I've been reading the Daily 5 with several kindergarten teachers in a book study. We are doing a chapter a week and I have had my eyes opened to many things that I need to change in my classroom and getting some really great ideas. Tomorrow is chapter 2 so I will tell you more about that later. Right now I want to tell you about another book that I am reading on my own.
No, I am not reading this because I am expecting to teach my preschoolers how to write. I found this book by accident while looking at some other teaching resources and thought "Hmm...I maybe I should read that so I can help Hunter." When Hunter started writing it was very stressful, for all of us. Granted, he is just going in to first grade but my how the expectations of kids have gone up. I read all of his writing from kindergarten a couple of weeks ago and couldn't believe how much he had improved already. But I had a hard time finding his "voice" in his writing. It seemed that there was more "Write three things you learned about Antarctica" and other reflections of things that he had read with his class than things that came from his heart. Now, I am not discrediting his teacher in any way. She was wonderful!
I started reflecting on the ways that I had taught writing in second grade and what had been stressed to me as a teacher that needed to be done. I remember telling kids what to write about more than giving them choice. (sound familiar? Daily 5 maybe?) I realized how telling kids what to write about and how to write was taking away their voice in writing. They were told to reflect on a piece of literature or tell what their favorite food was and why or if they could be any flavor of ice cream what would it be and why. Where is the fun in that? What boy wants to be ice cream?
Anyhow.... I knew there was no way that I could read this book while I was in school so I saved it to my favorites and decided to wait for the summer so that I could concentrate on it. I just got my book in today and I have already read chapter 1. Here are a few things that stood out to me as I read.
-Boys, those troubled, troubled boys.... What are we going to do with them? All they want to do is play video games and pretend to shoot each other. They are so rough, always hitting and pushing each other. Here's an idea, how about instead of treating them like a problem to be managed, we try to understand them.
-"Boy writers have unique strengths, quirks, and weaknesses that every thoughtful practitioner or parent will want to be aware of." I can't wait to see what the writer has to say about this!
-"Think deeply about what concrete steps we can take to do a better job of teaching boys to write." What can I do to help my son be a better writer?
