Teaching writing remotely with Google Classroom: 10 tips for writing workshop during remote / distance learning. Google docs, forms, hyperdocs, tech tools, and more.

Evaluating student writing can be one of the most time consuming tasks a teacher can face. It takes time and mental energy to read 30 (or more!) unique pieces of writing. Especially when you consider the fact that each student is on their own learning journey and will likely require different feedback to help them grow to the next level in their writing ability. There are ways to streamline the process and hand some of the assessment off to the student. Here are some suggestions for methods to best assess student writing at all stages of the process. Pick a Focus A piece of writing filled with teacher notes, corrections and proofreading marks can be overwhelming to students. In my experience, most kids aren't capable of taking in all that feedback at once. Instead of overloading students, pick one element to focus on. If you're working on conventions in whole-class lessons, focus solely on that. If word choice is the focus, don't worry about punctuation. Teach your students to edit their own work and how to positively do this for peers as well. Not only does it cut back your workload, but it empowers students to assess their own work, which will show greater rewards in the long run. In the example below, I only circled spelling errors I expected the child would need support with. I wrote the correct spellings down the margin for him to correct in his next draft. It's important to respond to the needs of the individual student. Write an End Comment Rather than mark up the whole page, select two strengths and one area of growth and write this feedback in point form at the end of the work. As teachers, we know the power of positive words. By focusing on what a child did well they'll make an effort to repeat those positives in future writing. Again, providing one area to work on is manageable to students. One-to-One Conference This is by far the most powerful formative assessment tool in any teacher's toolbox. I admit, it can sometimes be a struggle to fit in one-to-one conferencing. My favourite time to do this is during silent reading. Some questions to ask during the conference include: How are you feeling about your writing so far? What are you most proud of? Are there any points of the criteria you feel like you haven't met yet? What can I do to support you now? Involve Student Self-Assessment During the writing process, ask your students to pause and reflect on established criteria (more on that coming) and to ensure they've included, or have plans to include, all that is required. Most children won't think to do this unless you prompt them to do so. In my classroom, I have a board that is dedicated to writing. It houses specific anchor charts for elements we are working on at the time, as well as a year long checklist on the 6+1 Traits of Writing. As we address each trait in a mini-lesson, new criteria is added to the board. There are elements applicable to ANY piece of writing. Students can go up to the board and mentally check off whether they've met each aspect, or not. If you want to know more about the 6+1 Traits of Writing, or more about this board in general, head on over to this post. Have Clearly Defined Criteria ...that you set out from the beginning. In no world is it fair to assess a child on writing that they weren't aware of the criteria for. Be open with your expectations and the purpose of the task. No matter what task you're doing, if you're going to assess it at the end, be sure to share that with the class ahead of time. This might look like: putting a rubric under the document camera and explaining how you'd meet each aspect providing samples from previous students (with names removed) for each level of ability and having a discussion about the pros and cons of each sharing a checklist of elements you expect students to discuss and then posting it on the whiteboard for their reference establishing journal criteria and then posting it in the front of their notebooks to review each journal writing period Looking for more writing inspiration? Check out my Pinterest board. Pin this post. Helping to inspire,

"Ready to make missing addends fun for your students? Teach engaging strategies, turning this skill into an exciting adventure for learners!"

Teaching "The Crucible" | How to plan a unit that will engage and challenge your students | "The Crucible" activities, lessons, and unit plan

This blog is dedicated to making lesson planning a little bit easier for teachers who seek to teach with excellence (while still having a life outside of the classroom). This blog is primarily 1st grade focused.

Incorporating decodable readers and the science of reading into your teaching gives your students the foundation to become confident readers.

