Assignment #2 A strategy mini-lesson ppt

http://www.authorstream.com/Presentation/ryumith-620738-assignment-2-strategy-mini-lesson-ppt/

Assignment #6 Chapter 3 Writing strategies and skills

In ‘Writing strategies and skills’, Prof. Tompkins divides writers into two categories: novice writers and capable writers. She says that novice writers “…lack knowledge about the writing process and have few strategies and skills available to use while they are writing (Tompkins, 2008, p.55)”. Then, what kind of things that capable writers are capable to do? She also gives some characteristics of capable writers. According to her, capable writers are capable of considering the purpose of writing and the audience when they write something. They can brainstorm ideas and organize them to develop communication writing. They can use various types of forms for each of different writing genres. Also, they can evaluate themselves’ works and correct them, using proper strategies and skills. Of course these characteristics would enhance results of the writing project. According to these characteristics, capable writers are prone to organize the ideas and capable of making their works for effective communication. For these effects happen, the writer should be able to see the written works in terms of big context. This means that capable writers can see the whole structure of the work because they know how to use the strategies and skills to construct it. This point can be proven by the author’s statement that “… the most significant difference between capable and less capable writers is their strategy use, it’s essential that children learn about writing strategies (Tompkins, 2008, p.56)”.
Then, she explains writing strategies and skills. She says that we can use skills to do something unconsciously and automatically whereas strategies should be learned precisely. There are some steps of writing strategies given by her: generating, organizing, visualizing, monitoring, playing with language, revising, proofreading, evaluating. Out of these procedures, I think that organizing step is the most important part for novice writers to learn because they don’t have a sense of organized work yet. This is for making a proper structure of the entire work and goes with the entire process of writing to keep the work well-structured. For the next, she suggests some writing skills which the children can use, and there are six of them; Structuring skills, Mechanical skills, Language skills, Reference skills, Handwriting skills, and computer skills. Among these skills, I think that reference skills are the most important to learn for the children who are novice writers. For a writer, it is very important to comprehend others’ works and interpret the information into their own opinion. Thus, good/capable writers should be able to use outside references properly and easily.

Reference:Tompkins, G. E. (2008). Teaching Writing: Balancing Process and Product. NJ: Pearson Education, Inc.

Here are some interesting articles about this chapter.
http://www.all4ed.org/files/WritingNext.pdf

Response to Nan-Hee Jung:
In this chapter also she mention about Tompkins states " The position in this book is that teachers have the responsibility to teach children how to write, and part of that responsibilty is teaching children the strategies and skills that capable writers use. Although it is true that children learn many things inductively through meaningful literacy ecperiences, instruction is important" (Tompkins, 2008). And she totally agree with this opinion. And she understand that students have different skills and ability, thus teacher need to consider about students gap and teachers should help students learn the processes, strategies, and skills for writing instruction.

Assignment #6 Chapter 2 Writing workshop

In the vignette about Mrs. Zumwalt's writing workshop(Tompkins. 2008. p.41), I witnessed that children can develop their writing skills and creativity to be a more fluent writer more effectively than other formal-conventional writing class. Writing workshop is a classroom application of the writing process, and its approach is an innovative way to encourage children to write about what is vital and real for them. (Calkins, 1994; Fletcher & Portalupi, 2001; Overmeyer, 2005; Lucy McCormick Calkins, 1986) Simply put, children are given apportunity to write on self-selected topic and do independant writing, and this must be one of the most convincing way to boost up their self-motivated and self-controlling in the classroom.

There are typically four series of activities in managing the writing workshop class, they are the sessions of writing, sharing, minilessons and reaing aloud to children. Children spend almost of time on writing and sharing their writings to their classmates and taking feeback in open talk, being involved in minilessons from teachers in which teacher can give them some information about the author reading the model writing aloud. In the overall procedure, it's really important that teachers must understand the purpose of each approach and plan activites to fit their goals, choosing what kind of project they will give to children. Also, considering the workshop place could be a very dynamic and somewhat noisy atmosphere since students would be working on different assignments or stages, teachers should monitor children's learning and lead them going in the right way.

Reference:Tompkins, G. E. (2008). Teaching Writing: Balancing Process and Product. NJ: Pearson Education, Inc.

Here are some interesting articles about this chapter.
http://www.teachersfirst.com/lessons/writers/index.html

Response to Nan-Hee Jung:
She mention about Tompkins states " No matter which way teachers use writing workshop, its great benefit is that children become familiar with the ebb and flow of the writing process and experience the exhilaration that all authors feel as they publish their writing and share it with readers" (Tompkins, 2008). She think teacher is necessary to give opportunity to students and consider about writing process or teaching method. And she said 4 components of writing workshop (writing, sharing, minilessons, and reading aloud to children) can give feedback to students. I also agree with her.

Assignment #6 Chapter 1 Teaching children to write

In teaching children to write, teachers should understand that children cannot write and that they need to learn how to read before writing longer antiquated texts. There has been numerous research and evidence showing us that children can also learn how to write well-structured paragraphs with the appropriate words and phrases when considering the expected audience. As teachers, we are expected to do the leading and supporting role for children to express certain ideas and feelings they want to write and share with the audience. But teachers shouldn't do everything out of worry for the students rather we need to focus on how to have them lead themselves in a self-motivated and self-monitoring process.

It is believed that the writing process is generally divided into five stages of prewriting. These are drafting, revising, editing, and publishing, and in each step, teachers can provide the appropriate activities for children to complete their assignments. For example, in the prewriting step, teachers can help them by giving instructions to use a variety of writing activities like brainstorming, drawing, word-sequencing and clustering. Through the stages of drafting and revising, teachers can encourage children by having them sharing their writing in groups, participating in discussions, and giving and receiving comments from their classmates and teachers. At the next stage of editing, we need to help them in case they are having trouble correcting their writings in a mechanical perspective.

Reference:Tompkins, G. E. (2008). Teaching Writing: Balancing Process and Product. NJ: Pearson Education, Inc.

Here are some interesting articles about this chapter.
http://math-and-reading-help-for-kids.org/teaching_children_to_write.html

Response to SangHyo Park:
He think chapter 1 writing process is very useful, especially in Korea. And he was mention about the five levels of support are modeled writing, shared writing, interactive writing, guided writing, and independent writing. So, he think that is Making decisions about purpose, audience, and form should be taught as an important component of writing instruction, and in each case, students need to know the range of options available for them. I also agree with him.

Myself Information

I was born 1986, in Korea.

Current or previous teaching experience:
Actually, I don’t have any experience of teaching. After I graduated my school, I joined in army. And after my military service, I enroll this program. Thus, I don’t have any experience of teaching.

Current or previous work experience other than teaching:
No, I don’t have.

Undergraduate major:
In college, I entrance department of English education. But I changed my course in commercial.

Career goal (describe the level of ESL and context in which you would like to teach):
Actually, I’m not decided my career goal. But, I hope to teach beginner class or elementary school level.

Career goal (describe the level of ESL and context in which you would like to teach):
Actually, I’m not decided my career goal. But, I hope to teach beginner class or elementary school level.

What is your native language? What languages do your speak or have you studied?
My native language is Korean. And I can speak basic language in Philippino and Japanese. And now I studying Chinese language beginner class. But honestly, I’m not good in English. Maybe I’m poor English in your students. So, now I still studying my English.