Tag Archives: writing

Reading, writing and wikis

Posted on by • Posted in Conferences • Tagged , , • 1 Comment

In this session, two high school English teachers presented the way that they used a wiki to encourage their students to read.

Goals for their free reading project were for students to read good young adult literature, enjoy it and discuss it, just like people do in the real world.

Step 1. Booktalk good books for kids to read. These teachers worked with their librarian and selected lots of good books to recommend to their students. They used YALSA and TLA booklists, such as Best Books for Young Adults, Quick Picks for Reluctant Young Adult Readers, Teens’ Top Ten and Tayshas. Students went to the library as a class and heard booktalks about a few of the books that had been recommended for them to read.

Step 2. Students complete signpost projects. These were simple projects that students could do to mark their progress as they read. There were several choices of projects – most using technology. Directions for these mini-projects can be found on the Warriors Read wiki.

Step 4. Product. After completing their reading, students had to do a final product. Choices were book trailers, book posters, or a booktalk via podcast. Any digital products were uploaded to the wiki for all students to access.

These teachers chose a wiki to house the content for this project for several reasons. Wikis allow for multiple contributors. All teachers of a subject or grade level can monitor and contribute to a wiki. Students can contribute too!

The Wikispaces discussion tab was another reason for using that particular wiki. Students used it to engage in meaningful discussions about their books any time, any place. That meaningful discussion was one of their goals from the outset.

The fact that students’ digital work was posted for everyone to see really inspired them to do their best.

Collaborative groups meeting electronically don’t have to worry about transportation or scheduling issues.

A wiki enlarges the classroom by providing access to materials, instructions and multimedia all the time, everywhere.

Some tips for the successful implementation of a wiki with students:

Plan the organization of the wiki before you create it

Create student accounts yourself.

Develop a system for grading.

Post directions for activities on the site

Teach netiquette before you begin

Other ideas for using wikis:

READING

Current events discussions

Post an article or link to an article and have students read it and post their own reactions

Have students post links to news stories they find interesting or relevant. Students can view and comment on each other’s posts

Research and link collecting

In groups or individually, students find and post links to reliable articles or websites for a research unit

Discussion Circles

Students post thoughts as they read a novel

Virtual Book Club

Students “meet” online and discuss the book

Links, articles, pictures – anything about the book can be posted to the wiki

WRITING

Brainstorming and prewriting

Students discuss essay topics BEFORE they write. They see their own thoughts as well as the thoughts of their classmates, allowing them to struggle with the ideas before they face the blank page.

Collaborative stories

Provide a story starter (or have students start one)

Students add to/comment on/continue the story

PUBLISHING

Project showcase

Anything students can create digitally can be uploaded and shared with wiki viewers

Documents and multimedia can be “handed in” electronically

Spread information about your classroom, club or project

SUB PLANS

Not for emergency use, but you can put a PowerPoint or post links so students can get the best of you even when you’re not there

Other uses for wikis can be found at readingwritingwiki.wikispaces.com or educationalwikis.wikispaces.com

Survival skill #5

Posted on by • Posted in Teaching & Learning • Tagged , , , • Leave a comment

from The Global Achievement Gap by Tony Wagner

The Fifth Survival Skill: Effective Oral and Written Communication

Communication skills are a major factor highlighted in dozens of studies over the years that focus on students’ lack of preparation for both college and the workplace, and these skills are only going to become more important as teams are increasingly composed of individuals from diverse cultures. The ability to express one’s views clearly in a democracy and to communicate effectively across cultures is an important citizenship skill as well. …

When I asked Rob Gordon [former director of the American Politics Program at West Point] what advice he had for teachers today, he was emphatic: “Teach them to write! Effective communication is key in everything we do – people need to learn to communicate effectively with each other and with external communities. Even enlisted men need to communicate effectively via e-mail. … I saw the importance of this in Iraq when I went back in January of 2004. When we asked a brigade commander what he’d learned, he talked about the importance of relying on soldiers who understood not only what they were seeing on screens that showed near real-time combatant movements but also how to interpret and communicate what they saw.”

Mike Summers [vice president for Global Talent Management at Dell Computers] also spoke forcefully on this issue: “We are routinely surprised at the difficulty some young people have in communicating: verbal skills, written skills, presentation skills. They have difficulty being clear and concise; it’s hard for them to create focus, energy, and passion around the points they want to make.” …

Listening to Summers’s comments as a former English teacher myself, I was surprised by the list of skills he thought important: not only the ability to communicate one’s thoughts clearly and concisely but also the ability to create focus, energy and passion. Summers and other leaders from various companies were not necessarily complaining about young people’s poor grammar, punctuation or spelling – the things we spend so much time teaching and testing in our schools. While it’s obviously important to write and speak correctly, the complaines I heard most frequently were about fuzzy thinking and the lack of writing with a real voice.

This is important information for teachers and librarians. What is disheartening, though, is that standardized tests don’t typically test this kind of writing and teachers have very little time to teach it. Any ideas for giving students opportunities to practice this kind of communication?

Image citation: IMG_5505-2 by Phototrope.

Reading, Thinking, Writing and the Web

Posted on by • Posted in Books & Reading, Teaching & Learning • Tagged , , , , , • Leave a comment

Will Richardson’s Weblogg-ed pointed me to a very interesting and thought-provoking article today. Entitled Is Google Making Us Stoopid?, the author explores the increasing tendency to skim, scan and browse information rather than doing “deep reading” on a topic. In fact, he presents the idea that perhaps our brains are actually changing and becoming less able to handle this type of thinking.

I’m not so sure.

Where does the purpose for reading come into play? If skimming and scanning information on the web gets me the information that I need, then I’m going to skim and scan. If, however, I have a need to understand something in a deeper way, I’m going to make the effort to find some good quality resources and read them carefully in order to understand the topic and make an informed decision.

Before the days of the Internet, the encyclopedia was the enemy of teachers who wanted students to do deep reading and thinking in a research paper. Students would skim and scan an encyclopedia article and copy enough information to complete the assignment. Today they use the Internet to do the same thing. If, however, we change the assignment/research question so that it is requires original thought, skimming and scanning won’t do.

Maybe deep reading, thinking and writing will occur naturally when that’s what is required – in school and in life.

Take some time to read the article, then share your thoughts in the comments.

Image source: A Twisted Family Tradition – the Lime Jello Brain. Uploaded on February 6, 2005 by hurleygurley. Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works license