The Seventh Wish: An Impact Letter

In January, my STEM partner and I posted a Donors Choose project for a class set of The Seventh Wish. We had adopted the book as part of our Healthy Choices unit in fifth grade last year and knew that learning could be more easily facilitated with multiple copies of the book to provide more equity and access for the students throughout the unit. The project was funded in under two days thanks to the generosity of many donors.

If you've ever posted a Donors Choose project before, you might remember that one of the requirements of completing the project is to write a project impact letter. I did. And I'm choosing to post that impact letter here, too. Besides, this forum allows me to include a couple additional notes (below).

Here's the letter:

Dear donors,

Thank you for the generous spirit in which you donated toward our project to fund a class set of the book The Seventh Wish.

In this note, Donors Choose wants me to describe for you what reading looks like in my classroom and what kinds of skills or lessons were introduced with these books. And I can do that. 

We read the The Seventh Wish as a class read aloud, and the class set allowed students to hold their own copy and follow along while I read. For the most part, we shared this book apart from our regular reading workshop routine with explicit lessons and lots of choice reading. In my Humanities classroom, we read a lot, write a lot, and talk about reading and writing a lot. The Seventh Wish invited many conversations about character development as we looked closely and shared the actions, emotions, and conflicts of Charlie and her family. We shared many conversations rooted in students' inferences and interpretations. While reading The Seventh Wish there were ample opportunities to model what deeper comprehension looks like with the Notice and Note signposts (Beers and Probst, 2012) and share responsibility for noticing places that made us think. Having a class set of the book available for students to read along, mark passages that prompted thinking, and return to the book for evidence to support their claims made instruction easier and more equitable.

What Donors Choose doesn't know to ask me is what the impact of your gift was beyond the predictable and generalizable methods and strategies for teaching reading. Beyond teaching reading skills and comprehension, I aim to teach students about themselves and others and this complex world we share. The impact of having a class set of The Seventh Wish to use in the classroom is eyes opened, minds challenged, and hearts touched. Inside the pages of The Seventh Wish, our fifth graders met a character a lot like themselves, and through this book-friendship, the students witnessed the struggle and strain of life impacted by drug use/abuse and addiction. 

Some of my students' lives have been personally impacted by addiction already. "Sometimes it's hard for me to like read aloud right now because three people in my family have died from addiction," one student confided quietly as we closed our books for the day. Another student shared vulnerably, "I know that addiction can mess up families, that's what my biological parents did." Other students have perhaps been shielded and are more naive in their realizations, showing their developing understanding with assertions that they will "never try beer." Sharing Charlie's story in The Seventh Wish anchored all of us on common ground, with one story to share and talk about that - whether familiar or new - was distant enough for students to be both curious and anonymous.

The DARE program has been part of the fifth grade students' experience for a long time, and while DARE educates students about the health effects of drug use and supports students with skills to resist and make positive decisions, DARE alone is not enough. Including The Seventh Wish in our Healthy Choices unit has brought the rippling impact and effects of risky choices to life as students imagined themselves in the place of Kate Messner's characters, the Brennan family. The story of addiction in The Seventh Wish is an important compliment to the sterile facts students receive from DARE.

There's no doubt for me that each students' takeaway was personal and individual. Yet, if I were to try to summarize the most significant shifts in their thinking, I would choose two repeated messages. First, students came away with a strong understanding that addiction is not undone and that recovering addicts work hard every day to make better choices. Through Abby's story, kids could see that there is no going back to "before drugs." And second, it resonated with students that one person's risky choices impact entire families and circles of friends. Whether it was their resentment of the change of plans that caused Charlie to miss the Montreal feis or their heartbreak in hearing Charlie's mom meltdown or the worry they shared with Mrs. McNeill, the students' empathetic muscles - their heads and hearts - responded.

I had the opportunity to see and hear the impact of reading The Seventh Wish with students every day. I saw the impact as students' conceptual understanding of addiction changed. I heard students revise their thinking about who uses drugs and why. I heard them grapple with the same sense-making as many of us about how addiction can be so strong that it causes people to lose control of their choices. It's difficult to say with certainty what the impact of this project will be in five years, or eight, or fifteen...but I believe that as these students grow, their memories of Charlie and Abby and broken promises and tried relationships might inspire them to act with compassion, remind them they are not alone, and influence care about their own choices.

Your gift made it possible to educate students in a most meaningful way. Thank you.

With gratitude,
Ms. Guerrette

Here's a smattering of the responses students shared on Padlet:

You can hear some of the students sharing thoughts in their own words about The Seventh Wish on our classroom FlipGrid. (Warning: There are *lots* of spoilers in their videos!)

The impact of The Seventh Wish has trickled outward from our classrooms, too. My Donors Choose project impact letter wasn't the place to mention the impact of The Seventh Wish on others in our greater school community. The morning after the project was posted, one of our new teachers let me know she had seen our project and did I have a copy she could please borrow, she has a family member who is dealing with addiction. I listened while she shared what was on her heart. And soon another colleague was saying the same. One morning soon after, a parent of a former student who works at a near by quick-stop store mentioned seeing the project and voiced her support for talking about big topics with kids. And still later in the project, another new colleague stopped by with a question and spotted the twenty-six donated copies on students' tabletops, waiting for their return. "What's this book?" she asked with casual and innocent curiosity. I started to book talk. "Seriously?" she interrupted. "Can I take one? Is there one I could borrow? This sounds like it is so my story." Yes. Yes, she left with my partner teacher's own copy.

