Learning how to respond to students' writing

This week my students turned in their very first piece of writing. My cooperating teacher had warned me that many of the students had never written before, but I was still excited to see what they could do. The students had the option to respond to one of three prompts that correlated with the story we had read as a class. When I began grading my students' work I was definitely surprised by the papers I received. Many students had obviously never written before, and seemed to want to summarize the story instead of responding to the prompt. The effect of texting on writing was also evident, as a lot of my students chose to abbreviate words and forgot to use punctuation. However, in spite of this I was still very pleased with what I received. I had to keep in mind that my students really had not had a chance to write before entering my class, and they all put forth their best effort. We had gone over the important parts of an introduction previously that week, and I was very excited to see that almost every student formulated their introduction correctly. In addition to this, I loved being able to read the students' thoughts about the various topics. Every student had something great to say, and their essays were fun to read.

When I began grading the papers, I didn't want to be too critical. No one likes getting back a paper that is covered in red marks, and as this was basically my students’ first attempt at writing, I didn’t want to undermine their efforts. My CT and I agreed that it was best to focus on the positives for this first paper, instead of correcting every single mistake. This paper will serve as a learning process, a baseline we can use to decide what elements of an essay we need to focus on.
As I was writing this post I came across an article by Brian Slusher that addressed the exact problem I was facing. I didn’t want to be too critical, but I also wanted to make sure my students knew what they needed to improve. His article, titled “Praising, Questioning, Wishing: An Approach to Responding to Writing,” gave me a lot of great tips for responding to student writing. As evident by the article's title, Slusher encourages readers to use the Praise, Question, Wish model of response to help writers. He states, “Praise, Question, and Wish solves these dilemmas of tone by adopting positive language that strengthens the writer's confidence, while empowering him to take control of his piece.”

Through this model of response, writers are able to see what you appreciated about their writing, which generally motivates them to want to continue to write. This model also works for teachers, because it allows for the ability to give constructive feedback that can help students continue to improve, without returning a paper full of red marks. I really liked the wish part of this model, because, as Slusher states, “Since many writers are sensitive about receiving advice, it is a good idea to avoid sounding like you are directing their piece. The word wish has a positive connotation, so starting your advice with I wish avoids the tone of a command. For example, ‘I wish you would tell more about the horse.’” This allows the response to seem more like a conversation than an order.
I’m hoping that as I continue to teach my students how to format an essay, the papers I get will only continue to improve. I have a very intelligent, hardworking class, so I know this will be the case. I can’t wait to read more papers! I told a student this and he looked at me like I was crazy, and then said, “If I had to read that many papers I’d probably fall asleep.” Funny kid.

I love my students and I love my school. This year just keeps getting better!