I am selecting two of Katie Wood Ray’s questions that she asks herself when selecting texts for her students.
1. What do many of my students struggle with as writers?
2. What might my students be excited to see as writers? What will they want to try?
Oops, that was three questions. 
My students struggle with gathering ideas, knowing how to start, how to develop their ideas, how to write complete thoughts, how to write complete sentences, how to use punctuation, how to revise – they struggle with all of the writing process. Fortunately, for me, some of my students are better than the rest, but overall I have very weak writers.
What might my students be excited to see as writers? I’m sure they would greatly benefit if I started using “texts” to demonstrate various examples of how to do things that they are struggling with (see the above list). This means I need to seriously sit down with my daughter’s books, my own collection, and even plant myself at the school library one day to find these examples.
What will they want to try? I think my studens would love to try something where they get to “play” with their writing. So far this year we’ve been focused on the proper way of writing essays. We get into the creative writing in a few more weeks. I know they’re going to love doing that kind of writing simply because it’s not essays any more.
It is difficult for me to say what my students struggle with seeing as how I don’t have a class of my own. So technically I could say that they struggle with the entire writing process as well.
I do believe that they would benefit from my sharing texts with examples in them the way KWR does. That even helps and inspires me. It tells me that I don’t have to come up with it all myself and instead it gives me a starting point and at the same time I am truly learning. KWR’s whole process makes writing doable instead of daunting and dreadful. It breaks it down into manageable tasks. Even I can do it!
I think they will want to try just about any of the techniques suggested. There are so many choices. Kids love to imitate too. Just like the part in an earlier chapter where she read a poem to some children and a boy took the technique and wrote his own poem in the same way.
Speaking from a teacher in general I think that students struglle with expanding on ideas. When I taught 3rd and forth grade they all alwyas had ideas to write about. The problem was they would write for 3 sentences and then say they were done because they didn’t have anything else to say. Some ideas were not ideas that could be expanded upon. Sometimes it was just that the students weren’t thinking outside of the box and how they can make their writing more interesting. Once i started to use the approach of 6 + 1 writing traits and teaching 1 trait at a time it became easier for my kids to see how to make a simple writing great! We would read a book and then try to mimic the way that was written. I think that kids just need a greater understanding of each of the traits and they can become more insightful writers. 4 squares is also a good tecnique for your struggling writers in the older grades. 4 squares is exellent for your emergent writers in primary too! It help them organize their ideas. As for Kindergarten we are just learning how to write sentneces so we re no there yet individually but we still talk about traits as we write together.
What do many of my students struggle with as writers?
I think that many of my students struggle as writers because they are so verbal. Then may sound really dumb, but so many of my students would rather just tell you things, instead of writing them down. However, I also have many students who embrace writing and seem to love the freedom of this expression. I think it just all depends on their personality.
What might my students be excited to see as writers?
My students would probably like to see more of my writing samples. I don’t really don’t share a whole bunch of my writing samples with the class because often times I don’t have time. I am so busy that I usually slack with my writing. Note: Need to improve on this! lol
What will they want to try?
My students are really into technology and I think that they would really like to try their hand in some online comic strip makers, powerpoints, publisher, etc.
As a third grade teacher, my students struggle with getting their thoughts on paper. I have some students who are excellent writers, I can give them a prompt and they take off immediately! However, I have some lower ability students who say, “I don’t know what to write, I can’t think of anything.” I then will start jogging their memory and they have incredible thoughts but they have such a hard time writing it down.
We also have issues with complete sentences, run-ons, and writing things that do not make a lick of sense. I’m trying to get them in the habit of reading what they have read, and asking their selves, does this make sense, is it clear to understand? But..it’s work in progress…
I have shared with my students how to read like writers. They’re all EARS when I tell them about my MU classes. They love to find Katie Wood Ray’s writers crafts.. I tell them it is our little secret to find unique ways authors write a certain way. I told them that it is not always grammatically correct, but it produces a feeling that the writer is trying to convey. They love looking for these things!
My students would want to try anything that is relevant to them, anything funny, anything silly. I am excited to try poetry with my students, I really think they will enjoy that type of writing.
Kristy- I can identify with you on how your students are all ears when you talk about your MU class-it is like they trust it from a “higher power” haha. Mine also like to look for things from writers-although they haven’t quite learned how to use them. I wanted to share this idea with you that was actually from one of my students.
I gave them a little pocket folder-you know the ones that you out notecards in for color changes, the little library sized ones. I told them that this was their “wonderous words” shopping cart. They like to stop while their reading and write a neat word, or “ways with words” for them to use later in their writing. They love it.
I feel like younger students struggle mostly with the actual act of writing..because they are still learning of course. However, besides the obvious, I feel like my students have the most trouble with putting their ideas together to form a cohesive written work. 5/6 year-olds have no problem with being creative during the writing process, but sometimes their ideas are all over the place. They haven’t quite figured out the sequence of things yet, which actually makes their writings very imaginative and interesting. At this stage they are still trying to figure out all of the things they can do as writers, which is a lot of fun when we do group writings. Everyday is a learning process for us.
I know my students are excited to see writings that are different from the usual story format. They like to use different forms of punctuation and use silly words in their writing. At this point they will usually try any kind of writing because it is all pretty new to them. They especially love to create their own works and illustrations because it makes them feel like they are real authors and illustrators. I want to encourage a very positive view for them when it comes to writing with the hope that when they can write full-length stories in the future, they will actually enjoy the process!
My Kindergarten class struggles with the process of creating a sentence that isn’t like their neighbors and also taking the time to write their ideas down. My students are the “right now” type and they don’t understand that writing takes time. I have to agree with Jordan on that my students ideas are all over the place at times. If one student creates a great sentence, two or more want to use the same type of sentence.
One thing that my students are excited to see is our finial product. We create books in my class and my students love to see how their sentences create a book. They will look through the finished books just to see their sentences. “Hey look! That’s my page!” is something they always say.
Something they would want to try is having a book about them. In my class we are working on feelings and how we should be nice to one another. Each child will have their own book that is filled with nice comments from the other students. We have completed some already, and the student’s faces just light up. They like to hear nice things about them.
My preschoolers are in the first stages of writing. We journal each week I give them a prompt and they draw a picture about it. Many of them say I can’t do it, I don’t know how. I encourage them to do the best they can. On the other hand many of them get very excited about this they love this part of the week. Several of them are also excited just to have pencil and to write/draw on anything and everything (tables, walls, computer screens, and of course paper.)
They are also excited about learning to make the letters that are in their names. They also ask me what does this say when they write random letters they are starting to understand that the letters make up words.
I teach Pre-K. We are in the beginning stages of everything. We journal on Thursdays. The children remind me as they come into the classroom. We have special mailboxes to hold our journals. We have literacy centers in all our classroom centers. Paper, pencils, all kinds of props for writing. They initiate their own writings and are ready to tell you about their pictures. They want to spell words and some are learning words by sight and sound. They love learning.