Friday, July 17, 2009 ~ Finally Friday!

• At the end of a second intense week of writing, technology, and presentations, CAWPers filed into the room to discover a pleasant atmosphere of music, images, and quotes as Heather and Wendy prepared to open our day with their presentation. Promptly at 9am, they began and dazzled us with their topic- Stepping Into the Craft: A Workshop Approach. A research whiz, Heather shared numerous excellent resources, all conveniently listed on their handout. As an expert in teaching strategies for students with disabilities, she reminded us to always have a low-tech back-up for the high-tech strategies we use. Wendy then modeled the Writer's Workshop model for us using Angela Johnson's Joshua's Night Whispers and an anchor craft chart. They also shared the importance of Celebrations- a writer's moment to publish and share his work. We were all amused with her story of how parents fall short of finding the elements in a story that their children have the ability to find. They ended their presentation by asking us to work in groups to discuss ways the writer's workshop model could be used in elementary, middle, and high school content areas. All three groups found numerous ways the model could benefit our students' learning.

• Ruie then intimidated us with the assignment of the Class Position Paper. The purpose of the paper is to take a position on writing, find support for our position through authors, other teachers, and researchers, and defend our position against the anticipated skeptical arguments. Our class position paper should be multi-modal, so we've been encouraged to seek Donna and Megan's expertise in creating our portion of the final product. Some suggestions they gave us were using Youtube, Teachertube, or flip camera videos, voice threads, links, web pages, or blogs. We all contributed to a huge laundry list of topics to include in the paper and then chose two we felt we could expand upon with a partner. The topics' assignments are listed on the class wiki: http://cawp.pbworks.com/Position-Paper

• Donna presented a brief history and explanation of TPCK- Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge. Though Pedagogy and Content have always been merged, adding technology into the equation is necessary though tricky. Donna reminded us to note the affordances and constraints of integrating technology into our lessons. We should ask ourselves how technology has the ability to move us along in our goals. What can it do and not do for us? TPCK is the concept of all three components merged together, a successful accomplishment when it is achieved.

• After lunch, I presented my topic, "I Hope You Dance": Creative Expression of Poetry through Songs. I discussed Louise Rosenblatt's Reader-Response theory of making personal connections to literature, gave a brief explanation of the background of the project, and showed my own example. Then, we got to work making our own movies. We did encounter some technology mishaps, but I think most CAWPers were able to at least begin a movie. Hopefully, everyone began something she would like to finish at a later date. Maybe after CAWP when we have a little bit more time to ourselves. =) Wendy was able to finish her movie and share it with us at the end of the presentation. (Thanks Wendy!) We all chuckled over her kids' adorable pictures and quotes. It was a charming way to end the presentation. (Thanks, CAWPers for being patient with me and the technology! I appreciate it!)

• Ron ended the day with an intense diagram and discussion of the Rhetorical Paradigms for the Teaching of Writing. He talked Classicists, Current-Traditionalists, Expressionists, and New Rhetorics. He also included the Cognitive and Social Views. He was surprisingly upbeat for 4pm on a Friday afternoon, which helped us to digest the serious subject matter with our fried Friday brains!

• Happy weekend everyone! See ya Tuesday morning!

