| DWP Partnerships |
| The Dakota Writing Project, over the years, has developed successful partnerships with a number of South Dakota schools, including Wagner, Yankton, the University of Sioux Falls, and Vermillion. |
| What is a partnership exactly? The Dakota Writing Project, working with a DWP teacher-consultant, collaborates with a school, district, or other agency. The partnership 1) includes shared goal setting and planning; 2) includes more than a professional development (inservice) series; and 3) is intended to take place over more than a year. |
| To learn more about developing a partnership with DWP, contact us at dwp@usd.edu. |
| The DWP-Wagner Partnership: |
| by DWP Director Nancy Zuercher |
| DWP's partnership with Wagner Community School grew in its second year under DWP teacher-consultant Sue Morrell's enthusiastic and experienced leadership. The partnership's vision for 2003-2004 was twofold: first, to improve teachers' instructional strategies and put tools for better writing, thinking and reading into teachers' hands; second, to extend the good work of this school to the community. |
| The partnership continued to support the Teachers As Writers course taught on site through USD with twelve teachers, a completely different group from the previous year's course. The aim was to have course content replicate that of a summer institute. In addition to the class, the partnership also brought parents and children together for eight parent-child reading sessions, four sessions each semester. Parents and children built reading journals, learned about good books and good reading strategies, and discussed and told stories. One result of these sessions was engagement in positive discussion about the Wagner school and community and the need for reading improvement in the Wagner area. The partnership also provided professional development programs featuring DWP teachers from outside of Wagner. |
| A report from Sue Morrell: |
| To provide you with more details about how a partnership can work, here is a sample report from Sue Morrell, the DWP teacher-consultant who helped to facilitate the DWP-Wagner partnership. |
| Wednesday, February 11, 2004 |
| This, of course, was the day we nearly had to call class due to the weather. However, all attended the in-service session, presented by A.V. (Teaching Summarizing Strategies), and all except the one woman who is taking the credit for 2 hours were able to stay in spite of the blizzard. In fact, the class lasted longer than 7:00 Ð we were so engaged in discussion that we didn't want to let it go. I think I left school at 8:00, and I was not the last to leave! |
| 1. Writing into the Class: "What we think about the task of presenting to our fellow teachers." |
| I chose this topic deliberately because there was so much "chatter" during A.V's presentation, and we wondered if the ugly face of "attitude" was responsible. So, I shared the thinking of the class after our session with A.V. By that time, she had received several comments from other staff about how useful her presentation was to their disciplines. And based on our sharing, I was able to echo that. The participants unanimously praised A.V's organization and the practicality of her ideas. At the same time, they were sensitive to the distractions she faced. In sum, we were able to sensitize more than just our class members about teacher behavior during in-service sessions. |
| 2. M.H., a high school special education teacher, presented her unit summary on using fairy tales to complement reading and writing instruction with handicapped students. She brought every version of Cinderella (she must have had fifteen versions) and recapped how much difference there was in each version. Then, she had us do the comparison-contrast assignment she uses with her students. We all created tri-fold brochures of particular scenes from the stories. It was a wonderful presentation, and we discussed several non-sped applications of her activity. |
| 3. A.M, who is an early childhood specialist with the South Central Cooperative based out of Wagner, brought her box of manipulatives and showed us how each finger skill relates to language acquisition. How informative!! I did not know how important fingering, feeding, arm movements, building towers, and pointing to pictures were to thinking and pre-reading skills. Needless to say, the young mothers in the group (three of our participants have very young children) were completely engrossed. We all were engrossed by this developmental info. |
| 4. I ended class by assigning "Diving with the Whales" (which I've had in photocopy version since I attended the Santa Fe retreat. I also asked them to bring a first draft (very rough draft) of something they felt they MUST write for the next class. We brainstormed possibilities for topics using the overhead, and everyone had a pretty solid idea for a piece by the time she/he left class. |
| My thinking with this assignment was two-fold. I knew they needed to write away from class (in another arena), and I wanted to have us work through a full-fledged revision session in a future class, using the P-Q-P and Bless-Address-Shred strategies. |
| Saturday, March 6, 2004 |
| 1. Writing into the Day: "How do you answer the question, 'What is it like to be a teacher?' " |
| We shared these and discussed inside and outside perceptions of our profession, our professional duties, and our self-concept. There was incredible variety in these responses, and almost NO griping about the unrewarding aspects of teaching. I gained a renewed respect for my colleagues here--something that profits every one of us from time to time. |
| 2. I handed out Lori Burton's write-up of her demo (from the Yankton Open Institute) as a model for a demo write-up. Since I asked the participants to include the demo write-up in their portfolios, they needed a model for the basics. I had emphasized that I did not want a "lesson plan" and that the write-up should include rationale and objectives, research-based thinking, and an explanation as well as the process of the activity. Lori's is a succinct two-pager, and she had given me permission to make copies for use in this class. Notice how these open institutes build one on another? |
| 3. Demo by J.K. J. is a special education teacher in the upper elementary grades. She has worked extensively with the new reading programs that seem to change over and over again in our elementary systems. Her demo involved pictures, brainstorming of adjectives and descriptive phrases, writing (drafting) and revision. We "published" a class picture book that included the pictures she had gathered for our writing and our writing (polished copies). |
| Following J.K.'s demo, we discussed the various visualization strategies possible in all content areas. It was a great demo, and we all benefited from the discussion. |
