Michelle Strange

September
1. Describe your approach to composition.  I typically assign the students a topic to write about and give them possible ideas that they might use in their writing. We follow the steps in the writing process.

2. How often do your students attempt to write each week?  Typically we write between three and five times a week.

3. How have you integrated technology into instruction in the past?  Yes. I use the computers for Accelerated Reader, Orchard, STAR Reading and Math. I also use them with different instructional methods including power point presentations, CPS, research activities, word processing, etc.

4. What do you hope to gain from participation in this project?  I hope to learn new ways to teach writing in my classroom. I want to make writing more exciting for my students and hopefully to improve their ability to write more creatively and effectively. I hope to find out ways to introduce writing that make the children want to write without having to feel like they are constantly being prodded to write more or to change what they have written. I want them to have a method by which they can learn to express themselves more effectively and enjoy doing so.  

October
 

1. Describe your class’ positive experience(s) with Four Square writing this past month.

I was very pleased with my students’ success with Four Square this month. I was very surprised at how well they were able to grasp the idea. My class is generally very low in every area due to low reading levels and were able to do the four square writing much more easily than I had anticipated.

2. How far did your students get with the Four Square method? (4 Square, 4 Square to paper, 4+1, 4+3) Why? We only did 4 square to paper twice. We were able to complete several 4 square only writing activities. I’m trying to work on their abilities to write a good complete sentence and to avoid spelling errors of words that we’ve covered as word wall words or spelling words. If this group can manage to write a good topic sentences and four more complete sentences I will feel satisfied.

3. Have you experienced any problems through your participation in this project this past month? Describe. The biggest problems I’ve faced is writing complete sentences and remembering to indent and do so correctly. The children seem to have no concept of what it means to write a paragraph or what it means to indent. Very few students have really grasped the idea that you indent any time you write a paragraph of any kind. I’ve modeled for the students, had them look in books at paragraphs, showed them other writing samples, etc. and nothing seems to be working.

4. What suggestions would you have for making this project more beneficial to you and your students? I feel that it is important to emphasize that we do not have to complete all parts of the writing process every day. I appreciated hearing that it was okay to just have the students do a four square and not take it to the lined paper. For my students at this point, that was a relief. We are focusing so much on learning to read (three are on or below a first grade reading level) that trying to take on too many new things would be frustrating for both the students and myself.

November

1. Describe positive experience(s) with Four Square writing this past month.

My students are doing much better with their four square writing activities. They seem to be more comfortable with starting a project and even request to be able to take it on to the lined paper even if it was not required. I have noticed the students reminding each other to capitalize, punctuate correctly, and to indent which is quite a change. The students will ask when we are going to do a four square which has never happened which shows me that not only are they more comfortable with the process, but they are enjoying it as well.

2. How far did your students get with the Four Square method? (4 Square, 4 Square to paper, 4+1, 4+3) Why?

We have gotten to 4 square to paper at least once a week if not more often. We were able to complete 4 square +1 on two occasions (thanks to Connie’s help on her visit with us). I don’t feel as comfortable with doing four square +1 yet due to several students still struggling with complete sentences.

3. Discuss the Virtual Field Trip experience.

Our virtual field trip experience was very successful. The kids loved the idea of going on a field trip without leaving the classroom and started calling me Ms. Frizzle from the Magic School Bus episodes. We did the Colonial America field trip with Connie, a virtual field trip to the National Zoo in Washington, D.C. which I had created for my son’s class, and attempted the Easter Island field trip. The students had trouble with the last field trip when it came to doing a four square activity due to being unable to really understand the material presented and then remember enough of it to take to the paper. I hope to do additional field trips with the students, as well as to create some of my own.

4. What problems are your students encountering?

The students are having trouble with complete sentences and with writing only one sentence in each box or including details that are on the topic of that particular square and not jumping from one idea to another. Some are still forgetting to indent. They are also struggling with editing which I expected, but seem to be very slow in being able to help correct.

5. What problems are you experiencing?

I am having trouble with helping the students who are struggling with understanding when and how to indent. I am also having trouble with introducing the concept of editing the student’s own work as well as other’s work. Either they don’t want to be critical or they don’t see the mistakes. I am afraid it is more that they do not see the mistakes.

6. What suggestions would you have for making this project more beneficial to you and your students?

I believe stressing the fact that you don’t have to rush into all parts at once and that it is okay to just do a four square and stop. I would like to see more activities that help with topics such as indenting and editing. I am trying to put up paragraphs to edit on a daily basis as practice, but am finding it hard to find the time to come up with them. It would be nice if there were such examples on the web which could be easily accessed and even put on the TV screen or made into a transparency.

December
 

1. Describe positive experience(s) with Four Square writing this past month.

My students are doing much better with their writing this month. They are becoming more and more comfortable with the activities and are eager to start a new activity. Some of the students who were having quite a bit of difficulty are doing much better.

2. How far did your students get with the Four Square method this month? (4 Square, 4 Square to paper, 4+1, 4+3) Why?

Most of my students are doing a four square + 1 to paper. A few are still trying to master doing a 4 square to paper. Two of these students are pulled out for special ed. The students are becoming much better at writing complete sentences and staying on subject which has helped us a great deal.

3. Discuss the Sentence Stretcher experience.

Most of the students did well on the sentence stretcher activity. A few had quite a bit of trouble with the activity. I think most of the problems were due to limited vocabulary and other problems such as limited reading ability.

4. Were you able to complete a Colonial America writing activity? Discuss the success/problems.

We were able to complete a Colonial America writing activity. Most of the students did a very good job and seemed to really enjoy the activity.

5. Were you able to successfully download a file from the Write On site this month? Tell about any problems you encountered.

Yes, I was able to successfully download a file from the site. I didn’t encounter any problems which was a nice change!