Day 7, July 16: Phew…a long Thursday

Group II, Cathy, Darius, Margaret, and Wendy, started right at 9:00 a.m. with "Appreciating that Writing is Hard Work."
· Role Play: Margaret as the teacher needs to get grades done, so she tells her students (Wendy and Darius) to take out their daybooks and do some free writing
o Darius thinks this is stupid. Wendy is hard at work
o Margaret challenges Darius (from her desk) to “just write something.”
o And he does. The word “something” is centered on his page.
o Margaret and Darius go back and forth, Darius being the typical passive “reluctant” writer and Margaret being the typical uninformed, uninterested teacher.
o Margaret finally releases an audible sigh of relief as the bell rings and Cathy comes in for their planning period.
o Cathy asks Margaret how things are going and upon hearing a negative report shares some ideas of how to help Darius be less reluctant.
o Margaret still seems jaded but ends the planning period and role play by admitting that there are some things she could do differently.
· Margaret debriefed and asked CAWPers to think if they’d been in one of those roles (as Darius, the reluctant writer; Wendy, the successful writer; Margaret, the reluctant teacher; Cathy, the helpful teacher). CAWPers shared various ideas:
o Heather mentioned that some students are reluctant to write because they don’t think their ideas are good or they haven’t had enough prior experience.
o Margaret shared how some of her reluctant boys were afraid of being judged for spelling.
o Paige shared how she played dumb with some of her repeating 9th graders so that they would write about sports rules.
o Ruie mentioned Donald Graves’s terms for writers: reactive (Wendy) and reflective (get up, sharpen pencil, think out ideas). Graves says that reactive writers have been rewarded throughout their school careers.
o Ronnie mentioned some teachers who use writing as a management tool.
o Margaret commented that she feels uncomfortable confronting her colleagues.
o Heather mentioned the National School Reform Faculty and their protocols for various situations and how their resources might be helpful. http://www.nsrfharmony.org/protocols.html
o Margaret also added that some teachers are reluctant writers and that may be why they have a hard time with reluctant writers in their classrooms.
o Paige wondered if some of the reasons students may be reluctant to begin free-writing may be a personality difference. Paige, task-oriented, remembered a kindergarten experience with finger paint. She was reluctant to draw because she didn’t have any idea of the goal.
· Darius then transitioned to an example lesson of chunking the writing process and helping students work hard at writing:
o CAWPers wrote lists of adjectives relating to vending machines and cafeteria food.
o Then we wrote freely on the idea of cafeteria food and vending machines.
o Then we collectively wrote a thesis on the topic of students being able to use vending machines during school/lunch.
o We created a map one bubble at a time, adding in specific examples and support.
o Darius modeled one paragraph of the letter; we wrote one on our own.
· Wendy took over and gave each table a quote and told us to “Turn and Talk”:
o After some discussion about hard work, each group read its quote and shared some insights discussed.
o Ron rewrote Stephen King’s quote about attacking “the blank page” aggressively: “Tackle writing like the linebacker tackles the quarterback.”
o Wendy mentioned that this activity of rewriting a quote about writing might translate into some good posters for your wall.
· Cathy called on her expert listeners to recap the presentation:
o Teachers can motivate students to work hard by:
§ Giving various writing prompts and styles (persuasive for boys)
§ Giving personal topics that students can relate to
§ Chunking the writing process into digestible sections
§ Modeling and showing examples
§ Giving feedback in a non-threatening way
o Some of the reasons that writing is hard are:
§ Students think their writing will be criticized
§ Students are afraid to misspell words
§ Students are confused by conventions
§ [later in the day we learned that writing is hard because it uses 12 mental constructs!]
o Students can feel successful by:
§ Knowing that it’s ok to make a mess – quotes from other authors
§ Realize that they can make a sloppy copy
At 10:15, Paulette and Richard began their technologically-filled presentation on Threaded Discussions
· Paulette opened with the benefits/uses of using Blackboard’s Discussion Forum feature
o Talking about text
o Extending a discussion beyond what class time allows
o Longer response
o Time for quiet students to reflect then contribute
o Outlet for creative expression
o Nuggets for future pieces of writing
o Pre- & Post-Testing
o 21st Century skill
o Collecting resources
o Building community
o Opportunity for more writing
· Richard asked us to read and identify a couple of words/lines that “called out to” us from Stephen Edgar’s “The Secret Life of Books”
o We logged into BB
o Added discussions
o Replied to other CAWPers’ comments, thus creating a threaded discussion
· Richard showed the Mentor/Mentee idea he’s considering using with his ELLs and IB 12th graders at http://ohsnapphoto.net/matkins
o Richard had uploaded students’ essays and based on our group numbers, we read and responded to a student’s essay
After lunch and a time for sharing personal narrative drafts, Julie and Cathy took the stage, presenting “Flip the Script” on integrating science and literacy curricula
· Cathy asked us to think, pair, share about prior knowledge we had of electricity.
o She mentioned Horizon Research of UNC http://horizon.unc.edu/index.html , also associated with the National Science Foundation http://www.nsf.gov/
o Their research revealed that not enough time was given to “sense-making” or closure of science (i.e. Teachers do demonstrations/labs but don’t follow up with explanation or ask students to explain)
· Julie and Cathy focused on goal from the 4th grade science curriculum on magnetism and electricity while using an assessment with the Flip cameras
o Cathy showed the lesson plan model for science that integrates the Standard Course of Study as the What (intended); the lesson plan as the How (implemented); and the assessment as the learned (achieved).
· Using inquiry-based instruction, Cathy walked us through a scenario that presented a problem (we need light but don’t have a flashlight) and Julie passed out our “kits” that contained a wire, battery, and bulb.
o We started by creating a focus question (our first “entry” in our science notebook).
o Cathy shared student examples, making it clear that this is a skill that needs to be taught, scaffolded, and retaught.
o Then we made predictions about we can get the bulb to light; we also drew a diagram of the prediction
o Next, we worked with our partners to test our hypotheses, created a chart of the results, and diagrammed three successful ways to arrange the three parts and three unsuccessful ways
o We all learned that the bulb has two contact points, the battery has two contact points, and that all must be touching to create light. Some were AG and knew the term circuit.
o After our experiments, we independently wrote claims and evidence based on the models given by Cathy.
o Finally, we wrote conclusions and reflections based on the activity.
· Julie then passed out the Flip cameras and explained that the assessment piece involved our writing a script and filming it.
o We all answered the question: How does the relationship between a battery, bulb, and a wire create energy?
o We could create a commercial, a how-to, or anything else we wanted
o Working in pairs, we wrote the scripts and filmed ourselves. We then learned how to upload the videos to our laptops. Tomorrow Leigh Ann will show us MovieMaker, which can work as an editing program for Flip videos.

