eminutes 07/19/10

0845-0900 | Morning Social

0900-1015 | Post-Workshop Coaching of Workshops

August, Chris, and Julie met with their workshop coaches to reflect, go over feedback, and make adjustments on their workshops. The rest of the crew dispersed to the computer lab, the RWP office, or possibly the HSU Library to work on various tasks.

1030-1145 |Jessica Hobba's Workshop: Using Multiple Intelligence Theory to Guide Vocabulary Instruction

We opened up with a quick write formed around three questions: Do you use direct, explicit vocabulary instruction in your class? Why is vocabulary instruction important to you or for your students? What strategies have you tried in your classroom? We wrote for about 10min. and then had a group share-out while Jessica scribed our thoughts down on chart paper.

Next the article "Building Vocabulary Promotes Thinking, Enhances Communication" was passed around and we were given a couple of minutes to read it and jot down some thoughts on the positive or negative experiences we have had teaching, or being taught vocabulary. Our positives and negatives were then shared with the whole group. Some of the positives we came up with for explicit vocabulary instruction were:

Positives	Negatives/ Downsides/ Concerns
· Define words we as teachers might think our students already know because some students may be afraid to ask. · Vocabulary instruction can lead to students having fun with words, playing with the use of the vocabulary words. We as teachers need to model this and give our students plenty of time to practice this. · Routine vocabulary instruction can lead to excitement. · Use selected readings to introduce new words or neat words. · Collaborate as a whole class to define a word.	· Vocabulary is often just seen as memorizing a list of words. · Implementing assessment, is writing the definition of a word useful? · Lack of excitement from students. · What do you do when students still don’t “get it” and you have used all the strategies you can think of? · Vocabulary is a real process- Language Acquisition. · Lack of focus on vocabulary instruction. · Often taught as isolated events. · How do you get the students to use their spoken vocabulary in their written work?

Jessica then gave us a great little handout illustrating the 8 Multiple Intelligences. She also shared with us some of the ways she has her students show their understanding of a words meaning without having them write the definition. We then broke into grade-level pairs and tried to come up with different ways one could show the meaning of a selected word using the Multiple Intelligences toolbox. Each group then shared their ideas to the whole group. One really great idea that was shared with the group from Rachel Davis, was the Super Power Words bulletin board. She has a pocket chart up and the students write down words that they tend to over use in their writing on a card. That card is put in the front of the pocket chart and then students add in synonyms for the word behind it. It is constantly in use by the students and they are always adding to it.

Feedback forms were handed out and we were given a little reminder about how to fill out the feedback forms so that they are useful to the presenter.

1145-1230 | Lunch

1230-0145 |Kelly Smith's Workshop: Peer Interaction: Motivation to Revise

The workshop started with a fun activity called "Merry Go Round Revision". We each had the same list of simple sentences. We were given just a minute to revise the sentence and then we would pass our paper to the right and start to work on the next sentence. The group had fun with this activity and said that they learned a lot from reading the models left by others as the papers were passed around. After this exciting warm up we were asked to quick write about ways we as teachers use peer interaction in our class and what obstacles we may have encountered when trying to engage writers to revise their work. Some of the obstacles the group came up with included the idea that students think their work is fine the way it is, or they think revising is editing, students refuse to take peer's feedback, and we all agreed that we as teachers need to do more modeling and practice of revision for our students. Another big point was that revision is about the process not the product. The group was then split into two, one side read the article"Four Principles Toward Teaching the Craft of Revision" and the other group read "The Best Way to Teach Good Writing Is One Step at a Time". We shared our thoughts first in small groups and then as a whole. this was followed by a group brainstorming session in our response groups. In the end we all shared what we had produced and Kelly highlighted some ideas she has been using with her classes.

Way to go Kelly and Jessie, great workshops!

0200-0300 | ISI Follow-Up Options, Staying Connected to RWP

The day came to a close with a talk about the Fellows' responsibilities after the institute. The choices are to present your workshop at the Spring conference, complete a Research Analysis or Research Action Project, or start a Professional Learning Community at your site. It will be interesting to see what everyone decides to do.

That's all folks!