The early literacy landscape is filled with phonics, decoding skills, and all the components of Structured Literacy instruction. Is there room for writing? Our three Literacy Talks hosts say, “Yes!” In this episode, educators will learn more about teaching fundamental writing skills all along the literacy pathway. From the five critical writing skills early learners need to develop to the eventual skills they’ll need to learn writing craft, this episode connects the dots among reading, oral language, and writing. It’s a fascinating discussion about looking at literacy learning in a broader and more meaningful context.
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The early literacy landscape is filled with phonics, decoding skills, and all the components of Structured Literacy instruction. Is there room for writing? Our three Literacy Talks hosts say, “Yes!” In this episode, educators will learn more about teaching fundamental writing skills all along the literacy pathway. From the five critical writing skills early learners need to develop to the eventual skills they’ll need to learn writing craft, this episode connects the dots among reading, oral language, and writing. It’s a fascinating discussion about looking at literacy learning in a broader and more meaningful context.
Subscribe to our Literacy Talks podcast digest and never miss an episode! We’ll send you summaries of every session, links to the resources discussed on each show, and some extra goodies so that your learning never stops.
Subscribe to our podcast digest.
Download the new Reading Horizons Discovery Product Guide.
Access the show notes.
Read the transcripts.
Hello literacy leaders and champions. Welcome to literacy talks the podcast series from Reading Horizons dedicated to exploring the ideas, trends, insights and practical issues that will help us create literacy momentum. Our series host is Stacy Hurst, professor at Southern Utah University and Chief Academic Officer at Reading Horizons where reading momentum begins. Joining Stacy are Donell Pons, a recognized expert in literacy and special education and Lindsay Kemeny, a Utah based elementary classroom teacher. Today's episode is all about writing and the connections between early literacy learning and the growth of students writing skills from building handwriting fluidity to writing craft. This episode connects the dots. Let's get started.
Stacy Hurst:Welcome to another episode of Literacy Talks. I'm your host Stacy Hurst. And I'm joined by Lindsay Kemeny and Donell Pons. And this week, we get to talk about something exciting, it was Donell's turn to choose the topic. So I'm interested to hear what we're talking about. Donell.
Donell Pons:Great. So of course, I get to be the one who has brought up this subject. Some people love this subject. Some people hate this subject. But we've got to talk about it at some point. And that is writing and the connection between reading and writing. And I thought there was no better time to talk about it, then with a new book coming out by John sadita. That is called the writing rope. And some folks may have already received their copy it came out just a few weeks ago. And what I like about it is is there's enough of a sort of image that is familiar to us of something called the rope, right? She's calling it the riding rope. And it's similar to the reading rope that we've heard about from Scarborough Scarborough's reading rope. And this one mirrors it has these categories, and it has the strands. And so it's kind of a nice way to talk about writing and how important it is, and that our conversation isn't over at reading. It begins with reading, right. And ultimately, we want really excellent fluent readers and writers, and we want it to be fully literate. That's called the full complement of literacy. And so writing has to come into the conversation. One of the things I kind of want to acknowledge is, in the book, Joan is quick to point out that the research that she's leaning into, most of its been conducted for fourth to upper grades, she acknowledges that and a lot of this research about writing is about fourth to upper grades. And then I was also looking at another book that is by William Van Cleave on writing, which is another really excellent book. And William Vancleave is talking about handwriting, which obviously is going to be part of what we talk about in the writing row. And he acknowledges that a lot of the information about handwriting is research from third grade, just up to third grade. So that's kind of interesting. So we have to acknowledge at the outset from this conversation, that there may be gaps in research and how much it's telling us about what is appropriate, what grades and how you make these transitions from one grade to the next. Because there does seem to be and I think others will acknowledge a kind of gap between what is water students expected to do and have under their belt from third grade into that big transition to fourth grade. And it seemed to me that I was almost witnessing another one of those, we learn to read in the K through three space that we're all so familiar with this thing that said, and then from fourth grade, and above your reading to learn, almost looked that way to me when I was looking at a lot of the information and material is that kids were expected to have these writing skills, fourth grade and above, but I was seeing a gap between third to fourth. So this will be a really interesting conversation for all of us. Because all of us have different backgrounds and Lindsey, you're going to weigh in and that K through three spaces will be really nice. We're going to be looking at different materials. So if some of you out there, listeners