· Julie and Cathy asked us to end the presentation by sharing on our reflections what we learned and how we can apply it to our own “situations.”
After a quick break, Ron put us all to sleep with his presentation on research—just kidding!
· After a quick skim of the article we read for homework, Ron asked us to share among our table what was standing out to us.
· Ron identified two key people and an organization who helped the process approach replace the traditional linear methods taught in schools.
o Peter Elbow, author of Writing Without Teachers and Writing with Power
o Donald Murray, author of A Writer Teaches Writing and Write to Learn and former mentor of our very own Resolved Ron Honeycutt
o National Writing Project, begun in the 1970s in California (Bay Area Writing Project)
· Our Aha’s revealed that there is no consensus on the writing process, that the process approach is different for different people and can even evolve over the life of the same person.
· After a quick history lesson on the process approach, Ron shared some explanation of meta-analysis and what the research revealed about how teachers were teaching writing
· To conclude, we watched a short video of Peter Elbow explaining his struggles as a student of writing. You can watch it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDUn1c4uxUE . Elbow almost failed out of undergrad and did drop out of graduate school before observing his own writing process and then writing about it.
Tomorrow Heather and Wendy begin our day with a presentation titled “Taking it Apart to Put it Together,” and Leigh Ann will wrap it up with “I Hope You Dance: Working with Song Lyrics.” In the middle of the day, Ruie, Donna, and Megan will help us begin on our position paper, and Ron will explain the seven rhetorical paradigms for the teaching of writing.






I tried to cover it all, but I’m sure I missed something. Please share your funniest moment of the day or your own Aha!

