Make Every Minute Count

This chapter voiced some of my own sentiments about teaching, such as, we are 'life role models'. So many of our students are looking to us for the example of how to act, respond, etc., because they don't have the good example at home.
Connecting with our heart is so important. They need to know we care with more than words. Take time to look into the eyes of students, parents, and colleagues. There are people out there who are journeying through heartaches, situations, or insurmountable odds.
Ask frequently "Is this the best use of my time?" It is important to evaluate the paper load and if the activity was really worthwhile for the students learning.
Most important 'live life'. I became a better teacher after going through cancer, because it taught me to take time for life.

Build on Best Practice and Research

Wow, was this chapter chalked full of great thoughts! I found myself highlighting so many parts I wanted to remember. Such as:
* "Put energy and dollars into ongoing professional development, not into programs or 'one-shot deals'."
*And the entire 'Some Key Research Findings' list (all three and one-half pages)!
*"Share with students the writing you do outside of school; ask them to do the same."
*"The level of professional talk in a school impacts test scores.."
* And the "Characteristics of High Performing Schools."
*The last paragraph of the chapter which started with "Change happens one person at a time..."
So much to think about and to want to change in my own teaching.

10. Make Assessments Count

I agree with Routman that looking at a student's work over time is more valid than some of the assessment writing being done today. I thought it was interesting that the changes we are currently seeing on the KS assessment(KS Writing Pilot 2008) reflect the 'beginning, developing, and proficient' language that she mentions on pg. 240.
I really like the thought by Tom Newkirk, "It's not what the writing has-it's what the writing does."
Pages 248-249 are invaluable to use before any high stakes test. I tabbed the pages.
What a cool idea to showcase students' work from K-6 in the school! This could be a neat celebration for students.

Conference with Students

As I read this, the overwhelmed feeling kind of covered me like a blanket. The need to make my students better writers is foremost, but I'm feeling kind of lacking in being able to see the whole picture working with my day and time frame. I do like how Routman says to put the writer first. Above all, I want to remember to be positive in the beginning. There are a lot of good ideas in what to say specifically, which help to see the nuts and bolts of how it works. I really like the 'Teacher Talks", and can see myself revisiting this chapter many times to see how to do it and what to say.

Organize for Daily Writing

I love the positive ways to encourage students when discussing their ideas and writing. It was also a great idea to carry around sticky notes for "gems".
Routman continues to remind us to use the optimal learning model. It is helpful to be reminded and walked through this process throughout the book. And so many ideas to glean from in this chapter. One interesting idea was using writing to perform acts of kindness. With so many celebrities in the news concerning their involvement in acts of kindness or charities , this could be a hot topic right now with our students.

Be Efficient and Integrate Basic Skills

Routman's first sentence in this chapter struck a chord with me, "We've made writing way too complicated by breaking it up into bits and pieces." Yet I find it hard to believe the students will learn the necessary skills by meaningful teaching of writing and then teaching the skills to support the writing as she suggests. I know that research says isolated skills work does not carry over, but it is hard at 5th grade not to do some. This chapter did have some great thoughts on voice and having an audience. I loved the quote "Voiceless writing is like soup with no seasoning." This chapter was full of helpful minilessons and ways to revise in front of the students. I made many notes and tabs to refer to when I'm back in school.

Capitalize on the Reading-Writing Connection

This chapter encouraged me to especially do more writing with my low readers. Yet they are also the students whose writing is so hard to read because of the errors in spelling and grammar. How not to be distracted by all of the errors is going to be the key for me at first.
The idea of using small notebooks in reading groups sounds like a positive approach to getting more than a pat answer. It would help students engage higher level thinking skills.
Overall this chapter reminded me that the key is to do more demonstrating and then practicing. It especially sounded promising for teaching summarizing, which is a difficult concept to teach.

Do More Shared Writing

This chapter so encouraged me to get out there and do more shared writing in the classroom! The idea of shared writing was well supported with research and Routman really made the correlation to reading. I loved the idea for book reviews, and other responses to reading, which will help students meet reading standards. This chapter was especially full of teaching suggestions to make shared writing a success.
I appreciated the suggestions for reading groups which will help me be more efficient for writing and reading.

Raise Your Expectations

This is the very subject that seems to haunt myself as a teacher, because I feel torn between letting them create and having it readable. I agree with what Routman said about the finished product, "Work published for a reader has to be as perfect as we can get it." That is the way it is in the real world. Getting there is always the difficult part.
During this chapter I started asking myself, have I lowered my expectations in writing, conventions, etc. for my students? Sad to say, I think I have on some of their daily papers and such. How high to have those expectations has been a struggle. Demonstrating to them, how to do it well, has been effective recently, but I must agree with Routman, teaching breaks down when my demonstrations are not effective. This is most evident in the struggling students, who need more attention or more demonstrations.

Share Your Writing Life

Talk about being vulnerable!! Writing in front of your colleagues, as Routman suggests, seems like a hard sale to a staff unless a number of them are also reading this book. Maybe not, but even as a learning experience, it seems it might be hard for buy in. I do like the thought of compiling such writings by the teachers. What a great example for students to read and be inspired by.
My students have been journaling to tell me about their breaks, weekends, readings, or other events they want to share this year. It has become a favorite time of sharing. Reading Routman's suggestion to list your writing practices was an interesting activity. It is surprising just how much we do write daily. And I agree with "what our students need to see demonstrated is exactly what we are asking them to do-write on demand, within a set time."

Today I saw why I am taking this class. As the class worked on the 2nd activity of the KS Writing Pilot, writing the rough draft, I noticed one student, after 15-20 minutes, still not writing. I leaned down to ask if he was having a problem, and to remind him to use his planning from the previous day's activity. He turned his page to the planning page, which contained a circles with "I don't know what to write" and "I don't know" written several times. By now tears were rolling down his face. What have we created with tests? Hopefully taking this class will inspire instead of defeat! (Not all students were having this experience. One students said as I roamed the room, "I'm really on a roll!") :)

Start with Celebration

This was an amazing chapter which inspired me to encourage my students in their writing, no matter how small the success. And it was amazing. We celebrated great leads, just as Mrs. Routman suggested. Not only am I changing, but I can see my students responding in such a positive way. This week we started "special moments" valentines as Routman describes on pg.21 and pg. 201. I introduced the idea with the suggestion on pg. 25, modeling the whole lesson. The question I heard over and over was, "Do we really get to send them to the people?". They really responded to writing with meaning, including soaking in my 'moment', helping rewrite mine to sound just right, and talking about theirs out loud. And the moments were so well written!! They had great leads, tender stories, and were so full of heart!!

Simplify The Teaching of Writing

This author is a breath of fresh air. So many times as teachers we feel pressured by programs, methods, and test results. Nice to hear some rational in the middle of it all. It was great to read that her aim is to "raise expectations while streamlining the teaching of writing to essential elements and manageable procedures". Also some of these thoughts seems to somewhat correlate with the language the state is using within their pilot program this year? (Especially the part about writing to publish?)