# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The Being a Writer program offers student-centered, deeply interactive instruction. Its dual goals-fostering students' growth as skilled writers and as caring members of a community-make Being a Writer unique among writing curricula. Being a Writer provides:

# data[].attributes.headline
Free Trial Access to the Learning Portal

# data[].attributes.subject
Free Trial Access to the Learning Portal

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Start a Trial License | Collaborative Classroom

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Sign up for a free trial license and receive full digital access to all Collaborative Classroom curricula for 60 days. Get access to the Collaborative Classroom Learning Portal - home to all digital program resources such as teacher's manuals, student resources, formative & summative assessments, professional learning supports, and more.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Combining a writing process approach with guided instruction, Being a Writer is student-centered, rigorous writing instruction for students in grades K-5.

# data[].attributes.headline
Steps to Creating a Learning Portal Account (After Purchase)

# data[].attributes.subject
Steps to Creating a Learning Portal Account (After Purchase)

# data[].attributes.headline
Being a Writer 2nd Grade Scope & Sequence

# data[].attributes.subject
Being a Writer 2nd Grade Scope & Sequence

# data[].attributes.headline
Blog Post: Best Practices for Equity in Writing Instruction 

# data[].attributes.subject
Blog Post: Best Practices for Equity in Writing Instruction 

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
A Place at the Table

I had a dream recently in which I was editing a paragraph. I wanted to trim every extra word-but made sure to preserve the phrase shadow and grace .

I'll skip an exploration of all that the phrase holds at this particular juncture in human history, and simply ask: Who wrote it? In the dream, it was by an unknown author. On waking, I realized it recalled similar phrases I've heard and read. So was the phrase mine? Yes ... and no.

Words belong to everyone and no one. When we write, we're taking a seat at the communal table-sharing a poem, arguing a point, telling a story, laughing and weeping, responding vociferously or reflecting on others' contributions.

Everyone deserves a place at the table.

Words belong to everyone and no one. When we write, we're taking a seat at the communal table-sharing a poem, arguing a point, telling a story, laughing and weeping, responding vociferously or reflecting on others' contributions. Everyone deserves a place at the table.

And as writers, we practice showing up in a way that commands attention. We apprentice ourselves, hone our craft. Gradually we develop the patience and the determination to wrangle sentences to say something new, true, and important. We come to love the process itself.

This love, and the belief that we can make a contribution to the larger discourse, are necessary to sustain us through the hard parts.

Shadow and Grace

I'm counting more grace than shadows. The odds are working in our favor, so let's dive in and discuss practical ways to improve equity in writing instruction.

#1: Use Facilitation Techniques and Cooperative Structures

"If we all have stories to tell, then we must also stop and listen to the stories others have to share with us. It has to be a two-way communication, which means really listening to the other person too."

If we want of our students to put themselves on the line, literally and figuratively, we need to create an atmosphere of trust and mutual support. Zaretta Hammond writes, "Relationships are the cornerstone of culturally responsive teaching."

Facilitative techniques such as asking open-ended questions and using wait-time, coupled with cooperative structures, help build a true writing community in which all students know that they and their ideas matter. This is a necessary precondition for students to take risks with their writing and produce original work.

During whole-class discussions, open-ended questions help ensure that students dig deeper with their thinking, while wait-time encourages more than a handful of students to enter the discussion.

To use the cooperative structure "Turn to Your Partner," the teacher asks a question; then students turn to face a partner and take turns sharing their ideas. Now is getting a chance to express themselves verbally-a highly effective way to prime the writing pump. With "Think, Pair, Share," students have a few moments to reflect before turning and talking. And with "Think, Pair, Write," students funnel the ideas, language, and energy they've just generated through partner conversations directly onto the page.

Facilitation techniques and cooperative structures are invaluable during writing lessons. Better yet, using these approaches throughout the school day helps all students develop as confident speakers and thoughtful listeners who are more likely to approach writing time as a welcome opportunity to connect with themselves and others.

#2: Establish a Predictable Lesson Structure

"I'm often writing something almost every day. I keep journals: one on the computer, one for dreams, one for general observations and overheard things, and one for learning jazz standards....[I write best] when the airwaves are clear, either really early-like 6 a.m., 7 a.m., before anything is said-or really late." -Joy Harjo, U.S. Poet Laureate

Humans have always known that rituals help generate invention and vision-and at the most basic level simply help us get stuff done. When we know how things happen, we feel less jangled and better able to connect with the task at hand.

Harjo has created a daily practice crucial for continuing to accrue and weave together the multiple strands of her creative work in the midst of a busy life. Similarly, when designing writing instruction it's important to establish a reliable container where students feel safe taking creative and intellectual risks.

In "Principles and Practices for Integrating Social, Emotional, and Academic Learning into Daily Instruction," Peter Brunn recommends a simple, four-part process: preparation for the work; whole-class instruction; individual and small-group work; and lesson reflection. Implementing a durable framework like this can help students settle into their writing and ultimately gain independence and confidence .

And the more they can do that, the more the writing process itself will engage them. It's a positive spiral.