Wednesday, 7/15

Katie emerged for her final leg of her triathlon ready to go, taking us along on for her presentation in Reader Response Journals. The handouts on the need for guiding our students through notetaking and listening skills rang true, particularly in light of the info Katie found connecting cheating with note-taking ignorance. I especially enjoyed the list of the 10 Bad Listening Habits (talking about you, Luis). Ronnie's suggestion from last week of found-poetry-from-boring-speakers and Katie's anecdote of the strategies of a minister's wife's strategies entertained. More good information to know and to pass along to my English and my Study Skills students, in particular. I'll also try to keep in mind Ruie's comment of an audience's tendency to "focus to the light" (the overhead, LCD), although it will make me think of my students as deer.



Paige reminded us of our moral obligation to limit OUR talk before filling us in on new personality categories: the teddy bear, the magnifying glass, the slinky, and the paper clip. Discussion of Louise Rosenblatt's reader response theory led to Ron's clarification between efferent (for the info) and aesthetic (past the facts to the emotions) reading.

Katie then led us into a look into the the lyrics of Pink Floyd's song "Wish You Were Here". Her student's performance of the song for his deployed father must have been quite an emotional moment. Our interpretations grew after picking apart key words, growing into a dialogue within our daybooks. I thought of using these lyrics while discussing the role of nostalgia in One Hundred Years of Solitude with my seniors. My search for cheap daybooks is on now!

New words so far:
4-Panel Thingy (scientific name, dialecta responsus)
SLANT (Sit up, Lean forward, and Not Talk)
Anchor chart

After the break, Ruie guided us toward time to begin writing our personal narratives, making distinction between a memory piece and a personal narrative. Our personal narratives will cover larger spans of time and consider some point/moral/epiphany/insight. Reminding us that it certainly need not be somber, Ruie read a former fellow's amusing narrative of the humbling realization of a daughter (and bad driver).

Other notes for our narrative:
think of an era 1st (post-12 yrs old, probably)
then--consider moments of
trial & tribulation
deep forgiveness
innocence
loss

There need not be a big, profound theme--it can be quiet, a sudden insight into the nature of our own character.

And so, we were off to write (and struggle) and lunch.

Upon our return, Jessica presented her look into involving combining literacy activities through a visual arts perspective.

Two points of interest early--

• The use of the term composition in considering each creative act
• Her presentation's title, "the itch to make dark marks on white paper," taken from a Picasso quote, of the urge artists (and via Jessica) and writers take part in through the creative process

After examining a portion of a 1930 Time article discussing Picasso's career, we wrote a letter to Time's editor in response to his painting Bull Skull, Fruit, Pitcher to judge whether it is good or bad art, providing reasons and support. Tanya's letter called into question the receipt tapestry's artistic merits as well. The cereal box sketchbook ideas and instruction-writing activity were more great materials included in her handouts. Others chiming in included Ronnie's vocabulary grid with a new word, Similar words/roots identified, Definition, and Picture of the word sounded useful, as did Ron's one-pager description of a quadrant in which 4 scenes of a narrative add to an analysis of how each scene (with quotes) contribute to setting, tone, character, etc.

http://www.clemusart.com/exhibcef/barcelona/html/5036514.html
The interpretation here seems to have been taken verbatim from my letter...

After Jessica's presentation, Ruie poured on the learning, taking us through a collocation exercise. Some were able to whip up connections easily to nouns in our early drafts; others strained. I kneaded a break.

After it, I remember thinking I was sad that Heather, Karen, Catherine, and Tanya weren't around for Ronnie's Roundtable Chat. I had no idea our afternoon would offer the opportunity to hear a discussion from the likes of Annie Dillard, Annie Lamott, Georgia Heard, and Stephen King. They came to examine up the apprehension that writer's often feel, highlighting the courage writing takes, the detriment of requiring control in knowing where you're going with your writing, and the requirement to just write. They shared hanging onto rituals, letting go of fears, and releasing something in your writing to which you're clinging. The CAWPers returned just after our celebrities left to lead a discussion into the implications of writing apprehension in the classroom using an article from English Journal. Very entertaining and effective.

