In every classroom, there is always one student who finishes before everyone else, aptly named Mr. or Miss “I’m Done”.

Yet, they are not done, especially in a writing classroom.

These students are from three camps – the perfectionists, those lacking in spirit and those that don’t know what to fix.

When I say lacking in spirit, I mean that they are not motivated to look over their writing to make changes.

The perfectionist, also does not want to make changes because they are perfect.

Those who don’t know what to fix cannot make changes cause they have no idea what they would change.

These types of students cannot be changed over night.

Yet, the fix is the same for all three.

There needs to be an expectation stated in your room where students look over a criteria list and assess what their writing has and what it needs.

This needs to be modeled by teachers and rewarded.

Rewarding changes means that student work is shared often in the process of writing.

A student might share a revised beginning, a revised sentence, a reordering of ideas, revised dialogue or a revised ending.

All revision, edits, changes need to be celebrated in order to defeat the “one and done” approach.

Perhaps keep a record of individual changes in a document. This might provide the encouragement that they need.

Other ideas include a one column rubric, goal setting, breaking tasks down and comparing their current writing to past work.

As I mentioned in a previous post, it is also important to show students what you mean by adding details.

The reality is, in the writing classroom you are not done, you’ve only just begun.

Until Next Time,

Coach Clark

How Do I Teach Fiction Writing?

Fiction writing contains many parts.  Information on how to teach fiction writing is plentiful. When teachers ask me this question, do you have any ideas for teaching fiction writing?, I know that they may not be writers themselves and lack the confidence for how to teach writing.

Teachers need to write if they expect their students to write.

If teachers want to understand what the writing process feels like, they need to write.

A simple way of getting started is to write a product of what you expect your students to write.

Create your own exemplar.

For example, if your students will be writing a beginning, middle and end fiction story, create one that would match the level expected in that grade level.

By experiencing writing first hand, you will discover how the process looks and feels.

As you coach yourself through it, you will have uncovered “pain points” or areas that were challenging and required some problem solving. Record what you did to solve these “pain points”.

As you write, you will also be thinking about your students.

• Where might they have trouble?
• Who might need more support?
• What will that support look like?

Once you have experienced what it feels like to write and have connected the process to the needs of your students, then you will be able to select ideas to teach fiction writing.

There are many resources out there to help you, with your new-found experience as a writer, you will know what to look for.

The most important thing about teaching writing in schools, is to look at your curriculum first.

Curriculum should drive your instruction, the resource that you use to teach writing should be aligned with your curriculum.

If you are looking for more experience as a “teacher-writer” sign up for Teachers Writer Summer 2019.

Any questions, please let me know!

Love Coach Clark 🙂