Inside Writing: How to Teach the Details of Craft

by Donald H. Graves, Penny Kittle

Learn more about the Heinemann Seminar based on this Your curriculum is packed, and you have barely enough instructional time to teach students essential writing skills, let alone how to combine those skills to form cohesive, compelling work. Fortunately, there is a solution to the time crunch, a quicker, more effective way to help children understand the complexities of writing, and Don Graves and Penny Kittle are ready to share it with you. In Inside Writing , Graves and Kittle show you the power behind an apprenticeship approach to writing instruction where you mentor students using your own writing-even if you don't consider yourself a writer. Inside Writing is a practical, flexible three-part program that gives you numerous entryways for learning how to model the central elements of the Begin with any aspect of Inside Writing, and you'll discover new insights about high-quality writing instruction. The DVD : go inside real classrooms to watch as teachers from grades 2-6 demonstrate their writing process for students, and hear teachers and students share what a difference this teaching technique makes; hear commentary tracks from Graves and Kittle that underscore important instructional moments; listen in as the authors discuss their own writing processes; and print seventy-eight quick-writes prompts form your computer's DVD drive. The book : read about the voluminous research that supports the efficacy of the apprenticeship method for teaching children to write; strengthen the link between instructional theory and your own day-to-day classroom-teaching practices; and gain a new understanding of the role of writing in both your students' lives and yours. My Quick Writes Use Graves' favorite Quick Write topics to practice your own writing and reflect on it; find prompts for in-class quick writes with children that prepare them for timed testing situations without giving over your writing workshop to mere test prep; and make connections between your writing process and your students'. Sharpen your writing instruction by learning to trust your own writing. Then teach your students in a powerful, lasting way that will help them to not only understand the elements of writing, but also to combine them into better finished products. Apprentice yourself to Donald Graves and Penny Kittle and go Inside Writing . for a brief walkthrough of the book, notebook and DVD.

Genres: Education, Nonfiction, Teaching, Professional Development

240 pages, Paperback

First published September 12, 2005

About the author

Donald Graves was one of the greatest voices of his generation, a plain spoken, thoughtful genius. He was an educator, a writer, an outspoken advocate for educational best practices. His death was a loss too great to put into words for people the world over, whether they were aware of it or not. A Professor Emeritus at the University of New Hampshire, Donald Graves, with the help of mentor Donald Murray and contemporaries like Lucy Calkins and Ralph Fletcher, revolutionized writing instruction in the U.S. with the widespread practice of practical workshop-based language arts instruction. In his decades at the forefront of writing instruction research, Donald offered numerous works that continue to shape the face of instruction today and for the foreseeable future.

Reviews

[Beth · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are some great gems in this book, but it isn't the most cohesive of professional texts I've ever read. I didn't really get a sense of where Penny's voice fit into this book even though she's a co-author.

I do, however, love the strategies suggested for helping students expand on and revise their writing. I especially love the idea of asking students to find the heartbeat of a piece of writing. That's a phrase I definitely plan to use in the future.

[Melissapalmer404 · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm taking a course on this book next month....it was a decent read about ways to improve writing instruction.

[Annette Steele]

I am going to have to come back to this book as I just wasn't ready for it.

[Anne · Rating 5 out of 5]

yes!

[Kurt · Rating 1 out of 5]

61. Inside Writing: How to Teach the Details of Craft, by Donald Graves. 110 pages. Yet another writing book. Are you that bored? Looking for a life? Look elsewhere.