Date: Sun, 20 Jun 1999 23:10:01 -0700 Subject: 6Traits Digest #9 - 06/20/99 From: "SixTraitsMailring" <6Traits@> To: "SixTraitsMailring" <6Traits@> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-transfer-encoding: quoted-printable Sender: <6Traits@> Precedence: Bulk List-Software: LetterRip Pro 3.0.5 by Fog City Software, Inc. List-Subscribe: List-Digest: List-Unsubscribe: 6Traits Digest #9 - Sunday, June 20, 1999 Re: 6Traits- Dr. Mandel's article about grading-used with permission by "Debra Bornowski" Re: 6Traits- Dr. Mandel's article about grading-used withpermission by Re: 6Traits- Too much money? by "Tonette Kellett" Re: 6Traits- Dr. Mandel's article about grading-used withpermission by "Ellen Mize" Re: 6Traits- Too much money? by Re: unfinished work by "Julia Poor" Re: 6Traits- Re: unfinished work by "Avis Breding" Re: 6Traits- Dr. Mandel's article by "Susan Nixon" <susan@desertskyone.com> Re: unfinished work by "Susan Nixon" <susan@desertskyone.com> My love affair with writing by "Susan Nixon" <susan@desertskyone.com> Re: 6Traits- Re: unfinished work by "Amy Schrader" ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Subject: Re: 6Traits- Dr. Mandel's article about grading-used with permission From: Debra Bornowski Date: Sun, 20 Jun 1999 08:42:53 -0500 Thanks so much for forwarding that Susan. It really helps clarify some = things for me. Now I have a question. If a child makes below a 50% do you mark = the exact grade on the paper, then put a 50% in the grade book or mark a 50% = on the paper also? Another question I have is: Do any of you send unfinished = work home? I have done this (simply because there are not enough hours for the = slower ones to catch up in school with our schedule). I tell them if I do not = get it back I will have to put a 0 in my grade book because I will not have it to grade. Actually I put a 50% because I know they have at least started it = at school. What do others of you do? DebbieB ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Subject: Re: 6Traits- Dr. Mandel's article about grading-used withpermission From: Dswolk@aol.com Date: Sun, 20 Jun 1999 11:22:10 EDT Please post Dr. Mandel's article to the ring again. I must have deleted it = and I really wanted to read it. Thank you! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Subject: Re: 6Traits- Too much money? From: Tonette Kellett Date: Sun, 20 Jun 1999 18:32:20 +0300 I am sorry to do this, but unfortunately I need to be taken off this mailing list. I am living in a remote part of Kenya during these next three months, and can only check email on Sundays. Tonight I have 202 messages -- most all of them from this mail ring. I'd love to be a part of the course, but just can't stay online downloading this much mail every week for now. Thank you for your help. Tonette Kellett ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Subject: Re: 6Traits- Dr. Mandel's article about grading-used withpermission From: Ellen Mize Date: Sun, 20 Jun 1999 10:51:30 -0400 I'd like to ask a question about this grading system. What do you do if = the child turns in nothing for an assignment? Is this also recorded as a 50%? Ellen ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Subject: Re: 6Traits- Too much money? From: DLM2nd@aol.com Date: Sun, 20 Jun 1999 11:52:23 EDT In a message dated 6/20/99 11:30:22 AM Eastern Daylight Time, lionfood@iconnect.co.ke writes: Tonette, In order to unsubscribe, you need to write to the following address: 6Traits-off@ I am also writing the list, to let them know that you have been instructed = how to get deleted from the list, so you won't get dozens of these instructions! Dedra ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Subject: Re: unfinished work From: "Julia Poor" Date: Sun, 20 Jun 1999 14:32:05 -0500 I don't send any writing work home, finished or unfinished. It stays at school, either in the child's writing folder, or in his or her finished folder. Julia ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Subject: Re: 6Traits- Re: unfinished work From: Avis Breding Date: Sun, 20 Jun 1999 17:20:07 -0500 This years class had several who did not want to have parents always helping them. I started out requiring writing to be taken home.. and I had students forging their parents signature!! ;-(... so after a bit I quit sending it home. Had to develop a plan.. so if it was not completed on the day assigned.. it was down to a 50% and due the next morning. If not turned in.. they stayed after school (hate that!) and received a 30%. It improved some.. but not all!! Does this seem low under the circumstances?? AJB -- http://www.bismarck.k12.nd.us/bps/myhre/ 5-6 Grade Looping Teacher http://www.esosoft.com/abreding/ 