When we made the decision to give The Seventh Wish to our students as a shared experience, we did not foresee the way incorporating the book into the fifth grade experience would also help provide so many others a place to see themselves, too, and make it ok to acknowledge a part of their lives they otherwise kept to themselves. Reading The Seventh Wish with our students has sent the message to students - and staff, alike - that it's ok to talk about this topic here.

I knew from past experience that The Seventh Wish is a catalyst to important conversations and learning. I'm grateful that we'll continue to share this book with our fifth graders, and these multiple copies definitely help.

Why I Write: Students Need Writing Mentors

My mother recently found and sent me a photo of myself at 18 months, sitting in a highchair at the kitchen counter in our first apartment. Blank pages before me, one heck of a grip on a pencil, and a beam of pride on my face. My mother's familiar handwriting on the bottom of the polaroid reads, "Writing Letters!"

I've always been a writer.

Who I am as a writer and what I know and understand about writing has changed, though. And so has writing instruction in my classroom.

I'd be fibbing if I attributed the change in my perspective to one single factor over the last few years. Truthfully, I can name three very specific events. But the one of these three that is most easily replicable is this:

I write.

What I write ranges from short bits of fiction to poetry to book reviews to professional pieces. Most of what I write lives inside of notebooks and my hard drive, has never (and probably will never) be seen or consumed by readers. What I write doesn't matter so much. It matters more that I do.

Writing regularly (or, close...ish) changed my perspective. When I looked at writing instruction in my classroom through my teacher-writer eyes, I could hardly look away from the incongruence of my writing workshop and my own writing life. So, while I write for a lengthy list of purely personal reasons, too, these reasons #WhyIWrite are some of my most important:

I write because every day I face forty-five apprenticing writers, and it makes all the difference when I can say to them over their notebooks and my own, "Yeah, me too."

I write because my students need writing mentors. Students should learn by engaging with a writer who has plentiful and practical experience in this thing they are learning to do.

I write because my own tendency to shield and protect my writer-heart from criticism and judgement reminds me of the need to be kind with my students' writer-hearts, too.

I write because experiencing that the process of writing changes for me with everything I try to write nags at me to be flexible and open to students' writing needs and paths to "publication" that don't look like mine.

I write because relationships are born of risk-taking and bearing ourselves, and if my students are going to trust me, I must take chances first.

I write because my students encourage me and inspire me.

I write because they want to know what happens next.

And so do I.

On Using "The Seventh Wish" in the Classroom

I'm that teacher.
I'm the teacher in Maine who read Kate Messner's newest novel, The Seventh Wish, to all my students. Twenty-three 5th graders and twenty-two 6th graders.
I'm the teacher who said to my colleagues: You need to read this now, and we need to think about how to use it with our students this year, even though it isn't published yet.
Now all of our fifth and sixth graders have read The Seventh Wish.

And our students are all the better for it.

I read The Seventh Wish in October. October 14, the very day the advanced reader's copy (ARC) arrived from Bloomsbury as part of Kate Messner's kid-blurb project. I knew I had lots of Kate Messner fans in my two classes who would be lining up to read her much anticipated "next book." (Me too, if we're honest.) So I cleared my agenda for the night and hunkered down.

I was entranced by the natural beauty painted in the opening descriptions of the magical ice flowers on the lake and I was wrapped up in the adoration that Charlie had for her older sister, Abby. I enjoyed getting to know Charlie and her middle school world. I liked her. She reminded me of kids I know. Kids like mine who sit at my tables each day. Kids who want more than they have--be it understanding, attention, courage, or a solo dress for Irish dancing. Kids whose relationships with their real life heroes--older brothers and sisters, parents, babysitters--are everything to them.

I was enlightened, too. Aware that the book would also address the topic of addiction, I saw the signs as they played out, and then I learned. I learned about a life experience different than my own. Charlie's experience with her sister's addiction let me see the challenges and complications of addiction on a user's loved ones through her eyes. Deception. Brokenness. Sacrifices and loss. And that was when I knew there was a discussion to be had with my colleagues about plans for our Healthy Choices unit. On that first read, I had texted my colleagues, "We need to use this book," before I had even finished reading.

The next morning, our conversations started about how we would incorporate The Seventh Wish into the unit, which also included nutrition, digital citizenship, peer pressure, and the D.A.R.E. program. I passed my ARC along to my colleagues. Soon we were discussing this addition to our curriculum with the D.A.R.E. Officer himself. We put The Seventh Wish ARC in his hands. We asked him to please read it, too. We knew there would be lots of conversation, and we anticipated questions. Almost certainly questions we didn't know the answer to or for which there isn't an answer. But we were ok with that. We would do our best to respond to students, to consult resources (like Officer Jack) to investigate further, or we would grapple with those questions without an answer together.

We consulted with our administrator, to whom I also loaned a copy of The Seventh Wish. We revised the traditional notification letter that parents have received at the beginning of D.A.R.E. lessons for as many years as the program has been part of our school. And, we acknowledged that students would be talking about big topics and supplemented the letter with sites and ideas for families to have conversations with children about drug use and addiction.