| 4. Demo by C.V. C's presentation involved grammar, focusing on prepositions. It was actually a great complementary demo to J.K.'s because C.V. also used pictures for writing prompts, but refocused our attention to how grammar augments writing without overwhelming it. |
| 5. Lunch. I ordered pizza from Casey's and we used our lunch time for teacher talk. We also spent some time talking about final portfolios and the need for response to our "must write" pieces. We set up informal groups for response for later in the day. |
| 6. A.T.'s demo. A. is a junior high and high school social studies, language arts, and career planning teacher. . . . She showcased her presentation of writing activities that she includes with a social studies unit on India's Hindu Caste System. A.T. and I had talked extensively about how to present a piece of this unit, which is quite long in duration. We finally settled on the writing of journal entries as they relate to membership in the castes. I think her presentation lasted longer than she thought it would, but we learned so much from our exploration that we were reluctant to let her wrap up. So, the length was partly our fault--we asked questions! |
| 7. Because we were ran up to our scheduled finish time with A.TÕs demo, we did not have a lot of time for the depth of the revision session that I wanted. In the last hour of the class, we broke into groups, shared first copies of our "must write" pieces, and really just shared context and audience. We did use the P-Q-P and Bless-Address-Shred. However, several writers also exchanged pieces and took them with them for a more in-depth response. We decided to work on these again on March 17, knowing that we only had one demo on that class evening. |
| Wednesday, March 17, 2004 |
| Following our NCA in-service session, during which we had to develop Action Plans for implementation of our school improvement interventions, we held a three-hour class session. |
| 1. Writing into the Class: The Michelangelo Experience. Everyone is issued a big piece of paper and tapes the paper on the underside of a table. Using markers and crayons (not paints) I asked everyone to draw a place of significance to them. Of course, in the middle of the drawing part of the activity, the janitor walked in and asked "what the...." It was good for a good chuckle. |
| The writing part of the activity was 1) to write about the physical experience of drawing in a flat-on-your-back position and reaching overhead, and 2) to write about the place each participant drew. |
| We shared these writings and discussed the application of this activity for social studies, art, language arts, history, and science classes. |
| 2. D.C.'s demo: How to Write a Feature Story. D. is a junior high and high school keyboarding and business education teacher and a junior high coach in football and basketball. His demo was a spin-off of an activity he and I had worked on early in the school year. He wanted kids to write about what was happening at WCS and post those articles on his award-winning web site. So, he teaches the feature article format and asks his students to find the news. |
| For us, he asked us to interview one another and write a feature article, using his outline framework. The amazing part of this activity was how much we found out about each other that we had not known. His activity reminded me of Jean Helmer's "In Lieu of Whip and Chair" activity, although is had a different focus. Again, he planned for about an hour activity, but we became so engaged that we used up the better part of 90 minutes. |
| 3. Finally, we spent more time in revision groups, gathering responses to second drafts of our "must write" pieces. Although I was not intending to ask the participants to include these in their final portfolios, most did because they ended up putting so much time and emotional effort into the pieces. These were the pieces they cared about, more so than the article reviews and the demo write-ups, which was a good lesson for me as a facilitator. And the final pieces are as varied as can be. |
| Saturday, March 20, 2004 |
| 1. Writing into the Day: "Who/what has shaped the teacher-writer you are today?" We took about 20 minutes to write, and shared these for another half hour. This turned out to be an excellent prompt, and I can see that most of the participants are definitely easing into the role of writer, which I had very much hoped would happen. |
| 2. S.I's demo. Sue is an elementary Alternative Room teacher. She works with 6-10 kids who do not succeed in traditional classrooms due to behavior (often resulting from abuse and neglect). These are not brain-deficient kids, but they present a huge and very emotional challenge for the teacher. . . . S.I. has been reading Nanci Atwell's In the Middle, and her demo was very much influenced by that reading. She shared with us William Blake's poem "Tiger, Tiger" and pulled us through discussion/brainstorming for ideas and writing about the poem in a group response. |
| Then, S.I. scattered books of poetry on the floor, asked us to find one that we wanted to respond to, and read it to a partner. After we read, we wrote our thinking about the poem. Back in the large group again, we read our poems and responses. This was an engaging activity and an excellent learning experience. |
| Following S.I.'s demo we discussed application of this strategy to other content areas. |
| 3. The final demo of the classes was showcased by V.S. V.S. teaches third grade. She used a sensory writing activity to help us to write character sketches. |
| V.S. gave us all a pickle (dill) and asked us to come up with a list of descriptive words for the sensory experience of touching, smelling and tasting a dill pickle. After we brainstormed, we drew a pickle character and wrote in the voice of that character. The sharing on this activity was hilarious. What creative minds we have here!! |
| 4. We spend about 2.5 hours (before and after lunch) in individual and group writing sessions, preparing our portfolios and the piece we wanted to read at the Writer Reads session, and completing course evaluations. I spent the majority of that time meeting with individual class participants, answering questions, offering feedback, editing a review, etc. |
| 5. Lunch: I served lasagne, salad and French bread--all of which I furnished--in the home-ec room. We enjoyed each other's company but did not focus on writing for our lunch. Instead, we swapped stories of engagements and weddings, primarily because one of our participants, M.H. is marrying our high school government teacher, M.S., on May 8. |
| 6. Our final activity was a Writer Reads Session. As these usually are, the sharing and the pieces were an incredible and heart-warming experience. And c'est fini! |
| Final thoughts: . . . . [T]his open institute was rewarding, challenging, worthwhile, and fulfilling. I so love doing this, especially because it offers what I love to people I love. I hope we can continue the partnership indefinitely. It is worth every penny spent, and it fosters excellent relationships. |