5-6gradeconnection@esosoft.com *3-4gradelink@esosoft.com Call on God, but row away from the rocks = ********************* ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Subject: Re: 6Traits- Dr. Mandel's article From: Susan Nixon <susan@desertskyone.com> Date: Sun, 20 Jun 1999 17:15:07 -0700 At 10:51 AM 6/20/99 -0400, you wrote: >I'd like to ask a question about this grading system. What do you do if the child >turns in nothing for an assignment? Is this also recorded as a 50%? What I do is give them a zero. That's where lack of effort comes in. My students quickly learn that if they make any effort at all, it is better than doing nothing. Susan Nixon 2nd Grade Phoenix, AZ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Subject: Re: unfinished work From: Susan Nixon <susan@desertskyone.com> Date: Sun, 20 Jun 1999 17:29:44 -0700 Seeing the questions about grading, and about writing on the list, I thought I would just pose some thought provoking questions for the list members. This is a good topic to discuss while we're waiting for the = first week of July, because how you structure your writing program is as significant as how you teach it or grade it. I am not indicating that there is a right or a wrong to any of these situations, only that there is a difference. Please do not consider that there is negative criticism being made of anyone, or anyone's teaching methods. You have to know what you do and why you do it before you can really evaluate how the 6Traits will help you. There is no requirement to answer in public, but *please* think about these things. 1. Do you assign topics or let students select them, or both? 2. Do you give just that day to finish the assignment, or is writing an ongoing process? 3. Do you have, either mentally or as part of your grade system, a number of writing pieces you consider to be necessary, or that your district considers necessary, or does that depend on the student's abilities and writing level? 4. Do your students finish every piece of writing, through the whole process of publishing, or do they write several and finish one from a = group of pieces? 5. Do you have just one objective for a piece of writing, or several? 6. Do you grade every piece of writing? 7. Do you have writing conferences with every single one of your students over a period of time, or are they on their own once an assignment is given, or helped as they ask for help? Or????? 8. Do you model what you want your students to do when they write, including vocalizing your thinking processes, and modeling editing and proof-reading conferences? 9. Do you see your job as helping them to write in different ways, using different formats, and becoming more fluent, but already knowing how to write when they come to you? 10. Do you think of writing as a 5 paragraph format that can be taught = and that's all there is to it? ( I know many districts and states require this as a standard test.) 11. What are your writing goals for your students? 12. Do you write? (Maybe that should have been first!) Susan Nixon 2nd Grade Phoenix, AZ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Subject: My love affair with writing From: Susan Nixon <susan@desertskyone.com> Date: Sun, 20 Jun 1999 17:57:07 -0700 No, this is not my version of a pulp confession magazine. =3D) Please = save this message in a safe place. You will need it later. It occurred to me that many of you know me as a teacher, as a project coordinator, or as a quilter, but I don't think any of you know me as a writer. Perhaps that is something you *need* to know. My love affair with writing probably began with my love of reading. My mother taught me to read when I was 3, and I haven't been away from books since then. Texas had no Kindergarten, so I started first grade at the = age of 5 and fell madly in love with my young, beautiful teacher, Miss Gage. Of course, that didn't keep me from telling her she had misspelled my name on my desk tag. She had used some lower case letters that I didn't know. Miss Gage quickly straightened me out, and I continued to love her and to love reading. Writing isn't in my memories until later. My mother died the summer after fourth grade, and the year of her illness before that did affect my schoolwork, but not my love of reading. In = fact, reading was probably how I kept my sanity, and that year of life was probably when I learned to escape reality in books. My fourth grade teacher hated me and I ditched school about 50% of the time. Are you shocked? I would go over the back fence in the morning, with = books in hand, never manage to get to school, and come home when I saw the other students leave school. I don't know how I got away with it. It