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December 14, 2020: The Importance of Going Small
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This pandemic has taken a social and emotional toll on all of us. We are tired. Students are tired. Parents are tired. How about we take some time to rest? How about we give ourselves some credit for getting through what we’re going through?
Assign ¼ of the work you would normally assign. Yes – I’m talking about all of the work, but let’s stick to writing in particular.
Over the break, how about assigning the student and the entire family the one-sentence-essay? Or, giving the assignment only to yourself and your own family first so you can work out the kinks?
It’s better to teach students to write a few writing elements well --- writing tips that will stick to them rather than teach too much for them to remember.
PROMPT: Write one sentence that tells the reader exactly why you are on the planet? Write one sentence that describes your purpose for living (so far). Write it in 3rd person. It should be able to fit on a post-it note.
Example:
- She was the bringer of water to the thirsty and provider of rest for the weary.
- He lived to play music that stirred the human soul.
- She helped people think better so they could live and serve better.
- He gave more than he took.
Yeah – it’s kind of like writing an obituary. And yes, that might be an evil word these days, but if you were to write one sentence that summed up your life after you’re gone, what is the smallest amount of words you could use to define your life for yourself and clarify your life for people who knew you?
Why have a stranger try to sum up the life that you lived when you can do it yourself? You could write it now – and then start making sure that you are living the life that aligns with your values.
Why not teach students that every breath is precious and each day that we have life is a gift to cherish? Why not teach them that we can design the life we want, despite our circumstances?
She helped people think better so they could live and serve better.
The purpose of the one-sentence essay is to help students find their purpose for the moment – the one they will live up to. It is also to teach them that purpose might change over time as life teaches us more lessons that align with what we truly believe and value.
He was a daring skateboarder who made big leaps and solid landings…might become: He was brave; he tackled major challenges and worked to impact positive change.
To find your purpose, think about the ways you want to help people. To write a good one-sentence purpose, ask yourself these questions:
- What are you known for? Cooking, skateboarding, good at Fortnite
- How do you want to be remembered? A serious gamer who made good food and jumped good ramps
- What are some accomplishments you’re most proud of? Beating my brother at video games and cooking the Thanksgiving turkey better than my mom
- What brings you joy? Seeing people eat and laugh
- What life lessons did you learn when you were younger? I learned to share
- What life lessons have you learned recently now that you are older? I’ve learned to take care of myself first before I can take care of others
- What life lessons do you hope you would have learned in your old age? I hope to learn patience
- What three adjectives describe you? Smart, funny, brave
- Aside from school and work, what are the highlights of your life so far? I taught my sister to ride a bike
Be sure to have a clear grading criterion for students to follow once they’ve written their purpose sentence:
Sample Rubric:
- Sentence is a purpose about helping others
- Sentence has eliminated unnecessary words; the main idea is clear and precise
- Sentence has significance; the reader understands the intent of the purpose
- Sentence shows the mastery of the skill that has been taught: the sentence uses standard grammar, usage, and mechanics OR the sentence has a clear main idea
Don’t grade everything – only grade the skill(s) you’ve taught up to the point of the assessment. Tell students exactly what you will be grading, and stick to those two to three items.
You could go big: grade for main ideas and good selection of evidence and analysis or logical connections that connect ideas
OR
You could go small: run-ons, capital letters, punctuation at the end of sentences
Whatever you do, be sure to narrow your grading focus:
Only focus on what students are doing well and what they should improve. Don’t write any more than two to three comments. Comment on specific things you have taught. Don’t comment on everything you notice unless you see a pattern. Focus on MAJOR weaknesses, whether you have taught the skill or not.
SAMPLE COMMENTS ON SKILLS you taught: STRENGTHS
- “Your main idea in the introduction and the reiteration of it in the conclusion match. You’ve maintained your focus throughout the paper.”
- “You use good transitions throughout the piece that help the reader move easily from one idea to the next.”
- “Good use of precise language and specific word choices to describe the people, situation, and scene.”
SAMPLE COMMENTS ON SKILLS you may or may not have taught: WEAKNESSES
- “You have a pattern of running sentences together. See the first two body paragraphs.”
- "Be careful to define obscure terms or urban idioms so that a general reader can understand.”
- “I don’t understand the logic you are using to make this statement.”
ASK QUESTIONS MORE THAN MAKE STATEMENTS:
- "Where might you use end punctuations to avoid writing run-on sentences?”
- “Do your introduction and conclusion make the similar statements?”
- “What evidence supports this claim?”
Bottom Line: Go Small
Give yourself and your students small wins! You don’t have to assign a ton of writing or do a ton of grading to help your students become better writers. Take the small win. Assign shorter pieces of writing and grade smaller amounts of content. Focus on two things the student writer has done well – and one item that needs improvement. Make comments that elevate strengths. Ask questions about aspects of the writing that need improvement. Then either allow the student to revise – or allow the student extra points for the second essay that shows improvement from the first one. Go deep not wide. Design a writing life for your students that helps them improve their writing yet minimizes the time you spend grading. Small is good. Go small.
Archive
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October 11, 2020: On Writing Headlines and Being Keepers of the Light for Our Children
Mahatma Gandhi said, “If we are to reach peace in this world and if we are to carry on a real war against war, we shall have to begin with children; and if they will grow up in their natural innocence, we won’t have to struggle; we won’t have to pass fruitless idle resolutions, but we shall go from love to love and peace to peace, until at last all the corners of the world are covered with that peace and love for which consciously or unconsciously the whole world is hungering.”
And what if Gandhi is wrong and the whole world is not hungering for peace and love, and if the headlines about COVID-19 and racism and political incivility bring darkness, which is the opposite of peace and love, what do we tell the children? What do we do when we must teach when the headlines dim the lights in our eyes?