After getting spiffied up, many CAWPers met at Jibarra for a fantastic meal and insights from Australian literacy luminary Brian Cambourne. The Malbec was tasty, the fajitas yummy, the company fun.

Tuesday, July 14 from Cathy Horne

The day began with Ruie modeling how to make group poems. Using the sentence starter below we each wrote a long sentence to answer the starter.
I remember…
This frame works well for students because they start with long sentences and then learn to revise. Ronnie volunteered to take our lines about memories and edit into a group poem.

Research about feedback and evaluation-using rubrics was presented by Ruie next.
We discussed how teachers use computers with comment features to respond more and more personally, and not mess up their copy as Paige explained. (Make tracking marks also.)
Comments by teachers have a powerful impact on writing development.

Other things that influence writers and feedback:
• Unattractive names receive lower marks. More common names receive higher marks. Used same papers and changed the names to do this research.
• Studies show that we should: Be specific. Start with a complete sentence that begins positively.
• In a 51 teacher study, in elementary, social behavior influenced grading more than content.
• What errors bother teachers the most: not content but conventions and sentence structure.
• Don’t punish for invented spellings.
• When you make a comment you are creating fears, so students figure out what the teacher values or dislikes, and may not try new features in their writing. Error free writing is not necessarily good.
• Evaluation should be a learning tool, so that teacher’s instruction helps with improving writing.
• Best to keep pointing out the good. Teachers mostly do deductive: have the rule, correct the incorrect ones. Inductive is better such that you look at words and have students give the rule.
• Official “Crib” sheet…questions to be asked plus Ruie’s questions. Then work in groups to study the answers to the questions
• Study what do teachers value when grading papers: content, organization first and the conventions.
• Intensive marking is no better than moderate marking in grading for eventual outcomes.
• 6 yr study scoring papers that only were different in style, not content. Flowery language received better scores than clear, direct simple sentences.
• Effects of feedback: 2/3 of comments are negative; 7 from 1000 comments were positive.
• Don’t wait until the end of the assignment to give feedback, but have students email you a paragraph with which they are struggling and ask a question about it.

5 Goals for evaluating using rubrics:
1. Teachers need to protect themselves against their own ibases.
2. Teachers need to make their internal criteria overt so that students don’t have to second-guess;
3. teachers need to use language that children understand.Criteria should fit the task and genre of writing
4.Teachers need to help students internalize evaluation criteria so that they become peer and self-valuators.
5. Need to create a public record so that students are accountable for their own growth.

Handouts of rubrics given by Ruie with variety of purposes.

Characteristics of 5 passages:
#1 voice, descriptive language, looks like a clown, all inadequate in narrative, specificity of language, opportunity to elaborate, made me laugh, organization does not have a topic sentence. Last sentence has comparison and best sentence structure of the paragraph.
#5 voice, more sophisticated, more of a story, is elaborated in second paragraph about a family story. Has narrative as example, has most sophisticated sentence structure
#2 Gets off tract and needs to tell more about family. Last sentence is his most sophisticated sentence structure.
Expert listeners:
1. What does the research say about how teachers do mark papers, as compared t what they know to do?
Bias based on names, if a student has experience similar to teacher may get better grade. Also social behavior, if like the student better, get better grade. If topic is unpleasant to teacher, there could be bias.
2. What are the effects of names on students? Names carry meaning for the teacher and bias. Be fair and use criteria.
3. What are some data from research about the kinds and numbers of teacher markings on student papers? 2/3 from negative point of view. Start with positive. Makes it easier to ftake the negative.
4. What suggestions do you have for making comments on papers?
5. What does research say is/are the most effective ways to evaluate student writing?

