Writer's workshop requires time, yes, and dedication, but what a teacher needs are practical books and lessons to help them implement the writer's workshop. That is exactly what Spandel provides in this chapter when talking about how to teach sentence fluency within the writer's workshop structure.
The term 'Sentence Fluency' probably makes the average teacher cringe slightly because universities and colleges have never taught us anything beyond the five basic areas of reading, and, spoiler alert, sentence fluency is not one of these areas. Before reading this Spandel's suggestions, sentence fluency was a mysterious topic to address directly in the classroom, especially in the writer's workshop.
After reading Spandel, clear point emerge about this sentence writing fluency. Four things must happen to develop sentence fluency; the students must have great models that they copy and learn from, students must learn how punctuation can be used to create the rhythm of a sentence, students must read sentences aloud to hear the pauses and flows, and teachers must give feedback in order to help students improve.
But Spandel goes one step further by providing books, authors, and ways to use these for pages and pages; this is heaven to me, because one of the hardest parts can be scouring through book shelves at the book store to find the perfect teaching tool, sometimes with no luck at all. A resource like this that also includes what grade levels and what the author uses in the book may literally save my life when I am trying to implement the writer's workshop and teaching sentence fluency.
This chapter made me realize how crucial teaching mechanics, syntax, and other skills to writers during mini lessons that take place during the writer's workshop in order to develop more conscientious writers in my classroom.
The only caution teachers need to use in approaching this? Knowing developmentally what kind of sentence fluency students are ready to tackle in the classroom and what sentence types match the genre an the goal the students are striving for.
The term 'Sentence Fluency' probably makes the average teacher cringe slightly because universities and colleges have never taught us anything beyond the five basic areas of reading, and, spoiler alert, sentence fluency is not one of these areas. Before reading this Spandel's suggestions, sentence fluency was a mysterious topic to address directly in the classroom, especially in the writer's workshop.
After reading Spandel, clear point emerge about this sentence writing fluency. Four things must happen to develop sentence fluency; the students must have great models that they copy and learn from, students must learn how punctuation can be used to create the rhythm of a sentence, students must read sentences aloud to hear the pauses and flows, and teachers must give feedback in order to help students improve.
But Spandel goes one step further by providing books, authors, and ways to use these for pages and pages; this is heaven to me, because one of the hardest parts can be scouring through book shelves at the book store to find the perfect teaching tool, sometimes with no luck at all. A resource like this that also includes what grade levels and what the author uses in the book may literally save my life when I am trying to implement the writer's workshop and teaching sentence fluency.
This chapter made me realize how crucial teaching mechanics, syntax, and other skills to writers during mini lessons that take place during the writer's workshop in order to develop more conscientious writers in my classroom.
The only caution teachers need to use in approaching this? Knowing developmentally what kind of sentence fluency students are ready to tackle in the classroom and what sentence types match the genre an the goal the students are striving for.
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