have the book, the writing rope, and you've just picked it up. That's fantastic. We'll be in those first few pages, because we're just going to be looking at that general outline of what is the writing rope. If you have letters training, or you're receiving letters training, because that's something that a lot of teachers are receiving across the country, then you might want to dive into unit two of your letters training if you're there in unit two and some of the writing pieces that Eloise emotes has that are pages 250 and on. So there might be some information there that might be shared as well. And then William VanCleave known and I'm gonna refer to his writing curriculum that he has, it's so phenomenal. But to start this conversation going, let's dive in. I know Lindsay and Stacy both have a copy of the writing wrote the book, but we're just really going to be on page four. And we're going to be talking about those five critical skills that then have bullet points under them. That's why it's kind of familiar, it looks a lot like the reading rope. And it's done on intentionally for that reason. I'm gonna kind of name those five and then have his talk about some of those basic ones. So that kind of has a grade of the higher level skills, so to speak. And there's transcription, which is spelling and handwriting or keyboarding. There's writing craft, which is word choice, awareness of tasks, audience purpose, literary literary devices, text structure, which seems to have the most bullet points. That's narrative, informational opinion, paragraph structure patterns of organization that's description, sequence, cause and effect, linking and transition words. So that seems to be pretty heavy in text structure, their syntax, which is the grammar and syntactical wareness, sentence, elaboration, punctuation, the top is critical thinking it has two bullet points, generating ideas, gathering information, writing processes, the organizing, drafting, writing, revising, those are those rough five. So I want to start with down at the base their transcription, and just have Lindsey first and then Stacey, maybe in that order, Stacy can be thinking I'm giving you some think time. You're so lucky. I love it when people do that for me. But let's see, I'll have you go first about transcription. That's that spelling, handwriting and keyboarding. Talk about the emphasis in the grades that you teach? And how far does it get? And how much of that is really connected to writing? Oh,
Lindsay Kemeny:it's so important. I mean, this is the foundation of writing. And if they cannot form their letters fluently, that's going to impact them a lot moving forward, it's just going to take so long, and if it slows them down, so if they have to stop and think, Wait, how do I how do I form the E again, then, you know, by the time they remember and get the E, they forgotten what they wanted to write. So it's so important kindergarten and first grade, that we spend time on handwriting, and not just handwriting, but getting it fluent. So I just think that's huge. And of course, the spelling too. And this is like our segmenting practice, with phonemic awareness really comes in here where they're listening for the sounds in the word and then writing them and I like to have them say the sounds as the writing to help kind of solidify those sound spelling correspondences. Right. So and then, like, really, the another thing about the handwriting is I'm teaching first grades this year. And they a lot of them come to me and they're forming all the letters incorrectly, which is just not going to be as efficient. So they're, they're forming them from the bottom, or, you know, and they're their handwriting is gonna look so much better if we can get them to do the strokes the correct way. And starting from the top. That's huge. A lot of time is spent here.
Donell Pons:Yeah, like I said, it's big. And then Stacey, how about you? And also maybe Stacey give us a little feel for teacher preparation courses? And how much time do they spend on this very critical skill, as Lindsay has said, for teacher prep?
Stacy Hurst:Well, you've heard me say on here before that we don't have enough in my particular university, this is probably the case throughout the country. But we don't have enough courses to cover everything we need to. And so handwriting is typically the thing that gets kind of a short shrift. We do address it, but don't spend a lot of time on it. I make sure that I remind my students or teach them that there is a lot of research that says a letter recognition is a really good indicator of future reading, proficiency. And so we can't shortchange handwriting, because that's the best way to get letter recognition into long term memory. I also am famous for saying it's not me, I'm sure picked it up somewhere. But when we're talking about things that need to get into the brain, everything is slow before it's fast right before it's automatic. letter formation is a really good way to have our students identify those letters automatically, which seems counterintuitive initially, but spending that time on it. And then I think with spelling, and I'm thinking back to my time in the classroom as a first grade teacher and as a literacy coach. That of course is going to develop over time, just like Scarborough's reading rope. The writing rope, I imagine would be the the skills on that would develop in the same way. But I think it's also connected to the writing process because it depends on what a student knows when they're writing connected texts, what you hold him accountable for. So spelling was something that was fun for me as a teacher to watch progress across the first grade year because it just got better and better.