When dark headlines hover, I open the Sunshine File on my iPhone. That’s where years of pictures and videos of my and my colleagues’ smiling, laughing, and beautiful little ones and their stories live.
It is where one-year-old Micah dances in his living room and plays the drums and where Dillynn Grace sits in her high chair and very clearly rejects broccoli and where Sammy wears her self-selected “proper” attire for her first day of kindergarten. It is where the stories of Ames and Lincoln and Lyla and Zephyr and so many others live in perfect peace and love. It is the place in my phone that reminds me to look for the light before I look into the eyes of the children. Dark headlines or not - we are responsible for the children’s light.
James Baldwin said, “for these are all of our children; we all will either profit by or pay for what they become.”
And if Baldwin is right and we will reap what we sow with regard to how we educate the children and how we make them feel - whether they make good headlines or bad ones, whether they develop cures for pandemics, racism, and political incivility, or exacerbate these problems, we are responsible for keeping the light on in the spirits of the children we educate.
What happens when we treat our most vulnerable citizens as if they are not seeing the headlines? What happens when the children tell us and show us, they are hurting as a result of the headlines and we can’t hear them? What happens when we don’t help them critically think their way through the headlines that we know they are seeing and hearing?
These have been my struggles each time the headlines dimmed the lights in my eyes, and I found it hard to put on my ‘peace-and-love-face” when I looked at my 11th or 6th graders through their screens. I wondered if these children who are learning in the midst of today’s headlines would make us profit or make us pay for what they will become.
All I could do was try my best to craft writing lessons in breakout sessions based on the promise of Gandhi’s peace and love. So, with my Sunshine File and Gandhi and Baldwin’s reminders solidly in tow, I tried to teach 6th graders how to write their own headlines so that they could analyze and process the headlines in the news.
Our tools: Children’s books, “Craig of the Creek” cartoon excerpts, books read aloud on YouTube, Google’s Jamboard and lots and lots of discussion.
Our discussions: always, always challenged them to write their own questions - as fast as they could - as many as they could; the team with the most questions won second place; the team with the best questions one first.
What did they win? They got to pick the sign-off hand signal of the day. We would sign-off with Mr. Spock's Vulcan hand greeting; wavy finger hands; flea claps, thumb waves….or whatever silliness the kids and I could invent to bring the light.
Our discussions about humanity and changing mindsets in order to change headlines were fruitful as YouTube teachers read these children’s books aloud:
- The Dot, by Peter Reynolds
- Terrible Things and Smoky Night by Eve Bunting
- The Other Side by Jacqueline Woodson
- Teach Us Your Name by Huda Essa
- “My Name” chapter of The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros
- And almost any two-minute excerpt of the cartoon, “Craig of the Creek” on YouTube
We started small. We wrote our names as headlines. Since these weren’t my “official students,” as I was only the breakout room teacher, I had some leeway in getting to know them. Huda Essa, the author of Teach Us Your Name read us her book from her YouTube channel.
Students then researched their names based on https://www.names.org/ or their parent/guardian interviews and their feelings about their names. They then wrote one-sentence headlines for their names.
What did their names mean based on their research and interviews with their parents and guardians? What were the background stories of their names? What did they think about their names and why? We posted their writing to Jamboard and discussed them, using ALL of the Jamboard tools: post-it notes, pen, text, eraser, highlighter, background paper, and pointer.
HEADLINE NAMES THAT BROUGHT US LIGHT
Emilio: “Keep Calm and Let Emilio Handle It”
Xiomara: “The “I” means Independent and “R” means Really Good Friend.”
Thaddeus (aka Tay): “Tay Gonna Be Alright”We read children’s books to find and discuss topics and themes similar to current headlines and then wrote one-sentence summaries. We played the music they liked (ones we found the clean versions of) and used them to guide discussions about whether words or beats mattered more and why? We talked about food and Fortnite and finding solutions for the situations the kids of “Craig of the Creek” found themselves entangled in.
In one episode, Craig and his friends (all 5th graders) go to the Creek Daycare to drop off Craig’s little sister, Jessica. They find themselves “stuck” babysitting when Angel, the 5th grade daycare provider, unexpectedly has to leave to take another child home because she has poison ivy. After Angel leaves, the daycare becomes chaotic and the little ones try to leave. Craig tries to calm the children by playing a game of peek-a-boo, but his little sister has a better plan that works more effectively.
CARTOON HEADLINES THAT BROUGHT LIGHT
DeAndre: “Jessica Smart, Craig Dumb”
Jo’an: “Little Sister is Big Sister”
Thaddeus (Tay): “Craig Ain’t All That”The headline writing need not be exceptional. The thinking needs to be. As I said to one administrator, our job is not to teach students what to think but how to think. We must unpack thinking in the least threatening ways, using the least threatening tools - so that we always bring light to challenging headlines.
Children’s books and cartoons can take center stage in this as we help children deconstruct the messages in the books with these questions.
Is the message in the Children’s book or cartoon some or all of these?
- Clear? Accurate (for the world where the story resides), Precise? Relevant? Significant? Logical (for the world where the story resides), Complete? Fair?, Empathetic?...and does it have enough depth and breadth to look at the issue from multiple perspectives?
These questions are the same ones we can use to deconstruct and discuss news. We just have to remember to find our own type of Sunshine File and take heed of Gandhi and Baldwin before we turn on our screens.
The children are watching and listening to the headlines no matter how much we think we’re shielding them. And using children’s books and cartoons to discuss headlines is a softer, gentler way to keep the lights on in their eyes - and in ours.