Um, gee, I don’t know! Not sure where writing fits in with the reading skills focus our district has taken. Intended to be transferable, skills hold the place of being the ‘how to learn’ idea. They are the workhorses of education: many educators feel once a skill is taught, it can be liberally applied to cure any ill. Alas, they are not a panacea, but the good intentions are there. If skills are too much the focus, they become the leech or bleeding, and knowledge building misdiagnoses may occur. Point being: many good ELA teachers are confused by a skills-only focus. But that’s a conversation for another time.
One thing I can focus on with students is the ability to write comments. Found this video in my edublogs feed:
If third-grade students can figure out how to be nice to one another, then it is my hope that we can learn how to again, as well. Maybe on October 20 we can have a classroom discussion on what comments do to us emotionally and psychologically. Stay tuned.
Also, I like how this new layout looks. I am noticing links on the right that I had never noticed before.
Nice! I agree with all of the above, of course. But I like the idea of helping students learn how to comment. Besides teaching good grammar, how to use the red underline, and how to support your claim with evidence, you can also teach effective ways to get your point across without hurting someone’s feelings. I can totally see ways to use this in my own classroom. Thanks for the idea!