Donell Pons:And that's really interesting and Stacey just prove your point and kind of you know, backup your point, William Van Cleave in his writing curriculum on one page. It really stood out to me he said currently teacher education in handwriting is neglected. Graham also found this as a study by Graham, that while 90% of first through third grade teachers taught handwriting averaging 70 minutes of instruction per week, only 39% claimed their students handwriting was adequate. And it should come as no surprise then that only 12% of teachers in the same study by Graham said they received adequate preparation to teach handwriting and their college education courses. So that speaks to what you were saying about there just isn't enough time period for these really critical skills. And we should evaluate that how much prep we're giving teachers to teach the critical skills, right. That's another piece of all this. The other thing you mentioned, that was really important to Stacey that VanCleave also talked about, he made a comparison and said that phonemic awareness is to reading, what handwriting and handwriting production is to writing. I've had clients to sit with that for just a second here. And think about those students that we see in classrooms all the time that are struggling to produce those written letters, when they're asked to do a writing assignment, and just how much that is impacting their ability to do that assignment. Right? Yes, I felt these were really great quotes to think about. And Lindsay, I loved you're really emphasizing because you're teaching in that space, just how important it is and how much time you're spending to make sure students get as you say, and we remember fluent, because it isn't, I don't want to see students that are sitting right struggling, and oh, how do I make that? Is that quite right. And the other thing that VanCleave points out to in his writing is he says I'm not looking at neatness in the sense of the most beautiful letters produced, but he said fluency is still the biggest key. So how quickly and automatically can those students produce those obviously, there becomes a point in which it is important be able to read your own writing, right? How many of us have done that before? I not quite sure what I wrote there. Okay, excellent. Let's let's move on to this next one here and spelling to you, Stacy and Lindsay, thank you both for mentioning spelling too. And that transcription, writing craft. So writing craft is that next one up the tear out of the five we did transcription which involved all the handwriting spelling, and then there's writing craft, which has three bullet points. And it says word choice, awareness of task, audience purpose, literary devices. And so I'm going to have you lead out this time, Stacy, on your thoughts on that section, their writing craft, and maybe some of your because you also have taught in the first grade and those early grade spaces. What that looked like, as an educator for you.
Stacy Hurst:Well, I will say there, in my teaching, there was a definite, I say evolution. I did teach writers workshop when I was teaching first grade. And that was an interesting experiment, I should say, my students were really excited about writing. And when I found a phonics program, their spelling got better, their handwriting, not so much, you talk about being able to read their writing. That was not the case. But we did focus on format. So we started with Lists, will signs and lists and cards. But that was the focus, there were many lessons about the craft. Looking back now I think, oh, I should have been much more explicit with that. And my students really, I will say this they loved to write, they would frequently we'd vote as a class writing was in the afternoon, they would frequently choose to miss recess to keep writing. But I could have prepared them better to be more fluent and accurate in their writing. But their thoughts were definitely aligned with some of those things when we're talking about writing craft. And then when I became a literacy coach, my district adopted the six traits writing model. And so we were able to focus, a lot of those elements are in that craft area, including word choice. So we were able to get a little bit more focused in on those things. But it was just a piece of this big rope as I'm looking at it.
