Writing+Response+Groups


 * === Objective: === || =Essential Questions: = ||
 * ==== Actively participate in writing response groups with fellow writers to share experiences and move writing forward during the writing process. ==== || ====1) How could Writing Response Groups be used in your classroom? ====

2) What frameworks and/or strategies can we provide our students with to better guide their thinking during the collaborative peer response process?
||

**Conversations Among Writing Peers**

//I think you get different results in peer conferences, depending upon whether you structure the response or not. Just as with anything else, some kind of structure is helpful, especially in the beginning, with students who are just learning how to respond.//

//The structure in peer conferencing can act like training wheels. The first thing it can do, just as training wheels do, is make it safe. It makes it safe for the writer to share if he or she knows that the first response is going to be a positive response, and then that there are going to be questions, and then they are going to have an opportunity to ask questions. But I would view it as exactly that - as a type of training wheels. And when you feel that students get it, that they feel safe in the conferencing and they feel good about the kind of feedback they're getting and they're able to receive it, then you can remove the training wheels.//

//And once the training wheels are removed, the structure of the conferences can be negotiated based on what the writer feels he or she needs to hear to take the next steps with a paper and what the students listening to the writing feel is important.//
 * --Jacke Wilde**

//Conferences are not mini-lectures but the working talk of fellow writers sharing their experience with the writing process.//
 * --Carl Anderson**

//When I think about my own learning experience, it is through my interaction with others that I construct meaning, grow new knowledge and transform my thinking. When I reflect on my experiences in the National Writing Project, writing response groups and peer dialogue played an integral role in my writing development.//
 * --Amber White**

**Writing Response Groups ** **__Overview__ ** Writing response groups help shine the spotlight of awareness on the writer's thinking through intentional listening and talk. Opening up this collaborative space while drafting will help move your writing forward. Active listening. This is probably one of the most challenging, yet wonderfully rewarding things we can do to assist our peers within the response group. Active listening can take many forms, but don't let it fool you; it can move mountains and writing too! Discussion is an important part of learning. Our individual understanding, ideas, and perspectives are enhanced when we have the opportunity to interact with others. Paraphrasing is an effective way to demonstrate active listening while purposefulling helping the writer organize their thinking. It may be as simple as asking questions or mirroring back what was said in the listener's own words or lifting the text to call attention to a powerful writing technique. It can be more sophisticated, like passing back information in an emerging list of key points or helping the person shift their conceptual focus by extracting the text/passage the listener believes will be strengthened by revisitng and reworking.

Develop a culture of trust: get to know one another, actively listen to everyone, share air time, ask questions, paraphrase, encourage risk-taking writing, come prepared, respect differences, press thinking by engaging in meaningful talk about craft, revision and trait language, and don't forget to appreciate all the The following protocols will be utilized during TE 601 to provide an overarching framework for discussing and growing writing during Writing Response Groups.

**Writing Response Groups & Protocols** **TIP: Focus on the "Language of Discussion" vs. "Language of Instruction"** Adapted from Dr. Frank Serafini, //Interactive Comprehension Strategies:// //Fostering Meaningful Talk About Text// (2009)
 * === TE 601 Writing Response Groups === ||= === Peer Reader Framework === ||= === STAR Strategy by Kelly Gallagher === ||
 * [[file:TE 601Writing Response Groups.pdf]] ||= [[file:Peer Reader Framework.pdf]] ||= [[file:STAR.pdf]] ||
 * **Language of Instruction** || **Language of Discussion** ||
 * Call to attention/focus || Invitations to participate ||
 * Explicitness || Tentativeness ||
 * Explanatory talk || Exploratory talk ||
 * Pacing || Allowance of divergences ||
 * Focus on objectives || Focus on possibilities ||
 * Responses used to confirm || Responses used to extend ||