Technology discussion:
See notes
Interact site: blog used to interact with parents

Margaret Price: The Huddle Game
Recorder, writer, manager, and speaker…only speaker can talk to teacher
Writer records responses, recorder writes on the board.
The game continued through multiple rounds as we developed super sentences. Margaret presented several other ideas for engaging students in writing.

Sharing of Childhood Memories
Katie’s cat
Darius’ team selection
Julie- Saving Cathy swimming story
Amy Kay-Broken Conspiracy broken finger story

Week one - one sentence summaries

One Sentence Summaries of CAWP 09 - Week One
Beginning with first-day-of-school eagerness, the CAWP participants & instructors jumped into a week full of genuine inquisitiveness and camaraderie immersed in various writing exercises, ending with an intention to feel just as eager to come next Monday night to begin week 2. Melissa Hamm

Beginning with childhood memory drafts the Capital Area Writing Project spent time using web 2.0 technology tools, writing new found poetry structures, and ended by learning more about revised writing assessments in North Carolina. Darius Horton

Beginning with Tuesday and building through Friday, the CAWP participants performed a myriad of activities including, presenting lessons on writing, posting getting-to-know-you activities, bio-ing our lives, daybooking, maneuvering through tech sites, researching writing types, penciling in expectations, diving into poetry, wordle-ing, Wiggs-ing, Buckner-ing, Bell-ing, eating homemade goodies in between, and ultimately, for my personal purposes, learning to fall in love with writing all over again. Tanya Watson

During the first week of CAWP participates learned about various technology tools, wrote and shared childhood memories while various speakers doted the week with a smorgasbord of poetry, presentations, and an international perspective on writing. Margaret Price

Beginning with alliterative adjectives Tuesday morning, the CAWP wrote, revised, and responded to various types of writing, poetry, and technology, and ended the week with a reflection of our very intense, yet satisfying efforts.
Leigh Ann Lane

Beginning with alliterations on Tuesday morning, the CAWP plumbed childhood memories, challenged our knowledge of instructional technology, consumed vast quantities of caffeine and calories, revised our understanding of revision, waxed poetic on poetry, and studied curriculum Kiwi-style; all while learning from each other through presentation and fellowship.
Heather Lowry

July 10, 2009 CAWP

July 10, 2009 CAWP
At the bottom of my day book page I see in big letters “BLOG – JULY 10th!” as if the gargantuan letters will somehow leap forth to pound this reminder into my head. It is Friday, and a scrambled brain washed down with a large coffee is my breakfast. The morning begins with an hour of practice on Voice-thread and Photo Story. I decide to use a scaffold poem from the day before set to images borrowed, with proper credit given, from Google. The sound of my voice is strange as I check my seventeen second clips for reasons to be embarrassed. All words are pronounced correctly, all images accounted for; even if the dancing guy tenderly caressing the Bud Light could’ve chosen a better dance partner.

I notice Justine and Tanya flitting from table to laptop cart. From this and their matching purple and black outfits I zone back in to prepare mentally for their presentation on Found Poetry. At this point Justine is telling us they in fact did not coordinate their outfits. Tanya slings a shawl about her shoulders, strutting, sashaying with her hips and words, telling us that we must see beyond our preconceptions. The shawl can be just a shawl, or an exotic veil, an African queen’s coronet, or a sassy waitress’ apron. Her New Orleans charm is thick and inviting like hot chocolate made from cream. Katrina never stood a chance.

In Found Poetry, Justine picks up to say, selecting poignant words or phrases from existing and relevant texts enables the students to slide into a poetry unit with confidence. They are gleaning from an already existent text and need not produce any words, ideas, or themes on their own. This enables the student to learn the structure of poetry without becoming intimidated. I see a clip of the Simpsons pop up and grow increasingly excited. Justine makes mixed medium art, believes education is the new civil rights movement, and likes the Simpsons! We may have to forgive her Yankeedom.

