Choice Motivates Students to Become Writers

Control. Yes, I struggle with the desire to control my classroom, my students, my environment...  I'm the educational expert, right?  Why shouldn't everyone do exactly what I think is best? Now, with many years of teaching under my belt, I understand that if I seek to control every aspect of my classroom, I will lose my students. 

I'm a huge Harry Potter fan.  When Dumbledore said "It is our choices, Harry, that show who we are," I cheered not just because

it is a memorable quote, but because it is the driving force behind everything I do in my classroom.  Choice is the cornerstone on which my Writer's Workshop is built.  What you choose to write about says something about you.  I know it's true for me. That's why I choose to blog.  I want the same to be true for my students.

The Engaged Writer
I've heard countless discussions on engagement: how can we engage our students? There are endless stacks of books written on the topic by experts in the field.  Countless journal articles explain how teachers can capture their students' attention.  Let me save you some time.  In teaching students writing, the answer is simple: choice.  If we want our students to be engaged in writing, then we must allow them to choose what they write about.  Have students write an opinion piece on whether or not Confederate monuments should be removed or an explanatory essay on the Take a Knee movement.  Give students' voice a platform to be heard through their writing and watch their engagement soar.   

Choice in Writer's Workshop
As a teacher, I consider my students when designing independent writing projects for my Writer's Workshop.  When I design projects, I think about their interests and hobbies, controversial topics in the news, and current events that are important to them.  As a result, students write with passion because they care about what they are writing.  They are writing about topics that matter to them.  I offer four to six independent projects for each unit of study.  

For instance, when we studied non-fiction opinion writing, I offered four choices.  These were my most recent choices: 

1. Should Pokemon Go Be Banned?
2. Should Girls Be Allowed in Boy Scouts?
3. Are Self-Driving Cars a Good Idea?
4. Who is the Better Quarterback: Newton or Manning?

Steps to Provide Choice in Writer's Workshop
Providing our students with choice does require more time on the teachers part, but the pay-off is worth it.  Students will be writing for themselves.  They will be invested in their writing. 

Follow these steps to incorporate choice into your Writer's Workshop:

1. Consider topics in which students are interested.  Their interest, hobbies, current events, and controversial topics will all inspire them to write.
2. Find paired texts that relate to each topic that provide ample evidence for student writing.  The internet if full of exemplarily texts.
3. Create prompts that provide the students with a clear task.  I base my prompts on the state examples for explanatory, opinion, and narrative essays.
4. Set up an independent writing project table when students choose their next task.  
   
5. Allow students to choose a project.  I have them sign up for their project so I can offer conferencing opportunities.
6. After the projects have been chosen, I archive the choices for future choices.  In Writer's Workshop, students are never finished writing.  When they finish one essay, they choose another from the archives.
7. After students have read their texts and begin to plan, I allow them to conference with peers who are writing on the same topic.  They discuss the texts, possible thesis statements, oraganization of their essay, and review evidence they are going to use to use in their essay. 
8. As students write, conference with them using a rubric to discuss their writing. 
9. Once completed, give students the opportunity to share what they've written.  

Choice has the power to engage even the most reluctant writers.  It draws them in.  Students know what they like.  Ask them about something that interests them, and they will talk to you forever about it.  Why not take advantage of that passion and apply it to their writing?  The student who is afforded choice will demonstrate internal motivation to become a writer.  Isn't this what we want for all our students? 

The Painted Essay

       What student wouldn't like to paint in English class?   First-graders, fifth-graders, and high-schoolers alike will automatically be curious when you pull out the paints during your writing instruction. The Painted Essay provides students with a visual example of what good writing should look like and give you, the teacher, another opportunity to help students focus on what makes a successful essay.  

       Essay writing is difficult for many students, right?  Let's be honest, essay writing instruction is difficult for many teachers!  Modeling is a common practice in most classrooms.  However, when teaching writing this practice is often skipped. Writing is one of the most difficult skills for students to master.  For this reason, modeling should be a practice we don't skip.  Teachers need to model how to write an essay through an interactive class essay.  This class mentor essay provides support for students as they work on their own independent essay projects during Writer's Workshop.   After a class mentor essay is finished, students become writing artist and complete a Painted Essay.

What is a Painted Essay?

Fifth-grade students complete a Painted Essay during Writer's Workshop

       The Painted Essay is a strategy that was invented by Diana Leddy and is a featured component of effective writing instruction by the Vermont Writing Collaborative.  It is based on the idea that students are visual learners and need to "see" what an essay should look like.  I applied the ideas present in this strategy, and adapted it to fit the way my fifth-grade students are taught to write an explanatory and opinion essay.

The Classroom Painted Essay

       A Painted Essay will be a welcome addition to your writing instruction.  Follow these steps to complete one with your students:

1. Complete an interactive class mentor essay with your students. My students and I create ours together as I type it.
2. Make copies of your class mentor to use for the Painted Essay.
3. Identify what colors you will use and what each color will represent.  My students use red, yellow, and blue.
   
4. Prepare your paints.  Water colors are ideal.  I mix tempra paint with about a half a cup of water.  
5. Have stations set up for students to paint their essays.
6. Once we begin, I model the process using the document camera.  We complete one color at a time. I randomly call on students to tell us what to parts of our essay to paint.

   

   I model how to paint the essay as students complete their Painted Essay.

7.  Once completed, I let the painted essays dry and return them to the students to use as a resource.  We take some time to identify the colors that we used at the beginning and end of each paragraphs, as well as the colors that make up the inside of each paragraphs.
   

       The Painted Essay is a valuable tool for both students and teachers.  It provides students with a concrete example of how to use a thesis statement, topic statements, evidence, and elaboration in their writing.  When paired with a class mentor, it provides teachers with a structure to "show" students what a successful essay looks like.