#3: Foreground Voice and Choice

"I regret being scared. I regret wasting time thinking I wasn't good enough, that I didn't deserve a seat at the table.

You do belong and your voice is worthy. Say it to yourself in the mirror every morning if you have to, but don't ever forget it." -Jenna Wortham, Staff Editor, New York Times Magazine

I don't know whether Wortham's words are more heartbreaking or inspiring. I do know we writing teachers have the means to help ensure that more young people don't waste time doubting the worthiness of their voices.

We can make sure our writing curriculum gives all students equal opportunities to exercise their imaginations, express themselves, and explore their identities. (Their plural identities. We all have several, and many students face inequality based on more than one of their identities -for example, racial class gender identities.) Let's not treat these opportunities as rewards to be deferred until our writers master the technical aspects of craft.

As Dr. Marisa Ramirez Stukey and National Writing Project Executive Director Elyse Eidman-Aadahl point out in "Writing for Life: The Evidence Base for Powerful Writing Instruction," "Celebrating and amplifying student voice in writing is an essential aspect of quality writing instruction and is a way to cultivate the unique gifts and talents of each student."

One way we can foreground voice and choice is by encouraging students to select their own topics and develop their own characters. Another is to provide opportunities to write in a variety of genres. Each genre stretches budding writers in a different way.

Through persuasive writing, they learn to present cogent arguments for their points of view. Through nonfiction they learn the importance and practice of backing up ideas with facts.

Personal narrative invites them to share their unique experiences. Fiction opens doors to imaginary worlds while also at times providing a scrim behind which hard truths can be shared safely. Poetry operates as a permissive zone where rules can be freely broken and words become raw material for creative expression, much like paint or modeling clay.

Down the road, having a panoply of genres at their disposal will allow our students to gravitate toward the ones that match their purposes and preferences while also enabling them to approach each piece with more versatility and skill.

#4: Teach the Writing Process

"I never have a problem finding enough words; I have to cut pieces down. That is usually the hard part. What goes? What stays?"

Mochizuki grapples with trimming his drafts; other authors struggle to generate enough language. Each of us brings to the page our own assortment of strengths and weaknesses. But in the writing process we find a structure that helps us work through our individual quirks to produce a piece of solid work.

The writing process is an indispensable tool in our equity toolkit. As Hammond makes clear, we must disrupt the historical tendency to underestimate what our disadvantaged students are capable of intellectually.

Culturally responsive teaching includes helping every student move toward independence. Teaching our students a tried-and-true series of steps that can be internalized over time does just that. I've written about Collaborative Classroom's use of the writing process , but here I'll just note that it includes generating ideas and inspiration through mentor texts, discussion, and quick-writes; writing first drafts; revising; proofreading; and sharing with an audience-with plenty of teacher support and peer input along the way.

#5: Create Authentic Purposes

"Stories can save lives and it's never been truer than in my case, where I am determined to stay alive by pushing back at everything that says people like me are expendable and not worth saving." -Alice Wong, Author, Year of the Tiger (forthcoming 2022)

Disability rights advocate Alice Wong writes with a burning purpose. Not every piece of writing needs to have this level of urgency, but like any of us, students write better and more eagerly when they know their work will have an impact-one more meaningful than demonstrating compliance by turning in assigned work.

Students can present finished pieces to their peers from the Author's Chair, a powerful demonstration that every voice in the class matters. This celebrates the students' hard work throughout the writing process, while providing practice in skills such as oral presentation, listening, and responding in thoughtful, kind ways.

Besides the Author's Chair, other purposes can be established for different types of writing. Students might share persuasive pieces on a classroom or school blog, inviting responses by others in the community, or send them to elected officials. Fiction pieces or personal narratives might be bound together in a book to be featured in the classroom or school library.

Expository nonfiction writing might be done in the form of exhibit materials for a student-created "museum" addressing a particular topic or theme, replete with artifacts created or collected. Poems might be incorporated into a school mural. The sky (a.k.a. your imagination) is the limit.

#6: Provide Diverse Mentor Texts

"Chicana Falsa: And Other Stories of Death, Identity, and Oxnard [by Michele Serros] marks the moment on my timeline when I discovered that I had a voice, and that that voice was bilingual and it was just as valid as any other voice. It was truly an awakening. Bilingual people wrote stories, poems, and books that were taught in colleges? And even used SPANGLISH?!"

Carefully chosen mentor texts do heavy lifting when it comes to both inspiring young writers and teaching them craft. And students need mentor texts that reflect their own identities as well as give them access to others' identities and experiences.

I'm guessing you're familiar with Dr. Rudine Sims Bishop's oft-quoted language about the importance of providing our students with windows, mirrors, and sliding glass doors via multicultural literature. There's a reason we've heard this metaphor a lot-it's profoundly true, and nowhere more so than in the context of writing lessons.

Quintero's quote speaks to the earth-shattering impact that multicultural, #OwnVoices texts (texts by diverse individuals based on their own experiences) can have on students. Thanks to the impetus provided by movements such as #MeToo, #BlackLivesMatter, and #WeNeedMoreDiverseBooks, more and more Own Voices texts are being published .