Donell Pons:How about ulinzi? Yeah,
Lindsay Kemeny:so writing craft under their word choice, I definitely do a lot of that. And we will come up with a word, for example, said, and I'll make a little anchor chart with the word said, and then we're going to come up with a lot of different words that we could use instead of said, Because said is kind of boring. So what else could you use, you know, and they will come up with a list. And we'll do that for other words, like I remember eat was one E or eight we put at the top and then we make a list like oh, you could say gobbled, you could say nibbled, you could say Chomp, do and come up with all these different words. And so that's really fun for students, then we'd have those anchor charts up in our room. And when they're writing a story, and they want to use, you know, like a fancy word, we'll call them add fancy words, then they could go and that's the way they could do that. Awareness of the task and the audience and your purpose is something I feel like I can work on a little bit more but thinking about, you know, talking a little bit more about who are we writing for, and that can make the writing a little bit more meaningful. And then I just think the literary devices, I think it's just really interesting because I feel like that is much more higher than a foundation. tional skill in her book, she has this under foundational skills. And I feel like literary devices is much more complex. So and this in her book she talks about this is things like allegory illusion dialogue. Well, dialogue is something we could work on. But you know, foreshadowing hyperboles, that seems really advanced to
Donell Pons:me. Yeah, that's interesting. You know, just listening to the two of you talk, I'm thinking about most of the time, I have students who struggled all the way through their education with reading, and it impacted their writing as well, clearly. And then now as adults, they're expected to have skills that they don't have. But yet, day to day, they're expected to make decisions work with text. And so you don't have the luxury of saying, Oh, we'll get to that later, right, when you're ready. But you do in a way you you are going to teach them on a trajectory, make sure you fill in and give them the skills that they need, but you're also trying to meet needs where they are. And I'm thinking that a lot of the devices that the two of you were talking about that you used in your classrooms and the things that you saw happening with your younger students. In a way I see that with my adult students, too. I take those same strategies, but we're working with higher level text, but we're still taking it apart asking questions, that sort of thing. So I think that's kind of interesting. And Lindsey, when you were talking about hyperbole and that sort of thing, I was thinking of even my my young kids at home, because I love reading and writing. And what's interesting is that when we talked about hyperbole, once the kids had that down, it was funny, they'd walk through the house, and somebody would yell out something that was clearly hyperbole and that another kid from another room would say, That's hyperbole. So it's interesting once that becomes a part of, of your awareness, how you start to to notice, right, so I thought it was interesting when you said, and we could certainly do something with, you know, quotations and narrative, that sort of thing. And you're absolutely right, you know, making students aware. The other thing that I thought was really fascinating on the writing piece, and particularly here, when we're talking about how do you engage young people in this particular part here, where we're talking about text structure, the narrative and all that sort of thing, we're really starting to get into looking at what are we reading, and I thought of an opportunity I had years ago to go to Nicaragua, it was part of a master's program that I was doing. And there was a gentleman there who had been part of a literacy movement in Nicaragua when they gained independence. And he was also part of, of the major predominant religion there. And he said, I was tasked with by the government, we want everybody to be literate. And they had a really aggressive goal within a few years. And his task was massive, because it was a rural country, he would have to send people out into very rural areas, coffee grocery and that sort of thing, and teach people to be literate. How do you do that? What was really fascinating is there were two key pieces of his strategy. There were many other things, but just to the to, because they've stuck with me, he sent college students out. And he gave them all a uniform, it was Levi's dungarees shirt, and then had a hand that they could sleep in, and they could sleep with the family that they were teaching. And he set them up into the hills to literally go live with families and teach in their communities. And we asked him what documents what so what did you give them to use to teach? And he said, we asked the instructors, these young people to go and ask the family, What documents do you have in your house that you've never been able to read? What what precious documents do you have that you would like to know what they say, and every time family members would come with letters from other family members that they had been sent that they'd never been able to read but had held on to for 1020 years, or they had legal documents that they didn't understand, that had to do with the land they were living on. And they taught through what was most important to the learner. So I've never forgotten that piece of this. He said it was absolutely critical. You always have to remember what's most important to your learner, and reach them from there. So I think that's same here when we're talking about writing CC when you said they would rather stay in and go out to recess, because you'd hit a nerve with something they really enjoy. They wanted to tell about themselves, right? We all have a story we want to tell that's a key piece to writing
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Stacy Hurst:Yeah, and you know, as you were talking, I love that making it relevant. Right. And a lot of these skills to Lindsay's point, first graders have a hard time understanding sarcasm, let alone idioms. There you take those things really literally, but I am thinking of a specific approach I was taught in my pre service education and it was the language experience approach. So a lot of writing instruction in those early grades especially and I don't think this should ever go away right is modeling or using just having your students, especially first graders watch, you create something. And we did learn about dialogue in my classroom, that language experience approach really led to that because you have an experience as a class. And then you ask them to talk about it. And they watch you write down what they say. So we talked about quotation marks, and dialogue. And then I took it one step forward. Further, I should say, I wasn't, this was my own spin, for sure. So it wasn't a pure language experience approach. But then we did use that text to highlight spelling related to our phonics instruction. And I did that in my English language development classes, too. So I love that you're pointing that out, it's really important to keep it personal and relevant. Right? Thank