If you want to see me plan a GREAT lesson, don’t come find me on a Sunday afternoon when I’ve deliberately set aside a chunk of time for some hardcore planning. I’ll be priming my…

I have so much to share with you about writing interventions, but first things first: WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE NEW BLOG DESIGN?!?!? Please share your thoughts! Every year, I meet lots of middle schoolers who struggle with writing. And every year, I play around with lots of different interventions to meet their needs. Last year, I made establishing sound writing interventions one of my big goals. I spent lots of time (and money!!) on resources that I could use, and by about March, I had something that I thought I was pretty happy with. This year, I'm starting off with those interventions that worked so well last year and I couldn't be happier with the results! In fact, I'm so pleased with how they are working, I feel confident enough to share my practice with my blog readers. I can say that these are definitely KID TESTED, TEACHER APPROVED!! Creating a Time and Space for Intervention within your Classroom I teach by myself. There are no aides, special ed teachers, BSI teachers... just little, ol' me! So, when I want to create and manage small groups, I'm on my own. This is hard. It would be so much easier if there was another adult in the room to help, but there is not, so I just have to deal! It's work, but it absolutely can be done! A few weeks ago, I wrote about the Power of Bell-Ringers. Establishing a quiet and smooth transition into writing class is a great way to get started, but it also provides me with a window of time where I can pull a small group! By mid-October, my bell-ringer time gets extended to 15 minutes. The kids get started immediately and are clear on the expectations during this time. Now the environment for working with small groups is set: the room is quiet and engaged, allowing me to focus my time on the handful of kids in my group. I pull my kids to a table that I have set up in front of our classroom library. I have a "teacher station" at one end where I do my instruction. I usually stream some jazz or piano music during this time so my group doesn't distract the rest of the class. Establishing Interventions In my district, by middle school, there are no longer district-mandated interventions in place. There are no clear resources for teachers to use or personnel to help. So, when we have a struggling reader or writer in 7th or 8th grade, it's the job of the classroom teacher to meet their needs. In my tenure of working with middle schoolers, I've found that there are two types of students who need more support than my writing curriculum provides (and please remember... I am not a researcher/specialist/writer of books/etc. I'm just a teacher, like you, who loves my job, tries to do the best by my kids, and is compulsively reflective about what I see happening... to me, teachers are the best EXPERTS, but I know that we are hesitant these days to trust a "lowly" teacher and rather find ourselves relying on big publishers and educational researchers to show us best practices... I don't have lots of "data" to support what I'm sharing with you... just my actual observations I've made while working with real, live kids in an average classroom setting!!). Type One: Students Who Struggle with Structure The first type of students who need intervention are those who struggle with structure. These are the kids that can't organize their thoughts in a way a reader could follow. They simply write whatever their brain thinks at the time. They can generally stick with a broad topic, but because they are just writing whatever pops into their head at the time, there are lots of places where their writing veers off track and becomes confusing. Here is an example written by a former student struggling with structure: My dog Henry is my most special treasure. He is always there for me whenever I need him in sad times and happy. In many ways, he's my best friend. He has brown fur and a white chest. He is such a good dog to have around when you are sad because he always knows just how to cheer you up. His eyes are brown, like a Hersey bar. His favorite toy is a yellow tennis ball. Once he almost got hit by a car chasing the ball down the street. I have loved him ever since he was a puppy and we first got him. I was only 4-years old when that little ball of fluff was brought home by my parents to be best friends. His soft fur is always so smooth and warm when you pet him while watching TV on a cold night. He is my best friend and that is why he is my special treasure [sic]. This student is clear about his topic - his dog, Henry - but he cannot organize his thoughts. He is thinking about his dog and writes down everything he knows about his buddy exactly as it comes to his mind. Clearly, he has mechanical and conventional skills, and you can see evidence of where he is practicing what we learned in our mini-lessons and from studying our mentor pieces. But, because there is no organization, it is