If we want all of our students to light up and lean forward into read-alouds and writing prompts, getting these texts into our classrooms and libraries is a necessary step.

#7: Write

"...for the first 8 years of my teaching career I never once completed a writing task that I assigned my students. It wasn't until Holden in my 1st period 5 years ago, asked, "So, what is your poem going to be about, Mr. Briseño?" ... Entirely unaware, Holden was inviting me into 1st period's community of practice. I was on the outside, or more accurately, I was at the top of the pyramid and community was scarce." -Stephen Briseño, Educator

Writing alongside our students is a profoundly supportive act. We don't need to be accomplished authors by any means. But we can demonstrate that we view writing as truly important, and gain a profound understanding of our students' writing challenges and breakthroughs, by putting pencil to paper alongside them.

As Dr. Ibram X. Kendi has said, part of the teacher's role is to serve as a " model of vulnerability, of self-criticism ." When students see us check a fact or wrestle with the cadence of a sentence, they gain motivation for chipping away at the craft of writing. When we draft our own stories about the birth of a sibling or the loss of a treasured friend, we build an atmosphere of vulnerability that elicits writing with much more at stake than a grade.

#8: Assess for Individual Growth

"...a real writer is always shifting and changing and searching. The world has many labels for him, of which the most treacherous is the label of Success."
-James Baldwin, Author, Nobody Knows My Name

As teachers it is so difficult to maintain an SEL-healthy approach to students' academic development. We join the larger culture in pushing students toward standardized measures of achievement. Isn't a higher score better? Doesn't "best" mean something?

These measures are what we have, and it is our job to use them. But it's worth stepping off the wheel entirely for a moment and listening to one of our greatest writers.

Baldwin resisted the treachery of labels on every front-even the label of success. As a great writer he knew that every time you pick up your pen you must be ready to write the truth as it comes to you now, here, in this form. And that being told what you are-even being told that you are a success-dampens this readiness to discover and learn.

It's as American as apple pie to strive for success. But an even yummier and more nutritious version of the pie is this: each of our voices is unique and important and constantly evolving. If we believe in serving nourishing pastry for all at the communal table, we need to help our students fall in love with bringing their best , not being the best . That translates into lots of supportive formative assessment during the writing process and across writing projects, avoiding student-to-student comparisons, and holding standardized testing lightly.

Shadow and Grace, Redux

We can give it to our young writers ... and we can give it to ourselves. These are a few of the ways I understand the phrase shadow and grace in the context of equitable writing instruction. How about you?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Facing the Shadows, Moving Toward Grace: Best Practices for Equity in Writing Instruction - Center for the Collaborative Classroom

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Words belong to everyone and no one. When we write, we're taking a seat at the communal table-sharing a poem, arguing a point, telling a story, laughing and weeping, responding vociferously or reflecting on others' contributions. Everyone deserves a place at the table.

# data[].attributes.headline
Writing for Life: The Evidence Base for Powerful Writing Instruction

# data[].attributes.subject
Writing for Life: The Evidence Base for Powerful Writing Instruction

# data[].attributes.headline
A Conversation about Writing Instruction with Elyse Eidman-Aadahl of the National Writing Project

# data[].attributes.subject
A Conversation about Writing Instruction with Elyse Eidman-Aadahl of the National Writing Project

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The National Writing Project (NWP) is one of Collaborative Classroom's most distinguished partners. NWP played a vital role in the development of our comprehensive writing curriculum, Kelly Stuart and Marisa Ramirez Stukey of Collaborative Classroom recently had the pleasure of speaking with Elyse about the mission of the National Writing Project, the organization's ongoing partnership with Collaborative Classroom, best practices in writing instruction, and why the teaching of writing should be on an equal footing with reading instruction. Collaborative Classroom: We're excited to speak with you today. Let's start by talking about the National Writing Project. Tell us about the organization's mission, how you work, and how educators can get involved. Leading this partnership is the National Writing Project's executive director, Elyse Eidman-Aadahl, who has also served as a member of the Collaborative Classroom Board of Trustees since 2017. Collaborative Classroom: When educators engage with the NWP, what will they discover? What might surprise them? Being a Writer, and continues to be an important collaborator and thought partner to this day.
Elyse Eidman-Aadahl: At the National Writing Project, we envision a future where every person is an accomplished writer and engaged learner. We are teachers, university faculty, researchers, writers and journalists, librarians, and community educators who are working to advance writing.

Specifically, we advance writing by growing and sustaining nationally networked local communities of expertise in the teaching of writing. In all, we have 175 Writing Project sites housed on college campuses throughout the United States, and these sites prepare 2,000 new teacher-leaders each year. We also work with current classroom teachers, putting their knowledge to work to improve the teaching of writing, providing professional learning opportunities, and hosting online communities of practice.