Donell Pons:you, Stacey. Because that takes us up to the next to syntax and critical thinking those are those last two are the five. And then so you have an activity that you were chatted about even just a week ago that you do with your students. That is very much what Stacy just said about involving all of those. Can you relate that you know what I'm talking about? You said you you sit in front of your students, and together you create
Lindsay Kemeny:and just back to writing craft? Are the literary devices are saying, Yeah, I think if you like pull that out, and you're doing a one lesson on figurative language, right. And I think in the younger grades, you're just going to have to do a lot like separate before you're expecting them to put it into a writing, you know, and so that's where I'm like, wow, foundational, really, I think it would take a lot for them to be able to do it independently. But yeah, so we do a lot of oral language is definitely going to play into your writing. So we're going to create a story altogether. And there's a couple of different ways I do this, but you know, we're gonna come up and like today, we are doing it, and we're doing hand motions, and we're saying we start, you know, who's in the story? Where are they, and we kind of do our story opening. And then we're saying, you know, one sunny day out in the country, a brown dog went for a walk, and we all kind of do little actions to help us. And then I'll say what happened next, and we decide what happens next. And we have this this whole story that the students are going to practice orally retelling altogether, they're going to orally retell it with their neighbor, they could say it a little different. And that's great, because they're working on their language skills. And then I'm going to write in front of the whole class, we're doing like a class book. So together, we're gonna write our first sentence. And I'm modeling how I do that and modeling how, you know, we're seeing the sounds when we try and going back and reading what we wrote to make sure it makes sense. And, and then I'll have one student gets to be our publisher. So they, for each page, they get to copy my sentence down, and another one is going to be the illustrator, and they're going to do a picture. And over the course of a week or a few days, it kind of depends, we're going to make a class book altogether. But then I tell my students that if they want, they could write this story on their own, when we have our little writing center. And already, it's kind of taken some of the difficult part out because they don't have to try to come up with an idea. They already have the idea and they've orally rehearsed it. So now they can just practice writing it. And this was an example of narrative, right? So we're talking about, the next one is text structure. So we're kind of talking about our story opening has to, you know, have our character and what they're doing and where they are. And then what happens next, what happens next, and so on.
Donell Pons:Lindsey, I love the way you describe that too, because it's just like that rope coming together with all the strands. And it makes one very strong rope, right. And so you've moved and you can move up and down those strands that go into the rope. Because all of them once they're in the rope, you need all of them, and you move in between all of them, you know, relying on one here and another one there. So I love the way that you describe that. And for older students, there's an experience that I had years ago, it taught me so many lessons, and I was when I was listening to you speak Lindsay, I thought of so many things that were similar that were occurring with this older student in a classroom setting. I was in high school working with a student who had been in a journalism class, this was to write for the school newspaper. He had been in that class for two terms and had received an F both terms. And the English teacher turned to me and said, I don't know why keeps taking the class. He never gets anything done. And so I just went over, sat down and started talking with him. And he had a lot of challenges with writing that were foundational, just some foundational skills. So we discussed some structures, some things we could put in place to help and be able to produce some of that material. So that was foundational making sure we had to move to that transcription. And then we had to get to writing craft to was aware of word choice, that sort of thing. And he seemed to be and as you leaned into the oral tellings. Lindsay, that's the same piece I did with him. He had a real ability to orally retell, that was all very intact. So it was just helping him to be able to connect those to that writing piece. But the show man had been to the Sundance Film Festival and had wanted to write a review. He just loved going. This is but I know where to start. So I said to him, how did you get there? It was how did I get there? How did you get there? How did you get up to to the film festival? Well, I drove My car. So what was the weather like? Well, it was, it was snowing outside actually was really cold. So that's a great setting. I love that setting. So you're driving up there to this film festival, it's in the snow, will pretty soon as eyes kind of light up, he's getting the general idea just like you do with your class, right? You're giving them the idea, you're setting the scene, right? You're taking through all those steps of the rope. And he's loving it, and he's retelling these pieces to me, Well, he gets started, he works right through the bell, the bell goes gotta get to next class. And Stacy, it's like your little ones who don't want to go out to recess because you've provided all those pieces, right? When you see that rope coming together that getting tight and strong. And there's a man produced his first article for a paper, two terms, sitting in a class. That's the one thing too is if someone's that determined to be there, that they'll take an F for two terms they really want to learn, right? So that's the other thing is recognizing that all of those kiddos have a desire at some point to tell a story, no matter what that story is, right? So I'm gonna lead back into you, how do you help your teachers, your pre service teachers get this excitement for being able to teach these things?