too difficult to follow and all of the skills he has are lost to the untrained, teacher-eye. Kids who write like this need an intervention that focuses on structure and organization. Typically, I LOATHE teaching step-by-step process writing, but in cases like this, I'm left with little choice. The lessons that I put together for kids in need of this intervention consist of learning how to write a well-organized paragraph. Together, we will work on writing topic sentences, creating strong and clear supporting sentences, and finish up with writing a closing that sticks with our reader. My favorite plans for this type of writing come from Michael Friermood. His Fact-Based Opinion Writing products are geared toward teaching elementary students (grades 3-5) how to write a good opinion paragraph, and they are PERFECT for my struggling 7th graders. They also lack a lot of the "cutesy" images that you find with products for this age group, so my big kids don't feel like I'm making them do "baby stuff." (I do not use the stationary he provides for the final writing piece... it's adorable, but it would be pushing in with my kids! So, we just do our paragraph writing in our intervention notebooks!) My plan is to pull the intervention group for one week (at 15 minutes a pop, this comes to 1 1/4 hours of learning). Long before I ever pull a group, I work hard to make sure that my lesson is broken down into five succinct 15-minute increments. Since time is so precious, you need to make sure not one minute is wasted! I can say that it takes me much longer to plan for a small-group lesson than a 50-minute whole-class lesson because efficiency is so crucial. The first few times you plan a small-group lesson, don't be surprised if your timing is mess. It definitely takes practice to be an effective small-group instructor! After their week is up, then I send them back to completing the bell-ringer at the start of class. I will watch them closely and conference with them lots to make sure that I am seeing a transfer of skills. If I don't, then it is likely that I will put them back in an intervention group in a few weeks to practice again. This intervention model will continue all year. Right now, I have 8 intervention students in one writing class, and 6 in another. By the end of the year, those number should reduce to 3-4 and 2-3. Never in all my years of working with small groups, have I had 100% of my intervention students "graduate" from small group. Don't be frustrated if this is the case! If you can improve 50-60% of those kids, then consider that a huge success!! Type Two: Students Who Struggle with Motivation The next group of kids that I work with are those who struggle with motivation. These are the students who complain a lot about not having anything to write about, spend more time doodling or coloring in their notebook than writing, and who will write the absolute bare minimum for any writing assignment. Many times, these kids produce too little for me to gauge whether or not they also need help with structure. But typically, once I can get them writing, they will likely find themselves in a small group for structure work :) Come October, after we've spent lots of lots of time list writing, the kids who are still struggling to get their pencils moving find themselves using a very special Interactive Writer's Notebook called "Musings from a Middle Schooler." This product contains loads of interactive writing pages that will motivate even the most reluctant writers. The pages can be printed out and glued into a marble notebook. (Most often, I'll have the kids create their own... I don't always have them use all the pages, rather I let them pick and choose the ones they like!). Cover Table of Contents page Table of Contents cont. and an "All About Me" page "My Life Story in Two Pages" My Favorite Thing Comics I created this project just last school year and it's been an absolute smash! The kids (especially my boys!) LOVE, LOVE, LOVE it! In absolutely no time, they are writing like crazy. And once I can get their pencils moving it doesn't take me long to get them producing some actual pieces. I don't necessarily pull these kids and work with them in a small group. The first few days, we will assemble our books all together at the back table, but then they go right back to the big group. Rather than do the bell-ringer with the rest of the class at the start of the period, they will work in their "Musings" notebooks. Fifteen minutes of that is usually enough to get them into writing mode for the rest of class. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * So, that's how I make writing intervention work in my classroom. Phew!! That was long, folks!! I apologize for my wordiness and I am grateful if you stuck it out until the end! Also, I'm sure that I've left out some crucial details of my practice, so please do not hesitate to ask me any questions you still have! Do you have any good intervention tips or strategies that work for you? I'd love to hear about them. Drop me a comment and share! Happy Teaching!!