Many teachers can find a local NWP site and, for those not living close to one, we have a lot of online support through social media and online events. The best way to hear about our events is through our Write Now email newsletter. People can sign up for the newsletter at nwp.org.
Collaborative Classroom: When considering K-6 writing instruction in general, what do you believe is most important? What guides your thinking?
Elyse Eidman-Aadahl: What teachers will find online or at local NWP sites is a community of educators who are passionate about writing and the teaching of writing. And they come from all levels and subject areas. The Writing Project community is big and diverse, so people can always find others with their particular interests, whether that's teaching writing in a writer's workshop or writing in science or using writing in the community for civic action.

We have a very broad view of writing because there are always new forms and new contexts in which to write. Think of all the new forms of writing that have come into being during just the last few decades due to technology and the internet: blogs, emails, podcasts, and so on. There's always something new in writing.

Something that might surprise those who are newcomers to our work is that we strongly believe in the importance of becoming a writer yourself. Our NWP programs tend to focus on teaching writing, of course, but a lot of what we do at our local sites is to write ourselves. We think that when we are writers ourselves and we're wrestling with what it means to be a writer, that experience brings a level of nuance and understanding to our teaching of writing.

We strongly believe in the importance of becoming a writer yourself . . . We think that when we are writers ourselves and we're wrestling with what it means to be a writer, that experience brings a level of nuance and understanding to our teaching of writing.

One of the things I love about our partnership with Collaborative Classroom and about its Being a Writer curriculum is the emphasis that Being a Writer places on the teacher as writer and the act of teachers writing alongside their students. So, we would invite all teachers using the Being a Writer program to seek out a local NWP site or join our national online community to become part of a community of writers themselves.
Collaborative Classroom: What do you think is essential for writers in grades K-2?
Elyse Eidman-Aadahl: When considering instruction, I think there are a few things that are very important to understand first about writing. Number one is that writing is something we make. Although we have maker movements in areas such as STEM, often people forget that writing is an act of making something. Therefore everything we know about "making" applies. It's a chance to be creative, to be independent, to carry through something that is ours, to make a contribution to the community. Looking through this lens of writing as making, when we are teaching and coaching young writers, we have a perfect opportunity to guide them in becoming reflective, self-managing, and independent learners.

Often people forget that writing is an act of making something. Therefore everything we know about "making" applies. It's a chance to be creative, to be independent, to carry through something that is ours, to make a contribution to the community.

The realization that writing is making also helps us clarify what the work is in a writer's workshop. Like all making, writing is a process. We need to dispel the idea that what we write comes out perfectly the first time. Instead we must embrace the process. It begins as we imagine what we want to write. Then we write a little, we revise it, we write a bit more, and we make it better, just like we do with all the things we make. Writing is making, and human beings love making!
Collaborative Classroom: And what would you say is important for upper-elementary students?
Next, I would hope that all elementary students get a chance to see how writing is a tool for thinking and learning, something that will be useful across their whole lives. We use it in a million ways: to plan, to keep track of things, to organize content, to reflect on our lives. A lot of this is writing that we do for ourselves, for our own purposes. It's low stakes or no stakes. It's done informally in a notebook or journal.

It's important for students to understand that writing is something we can use for ourselves, including managing our emotional lives. That might be especially important now as so many of us are in remote, online, or hybrid learning situations. We're asking students to be a little more planful and self-managing, and writing is a tool for doing that. I'd encourage teachers to really emphasize and welcome all these uses of writing.

Elyse Eidman-Aadahl: Our youngest students are learning how language works, including language that is spoken and language that is in print and graphics. Writing is another window into understanding language. We learn by drawing and then explaining our drawing to others and then working to link the sound-spelling patterns to our explanations. Drawing and writing go hand in hand for our very youngest learners who are learning to move between spoken language and representations of language.

In addition, teacher modeling of the writing process is key for our youngest writers. The teacher shows students how to write, revise, and edit pieces. Drawings can also be revised! Since we are teaching our students that writing is communication, we need to try out our writing on others, listen to our audience, and revise when we get feedback. We want K-2 students to see that process of making and understand it as normal.
Collaborative Classroom: These skills seem so important, and yet writing often gets less attention than reading in the approach to English Language Arts instruction. In fact, a lot of writing instruction is heavily focused on writing in response to reading. How does this impact writing? What are the benefits for students in moving beyond writing in response to a prompt?
Mainly, our youngest students need to understand and practice that we all "read writing" and we "write what people will read." We want them to understand that everything we read was created by a person just like them. Keeping the writer at the center of instruction helps students to see themselves as writers as well.

Elyse Eidman-Aadahl: For our older elementary writers, we can build from the strong foundation of writing from K-2. Content, genre, and mentor texts are essential for this age group. Older writers begin to expand their knowledge of the world, and therefore their writing expands as well. These students need to write across the disciplines, explore their own learning through writing, as well as explore their interests.

In addition, through the use of mentor texts, students can try out different techniques using published authors as their model. Another writer can give us insight into the different ways we can write, and if students come to understand that they can always look to other writing as a source of ideas for their own writing, they will have learned a very useful life skill.
Collaborative Classroom: Written communication-especially in today's digital world-is everywhere. Why might teachers think differently about placing equal importance on writing?
Lastly, I would say that writing for an authentic audience and understanding who that audience is are both essential for grades 3-5. These upper-elementary students can reach a larger and more distant audience than students in earlier grades. So much of learning to write comes from learning how your writing comes across to an audience, what they understand or get confused by, what made an impression on them, or where they got lost. Reading our own writing from the perspective of an audience is a vital but very challenging skill that is learned most effectively when we actually get to write for an authentic audience.

