July 9 2008

Presenter: Debra Hartley

Topic: What Do You Want Me to Do? Using 1-1 conferences to reinforce student’s ownership of their writing

Scribe: Elizabeth Curran

Debra’s background:

Teaching Certificate from Gustavus, then library science degree, academic librarian for 9 yrs.  PhD English lit, U of Iowa, Augusta Illinois writing center “thrown into it” did 1-1 conferences…director of General College writing center

Debra trains writing tutors

Writing consultant world for 17 years

Writers Workshop Principles

*Talking about their writing is important for writers

*The writer owns the paper (trains her tutors to not  write on the paper, take notes on a separate piece of paper

*Its important for writers to hear about what they do well, vs. not always was doesn’t work in the piece

*Comments should focus on 1-2 concerns, vs. whole paper (Hard not to be too directive with the student…start where they are)

Student conferences: Debra asked, “Why do them?  How many of you have conducted student conference?

What is your role is a responder?

List of class answers: personal connection, individual instruction, student able to verbalize ideas, form of assessment for you, positive comments, encourage the student, support, start with a compliment, be sensitive, share your own struggles as a writer, don’t go to conference with assumptions,

Debra:  What is the writer's role?

List of answers:  put words on the paper, be prepared to work, realize this is just one reader, come with 1-2 things to come to conference with, not being defensive,

Writer doesn’t talk, just listen to comments—pros and cons of this as lots  of discussion followed about this 

Role-play: Muriel as student who is coming to a writing center. Debra as writitng tutor.

M: explained piece about Grandparents bakery

D: is this a memoir? How long would you like it to be?

M: can you sense what the bakery is like? 

D: read for bit, M asked about verb tense. M read again….

Things Debra did :  –made her feel comfortable, quiet mellow voice…let M lead, responded to her questions and would give her opinion, and then would say “What do you think about it? “  Also she didn’t take notes and at first gave the paper back to her.  Gave her quiet time, gave M time to think, used wait time and silences. D didn't talk too much!!   Also good body language…active listening, eye contact open questions, wait time, use silence,  She made a few comments such as “lots of details are good here” but mostly it was her non- verbals that I just found myself writing down!!!  Her time spent interacting with Muriel about what she didn’t say that was so powerful!!

This is about not what you say but HOW you say it!!

 Class broke into groups of 3-4 and practice doing a writing conference with each other. One had some writing, one was the tutor, one was the observer,. Naturally a Lively buzz ensued!! 

Rec book : How’s it going? By D. Carl Anderson

Discussion: any adaptations the model to the classroom

Presenter: Gretchen Hovan

Topic: Writing Committees

Scribe: Gloria Webber

Opening: Students spread out, crouch down, and then jump up and stick their tongues out at someone…do 3 times to loosen up everybody.

Background

    Quaker Religion- Protestant religion that stemmed from Martin Luther. Hold belief that every person has a part of God in them. Therefore, each person is a preacher and speak at meetings when they’re inspired. Meetings are silent until someone speaks. Concept of The Light (of truth, God, healing…etc.)

    Clearness Committee- If you have an issue you’re struggling with, you can come to your meeting and ask for a Clearness Committee to listen to you and ask you questions. They don’t give advice or lecture; they only listen and question.

Gretchen adapted this for classroom use with writing and did this with 5th, 6th, 7th, and 8th graders in a Quaker school.

Activity: Divergent Questioning

    Take 2 minutes and think about a gift you were given that was really important to you. Volunteers are given a note card with a question about the gift to read out loud and answer, but they can only answer that specific question, not give any extra information. (How big was the gift? How old were you when you got it? What color was the gift? How have your thoughts about the gift changed over time? What about the gift made it meaningful to you? Would the gift have been as important to you if someone else gave it to you?)

    Some questions (purple) were convergent, surface-level questions, and people felt…

        -bad and wanted to say more

        -the question had nothing to do with why the gift was important

    Some questions (yellow) were much more divergent and thought provoking, and the responses revealed much more about the importance of the gift.

Writing Committee

    -Using divergent questioning to enhance writing (Instructions on handout)

    -Divided into groups of 4 (use M&M’s to form groups by color) and practice

    using this questioning technique to help a writer develop an idea.

    -Took about a half hour…each person in the group had a chance to explain a

    writing idea and listen to the group’s questions.

    -Wait time/think time very important!

(Muriel’s cool idea that she got from Kirsten: Dance as a metaphor for conferencing.)

Gretchen’s Questions

1.    What would you change on the form?…What other instructions would you need?

2.    Would the silence be a challenge in a non-Quaker school classroom?

3.    Where should the teacher be?

Was it valuable?

-great to hear different questions that help develop an idea

-broadened the scope

-the pace forced us to slow down and think about the ideas and issues in different ways

-the time honored the ideas

-interesting to have students journal on what they’re doing during the silent periods

-Have to be careful not to give advice within your questions.