D.A.R.E. lessons happened weekly in the students' STEM classrooms. In Humanities, we read The Seventh Wish daily for read aloud. Here's what happened:

• We researched ice flowers.
• We watched Riverdance videos (and amateur feis videos, too).
• We weighed out our own winners of the "thinking of a word" game.
• We laughed together over Charlie's haphazard wishing and Bobby's hopeless crush and Drew's Lake Monster routine.
• We decided we'd like to try eating insects to know what that's like. (And we did.)
• We pondered Mrs. McNeill's words of the wiser on each trip onto the ice.
• We talked about friendship, and our wishes for others, and secret-keeping.
• We connected the information we learned in D.A.R.E. to the actions and effects of Abby and her heroin use.
• We asked questions--thoughtful ones--and considered the human aspect of drug use as a choice and addiction as a disease.
• We built empathy and understanding for individuals and families facing the obstacles of a loved one's substance use.
• We internalized the power we have to make our own choices, to know and understand more fully what the consequences of our choices on ourselves and others.

See, when I read The Seventh Wish in October, I saw an opportunity.
The Seventh Wish is as much an example as any other that we are classifying as "windows and mirrors." The life of the Brennan Family is the life of many families today, even though we wish it weren't so. Some of my students live inside The Seventh Wish. Probably most don't. But this brave and honest book let us all be at times inside and outside of the story, providing us a safe distance and enlightened perspective to have important conversations about lots of big themes for kids, one of those being addiction. In reading The Seventh Wish together, we had the opportunity to open the door to unheard conversations, to say to our students, "It's ok to talk about This Big Thing here. It's ok to ask questions. We'll talk about this with you."

I don't think my students understand the adult perspective that the subject of heroin (or other substance) use is "too heavy" for them. They would disagree openly. They would argue that they want to know about "the hard stuff."
I know they would.
They did.
Yesterday.
When one classmate shared with the others that Kate Messner's school visit to a Vermont school was cancelled because the book was "too heavy" for the 4th and 5th graders there, my students were vocal.

Kate Messner is a familiar and much-loved author to my students with a reputation she's earned by publishing many books that they have read and loved and grown from. The students trust Kate as a middle-grade writer who will invite them into the story and lend them characters to befriend, take them through trials and troubles, and will bring them out the story's end knowing something a little deeper or having learned something about themselves they hadn't thought about before. The same is true for The Seventh Wish. She writes the truth about characters (like our students) and a world that includes harrowing truths (like ours). She sizes up her research and knowledge of the subject and writes it to be perfectly fitting for her middle-grade audience. The Seventh Wish is gentle in building readers' investment in the story and conflict, but the serious nature of the topic of addiction is not dulled or downplayed, speaking solidly to Kate's respect for her readers.

What was the impact of reading The Seventh Wish with our students?

Traditionally D.A.R.E. program has students complete a formulaic five-paragraph essay as a requirement for graduation. With Officer Jack's support, our 5th grade team revamped the culminating reflection and asked students to write a letter to their 18-year old selves beginning with "Dear Future Me." This year's end-of-unit writing was some of the most personal and convincing evidence that students internalized their learning. Tracings of The Seventh Wish appeared in almost every student's letter. As a teaching team, we isolated one-line excerpts from each students' letter, filmed these lines, and compiled their reflections into one collaborative letter that we set to music.

Take a look.

Sixty Days: Making Writing a Habit

To be entirely honest, I probably wouldn't have realized the milestone if it wasn't for a student's inquiry this week.

"Ms. Guerrette, how's YOUR writing coming along?" was the question he quietly asked me during an unusual moment of calm in our writing workshop. 

"Oh, I'm still writing," I answered, my mind jogging for where this out-of-the-blue question had come from. "Thanks for asking!" I was reminded, yet again, that they are always watching. 

Then came his explanation. "I was just wondering. You must be behind on marking your chart."

The chart in reference is the Don't Break the Chain calendar that hangs on the bulletin board near my desk with other "about me" items: my mission statement, quotes I try to live by, a picture of story time with my nephews. And he was absolutely right. Somewhere back in the middle of January, I had fallen behind on crossing off my writing days.

But I had not fallen out of writing. 
And that...that was what I celebrated as this week drew to a close. I successfully maintained my commitment to writing for 30 minutes daily through a second month. Writing daily is becoming a habit.

At the end of December, I celebrated my success with this goal. It was my longest string of uninterrupted time. More important than the uninterrupted string though, I had succeeded in carving out time to write regularly. My previous efforts had started well, but been derailed by variations on the litany of excuse making for why I couldn't fit writing into my world.

At the end of December, I had some decisions to make about my goal. I had uncovered an idea that was nagging at me, it needed more of my attention to develop. But I was also afraid that my very new success of writing daily would take a hit if I restricted my writing to only this one "project." I need my writing time to be flexible enough that I can go where I need to when I sit down with my notebook and pen.

So, I kept the same overarching goal for January. I wanted to continue my commitment to find 30 minutes to write daily. And I threw in a few other measures, too. Instead of limiting the focus of my writing, I listed four specific writing "tasks" I wanted to complete in the month of January. These would be my measures of success: maintaining my daily commitment and accomplishing these smaller writing goals within the time frame of January.

I did it. Mostly.