Stacy Hurst:Well, I think that's a good question. And it comes partly from them wanting to be a teacher in the first place, like you tap into why, and those teachers who are there to really make a difference and to teach them we talked about why it's important, and the role that literacy has played in their lives. And I think out of anything that we teach, as, again, my focus is elementary education. But out of anything that we teach reading is so important to life. But you've heard the phrase literacy is opportunity, it really is. And I think once my students understand that, and realize they get to be part of that, then that kind of feels the excitement, then as they learn more, and they're able to apply it like with anything, they feel like they're competent, then they can begin to get really excited about it. I love that when their level of passion for the subject and elementary teaching in general matches mine or gets close to mind. It's addicting. It's really cool to see
Donell Pons:now we have just touched the very tip of the iceberg. With all of this information, we literally just went over the basics of the strand, really the basics of this strand to just get kind of conversation and dialogue started, we couldn't fit nearly as much information as we would love to. In this podcast, it's short. So we're gonna wrap up, but I want to give each of you an opportunity to add whatever it is you'd like to add to this conversation that we didn't quite get to where you want to emphasize, Lindsay, what do you think
Lindsay Kemeny:we didn't really talk very much about the syntax strands. So and that's something that's really I'm working on in first grade, of course, I'm new to first grade. But this is another thing that we're doing a lot orally, and we're talking about, you know, it's the beginning of the year. So we're talking about what is the sentence need to have, it needs to have a who, and a do, or but really that who could be a who or what. And then the do is like some kind of action. And so I had these PowerPoint slides and with a picture. So maybe it's a fish, and you can see it in the water. And then Okay, turn to your partner and tell a sentence, you know, and they're coming up with these great sentences. And some of them are very basic, like the fish is jumping, and then others are expanding a little bit, the fish is jumping out of the water, or the fish is swimming in the water. But anyways, that's so fun, because we're doing it orally and then we're practicing this week, then we're going into nouns. And so what's the noun of your sentence. So we're sorting nouns and doing all this practice, but it's so great, because our focus is oral right now. So all my students can participate. So even my little student who doesn't know all the letters of the alphabet, he came in not knowing any, he can participate. And he raises his hand and he feels successful. And it's really exciting to work on this oral first, and then we're going to write the sentence, but it's great.
Donell Pons:Great, fantastic, Stacy, how about you?
Stacy Hurst:I think there's like you said so much that can be said so much. And as Lindsay was talking about about a million other ways to answer your question, but I would say Lindsay did touch on it. And we have throughout this podcast, just the relationship that writing has to every other aspect of literacy. So we can study story structure in an effort to comprehend stories better, but then that also applies to when we create stories, right? We we can really relate to those characters and make sure that we have a compelling problem and that the problem is solved and those kinds of things. So I think the correlation, even just to life, right? And I think one of the things I noticed with mostly when it became a literacy coach, and I was working with kindergarten through fifth graders. And beyond, right, I think we're natural storytellers. Any child loves to tell a story. Getting it in print is an aspect of immortality. Write even if you read that 10 years later, 15 years later, you see your you know, eight year old self that's written a story. There's so many reasons why writing is important to our society, but also personally. And one thing I noticed with my students, we did have something, they called it the author's chair. And every day, at the end of our writing time, we had somebody share what they had been working on that day, very much workshop approach. But that as I watched my first graders be so excited about sharing their writing, and they really weren't in tears, if I ever made a correction, I wouldn't when they were sharing their writing, but the editing process, we talked about that too. But I think now I work with college students, right. And they're so much more reticent to share their writing, because it's so personal, that and I think that maybe we could do a better job in the early elementary age stages of helping them to understand it is thinking in print, and you get the opportunity to refine it, I don't get the opportunity to refine something that just came out of my mouth always right. So being able to share that I think sharing our writing would be something important to focus on too. And I know that that is a lot. But I think that would be really great for our students to be able to learn early on.
