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Plan to Write
By Marcia Worth-Baker
Five rules that will help make writing a priority for your students – and for you, too
As a writing teacher, I have an opportunity to practice what I preach. All any writer needs is a pen, paper and – most importantly – time.
Although I often mean to write before school or during lunch, things get in the way. So, at least once each marking period, I journey through the writing process with my class, taking a piece of writing from draft to finished product. As we write, I introduce and enforce my five Writing Rules:
- Put it in the plan book. I begin each class by putting a writing prompt on the board. The prompt, known as a "Journal Entry," can relate to any subject area. A prompt about ancient Greece might ask students whether they'd prefer to live in peaceful Athens or powerful Troy. A math Journal Entry might ask students to describe how they used math in the past day.
- Write first, solve problems later. The classroom reality of fire drills, announcements and half-day schedules can cut a 40-minute period in half. I take attendance as students enter the room. Everything else – homework, notices, excuses – waits until the Journal Entry for the day is completed and some responses are shared. Writing first ensures that it happens and makes it a priority.
- Write with the students. I write for as long as my students do, on the same topic. Not only does this give me time to write, it gives me insight into my prompts. Sometimes I find the prompt was too simple, requiring only a "yes" or "no" answer. Sometimes I realize the answer demands a graduate thesis. If I weren't writing at the same time as my students, I might never have realized this.
- Write like the students. As much as I'd like to model diligence and good posture, I just as often model frustration and, finally, a breakthrough. All of these things are part of the writing process.
- Commiserate and celebrate. When I write with my students, I empathize when it's hard to focus and sympathize when the search for the perfect word seems fruitless. I also seize every opportunity to celebrate inspiration, inviting students' parents for a reading of recent works or leading a class cheer when a child sends a completed draft to the printer.
One of my former sixth-graders, now a high school senior, came to visit. She nodded when she saw the day's Journal Entry on the board.
"I sort of miss those," she said. "I guess the next step is to write and answer my own, huh?"
Marcia Worth-Baker teaches at Gould School in North Caldwell, NJ.