One of my four writing tasks was to resume my Monday posts as part of the It's Monday, What Are You Reading? meme. I posted most Mondays in January, but this past Monday, I skipped. It weighed on me all week. And it means I didn't *exactly* accomplish my goal. But, that's awfully darn close. In addition to the writing tasks I had outlined, I began a blog series about our whole-school community reading project (OES Reads), posting almost weekly with updates. My blog saw more posts in January 2015 than any other month since I started blogging.

Being able to say I met my goal feels good, but I've been thinking about more than just accomplishing the goal. Reflection has a way of seeping into everything.

Writing has become something I do. I'm still afraid to say I've built my writing habit, because there are days when it takes everything I have to keep the commitment. Some nights I feel like my writing is more legitimate than others--better subject, more coherence, less "work"--but regardless of my judgement about the quality of my writing, I'm writing daily. The routine I'm establishing matters.

I value my 30 minutes. I appreciate that small chunk of time when I power down, put the phone in "do not disturb" mode, set my timer, and empty my thinking onto the pages of my notebook. Most days it is the most peaceful, attentive time I spend. 

Ideas abound. More than I can attend to. Phrases or whole ideas jump out at me, and I have a knowing feeling when loose ideas need to be tethered and captured in my notebook. Then I can play with them, get to know them, and find out the substance of these ideas.

Many ideas are asking to share my time. Daily, there are new things to scribble about in free writes, and yet many potential pieces or posts wait inside the pages of past free writes. I need to balance free-writing and discovery with time for revision and polishing.


In February, I will continue my goal to write for 30 minutes daily. In the next day or two, I'll make a "wish list" of writing tasks I want to accomplish in February, mindful that I want to balance new writing with mining pieces from the last sixty days of writing.

And I'll try to do a better job remembering to mark my progress on the calendar. For my students' sake.

One Little Word, 2015

Sometime in the last week or so, it occurred to me that the new year was creeping nearer. As the talk of One Little Word simmered, I started a list of possible contenders in my writer's notebook and would daily add a word or two that would be deserving of my attention in 2015. Everything on that list appealed to me for it's own reason--from feelings they tapped to the challenge they issued. In the end, the word that I've picked is not a feel-good, glitsy word, but the very first word that came to mind when I started listing.


Last night, the last night of 2014, I made Tarte au Sucre. 

For those not on the up and up with French-Canadian cuisine, Tarte au Sucre is a one-crust sugar pie, made with brown sugar filling. Despite growing up in Madawaska, a small Maine mill town on the Canadian border, I had never attempted this sickly sweet Acadian treat. I hadn't even "helped" anyone to make it. But, my father was determined to see me use the new Acadian cookbook he gave me for Christmas, and he has a bit of a sweet tooth, too. When he asked for Tarte au Sucre for New Year's Eve, I headed to the kitchen.

Tarte au Sucre filling on the stove. On medium-low heat.

The recipe itself is pretty simple. In fact, I think I know it by heart already. All of the ingredients go into a pot at the same time, and the mixture is brought to a boil over medium-low heat. 

I imagine if there is a way to mess up this recipe, it's right there: medium-low heat.

Because, you see, the filling sat on the stove-top and and needed to be tended to. I had to continuously stir and stir and stir. If I didn't, the bottom would congeal, and once it did, the lumps wouldn't dissolve again into the desired smoothness. There was no stopping or looking away or multi-tasking. I had to keep the spatula moving, sometimes scraping, over that medium-low burner.

It took a long time.

Ok, it probably didn't, really. But it felt like it did. I was tempted to turn up the heat to expedite the cooking. I was teased by the conversations being had without me in the other room. I was happy to prepare this pie, but I wanted it to happen quickly, too.

There, in the kitchen stirring the brown sugar filling round and round and round over...yup, medium-low heat...my One Little Word choice was starkly clear.

Patience.

Because this scenario with the sugar pie is emblematic of so many less tangible things for me. Too often I am impatient. I'm not short-tempered (usually), and I'm typically patient with other people. But I am horribly impatient with myself.

I cause myself undue pressure by expecting things to happen quickly. I beat myself up when I don't seem to move fast enough or make enough progress on an unrealistic timeline. I have a half-million wonders, but I don't like to wait for answers. I don't want to wait to know or see or discover...I want to arrive quickly. I coax others--students, colleagues, friends--to be patient with themselves, to embrace their journeys, to allow themselves room to practice, grow, evolve...I teach, for goodness sake! But I apply a harder, less forgiving standard to myself.

My first-ever Tarte au Sucre

Being patient will mean accepting my abilities and my limitations, trusting time will help me "be." Patience will prompt me to slow down and curb the pressure. Giving less attention to the destination will heighten the path to "getting there."

In 2015, I want to be more comfortable with the need to stir the filling steadily, continuously. I want to embrace the time spent heating the filling as part of the process to the sweetness to come.

And the pie?
It got good reviews. 
I'll save you a piece.

Thirty Days of Writing: Looking Back

My December "Don't Break the Chain" Calendar

Today makes 30 days. December 1 to December 30.
I wrote for 30 minutes on every one of those 30 days.
My longest string yet.

So, on this last day of #writedaily30, I'm looking back.

Calling today "the last day" has me a little on edge. See, I can't really look at today as a "last" day. I've been successful with this challenge, but I can't afford to chance breaking the chain. I can't treat today's celebration of my accomplishment as a finale or lean on 30 days of success as a reason I don't need to write tomorrow.