was the 50s and I'm sure the school personnel knew my mother was dying, even = though I didn't. But still, I wonder how I got away with it. After my mother's death, and shifting around among brothers and sisters = for six months, I went to live with my aunt, my mother's sister. She and I = had a long history of conflict, and nothing changed with my new resident = status in her home. She had no children, but she had taken my 4 year old sister at the time of my mother's death. I did do one thing that pleased her. When I brought home library books, they were authors of whom she approved = - Dickens, Twain and others. I didn't do it on purpose. They were authors I'd learned to like. We skip forward to seventh grade. I took the dog for a walk and let him get into a fight with another dog. Like I had a choice. He was injured, though I didn't know it until later. I was locked in my bedroom for four days. I had access to the bathroom, and my aunt brought me my meals. I'm sure she thought it was a terrible punishment. I didn't. That's when I discovered writing. I began an epic. It makes me laugh to think about it now. I must have recently read _The Diary of Anne Frank_. I wrote about the escape of a brother and sister from the Nazis. I still remember that somehow they had to take a train from Graz, Austria. Probably a psychologist would say I was writing about my own escape from this terrible situation in which I found myself. The truth is, I was writing about a brother and sister escaping from the Nazis. I loved being alone. I loved not having to do chores or be with = my bratty sister. My aunt must have figured that out because, after 4 days, = I was let out into the world again. The dog survived. That's probably why = I survived. The damage was done, however. I was a writer! I continued to write, everywhere, everything. I wrote and wrote and wrote - always fiction. I wrote my way through a senior English independent study year, an = experiment on the part of my high school. I wrote my way through a college semester of reading Albert Camus, whose work I never did understand. I wrote my = way through college writing classes. I wrote and wrote and wrote. In my early twenties, I switched to poetry for a few years and wrote and wrote some more. A classmate in a poetry writing class said I was able to express things that she felt, but couldn't say. I had years of experience in trying to express my feelings. The professor told us that poetry = wasn't a therapy exercise. I disagreed then, and I disagree now. *Writing* is a therapy exercise, or can be. I wrote my way through a Bachelor's Degree at Kean University in New Jersey, and then through a Master's Degree at Northern Arizona University. If there had been more money, I might have written my way through a Doctorate! Shortly after receiving the MA, an opportunity came along that I couldn't refuse. Col. George Day, the only Vietnam POW to escape for a short time, had been trying to write his story for 20 years, and had it rejected continually. He knew someone who was trying to change that for him, and who knew my husband. My husband doesn't think there's anything I can't = do, so he suggested they give me a shot at editing the book. A year of my life was spent, not editing, but rewriting Col. Day's story, which is a good one. He was free for two weeks, and was about 30 minutes away from a Marine encampment when he was recaptured, starving, = practically crawling along the forest floor. By the way, Col. Day served camp time with John McCain, an Arizona Senator, whose name may appear on the Presidential primary ballots soon. The book was published, in a limited 5000 copy edition, and without my = name anywhere except the acknowledgements. I gained a lot of experience, if no money or recognition. After that, I wrote a romance novel, also rejected by the best publishing house. (I'm smiling here.) That's it. My love affair with writing. I haven't given up. I'm still writing. Someday you might see my name on a bright colored book jacket. Susan Nixon 2nd Grade Phoenix, AZ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Subject: Re: 6Traits- Re: unfinished work From: Amy Schrader Date: Sun, 20 Jun 1999 20:19:23 -0700 (PDT) I don't send anything home either. It doesn't get done or done right. Connie Prevatte says you shouldn't send writing work home unless you can send yourself home with each child. Amy in SC --- Julia Poor wrote: > I don't send any writing work home, finished or > unfinished. It stays at > school, either in the child's writing folder, or in > his or her finished > folder. > Julia > > > > _________________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------- End of 6Traits Digest