6 + 1 Writing Traits

As I mentioned before, one of the main purposes of this blog is to document and evaluate my work in the classroom. Because most of last year was spent in survival mode and because I don’t have a background in education, my approach to teaching was largely based in internet research and trial and error. I feel like I did some really great work last year helping my students expand their existing skills, especially in literacy but this year I want more. I want to really dig in deep and find ways to allow them to use language to express themselves. But how does one do that? That is a question I’ve been chewing on all summer.

The answer, at least in part, lies in encouraging students to find their inner writer. Once the desire to write is there, the rest is simply giving them the tools to be able to bring that writer to life. I suppose there are a thousand approaches to teaching writing but the one that I’ve found most useful (and that’s been widely adopted under the Common Core Standards) is the 6+ 1 writing traits. The idea behind 6+1 is that it’s a tool for teaching writing that creates a common language for teachers and students while making certain areas of writing easier to teach and assess. Here are a few helpful links for explaining the 6+1 traits:

http://educationnorthwest.org/traits

http://languagearts.pppst.com/6traits.html

http://ethemes.missouri.edu/themes/1283

http://writingfix.com/traits.htm

I hope to be able to integrate these traits into my teaching of the writing process in more depth this year. I’ll keep you posted on what that looks like when the year gets underway.

In other news, I’m looking forward to the new books I ordered last week. For those of you living in the western world- you have NO IDEA what a luxury it is to be able to just order books online and have them show up at your door or go down to your local bookstore and peruse the aisles of categorized paperbacks. Please take a minute to be thankful for that amenity. I won’t go into too much detail about what an ordeal it is to acquire such things here, but just know that it’s one of many challenges to be faced when living/teaching abroad. Here are the books I’m making my wonderful partner schlep back to Vietnam to help get me through the school year. If you’ve used any of these or have other recommendations, I’m ALWAYS open to hearing about it. Goodnight from Greece.

my new books-