The truth is, I do.

I do need to write tomorrow. And the day after. And the 363+ days that come afterward. 
I do need a place to reflect and express and play and create and explore.

I don't always need the same thing of my writing time, but I do always need my time to write.

My December #writedaily30 goal was essentially to show up. To make a commitment to keep my pen moving on paper for 30 minutes every day. No specific topic, no intended audience, no pressure to publish. Just "me" time with my notebook to see what would come.

Writing is generative.

Flitting among the pages of two (Yes, not one, but two!) notebooks, there are recurring themes and ideas I have circled back to. There are pages that house classroom vignettes or specific memories I'll be glad to hold on to. And there are occasional rants or outpourings of questions--followed by more questions--that may never have real answers. But that's ok.

All of it is, actually. Because it's evidence of how my thinking and my life as a writer are evolving. Together.

Last night I set a timer for five additional minutes after my 30 had passed. I wanted those five-more-minutes to respond to Linda Urban's prompt: What have you learned about yourself? What have you learned about goals and daily writing and commitment?

Reflective notes flowed freely from my pen. I was astonishing by the ease in which I was listing! Could it be that while my attention was turned to keeping a 30-day writing commitment and establishing a habit, I was glazing over some bigger realizations? Like these:

• Ideas come to me. All. The. Time. An offshoot of writing daily means that consciously or subconsciously, I anticipate the chance to write. My daily goings on include observing, generating, and storing ideas for writing time, whether intentional or not.

• My notebook is an extension of myself. Along with my wristlet and phone, my notebook is the third thing that travels with me almost everywhere. And I depend on my notebook to catch my randomness--inspirations or otherwise.

• Sometimes the pressure of posting publicly stifles me as a writer. I get caught up in doing it right. Giving myself permission to "take a break" from blogging was hard, but a necessary reprieve to let me get back to reflecting on and banking ideas. And I've come away with at least a dozen smaller writing pieces that I can return to. That said...

• I need to up the ante on myself. Free writing with no pressure has been what I needed this month, but now I need to attend to a nagging idea that is begging for more of my attention. It's time to find a balance between continuing to generate writing and making project-specific progress.

• As solitary and personal as writing is, keeping the company of other writers is motivating to me. Beyond the gentle nudge of accountability, the #writedaily30 community is special, generously encouraging one another with positive responses to expressions of relief or frustration.

So...
Today I'm celebrating my success. 
I kept a commitment for 30 days and wrote 30 minutes on each of those days.
And I came away with lots of possible blog posts, a project to pursue, and a whole lot to think through about what it means to be a writer and a teacher of writing.

I'm pretty sure I still need to write tomorrow.

A Letter to My Blog

Dear Neglected Blog,

I'm sorry. I realize I've done a really poor job of keeping you refreshed and up-to-date with my reading diet, happy celebrations, and otherwise random musings of classroom life and professional endeavors. I feel really guilty that I have not shared the highlights of #NCTE14 or amazing connections my students have had with books and authors. I know it likely seems I have been swallowed whole by a book I have yet to review, and that is somewhat disheartening to you. It is to me, too.

So, let me begin by reassuring you: I am still the same "me." I'm still doing important work helping kids find who they are and assume their place of responsibility in a crazy world every day. I'm still a nerdy book lover, devouring middle grade novels in a single sitting (when I can). I'm still thinking-incessantly-about what is going right in my professional world and what needs to change. And, I'm still writing, I promise. In fact, I'm writing more now than ever before.

So then, you ask, what's the deal?
Why no new posts since mid-November?
Why the skipped weeks of #IMWAYR?

*sigh*

For the most part, it's because I'm writing. 
A lot. 
All the time. 
In my notebook.
To reach this point, I've had to give myself permission to relax about posting to you, sad Blog. I've had to allow myself the freedom to write to explore my ideas without the expectation of publishing for an audience, without the pressure of finding words that are pretty, or perfect, or provocative enough to interest readers. And you know-just between you and I-doing so has actually give me PAGES of what feel like possibilities. Possibilities for researching and revisiting and revising... Things that might grow into blog posts I can share later, that will help you appear "impressive."

Dear Blog, I hear your cry of concern that time is passing me by, and I'm not saying enough or showing everyone else who I am. I share your concern a little, too. But right now, this free, personal writing feels good, feels promising. So I'm going to trust in it...for a little while longer.

I want people to look at you...I do. I hope you can one day do even more to introduce me to people and connect me to great professionals with whom I can stretch my thinking. For now though, I beg you, be patient with me and my process. Support me in taking the quiet road. I have some things I need to think about. Explore. Tussle out. 
For a few more weeks, at least.

I will be back. Don't give up on me. 
I'm just finding my way.

Your wandering (but no less committed) writer,
Melissa

I Told My Students to Make a Mess

It's the first week of school, and my new students are impressionable. And I told them to make a mess. 
I really did.

The students have started their 4th grade writers' notebooks.

Friday I plopped three of my own notebooks in front of my students and flipped through the pages under the document camera. I paused to show lists (after lists after lists after lists), some started, others titled and left lonely for a long time, and a few illustrating returns and additions with different colored inks and check marks noting pieces I've explored. I pointed out webs, doodles, maps...anything that I thought would challenge their thinking. But mostly I emphasized imperfection--MESS.