Lindsay Kemeny:So something Stacey said just kind of reminded me just I wanted to point out again, one way to improve their reading comprehension is through their writing. And a lot of times we don't do enough at the sentence level. And that is what's so great is at the sentence level, you know, teaching them, you know how to put in an a positive, and adding those in adding an independent clause, they practice that a lot. And then when they're reading, they're going to understand that the sentence level a little better, what's happening. And so I just with my second graders, that was so fun, we would add that and I had everyone add independent clauses and their sentences, and it sounded so great. And then I just noticed that sometimes are very complex sentences for them as they're reading, but they can understand them better if they've learned how to write that same type of sentence.
Donell Pons:Yeah, you know, I loved everything, like you said, we could use all day, we can't get nearly everything in there. And I didn't say from the beginning, I didn't say on purpose, that writing is really one of my loves that that was one of my first careers. And so what's interesting is, if you love something, your students pick up on that or stay. So you touched on it, trying to give that that to your pre service teachers, that real love for teaching these things and understanding. And I remember there was a student who had struggled with the writing, and I love to teaching using newspaper writing the craft of writing for a newspaper, because you really take it down to the bare bones and the basics. And you know, it was Hemingway who was a newspaper reporter first. And he was the one who always said if you want to be a good writer, right, I thought that was interesting, right? To be a good writer, the practice, right? That's what he said that gave him and we really do take it down. And Lindsey, we have an opportunity to also look at how somebody wrote an article and take it apart to write the article. So it's all those pieces. That's why I loved it so much, that there was a student that had had struggled with writing, and I remember having a conversation and he was getting better at it. But in the beginning, he was not so sure. And the comment that he made to me that was really interesting is he said, I wasn't so sure I could do this. I didn't know if I wanted to do this. But you seem so sure I could do this. And I thought that was really great. It's my confidence that I knew, hey, look, we have these skills that we're going to develop for you to be able to do this thing. And he was able to do it. But he said My confidence is what gave him his confidence. Right. And that's the role of the teacher in a lot of ways is our confidence. Confidence comes from all the knowledge, right? And that's what we're doing here today is sharing, learning, giving information to each other. And that's how we're going to become those teachers that get that confidence. So this was a great conversation. Thank you guys.
Stacy Hurst:Yeah, thank you, Danielle. And, you know, I think Lindsay and I have talked about this before with you, Donald, but as elementary teachers, even in our pre service education, that's a whole other course, right? If you just had a writing class, that would be great. But also in the materials that were traditionally given to teach. There's a dearth of information there, meaning that very much. And I have found the literacy House series, they have one that's on syntax. It's really great. In fact, they have an online course right now on the sentence level syntax, I believe, but that's a good resource. And just before we close, Daniel, you've mentioned already and William Van Cleves work, of course, Dr. cidade is writing rope. We're going to be referring to that but to your point that is in those upper elementary grades as well. Lindsay, what are some resources you found useful to focus especially in that K 2k Three Space.
Lindsay Kemeny:Yeah, the syntax Project 2022. If you just put that in Google, there's all these free PowerPoint slides. And it goes from, you know, very beginning K, I'm not sure what grade it goes up to. But I think all the elementary grades and they have these PowerPoints already for you, and you can just go in. And that's been awesome. And so that's what I was saying. I was doing a lot of that orally first working on the, you know, a complete sentence and a noun, we're gonna do verbs next week. And it's so great. It's all there for me. So that's been awesome. It's free.
Stacy Hurst:Great. And Daniel, you started out as a writer, but I will tell you teaching writing really developed a desire and me to be better at it. And I do appreciate things like word choice, making sure we use the exact right word or the word that as the author you want to convey. I think there's so much power no matter what grade or age or teaching, as soon as somebody can start identifying as an author, and we all are, we all are, then I think that's really powerful. So thank you, Donna, what a fantastic conversation. And thank all of you for joining us. Feel free to reach out and share with us and resources that you've found helpful as you're teaching, writing. And as ever, I'm sure we'll discuss this again, but we'll see you next time on literacy topics.
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