How to structure learning stations with Google Classroom, docs, slides, and forms; 10 ways to use learning stations with online teaching and remote / distance learning

Teaching "The Crucible" | How to plan a unit that will engage and challenge your students | "The Crucible" activities, lessons, and unit plan

How to structure learning stations with Google Classroom, docs, slides, and forms; 10 ways to use learning stations with online teaching and remote / distance learning

I have missed blogging! I think when I moved to 3rd Grade, I felt lost in the blogging world because all of my blogging buddies were 1st or 2nd grade teachers. Not only do I not teach first or second grade, I don't even teach reading or math...I teach 3rd grade science and social studies. I just didn't feel like I fit in anymore. But blogging I think helps me to be a better teacher, it helps me to reflect on my lessons and projects so that I can improve them for next year. So I'm going to try to jump back into the ring! This year's class studied maps in much more depth than than my class did last year. I do a pretest and post test on all of my major skills. I don't really mind doing that except I have to remind the students over and over that the pretest IS NOT going in the grade book. Now that we are 3/4 through the school year, I think most of them understand that now. Anyway, I really like doing small projects to follow up the lessons so the students can show what they know. I was thinking about doing a group (4 people) map, but I didn't really have any suitable paper for them to use. I was going to have them make a city map and then as a group they would add things that were important to each of them. I started searching the Internet to see if I could find some ideas. The first thing I found was called Barefoot Island. I liked it, but I kept looking around. Next I came across these Autobiography Islands. I really liked them! I had to make a few adjustments since the ones I found were for middle school and I teach 3rd grade. I'll be making a rubric for next year. This year I told the students I would be grading them in four areas: Neatness, Creativity, Spelling and Required Elements. We first discussed the definition of an autobiography. We looked at samples from the middle school students. We brainstormed what types of things could go on our maps and then the students got to work on the rough drafts of their maps. I helped to proof each one for spelling errors. After that, they got to work on their final project. The required elements for each of the maps were: 1) Map Title 2) Compass Rose 3) Map Legend 4) at least 3 Man-made objects 5) at least 3 Natural Landforms. I thought most of them turned out great. I liked the way this project kind of evened the playing field. Since I was checking the spelling on all of the projects, I got to see some of my lower students shine with creativity in their maps. Here are some examples. Probably too many, but I just loved them! Be glad I didn't post all 68! LOL I'll be honest, when it came to grading their creativity...everyone got a 5 the max points. I don't know call me a softie, but I really thought everyone was creative on their own level. I did give a bonus point on those I thought we "extra creative".

Are you looking for a writing PowerPoint that can be used to help your students analyze sentences for punctuation and spelling errors? This 25-slide PowerPoint is short, sweet, and to the point! Students will analyze and edit sentences. You can begin your writing lessons by doing a few slides a day, and it will last you a week! Or you can do the PowerPoint all in one day as a complete lesson on editing. Each slide begins with a sentence and contains these answer choices: This sentence... A. is written correctly. B. has a misspelled word C. is missing a capital letter D. has incorrect punctuation. My students have to take a semi-annual assessment where they have to read paragraphs and analyze the writing. I created this PowerPoint so that students are prepared when they see this type of question on their assessment. The answer only appears on the slide after the teacher clicks the mouse a second time. This file contains a 3-page companion handout. Students follow along on the PowerPoint, recording answers, as you progress through the PowerPoint. Click on the following links to check out my other writing PowerPoints! Word Choice PowerPoint (40 slides!) Show, Don’t Tell PowerPoint and Flipbook Types of Writing PowerPoint and Activities (25 slides!) Writing Dialogue PowerPoint (60 slides!) Topic Sentences and Conclusion Sentences (includes 2 PowerPoints plus worksheets!) Writing Leads PowerPoint (37 slides!) Copyright by Deb Hanson This item is a paid digital download from my TpT store www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Deb-Hanson As such, it is for use in one classroom only. This item is also bound by copyright laws. Redistributing, editing, selling, or posting this item (or any part thereof) on an Internet site that is not password-protected are all strictly prohibited without first gaining permission from the author. Violations are subject to the penalties of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Please contact me if you wish to be granted special permissions!

Engaging strategies to teach persuasion, argument, and debate in middle or high school ELA: activities, lessons, ideas and resources

What is one thing that is common among Albert Einstein, John Dewy, and Abraham Lincoln? It is their critical and rational thought process. Along with their unique personalities, their unique thinking pattern and view toward the world make these individuals creative and different. Critical thinking is the ability of

Investigate the Teacher: Frequently Asked Questions. Engaging, first day of school activity for any subject!

5 engaging activities for teaching The Giver by Lois Lowry. Pre-reading, during reading, and post-reading lesson ideas to help you plan!

Hi y'all. Currently I am in the process of reading the 2nd edition of Daily Five. I have found that implementing Daily Five framework to be ...

