I've said before that some of my struggling readers feel like they have nothing important to say, or they may feel they have nothing academic to say. Add to that the task of writing - my students are rendered voiceless. Besides giving them the tools to be able to write for multiple purposes and multiple audiences for life, I want them to see themselves differently - not just as readers, but also as writers. They do have something to say, a truth to be told, and they can learn how to say it in writing.
This part of the unit focuses on how to teach the writing process when the student thinking sets the agenda for the paper. Students and some teachers alike have a hard time with the concept of student-chosen issues as the focus of the essay. It's important for students to learn how to look at their world critically, to find what's worth exploring - listening to the voices around them and then joining the conversation. One way they do this is through writing. I spend an entire period explaining and discussing the whole idea of students as real writers, as opposed to someone playing school and writing for a grade. I do this by analogy, relating the skills they'll learn as they write to the moments in their lives when they'll need them - argumentative skills, learning to look at an issue from someone else's perspective so you can direct your address to them, finding their voice and helping them learn how to make it heard from the paper or how to make it powerful from the paper so it has its intended effect. I introduce the concept that a piece of writing is supposed to have an effect in the first place. For most of my 9th graders, this is a novel concept. Our writing is supposed to
do
something, for the writer and for the reader.
There are a few different roads to a finished piece of writing. The students may get their idea for the paper from any of the readings, from class discussion, or from their reader response journal. Students comb their notebooks, homework, etc. looking for a few issues they feel compelled to write about. I have the students focus on issues, because I really want them to learn how to figure out what their perspective is and then in turn learn how to express it through the writing process. Further, when they write about issues, their "thesis" is always debatable. In other words, there are inherent questions in issues, as opposed to topics where there are already answers. For example, a topic might be child abuse, and there is a great deal of information on that topic, but the students' job is not to inform. This is not a report; it is an essay. What about child abuse is the student wondering about? Perhaps the student may wonder why Pip never told anyone about his abusive family. Why don't victims of abuse always tell? The "so what," the question makes the topic an issue, makes it worth writing about. When there is a "so what" for the writer, the reader will too feel more invested because the ideas in the paper then matter.
Many of the skills and strategies I will use for this part is in the 9th grade curriculum, but I will outline them here briefly. Once students pick a few issues they want to explore, they write Possible Ideas for Possible Papers, which is a framework for students to help them begin to realize their perspective. Once they determine that they aren't writing about something everyone will say "no duh" they then write three discovery drafts. Discovery drafts help them play around with how they want to approach the issue, what their voice sounds like on paper. Students spend 20-30 minutes on each, making their thinking visible to themselves. This gives them a structured opportunity to pay attention to the voices of the text, of society, of those in their lives, of themselves and synthesize them into paragraphs. They don't need an introduction or anything - it's a more organized way of brainstorming. Before they determine which issue they want to write more about, they practice talking to each other about their drafts using Talking Points, also in the curriculum. Much as an orator uses notes or a teacher uses a lesson plan, talking points allow students to prepare for a discussion on the paper they have floating around in their head. Experienced writers may do this thinking silently and quickly, but inexperienced writers need to be explicitly taught. Some questions they might discuss with their partners are: 1. Where did this idea come from? 2. Who's your audience? 3. How are you planning to lead into this piece? 4. How is the way you see the issue different from theirs? 5. What's the next problem you need to solve in order to write this paper? I ask students to list their thinking on one side of the paper and their audiences thinking on the other. This way they can help their audience look at the assumptions they make and see why a student's "way of thinking makes more sense than the way they're looking at it" (9th Grade Curriculum).
I always model this for students using an issue I find in my own life or readings. I tell students the effect they are going for in their paper is for their audience to say, "Hmm. I've never thought about it like that before." If we can get our audience to say that, we've begun the process of having our voices
truly
affect someone. We discuss when this would come in handy, the power in it.
Next, we will think back to how Murray created Pip's voice, how Bloom made his heard so students will begin to consciously craft their paper to reflect their voice. This takes years of practice, but we can't wait until they are older to begin. Students then write a first draft, ready for workshopping. I directly teach peer workshop together in a whole group first. Students need to learn how to talk about the craft of writing - act as sample audiences for each other. Since they may have never heard this "voice" before I model for them and then they help me as I guide them, giving them the language to express their constructive criticism. Students then work in groups as they workshop each other's papers. I provide them with protocols for each stage of the process, to structure the discussion for them until they no longer need my help.
It is tough for my students to accept that writing is indeed a process, a recursive one at that. They want to bang a paper out and be done with it. I try to get them to understand exactly how powerful a practiced and crafted piece can be - the power it adds to their voice. Once they have re-envisioned and redrafted one or two more times (or more if needed), I finally look at their paper and provide some feedback for the final draft. It's important for me to note, that a finished product may still have quite a bit of errors/weaknesses. While I do not use the John Collins method of grading, I do grade for specific things I've taught; for this paper I will focus on: audience and purpose are evident; position on issue is clear; reasons for position are evident; concrete examples are used; heading is in MLA Format. I do not yet worry about a clear thesis statement, or that the introduction is funneled, or that the reasons are in the most effective order. I'm looking for students to play the game - to work the process and begin to try to communicate effectively and clearly in writing. I keep student writing in portfolios in my room, so students can always go back to earlier work to practice a new skill.
For example, when I do teach thesis statements and introductions, students can go back to earlier works and rewrite the introduction, ending with a clear thesis statement.
Once students have completed their finished product the last two steps are very important: going public and reflecting on the process. Depending on the size of the class and the length of the papers, students either read their paper to the entire class or to each other in small groups. Students need to listen with a pen for the following information: the issue the person's writing about, their position on it, strengths in the way they've crafted the paper. Once all students have read their papers, students need to type a reflection (see Appendix).
