Post #1-Sept 24.

In Wondrous Words, the organized inquiry helped me get a better sense of how students perceive reading like a writer. Up to this chapter, the author repeatedly emphasized the significance of “reading like a writer”. The thing that grab my attention is the emphasis of getting the specifics of noticing what you should notice as a reader and writer, the author called it “noticings”. Students had to find readerly and writerly things in the text, which allows the students to perceive in different perspectives. Though, as teachers we have to keep in mind that students may only touch the surface and may not know the difference of what writers and readers see. In other words, they may approach this activity with general responses. So, we should provide questions helping students to get a better sense of distinguishing the two. Helping students envision what to write eventually entails them to become adept to writing in what they envision, over a period of time. In page 131- the inquiry chart is a great example of how to help process students’ ideas.

Furthermore, I found that the think alouds provides a sense of letting the students know how they’re going to write. Allowing them to be the writer themselves, helps students feel that he or she is capable of going beyond what he or she expected can do. I wish/wonder if I can allocate this method into the students’ reading in my practicum classroom. I don’t know how to phrase this, but the second grade students in my practicum class struggle so much in writing what they envisioned. I know it’s only the beginning of the year but, hypothetically if I were to teach in this class, would it be too late or early to try to apply “read like a writer”?

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Good comments. I like how you added in the idea of think alouds and how we can incorporate those into our writing lessons as well.

Bryan

You point to the use of the terms  ”readerly and writerly” as used in the readings and how it can impact student work. You indicated that, “though, as teachers we have to keep in mind that students may only touch the surface and may not know the difference of what writers and readers see. In other words, they may approach this activity with general responses”. I think this is a very astute observation of how the text can be applied. Sometimes how we frame a given task makes all the difference in the world.  Confidence is an essential part of becoming a good writer, and I think the use of these terms and the skills and tools they point to will help to empower students seek out good writing and also to pen such writing themselves.

Courtney