Repeated reading is a research-based instructional strategy with the goal of increasing decoding automaticity skills. The goal of repeated reading is not for students to become “fast readers”. Rather, we want students to read the words accurately, with intonation, and at a rate that is comparable to the speed of oral language. This resource was created to provide a rereading routine for students who would benefit from increasing accurate and automatic fluency skills. It is designed to be led by older students or volunteers, who assist younger students in the rereading routine. While it can be implemented as often as desired, we used this rereading routine three times a week for 6 weeks. Each student who participated in the fluency friends rereading routine was paired with a fifth-grade student who volunteered the first 10 minutes of their recess time. The older students used the assembled toolkits to walk their readers through the day’s rereading routine by following the instructions on the card. Each toolkit contained all of the materials needed for the lessons. This resource is designed to be used with passages or texts that you, the teacher, supply each week, based on the student’s decoding skills and needs. Please note, that no texts or passages are included with this resource. It can be used in conjunction with whatever word recognition curriculum, program, or texts you use. What does the rereading routine look like? (We chose the routine to take place every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. You can edit and choose the days of the week that work best for your classroom.) Monday: Modeling Day. Volunteers led the student through a series of modeling exercises. They first read the passage to the student, modeling fluent reading. Next, they did a choral reading with the student. Last, they scooped the sentences in the passage for the student, and practiced fluent phrasing with the student. If time allowed, the student reread the passage an additional time. Wednesday: Fluency Fun Day. During Day 2, peers and students used novelty reading tools to reread the passage in engaging ways! Flashlights, microphones, mini cards, and reading pointer wands are used throughout the lesson. This rereading day is designed to be motivating and encourage as much rereading practice of the week’s passage as possible. The card for Day 2 acts as a "choice menu" to practice rereading the passage or text several times. Friday: The final day of each week is called “Beat Your Time Day”. A highlighter or pencil, and a sand timer is used on day 3. The student reads the passage. At the end of one minute, the peer leader draws a line after the last word read. The routine above is repeated, and the student tries to read farther than he or she did the first time. If time allows, the reader tries to read even more than his or her second reading. When can this routine take place? Fluency Friends is a perfect routine to fit into a center time, intervention block, before school, during a designated "no new teaching time", or during small group time. It's also a great way for parents to help their children with rereading practice at home! What grade(s) is this resource designed for? You can use this resource and rereading routine for ANY student who is reading connected text! Kindergarteners who are reading short decodable passages, first and second grade students, and upper elementary students who could benefit from increased rereading practice will love this routine! Thank you so much for learning more about Fluency Friends! -Christina DeCarbo Miss DeCarbo, Inc. Copyright 2023 All Rights Reserved.

How to facilitate successful Socratic Seminars in the secondary ELA

How to facilitate successful Socratic Seminars in the secondary ELA

Winter break is almost over and that means your little learners are about to come back to school rested, refreshed, calm, and ready to take ...

I’ve never been more excited for a month of 6-word stories! October HAUNTED Six-Word Story Challenge Prompts (#PFSixWordChallenge) are live on Instagram. |October Prompts: 6-Word Story Challenge (#PFSixWordChallenge)| This is the … October Prompts: 6-Word Story Challenge! (#PFSixWordChallenge) Read More »

All students are required to write expository and argumentative papers, and the skill they struggle with the most is explaining or elaborating evidence. They often end up paraphrasing the evidence (and not very well at that) and missing a key component to a well-constructed paragraph. This product teaches five different strategies for elaborating on evidence - Cause, Add-on, Process, Effect, and Significance, or CAPES. These strategies eliminate the guesswork of elaborating by offering options. With multiple ways to explain evidence, students will write with more confidence and clarity. There are four parts to this product: a Powerpoint presentation, a Google Slides presentation (the link is in the Powerpoint), a PDF for student/group exercises with question prompts, and a PDF for student/group exercises with only an initial set of question prompts. This will allow you to not only introduce CAPES, but also decide how much scaffolding your students need. At the end of this presentation, there are blank slides where you can add your own topic sentence and evidence. This allows you to customize it as necessary. Also, all of the text and images are static, so you can type directly on it without moving anything around. This helps if you’re modeling the techniques in class! If you like this product, then you'll definitely want to visit my Teachers Pay Teachers store for my resources on writing introductions using the funnel method and on different types of evidence in writing.

5 engaging, student-centered ELA strategies to try this school year: Socratic Seminars, Mock Trials, Question Trails, Speed Debating, and Learning Stations

Rhyme-Away Story | LoveToTeach.org

Dual language education provides a unique and powerful opportunity to strengthen children's highest cognitive brain potentials.

This blog post uses An A from Miss Keller as a writing mentor text. It includes a personal narrative checklist anchor chart, a writing lesson and FREE printables!

The TPCASTT method is a wonderful way to provide structure to poetry analysis, allowing students to consider a broad range of elements – from tone and imagery to structure and perspective.