By Patricia A. Dunn Whether students compose arguments for tests or for real-world genres such as online petitions, public service announcements, complaints to manufacturers, letters to editors, etc., their writing would be more persuasive if they acknowledged and understood opposing views. As more and more people today shield themselves from positions with which they disagree…
by Ann D. David and Megan Janak Writing in Room 103 How big is a blue whale really? Is it bigger than our room? Who would win in head to head race, a tiger or a cheetah? Are naked mole rats really naked? First graders inquire, and as their teacher, I work to draw upon their desire…
By this point in the fall, parents, students and teachers have all begun to settle into school routines. The work that is arriving home in students’ backpacks and laptops is probably more involved and extensive than it was in September. As our students begin to write more for school, we should always look carefully at…
Jonathan Rochelle, project manager of Google Apps for Education and co-founder of Google Docs and Sheets, considers the role of YouTube in his son’s life. Within the past year, my 13-year-old son, Jeremy, started showing a deep interest in making videos. He was mostly inspired by other young talents he saw on YouTube and by…
By Alex Kameen As many writing teachers are aware, a power struggle exists today between standardized test writing and authentic writing, and this struggle threatens to disempower our students on a daily basis. Realized primarily through the pressures placed on teachers to prepare students for standardized tests, the impact of this struggle exists equally on…
In honor of NWP and NCTE’s Advocacy Days focusing on Literacy Education Advocacy, throughout March, Teachers, Parents, Profs: Writers Who Care is hosting a Flipgrid to showcase the many ways that writing can be used as a tool for advocacy. How do you use writing as a tool for literacy advocacy? We invite you to…
by Michelle Tremmel Mr. C is the reason I became an English teacher. Smart, charismatic, funny, and caring, he inspired students over a long career with a passion for and knowledge of American and British literature. However, one feature of his teaching—the five-paragraph theme—was a mistake even in the hands of an otherwise brilliant teacher.…
by Ken Lindblom We all have different relationships with other people. Some people love us, some people don’t, and others don’t have enough information to form an opinion yet. When we write, we also have relationships with the people who read our writing. And our writer-reader relationships are as varied as our flesh-and-blood ones. One…
by Anny Fritzen Case Teachers have long used graphic organizers and other instructional strategies designed to demystify and teach more complex literacy practices. Functioning similarly to a ladder, they are intended to help students progress step-by-step towards the learning goal until they are able to master the targeted skill or new understanding independently. Examples of…
The spring semester is underway, and we are welcoming changes to the Writers Who Care editorial team. One of our founding editors, Leah Zuidema, has transitioned off the board. Leah’s dedication to Writers Who Care has helped to grow the blog, and her skill in coaching authors and shaping posts will be missed. Thank you, Leah,…
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