their writing and taken time to talk about and celebrate positive aspects of their writing.  As I stated before, I believe our students need to have a positive experience with writing so that they will continue to grow as writers in the future.  So, during our first month or so I really try to focus on the positive aspects of every student’s writing.  Also, I let my students write about what they want during the first month or so of school.  Since my students are writing about what interest them it really allows me to get to know my students better as individuals and connect with them.  I believe that between the positive experiences with writing and by getting to know each student it allows me to develop an environment in which my students can take risk and I can help them grown as writers. 

Chapter 1 Response

I have always believed that as teachers we need to make writing fun and enjoyable for our students.  We need our students to have a positive experience with writing so that they will continue to grow as writers in the future.  I recently read Chapter 1 in “Writing Essentials” by Regie Routman that confirmed this belief.  I have always let children choose what they want to write about because if they are writing about something they care about, they always put in more effort, and in return their writing turns out better. 



Also, I believe we need to look at real world text that is published with our students.  For example, writers often play with words to make it more interesting.  Take for example the book, “The Night I Followed the Dog,” by Nina Laden.  The author mixes art and descriptive words to make the text more interesting.  My students are always interested and engaged in this story.  Also, after I share this book many of my students think of different descriptive words to use in their stories to make their writing more enjoyable.  It really increases students’ word choice.

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I still have a few questions even after reading the chapter though.  I often wonder what is the right balance between ideas and content and conventions in writing.  I don’t want my students to be so concerned with conventions that it limits their ideas and content of their writing.  Also, I don’t want my students to be so concerned with conventions that writing becomes stressful and eventually hated.  On the other hand, I don’t want my students’ use of conventions to hinder their writing.