Welcome! - Lora Darden

Writing Camp Planning Training Thursday, January 15, 2009 Bluebonnet Elementary, Library 3:30-5:00

Purpose - Mary Beth Cordon

 Guide campuses in planning writing camps to support students as they polish their writing for TAKS.

 Celebrate what is going well – make students explicitly aware of how they are already prepared

 Refine what students are already doing – now is not the time for major overhauling

 Keep a monitor on student stress levels

 Use literate adults as a guide for what we’re asking children to do

 What is the purpose of your writing camp and what kind of data are you basing these decisions upon?

 How will what you are teaching impact student achievement?

 Take into consideration what you taught before the camp and how you can tweak what you’ve already taught

 Where is the biggest bang for your buck?

TAKS Rubric Calibration – Debra Blackburn

 The differences between Score 2 and Score 3 writing samples

 Identify the shades between 2s and 3s

 What are the strengths presented in each and what makes the ultimate difference?

 TEA’s document describing students who did and students who did not make the scores and why

o Level 2 – “San Diego” and “Wahoo!”

o Level 3 – “Yum” and “South Paradise Island”

Writing Camp with a New Twist – Julie Carrera, Christy Evans, and Julie Rodriguez

 As we keep in mind what’s best for students, we will explore developmentally appropriate writing camp structures.

 Use student data to inform the camp

 What is the purpose of your camp, driven by student data

1  Own your own students, keep your own students

 Vital Student Groups – ESL Students… hard enough showing your writing – no strangers involved

 Tweaking writing – Not a last minute OVERHAUL

 Identifying Student Needs based on Writing Samples – do you have proof that this is what the student needs?

 Students are writing each day – but not for crazy amounts of time

 Work in small groups of no more than 5

 Pull small groups for various reasons

 Students need time to share their pieces or read two different versions and get audience input – that’s what real writers do

 Long-term regrouping – don’t confuse a student by sending him or her to a teacher never before seen to learn a strategy never heard before to never see this person again… growing writers takes time

 Consult with small groups over time

 Many writing camps have students writing one time a week and then teachers spend the rest of the week giving kids feedback about the piece – allowing time for revision

 No awards for being “the best.” Nothing craters progress faster. Share pieces with people all over the school.

 Celebrate strong parts. Give the strategy a name.

 Instructional Coaches – are assigned to campuses already and will not be able to participate in as “presenters” in writing campus (11 coaches and 30 schools)

Modeling Lessons & Conferencing for Maximum Impact – Christy & Lucy

 Model short lessons based on something you’ve already covered – this should not be a new epiphany for kids

 Engage in repeated cycles of feedback with students in small groups or 1:1

 As an adult, I don’t go to 15 different people for writing advice – don’t do this to your students, either

Writing Fluffers not Writing Busters - Lora

 Calm minds = productive writers

 Let’s avoid torture guaranteed to cause young writers to have a panic attack before the test…

 DO build kids up – DON’T decide to teach all kinds of new strategies kids have never seen before

 DO reinforce and tweak a few strategies that will impact student writing – DON’T decide to review the entire year in a week 2  DO identify what will impact each child the most (small groups) – DON’T treat each child the same running them through 8 different teachers as if they all need it