One of this year's students names
good writing "the perfect ones."

My thinking has been guided by years of students with the same ingrained perceptions of writing. Students envision good writing as completed, published work. This year's writing surveys produced words and phrases like neat, good handwriting, capitals and periods, long, makes her [teacher] smile, books, perfect. I realize I'll need to work to continuously combat old perceptions and help students re-vision writing. One of my overarching goals for writing this year is to help students to embrace messiness as part of the process, part of what it means to write.

I want the permission to make a mess--the invitation to have mess inside their notebooks--to be empowering. I hope students will find my acceptance and encouragement to be freeing. I hope it will alleviate some of the pressure that comes with a long-standing image of "writing" as shiny and polished and pretty.

I will continue to keep my notebook and writing process open to my students. This week I will also share images and stories Linda Urban has shared on her blog. I will project a photo that Jeff Anderson shared on Twitter. While showing my writing is powerful, the examples of these published writers will model for students that this isn't just a teacher thing I'm telling them.

Of course, by encouraging students to allow messiness as part of their writing process, I've also invited some big implications for me as a teacher.

I need to embrace students' mess. What they want to try in their notebooks and call writing has to be ok. Work samples varying from lists to graphic novel drafts need to be validated. I've always considered myself tolerant of honoring students' paths, but...am I? When a student came to me during our writing time, disbelieving, and asked, "Can I draw in my notebook?" I had to catch myself before telling him no, torn between encouraging his writing and worrying about avoidance. If that is his entry point, I need to follow. And think about how I'm going to nudge him further. Managing this students' trajectory will likely be handled best through writing conferences.

My perception of monitoring writing progress needs some revision also. It won't be as simple as glancing through the pages to look for approximately one page of writing each day. The work of a writer is not so predictable and calculated. Some days a student may have invested more in small, deliberate revisions than his counterpart who drafted a third repetitive page of a story without direction. There aren't quick or easy rules towards evaluating student progress. I won't be able to judge a student's effort or progress without investing time in learning about the writer. I need to find out who my writers are now--today--in the second week of school. And then I need to watch for evidence of shifts...progress...growth.

So, I'm pulling on my rain boots and rolling up my sleeves, spending time "making mess" with students in our notebooks this week. I need to notice the writing students collect in their writers' notebooks this week. I need to make note of students who might have some reservation about mess, and I need to affirm and celebrate instances of risk taking, wild and messy writing that helps commit thinking to paper. Maybe compiling these observations about the examples they try and what they attempt can inform my next steps and minilessons. After all, it's my students response to my invitation that will give me guidance about where to go.

The First Days

Last week I spent two days in district committee meetings preparing for the start of a new school year. When I heard a colleague describe her plans for the opening of school, I thought her objective to test all students' reading with an assessment in the first three days was hyperbolic. I was certain she was trying to be humorous, maybe poking fun at the way we sometimes are overzealous about collecting student data with many assessment measures. But this week I was chatting with her during our workshop days, and found that was precisely her intent for our first three days: Fountas & Pinnell Benchmark Assessments (FPBA) and writing prompts for all!

Granted her instructional context is slightly exceptional because she is looping with her class this year, but I found this goal to be absolutely startling! I was taken aback as my mind imagined the tone being set around students' performance levels and measurement from day one. Her rationale was to get to know the students and set goals for them. On the other side of those first three days and looking back now, I learned about my students, too, and not with an assessment.

My mindset going into the school year was to make my students my highest priority of study in these first few weeks. I have always felt strongly about building relationships with students, considering relationships to be critical to my success as a teacher. This guiding belief was reinforced for me in reflecting on sessions with Kathy Collins, Sara Ahmed, and Linda Rief at Heinemann's Teacher Tour. All three presenters promoted the importance of student-centered work in today's classrooms.

In the first three days, my students have created and started sharing identity maps (Thank you, Sara), played community building games, attempted the Marshmallow Tower challenge (we'll be trying again), prepared and presented skits, and discussed read alouds and what they mean to us.

I learned Alex's passion is rocks and I can connect with her by finding her real ways to learn more about rocks and purposes for sharing.
I learned Lissa likes to garden (something I cannot do!).
I learned Steph eats, sleeps, and breathes One Direction.
I learned my students can't get enough of Jerry Palotta's Who Would Win series. Cassie is hungry for more Babymouse, Lee is into Percy Jackson, and book orders make them all squeal.
I learned Luke has a leader growing inside of him, and Michelle has exceptional patience and tolerance.
I learned Brittany is artistic, Scott is athletic, and Alan is musical.
I learned my students are sponges when it comes to read aloud and they just can't get enough.
I learned they really want to learn and master that most tricky operation: division.
I learned they expect kindness and helpfulness from one another and want classmates who look out for each other.
I learned their stamina for independent work needs developing, their cooperative skills are reasonably strong, and--more than anything--they want to do well.

I learned countless things about my students--families, interests, likes and dislikes, traits--and none of those came from an FPBA. 

There will be a time and place to assess reading comprehension, evaluate their writing, and rank their computational fluency. Those are important informants to my instruction and tools for monitoring student progress. But those will be meaningless and lack student interest and investment without establishing a community for learning first. My students need to see that they are the reason I'm here. They need evidence that I'm interested in them, what they are about, the people they are. From day one, I want my words and actions to tell students

Hey, this place is YOURS.

