Maxmom’s Weblog

I enjoyed reading this chapter, Best Practices in Teaching Planning.   I found the ideas and planning strategies practical and helpful.   I feel the program we use, Empowering Writers, only teaches writing for the test.   This  worried me, but I was unsure what or how to do differently.  The program does have some good ideas for writing an interesting story, but I believe it teaches my younger students somewhere in the middle of the writing process.  They need more of a foundation of writing and an opportunity to overcome their fear of putting thoughts on paper. Later, they can add in the “extras” that improve a story.  I realize students must be taught how to plan, and was excited to read some ideas I feel comfortable trying to implement.   For my second graders, I especially liked the W-W-W; WHAT=2; HOW=2 strategy.  This is a basic story plan that we discuss during reading and are questions even my most reluctant writers can think about and answer.   I also want my students to be introduced to and practice other kinds of writing (real life writing- not just narratives).  The three steps of the General Planning Strategy make this seem possible.

side note: I was happy to hear this week in class that just allowing children to write will prepare them for the writing test; that we should not and need not program them for one writing genre. J