6. What problems are your students encountering with their participation in this project?

Primarily the same problems are being encountered like indenting, sentence structure, editing skills, etc. The students are doing better at indenting, but are still struggling quite a bit with editing. We have been working on editing activities as a class, but this doesn’t seem to be helping a great deal.

7. What problems are you experiencing?

Some of the students are struggling with coming up with a topic sentence on their own. If they do come up with a topic sentence they seem to stray more form the subject when they get to the squares then when I give a topic sentence. I really have no idea why this is happening. Maybe they’re putting too much emphasis on the topic sentence.

8. What suggestions would you have for making this project more beneficial to you and your students?

More instruction on how to edit, more outside assistance in the classroom (seems to help them to have two teachers describing how to do the same skill – reach more students) 

February
 

1. Describe positive experience(s) with Four Square writing this past month.

My students are showing quite a bit of improvement with doing a four square and we have been easily able to move to a four square plus one. We used a four square plus one to do a school wide essay which made the writing experience much more positive and produced much better results.

2. How far did your students get with the Four Square method this month? (4 Square, 4 Square to paper, 4+1, 4+3) Why?

We got to four square plus one and the students were able to complete it almost entirely on their own and get it to lined paper without my having to intervene quite so much. I was pleased to get to this level because we seemed to be struggling with only a four square before. I think the kids have really begun to be comfortable with writing using this method.

3. Discuss the Goof’s activity.

We didn’t get to do this due to time constraints.

4. What improvements are you seeing in your students through participation in this project?

Student writing samples are becoming much more fluid and the students are staying on topic much better within paragraphs. The students don’t dread writing like they used to and even request the chance to write.

5. What is the biggest hurdle you have experienced in composition instruction with your students?

The biggest hurdle has been indenting and self-editing which we still have some problem with, but not to the same extent.

6. What activity through Write On has been most beneficial to your students?

It would be hard to narrow it down to one activity. My class really needed to learn how to write a topic sentence and be able to write a paragraph that stayed focused on one topic. If I had to choose only one activity it would probably be sentence stretchers.

7. What suggestions would you have for making this project more beneficial to you and your students?

I feel it would be more beneficial to my students if we had overcome obstacles like indenting up front before it became such a problem. I feel it would be very helpful if the teachers who are not involved in Write On could have an in-house workshop on the use of Four Square as far as just doing a Four Square that would provide a basis for the older grades to build on. I introduced this to one of our second grade teachers last week who loved it and used it to write essays for our school contest and had some of the best papers they had written all year. She said she wished she had known about it before now.

March
 

1. Describe your class’ experience with Four Square writing this past month.

My class is continuing to improve each month with Four Square. They are very comfortable with a simple four square and seem to be getting much more comfortable with doing a Four Square plus 1.

2. Did your students participate in a science cross curriculum writing activity? If so, describe its successes/weaknesses.

We did a writing activity about animal habitats and they seemed to enjoy getting to do a “science one”. The students were able to do a Four Square plus one for the most part with the exception of one student who did a simple Four Square. The students did not incorporate as much vocabulary as I would have liked, but they still did a great job with completing the assignment with little or no assistance from me.

3. Other than time restraints, what is your biggest problem in composition instruction?

My biggest problem other than time restraints would be getting the students interested in writing primarily due to the fact that as a group they tend to be somewhat lazy. Even though the students enjoy doing a Four Square, they still tend to want to make it as short as possible. They also tend to use the same adjectives over and over (even though they’re not “dead and tired” words) and don’t seem to want to look for additional words in their writing notebooks.

4. What positive effects can you see in your students through the participation in the Four Square method of composition?

I am seeing a much higher quality of writing coming from my students. They are able to complete a writing assignment in much less time than before incorporating the Four Square writing method.

5. Have you been able to share experiences or activities addressed through this project with any other educators? What was the result?

I have been able to share my experiences with this project with other educators including my fellow grade level teacher and my son’s second grade teacher. Both were very impressed with the method and have since started incorporating it into their classrooms.

6. What changes will you make in your approach to composition in the upcoming school year?

I will definitely begin teaching the Four Square writing process at the beginning of the school year. I feel that after doing it in my classroom this year I have a better understanding of what difficulties the students will face and can cover those in the beginning in hopes of keeping them from becoming a bigger problem later on.

May

This project address the following Tennessee Master Plan Goal: State of the art technology will be used to improve curriculum. Tennessee Report Card Performance Indicators Competency (Composition Skills) How do you feel this project moved toward the goal of improving student composition skills?

This project was vital in moving us toward this goal. This project gave me a way to teach writing that I was not using before which was much easier for the students to understand. This method was much less intimidating to the students and made writing much more enjoyable. This allowed for much more student involvement with the students even writing on their own without being asked to do so.

List ways your participation in this project has positively affected the writing skills of the students in your classroom.

My participation in this project has given me many ideas that I have been able to take back to the classroom. The items generated from this project have been great resources to use in the classroom and the kids have really enjoyed using them. The items generated from the project have also been a great tool to use to review or reteach a concept that students missed or had trouble with.

How did your participation in this project positively affect your instructional strategies?

My participation in this project has positively affected my instructional strategies in many ways. I feel better about teaching writing in that it gives a step by step process for students to use. I have enjoyed using the PowerPoint presentations generated through the project because the students enjoy doing them and it makes for an easier environment in which to teach or reteach topics. The methods also are less intimidating to the students than previous methods I have tried in the classroom which makes it more practical.

How has your approach to writing composition changed through your participation in this project from that of previous years?

I am much more excited about teaching writing than in previous years. I feel more confident in my approach to teaching writing.

What other curriculum areas would you like to see implemented in a professional development technology integration project?

science, social studies, math