This thing called learning is a shared responsibility.

You're important--I want to know about YOU.

My classroom is about more than attaining a score on a trimester rubric... My classroom is about growing and improving, helping students discovering who they are and becoming who they want to be. Assessments alone will not equip me for what I need to be their teacher.

At the onset of our new school year, I'm on the lookout for what makes them smile, laugh, grow excited, and feel tense. So for now, MY FPBA kit can collect a little more summer dust while I listen and observe and discover my students.

Reading in the Wild: Developing Reading Preferences (#cyberPD)

When Twitter connections selected Reading in the Wild (Donalyn Miller) as this year's #cyberPD book study, I found myself grateful for the chance to go back to the treasure trove and reread parts of the book alongside so many others. For more on the #cyberPD project, visit Literacy Learning Zone for this week's installment.

Also, join us next Wednesday, July 30, 7 p.m. CST when we chat live on Twitter with Donalyn Miller (hashtag #cyberPD).

"Determining readers' expressed preferences in what they like to read helps teachers connect with students and value their individual reading tastes...Wild readers develop authentic preferences through wide reading and heightened awareness of the variety of texts available. Encouraging students to read what they want while exposing them to high-interest, engaging, quality texts of all kinds fosters their engagement and provides the diverse experiences they need to find texts that will meet their reading interests and needs both today and tomorrow." 

-Donalyn Miller (Reading in the Wild, 2014, p. 192)

In my current job in a summer program, I'm delivering math tutoring. But my reader-heart is happy because I get to engage in a lot of talk about the students as learners with my literacy colleagues. The population of students served by the summer program attend a different elementary school than the one in which I work, and this has made for an interesting learning experience. This temporary change in communities has provided me with distance in my perspective since I have no previous experience with the kids. I've noticed the way this impacts my reflection.

When we started the program a few weeks ago, we had to get to know the students we'd be seeing. They came with essentially no data (the previous year's standardized test score was of little help in designing short-term goals). On one side of the room, I surveyed students about their math attitudes and played games to observe their number sense and computation strategies. I could overhear my counterpart on the other side of the partition, questioning students about their interests in reading: books they've enjoyed, authors they like, genres they prefer. There was a lot of wait time between questions and responses. When the students did answer, it was mainly the same responses: Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Goosebumps, Captain Underpants, animal books.

Whether fair or not, I found myself processing these conversations and reminded of one of Donalyn's prominent points: We must build relationships with our students. Students will reveal information about what they need as readers if you listen to them. These students seem to have exposure to series. They also seem to be reading in the same circle of books.

Immediately, I wondered: What do conversations with MY former students, those I consider to be "wild reading ready," say about my reading instruction and the opportunities I facilitated?

Nurturing students as wild readers depends on balancing and advancing several factors. Giving students choice in independent materials is crucial to their buy-in and engagement. Safeguarding time for students to read is a priority for acceleration and growth. Yet, neither can operate smoothly without the students' awareness of their reading identity--part of which is recognizing and attending to their preferences. Until they do, do students really have autonomy over selecting independent reading materials?

And, they don't--as a rule--come with that awareness.

So then, how do kids develop preferences?

Kids develop preferences in music, clothing, food, hobbies, favorite idols, largely in part to outside influences. They observe the world around them, making note of the preferences of others in their sphere of influence: adults, older kids (siblings or otherwise), and peers. Sometimes they experiment and learn by trial. Sometimes they assume someone else's preference as their own. And still, at other times, they have to be forced into trying something  and finding out if it fits their preference by a trusted other. (How did you first try calamari?)

And then, in typical reflective fashion, I went a step further: what does this mean for me as a teacher? How do teachers help students develop preferences?

As a teacher, I should challenge my own preferences a little more. I want to be explicit with students about how I choose what I'll be reading, and I want to demonstrate how I weigh one book against another-especially when it challenges my preferences. I'd like to encourage colleagues to help share their reading preferences with students also, to show students more of ourselves and communicate that not all readers are shaped in the same mold.

I recognize I need to be more aware of the reading diet I feed my students. I need to expose students to a wider variety of texts and facilitate experiences with these books that enable my readers to make more informed judgments about their preferences. When I first moved to grade 4 three years ago, my grade-level partner and I modified the 40-book Challenge. I looped the following year and discontinued the challenge, determining my group didn't need the same level of scaffolding in 5th grade. However, I think I am going to recommit to a modified genre challenge. My incoming 4th graders need the structured support to engage in self-discovery of their preferences.

However, simply instituting the challenge and providing the students with a genre graph won't do the metacognitive work of developing students' reading identities. That will come in the ways I guide students to be reflective. I will need to be intentional with coaching students to analyze patterns in their behaviors and choices to arrive at conclusions about their preferences. We'll need to, together, make use of logs, surveys, and notes from conferences and observations. I'll need to listen, and reflect back to readers what I hear, gradually lessening my input to encourage their independence.

And eventually, my readers will be better equipped for release into the wild.

How do you help your students develop their reading identities and uncover their reading preferences?

Reading in the Wild: Reading as Connectedness (#cyberPD)

When Twitter connections selected Reading in the Wild (Donalyn Miller) as this year's #cyberPD book study, I found myself grateful for the chance to go back to the treasure trove and reread parts of the book alongside so many others. For more on the #cyberPD project, visit Ruminate and Invigorate for this week's installment.