When students publish their work for a real audience, this is a great place to introduce the idea of editing for "correctness." Grammar and conventions are essential aspects of the writing process, yet the research literature is clear that instruction in those areas happens best in context-right when the students have a need to ensure proper spelling and punctuation and care about getting it right.

Elyse Eidman-Aadahl: One of the most significant impacts of instruction that's centered on "writing in response to reading" is that this approach narrows writing to short-answer or constructed responses in the reading program. It may seem as if the students are doing a lot of writing, but the writing they are doing is mostly just a comprehension check based on response to a passage they have been given. If this is the majority of writing that students are doing, then there are a wide range of writing experiences they are not having: generating their own ideas for writing, writing more substantive genres, doing their own research and writing about that.

A big part of learning to write is learning what to do when you face the blank page-when you are generating your own topic and question, rather than just responding to a question that was given to you. Every child has questions and a desire to learn.
Collaborative Classroom: How might teachers balance the need for teaching students to respond to a prompt and perform well on tests with the need to offer students choice, ownership, and voice in their creative endeavors?
Children also bring enormous funds of knowledge. If our children aren't writing about something they choose, a topic in which they have the ability to be an authority, they aren't learning the full aspects of what it means to write. It is an error and a huge missed opportunity if students end up thinking, "Only after I read, I write."

Elyse Eidman-Aadahl: Well, you're right that writing happens everywhere. Writing as a skill is a huge gatekeeper and advancer for people. In the workplace and in higher education, writing skills are essential to success.

But it's not just about writing in the future world of college and work. Kids are already publishing and writing in multiple forms on the internet. As we look at social media or online games, kids are constantly making things and publishing. The challenge is that there is often no link for most kids between what they are learning in school and what they are publishing right now in the world.
Collaborative Classroom: Given the fact that most texts that students experience at school are less representative than they should be, how do we encourage and support students' own voices and teach them high-level writing skills? How can writing support individual children's identities?
If we as educators can make this link, this is a powerful opportunity to support students in understanding the responsibility of being an author. Knowledge, authority, and ethics are parts of being an author. It's a way of showing students that they matter and their thoughts matter.

As we look at social media or online games, kids are constantly making things and publishing. The challenge is that there is often no link for most kids between what they are learning in school and what they are publishing right now in the world. If we as educators can make this link, this is a powerful opportunity to support students in understanding the responsibility of being an author.

Elyse Eidman-Aadahl: We know that when kids have a strong writing program in which they do lots of writing and develop fluency, they do better on assessments. When students don't have opportunities for regular writing, but instead just do writing that is focused on preparing for the test, they may not do well, and in fact, a sole focus on writing for high-stakes situations can produce writing anxiety. Students who develop fluency and stamina, as well as confidence in their writing, typically excel in writing and on assessments. Confident writers will do better than anxiety-filled writers.
Collaborative Classroom: Our ongoing partnership with the National Writing Project has been such a rich experience. Could you say a little about how that partnership began?
I know that teachers often feel a pressure to teach students the formula that will "ace the test." For many years, I have worked with the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) in writing and with several state committees, and NWP has its own writing assessment tools. In all of these cases, assessors work hard to not look for formulaic writing, but to look for writing that has an engaging voice and interesting content. When scorers see this kind of writing, it really stands out.

So I would say to teachers that if they encourage a lot of writing, help students develop fluency and ease in generating content, and help them develop independence and confidence as writers, their students should do well in most writing assessments.

Elyse Eidman-Aadahl: Writing is an extraordinary thing. It's transcendent. I want students to understand that writing has the amazing capacity to let us all contribute to a conversation that started before we were born and that will continue after we're gone. Our writing will continue beyond us. Your location, your voice, your place, your community need to be a part of that conversation.

Therefore we want a wonderfully representative set of texts and imagery for our students. And, when we see a book that shows difference, we use it as a mentor text-as a way that we can learn about someone or something different from ourselves. We should also encourage students to write books themselves, bind them, and publish them so that they can see themselves in the books on the shelf.
Collaborative Classroom: As you've said, the National Writing Project was involved in the early development of Being a Writer and has continued to be supportive of the work we do in that curriculum. What specifically about our approach resonates with your beliefs about teaching writing?

Writing is an extraordinary thing. It's transcendent. I want students to understand that writing has the amazing capacity to let us all contribute to a conversation that started before we were born and that will continue after we're gone.

Elyse Eidman-Aadahl: The National Writing Project began working with Collaborative Classroom back in 2005 when the organization was still called Developmental Studies Center, very early in the development of the Being a Writer program. This was a period of tremendous growth in both research about writing and the practice of teaching writing, so it was exciting to be part of imagining and conceptualizing a comprehensive curriculum that really focused on writing.