The steps of Found Poetry include reading an entire excerpt, marking the words or phrases that stand out in some way to the reader, and using only those selections in a new poem. A true found poem uses the found words in order from the first found to the last. The poet does not need to use all the found words, just the ones that make sense in an order. Listing the found words on a separate sheet may help some learners organize but is not necessary. Also, the new found poem does not need to refer back thematically to the original piece. Excerpts for found poetry can include articles, poems, speeches, graffiti, letters, or even street signs. Found poetry can ease a student’s reservations about poetry and creating an original work, can be used as a hook into a new poetry unit, as a summary tool, or even given to show theme in a particular work. Ronnie suggested that found poetry is reminiscent of Dada poems, named after the Dada movement in art, in which words are cut out individually, jumbled about in an envelope, and pulled out one by one with a limit of how many are pulled. The student then makes sense of the words pulled by arranging those words into a new poem.

Dr. Ron allowed us to embrace our inner child by participating in a tracing and coloring activity with a “get-to-know-you” spin. After tracing one hand, we added our goals, concerns, things we are proud of, accomplishments, objectives, and talents inside the hand. On each of the five fingers we placed one of our life roles. I am jealous of the Meredith sisterhood at my table, all of whom trace their black Meredith rings on their hands.

Melissa’s presentation rounds out our day. She begins by making us jealous and woozy by her use of the document camera. Inconspicuously I add “document camera” to my “things to beg principal for” list. The presentation centered on an incident Melissa had encountered with her elementary school in regards to the 4th grade writing assessment. The butterfly prompt we were shown was her school’s initial practice prompt, but it was incredibly vague. Melissa laughed as she recalled the hundred different ways the children wrote from the prompt and how unprepared the teachers felt to properly and concisely grade this assessment. Though it took four days of incredibly hard work and focus, the school produced a new prompt through collaborative effort. Even the PE teacher helped! The new prompt and rubric were more focused, written in more child friendly language, and more enforceable. More importantly than knowing the rubric guidelines, students must understand those guidelines. Once understood, the teacher should model a writing assignment using the prompt and rubric; only then should teachers ask the students to write to a prompt. This progression proved successful in Melissa’s school.
Happy weekend y’all!! - from Katie

Thursday @ CAWP 7.9.2009

Along with their laptops & writing materials, the 2009 CAWP participants & presenters came to class bearing gifts. While the room was not completely, everyone was busy working in some way – engaging conversations about when assignments are due, if things are actually assignments, how much more time there is to procrastinate, & of course plenty of “shop talk.” While we did not start the day off following the agenda, participants were very productive; this is a huge difference in adult learners & early childhood learners.

Small groups scattered around Poe Hall when Ruie realized that we were getting started late. The budding authors read aloud their pieces about childhood memories as others listened intensely to offer their own opinions.

A short few moments later, the whole group reconvened in our humble abode to listen to a guest speaker. Dr. Sally Buckner presented many wonderful ideas about poetry instruction in her talk, A Smörgåsbord of Poetry Writing Activities. As any great teacher, Dr. Buckner came to class ready to teach us, while we sat eager to learn. She challenged us to write several different types of poems from frames & even enticed several participants to share their poems. Dr. Buckner was a true southern delight!

After a round of applause, the community of educators joined in fellowship over a potluck lunch shared with Dr. Buckner, as well as Ms. Vinetta Bell, an ELA consultant at DPI.

After everyone loosened their belts a notch, CAWPers participated in a presentation by our kiwi-friend, Ronnie Davey. Wearing a lovely pair of jandel earrings, Ronnie got our attention with information about the literacy curriculum & assessments approved by the national Ministry of Education of New Zealand. Between presenter & the audience members many comparisons were made to writing instruction & assessment in North Carolina public schools.

To end our first Thursday of the summer sessions, participants of CAWP continued their collaborative efforts within their small groups to work out further plans for upcoming topic presentations. These are sure to give all participants a new perspective on writing, as each is working diligently to become more successful at the task &/or love of writing!