"Reading seems like something we do alone, 
but it isn't." 

-Donalyn Miller (Reading in the Wild, 2014, p. 128)

This week this was the line that resonated with me in a way I knew I needed to explore further through writing. Just this very morning at work in the summer program, I listened to a colleague's concerns that many teachers have a vision of reading as a controlled, solitary activity. The image of a student "reading" tends to be of the student alone with a book, no? Unfortunately our conversation went unfinished as the day began. But then, this quote was there for me to consider again this afternoon. How do we portray reading in the classroom? What image of reading do we paint for students? If we pause to really consider our own reading behaviors, can we honestly say our actions are solitary?

Before we read, we talk about what to read. We elicit recommendations and opinions that lead us to our selection. We probably talk about related books-other books by the same author, other books like this one, even other books that are NOT like this one. When we anticipate a book's release, we count down the days with other readers, we speculate and predict, share reviews and behind the scenes notes as we learn of them. These behaviors are as much a part of reading as the act of turning pages and diving into a story.

When reading the book-the part that probably most often looks like being alone-we react and respond to the message the author has crafted for us. The characters become friends, sometimes foe. The characters' feelings, conflicts, and choices remind us of other people...and we might tell them. We remember our own experiences or lessons learned, and sometimes we are saved us from having to learn all of life's lessons ourselves. We find ourselves asking our own tough questions, and we talk about hard situations and tough choices with others. We are hardly alone.

After we turn the last page, we share. We talk. We tell someone else-to get it, to skip it, to give it to so-and-so. We recount our thinking, our relationship with the text. We post to Twitter, to Facebook, to Goodreads, to blogs. We add it to visual displays and record keeping lists. But we usually don't keep our reading to ourselves.

Reflecting on this quote in Reading in the Wild reminded me of the reading experiences I had when I read Brown Girl Dreaming last month.

At first, the social aspect of reading was indirect and subtle, like an overheard conversation. Known readers on Twitter began to buzz about Jacqueline Woodson's new book, Brown Girl Dreaming (available August 26). A frequent sufferer of f.o.m.o. (fear of missing out), I was sufficiently curious. Then, my friend Justin returned from the IRA conference with an ARC. He did what readers do-he read it, told me about it, and let me borrow it. I had only just started when Justin and I met Donalyn for dinner. She had just finished reading Colby's copy. Guess what we did? (Really, this is a gimme: Donalyn, book, dinner?) We talked. We talked feelings, opinions, related works, memories. We talked about who we would recommend the book to next and how we would share it.

I had a little disruption to my reading life that week (ahem, Boothbay Literacy Retreat!) and it took me longer than usual to finish. (I also wanted to linger in it so badly.) All week, I was sharing the special company of Jackie Woodson in the pages of her book, listening to her share the stories of her childhood and being reminded of my own-so very different. This is to say nothing of the added bonus that came with reading after Justin had, noticing passages that he had marked and noting those that struck me, too.

When I did finish Brown Girl Dreaming, I talked to people about this book. I tweeted. I blogged. I shared by word of mouth. People responded. I responded to others. I got on my computer and sent an email to Linda, who I had seen comment in another conversation that she was interested in the book.  We wrote back and forth a little (me about Brown Girl Dreaming, Linda about having just finished Locomotion-same author). Justin gave me the nod, and I shipped the book out to Linda.

Brown Girl Dreaming was not an "alone" reading experience. 

If anything, my experience with Brown Girl Dreaming made tangible the real connectivity of reading.

I feel gifted with a new chance to awaken to this notion that reading is not solitary. But what does it mean for me as a lead reader? What can I do to promote the awareness that reading is connectedness in my classroom? How do I not only permit the social act of reading, but promote it?

Three things I want to try to promote connectedness:

1. Taking the lead from my interest in Justin's response to the text, I want to see what will happen if I leave post-it note flags or pencil notes in books after reading them. I don't want to distract my developing readers, but I do want to extend an invitation to react to parts that made me think, note places that made them think, and see what-if any-conversation ensues. I know Justin has put copies of books he marked up in his library. I'm curious to see if my 4th graders will connect with me and each other this way. (And maybe this will create a spin-off to Donalyn's graffiti board model, too.)

2. Included in our discussion of Brown Girl Dreaming was the need to find other readers to whom we would recommend this book. I am better now than ever before at regularly incorporating book talks into the reading community's routines. (My students will ask for Book Talk Tuesday on any day of the week, actually.) What I am not good at (yet) is helping students synthesize their thinking about their own reading and handing over the hot seat to them to make peer-to-peer recommendations. I want to be more deliberate in promoting their ability to influence other readers by giving attention to this.

3. I'm dreaming up a way to emphasize our connectedness through books visually. I want to find a way to illustrate for and with students what the chain looks like when readers pass books along amongst themselves. The copy of Brown Girl Dreaming that I read changed hands three times. I don't know how many times Colby's copy got passed. But I also know that a book vine has since been started and other copies are being mailed reader to reader, state to state. On a smaller scale, I want to encourage students to share books with other readers, and to begin taking interest in what each other are reading. I think this might be workable.

How have books helped you feed connectedness?

How do you promote connectedness in your classrooms?