Minutes (Jennifer)

Everyone entered the room with the familiar smells of Chick-fil-A!  Their unbelievable chicken minis, sausage biscuits, and fruit tray with the delicious caramel sauce was served by yours truly for b’fast. Of course, I do have an inside connection to CFA, so I must say “thank you” honey!

 

John opened us with the acknowledgement that several people had added to their writing spaces; Lori G. brought roses from home (and tomatoes, but they were for us, not her writing space); Vicki brought pictures of her family, including her stepson who is stationed in Iraq; Amy brought pictures of her students, husband, and dogs, along with some of her favorite children’s books from her third grade classroom; and last, but certainly not least, Jevette and Ivy won the prize for bringing their principal with them today! 

 

The morning invitation was given by me.  I read a couple of pages from John Ortberg’s book, Everybody’s Normal Until You Get To Know Them which is a book about community.  We sometimes view ourselves as the “normal” ones, while everyone else is weird and Ortberg simply states, we all come like the clothes from the corner department store “as-is”, with all our flaws.  I also read from Max Lucado’s Facing Your Giants which included a story about him waiting for a phone call as a young boy to find out if he had made the baseball team, only the call never came.  We all have a time in our lives that the call never came.  Be it a missed job opportunity or the date that you thought went well, only they never called again.  The invitations were to write about someone you know or yourself that you have accepted “as-is” or to write about the time in your life that the phone call never came. 

 

Our first TIW of the day was with Yvonne.  We scoped out a new room in Haley to give us space.  Her essential questions were:

1. How can I help writers consider the reader’s perspective?

2.  How do writers show what they know?

 

We were given a folder with instructions about how to carry out the activity. Directions: You must describe a picture to your partner so that he/she can draw it without looking at the original.  Take a minute to organize your instructions….give instructions only twice and wait for your partner to draw before proceeding to the next part.  Do not look at your partners sketch until it is completed, and  you cannot use hand gestures.

 

Reflection:

 Did the activity transmit the intended concept?

 What changes in the procedure would improve the effects?

 

As we discussed the activity, I took notes from who said what.  It is important for me when I look back on an activity to remember where I got the information.  I am including what I recorded below:

 

Whitney – extension to have students write their directions next

Vicki – described game of “get Mrs. Pheil out of here” in students giving directions to get her out of the classroom

Lori – use in science classroom to help with descriptions with microscopic organisms

Michael – uses figurative language to describe the drawing “looks like a stop sign”

Jevette – give feedback, “which communications were most helpful?”

Amy – www.monsterexchange.org – they draw a picture of a monster, then the description and sends it to another school, use of adjectives; provides an audience for their writing

 Maribeth – ideas for peer editing lesson

Dr. Whyte – how hard it was to face one another; big bright sign that says “solicit side by side feedback” 

Whitney – the reader is literally showing you what they heard you say; what does it mean to conference with my writing; important to make changes to writing; journal or log about what they have learned about themselves; explicitly telling the students to think about what they are going to say before they begin, what type of language are they going to use? learning from someone else’s example person B listened

Vicki – listening skills involved;

Michael – when to consider your audience, language fits with who your audience is; looking at things like a writer, knowing you will have to describe it to someone else. 

Amy – forced to have mental images in your head and put those to paper

Holly – mathematical terms reinforcement

 

We had about twenty minutes before lunch and we spent time writing our reflections for Yvonne.  I was impressed by the simplicity but the effectiveness of the lesson.  It was great and something we can all use no matter what grade we teach.

 

Lunch time was finally here.  Some stayed in the room, while some ventured outside in the beautiful weather.  Amy returned to the room early to begin preparing for her TIW.

 

Amy’s TIW was a beautiful way to teach across the curriculum in an elementary setting.  She combined, reading, writing, social studies, and more into this one lesson.  We read Fairy Tales from other countries, we talked about mail, we wrote to someone from a fairy tale character’s perspective, we learned proper conventions of writing a letter.  We could easily see how effective this was in her third grade classroom. 

 

Amy’s essential questions were:

1.  How can I get students to enter into the “story world” through the use of writing?

2.  How can I teach the conventions of letter writing in a fun and engaging way?

 

Amy also gave us several books to use in our classrooms and I am including those titles /authors here for our use:

 

Jim Trelease – author who came to Auburn in September of 2007 The Read Aloud Handbook

 

Jeffery Wilheim – putting the students in the role of the character Action Strategies for Deepening Comprehension

 

Gail Gibbons How the Post Office Works

 

The Jolly Postman by Janet and Allan Ahlberg (The Jolly Christmas Postman)

 

Punctuation takes a Vacation by Robin Pulver

 

Whitney shared about a handout from Dr. Ash that says “we have conventions so that we can communicate” – if the reader doesn’t know what you are talking about, it looses meaning.  How true!!

 

We took a break before heading into one of my favorite times, writing response groups.  I feel like my group is my safe place.  Like going to a weekly help group.  It is a time for us to share what we have been working on in a small group and of course, my group is the best!  They are so encouraging and helpful with all they say.  It is a great time and would love to meet with them on a daily basis….Whitney….can you work that into the schedule? 

 

Our closing was given by Jevette.  I think we are all in awe of her choice of words and ability to convey her thoughts.  Thank you Jevette for sparking the writer in all of us!!  We all left hungry to return to 2474 tomorrow (and I don’t just mean the wonderful food we’ve had!)