For context, it's important to remember that, at that time, there was a considerable investment in the development of reading curricula, and sometimes writing instruction was added as an afterthought. In contrast, Being a Writer puts writing and the writer at the center of the curriculum in a way that complements the full range of language arts experiences. It was great to be a part of that project early on.

Later, of course, local NWP sites may have worked with teachers and schools adopting the Being a Writer curriculum, and the partnership grew. Now, as a member of the Collaborative Classroom Board of Trustees, I have an opportunity to see how this partnership can continue into the future.

Being a Writer puts writing and the writer at the center of the curriculum in a way that complements the full range of language arts experiences.

Elyse Eidman-Aadahl: The program name itself says a lot about the intent. From the very beginning, Being a Writer treats the student as a writer. That is vitally important. The message that you are already a writer sends a message to students: you are a writer, you are going to get even better at your writing, and you are going to learn about a lot of different kinds of writing. The program is telling students that their voice is important. Being a Writer is also a curriculum that values and addresses the craft of writing and the fact that there is a deep connection between what we want to do as readers, writers, speakers, and listeners.

Also, one of the many places where [fellow Collaborative Classroom board member] Zaretta Hammond and I agree is that frequently we see writing instruction that is over-scaffolded. Many teachers end up doing the majority of writing and thinking for their students, and unfortunately students are just doing a small part, remaining dependent learners.

Being a Writer takes a very different approach: students are given a lot of choice and independence, and teachers release responsibility throughout the program, yet have ways to support students with revising, editing, and correcting within the context of the students' writing, where it makes sense. This approach to writing instruction enables students to build their skills and continually know they are writing for real audiences-and most importantly, they know that their individual voices and thoughts have value. Each student is, in effect, being a writer from the very start.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
A Conversation about Writing Instruction with Elyse Eidman-Aadahl of the National Writing Project - Center for the Collaborative Classroom

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The National Writing Project (NWP) is one of Collaborative Classroom's most distinguished partners. NWP played a vital role in the development of our comprehensive writing curriculum, Kelly Stuart and Marisa Ramirez Stukey of Collaborative Classroom recently had the pleasure of speaking with Elyse about the mission of the National Writing Project, the organization's ongoing partnership with Collaborative Classroom, best practices in writing instruction, and why the teaching of writing should be on an equal footing with reading instruction.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
We all light up when we see small children express themselves spontaneously, through a drawing, a song, a somersault, a giggle, or a heartfelt sigh. And we all admire the great writers whose texts impart powerful insights, make the bestseller lists, or morph into movies that move us.

What happens in between?

Not every student will become a renowned author, of course--though some most certainly will. But all of our students can and should come to see themselves as writers, experience a love of writing, and grow in their ability to write clearly, creatively, and purposefully.

So exactly how do we nurture that original, expressive spark we celebrate in the very young, while steadily feeding and guiding the flame? How do we develop writers who are able to confidently and effectively communicate through written language, so that they can succeed in school and beyond?

Best Practices in Writing Instruction

According to the Institute of Education Sciences (IES) at the National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance, a successful writing program must:

Provide time to write daily

Teach the writing process and have students apply it for a variety of purposes

Help students develop fluency with handwriting, spelling, sentence construction, and typing and word-processing

Create an engaged community of writers¹

The "Strategy Guide for Implementing the Writing Process" published by the International Literacy Association (ILA) echoes IES's emphasis on teaching the writing process, adding that the process is further enhanced when students coach each other. The ILA guide points out that the writing process empowers students to write in several genres, encourages creativity, incorporates writing conventions, and connects writing to state writing standards. These attributes show up in assessment, as well. As the guide notes, "studies show that students who learn the writing process score better on state writing tests than those who receive only specific instruction in the skills assessed on the test."²

From Writing Process to Writing Workshop

Regie Routman advocates that students "write daily, for a sustained time, for authentic audiences and purposes."⁴ Lucy Calkins and her colleagues at the Teachers' College Reading and Writing Project have done an enormous amount to refine Graves' initial writing process approach. Jennifer Serravallo includes, among her ten goals for writing, those of helping students learn conventions of spelling, letter formation, grammar, and punctuation, and that of supporting collaboration and partnership in the writing process. ⁵ Ralph Fletcher and Joann Portalupi's classic Writing Workshop: The Essential Guide discusses the importance of establishing an atmosphere of respect and support in which students exercise choice and are willing to take risks.⁶

Proponents of the writing workshop model advocate for additional practices that operate in harmony with the IES guidelines. These include the use of mentor texts to inspire and motivate students, teacher modeling at various stages of the writing process, one-on-one writing conferences with students, and careful formative and summative assessment of students' development as writers.

Our Approach to Teaching Writing

Following Graves' foundational work, our approach to writing instruction is based on the writing workshop ⁷ and incorporates the best practices recommended by IES and ILA. We also stay true to Collaborative Classroom's commitment to educating the whole child, by which we mean addressing students' social-emotional, ethical, and academic development in a deeply integrated way.

In classrooms using our work, teachers provide daily opportunities to write in the context of safe, caring classrooms. They teach and model the writing process from first inspiration to the fixing of punctuation, and include a variety of genres, use mentor texts, and assess student development.

Our approach empowers students and gives them ownership of their writing. They exercise meaningful choice of writing topics and write for authentic purposes. All instruction takes place within the classroom writing community, in which every student is a valued and supported member. Students regularly publish their finished work and share it with their community.

Our approach also supports instructional equity in the teaching of writing by providing a year-long program of grade-specific, fully articulated lessons, allowing teachers, with minimal preparation, to provide robust, consistent, carefully paced K-6 instruction that is grounded in Collaborative Classroom's four decades of research and practice.

These lessons incorporate highly engaging mentor texts selected to exemplify specific writing strategies and genres, and to both mirror students' diverse backgrounds and provide windows into the worlds of others. 8 The accompanying assessment and conferring tools have been assiduously designed to track students' development, provide data needed to respond in real time to their evolving needs, and help teachers arrive at grades.

How Our Writing Instruction Unfolds

Skills and conventions in grades 1-6 are taught during the proofreading phase; additional support is provided through flexible, modular skill practice teaching and practice guides. For all grades, the year ends with a unit that helps the students reflect on their growth as writers.

While the writing process itself has been shown to help students prepare for standardized tests, we also offer detailed, grade-specific guides that help students prepare for writing performance tasks and the unique demands of standards-based writing assessments in grades 3-6. Each guide provides explicit instruction toward this goal and can be used between genre units.

The integration of academic and social-emotional learning is fundamental to our pedagogy, and every lesson across grades K-6 braids these strands together through the use of cooperative structures such as "Turn to Your Partner" and "Think, Pair, Share." These structures provide consistent opportunities for students to practice SEL skills and competencies as they work with partners to provide constructive feedback on one another's writing. In addition, lesson facilitation tips for teachers are embedded in every lesson, allowing for in-the-moment professional learning and deepening of teachers' craft.

Writing well is not easy. No worthy task is, whether you're climbing a mountain, playing the drums, or writing code. The teaching of writing requires a careful balancing of freedom and discipline, so that students become equally willing to take creative risks and attend to the nuances of writerly craft. Collaborative Classroom's approach to teaching writing weaves together the many threads of good writing instruction in a seamless and effective way. This allows students to develop their innate capacity for powerful self-expression within a safe, caring environment, and allows teachers to focus on their calling: the teaching of students.

²"Strategy Guide: Implementing the Writing Process," International Literacy Association, http://www.readwritethink.org/professional-development/strategy-guides/implementing-writing-process-30386.html

³Graves, Donald H., "All Children Can Write," Learning Disabilities Focus 1, no. 1 (1985): 36-43. http://www.ldonline.org/article/6204/

⁴Regie Routman, "Read, Write, Lead: Breakthrough Strategies for Schoolwide Literacy Success," Scholastic Reader Leader (2014), http://www.regieroutman.org/files/3814/0349/5918/Routman_Reader_Leader_May_2014.pdf

⁷ The workshop approach accords perfectly with Collaborative Classroom's grounding in constructivist pedagogy. This pedagogy was first articulated by psychologist Jean Piaget, who observed that children construct their own knowledge, and argued that therefore our job as educators is to place before them the tools they need to do that construction at each phase in their development, and a safe environment in which to do it.

⁸ Mariana Souto-Manning et al., eds., No More Culturally Irrelevant Teaching , in Not This But That series, ed. Ellin Oliver Keene and Nell K. Duke (Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 2018), 8-9.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Our Approach to Teaching Writing | Center for the Collaborative Classroom

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In classrooms using our work, teachers provide daily opportunities to write in the context of safe, caring classrooms. They teach and model the writing process from first inspiration to the fixing of punctuation, and include a variety of genres, use mentor texts, and assess student development.

# data[].attributes.body
Being a Writer is one of the only programs recommended by the National Writing Project.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Summary: Being a Writer is a flexible writing curriculum for grades K-6 based on the writers workshop model. The curriculum is also based on NWP's widely shared principles of literacy and language learning. Originally developed by the Development Studies Center (DSC), Being A Writer is now part of the Center for the Collaborative Classroom (CCC) since DSC's merger with Cornerstone Literacy, Inc. NWP is now partnering with CCC to build and enhance a community of writers.

It's not about the 4-paragraph essay or whatever, it's about students realizing what they have to say, it's about kids really realizing that they are writers and they have stories to tell and their stories have value.

"There are few commercially-available elementary school curricula that really address growth in writing," says Richard Sterling, Director Emeritus of the National Writing Project. "Not just writing as a way to improve reading," he adds, "but writing on its own terms. Being a Writer is one of them. I served as advisor and Trustee for the Developmental Studies Center (DSC), the non-profit organization in Oakland that developed the program for several years, and I am pleased to see this program made available to schools and districts nation-wide."

Being a Writer is a flexible writing curriculum for grades K-6 based on the writers workshop model that works to build a community of writers steeped in rich literature and high-quality trade books that can spark both social and writing development. Being a Writer treats writing as a content area in its own right, not just a handmaiden to other content areas. And its commitment to supporting young writers begins with our youngest students.

For Kelly Stuart, Vice President of Implementation at CCC and also a former elementary school teacher, the idea that students feel like writers within the first week of school plays a significant role in how teachers approach using the program and how they see themselves as writing teachers. "The intent of our author team was to treat students as though they are already writers which is why we named it Being a Writer as opposed to Becoming a Writer."

Being a Writer is built around regular and ample periods of writing with units focused on genre study using high-quality children's literature and trade books. Units are also built around recurring ways of working together in the community of writers: teacher and peer conferences, classroom discussion of writing informed by models, collaborative writing, student self-assessment, and an emphasis on choice. Careful attention to teaching students how to work positively in a community harken back to the DSC's founding by Eric Schaps as a research center concerned with character development, social and emotional learning, and positive youth development in schools and communities.

According to Sue Wilder, a Center for the Collaborative Classroom Regional Director National, "Literacy learning at its best is about more than simply teaching writing and preparing for the test, it's also about how literacy helps us become full and responsible human beings."

Local Site Partnerships

The common interest in workshop models for writing instruction has led to collaborations between districts implementing Being a Writer and local Writing Project sites. Peter Brunn, Vice President of Organizational Learning and Communications at the Center for the Collaborative Classroom, sees this as a natural partnership, where local Writing Project sites become long-term professional development homes for teachers who begin to engage with teaching of writing as their school moves forward with the program. "Writing Project teachers bring a passion and depth of knowledge that can really support a school working with Being a Writer," according to Brunn. "It gives teachers a community."

And in support of NWP's mission, Brunn adds, " Being a Writer gives districts an opportunity to scale quality writing instruction. A lot of teachers come to the National Writing Project and they come to feel a vocation, almost, as teachers of writing, and they give of themselves as teachers and leaders. Our challenge is to provide experiences for teachers who haven't had that yet and are just getting started." Partnerships between districts and schools using Being a Writer and local NWP sites can provide a place for a whole new generation of teachers to work with writing in their classrooms and then take their developing insights and questions to a community of engaged colleagues at the Writing Project.

"At the end of the day, the Being a Writer curriculum is a book," Brunn notes, "and like any book it has a beginning, a middle, and an end. It's static. A professional learning community provides the nourishment that a teacher needs to go beyond it."

Rhonda Sutton of the Northeastern Pennsylvania Writing Project agrees that educators working with Being a Writer will find common ground with writing project work. Speaking on NWP Radio, she said, "There are really three key ideas that people should continue to think about as connections. One is the core belief between Writing Project sites and Being a Writer, which are to provide time for writing; that students choose their writing topic and they're writing for real audiences; and that there is modeling of good writing. In addition to that, I also think that it's important for people to understand, too, that Being a Writer is about giving students the ability to write clearly, creatively, and purposefully for sustained periods of time. And lastly, the instruction of the program supports the development of the writer rather than the writing."

Teacher as Writer

Another connection is in the expectation that teachers have literate lives too. Like NWP, Being a Writer puts a premium on teachers as writers. "When teachers see their students really getting engaged with writing, and produce real work and get excited about it, and complain when the bell rings for recess, it sometimes takes them by surprise. And it makes them really want to reflect on their own experience as a writer and how they might become writers themselves and nurture that voice inside them that was waiting to get out" commented Sue Wilder.

Consistent with NWP core philosophy and the workshop model itself, Being a Writer emphasizes teachers writing along with their students, exploring writing from the inside, and sharing insights as both teacher and fellow writer. Every unit contains ideas for teachers as writers as well as lessons for students. "This is another place where partnerships with local Writing Project sites can benefit teachers in Being a Writer districts," said Brunn.

Common Roots

It's not surprising to find so many synergies between Being a Writer, NWP sites, and professional development work, suggested Elyse Eidman-Aadahl, Executive Director of the National Writing Project, as they developed from common roots in research and practice in the teaching of writing. "But more importantly," she added, "both organizations design learning around the potential in every writer and in every teacher to contribute some new knowledge or new perspective in the world through writing. Schools are very much about consuming. But when you shift your gaze toward producing, and think about how to support young people to become creators and makers, you start to see that Being a Writer and the National Writing Project spring from common values as well."

Download "Connecting to the CCC Learning Hub_Directions for NWP Sites"

Related Resource Topics

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Being a Writer: Curriculum to Build a Community of Writers

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Summary: Being a Writer is a flexible writing curriculum for grades K-6 based on the writers workshop model. The curriculum is also based on NWP's widely shared principles of literacy and language learning. Originally developed by the Development Studies Center (DSC), Being A Writer is now part of the Center for the Collaborative Classroom (CCC) since DSC's merger with Cornerstone Literacy, Inc.

# data[].attributes.headline
Webinar: Our Journey to Improve Engagement and Rigor through Writing

# data[].attributes.subject
Webinar: Our Journey to Improve Engagement and Rigor through Writing

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Our Journey to Improve Engagement and Rigor Through Writing | Collaborative Classroom

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Is your writing instruction rigorous, with your students actively engaged in the work of making meaning as they write? And what role does social and emotional learning (SEL) play in successful writing instruction?