Action Plan 2008

OWP fellows, thank you all for an incredible experience and the plethora of ideas I will take back to my classroom this year!

My plan of action was hard to create. I plan to use so many of the new activities you all have taught me that I couldn't fit them onto the little chart Casey gave us! For the fall, however, I plan to implement a book pass at the beginning of the quarter that will help my students pick their first quarter book. From this I hope they will pick a book because they are interested in it, not just because it's short or it has a pretty cover. I also plan to implement free writing and writing response groups into my weekly lesson plan. Melissa gave me great encouragement to teach content Monday-Wednesday, then meet with writing groups Thursday, and Freewrite Friday, along with any other activities that need to be wrapped up. I think the students will enjoy the fact that I'm only teaching content three days a week. I also want to use a modified activity from Jenner's claymation demo and have each group of students respond to one stanza of the same poem, then take a picture. I'll collect all the pictures and we'll create a storyboard for the poem and respond in writing to that poem. Also, I plan to implement paper wad blogging to respond to various short stories and poems we will read in the first couple of months of class. Thank you, Genesis!

I plan to continue writing as much as possible. I would like to finish the memoir I started in Kim's demo and give it to my mom. I would also like to continue working on my professional piece and seek publication for it. Also, I want to write with my students and complete as many of the projects that I assign my students as I can.

My classroom will look completely different after this experience. I have already mentioned the change in my weekly teaching plans. Also, the students will be working together more and creating stronger bonds with their fellow students. The writing response groups will work perfectly with the cooperative learning that I have been trying for the last couple of years. I hope that my students will enjoy class more and laugh more. Maybe they'll cry, too. :) I plan to share my writing with them from this institute and what I will continue to write.

I can collect the paper wad blogs, the pictures from the clay project, and pictures and student reflections on other various activities I will use in class. I would also like to collect the students' favorite pieces of writing from their freewriting notebooks to share with you.

Other demonstrations I will use are: well, all of them! No, seriously, I have marked at least one activity from every demo that I want to use this year in one way or another. I plan to have the students write a memoir, create their writing territories, write episodic fiction, and I also plan to use Image Grammar and Conscious grammar monthly.

I was inspired by Liz's discussion of creating a program to improve her learning community. I would love to implement a support system for my school district to improve writing across the curriculum. I would like to involve my department to serve as ambassadors for writing and each member visit a different department during our PLC to support and encourage every department to use writing to improve student learning.

I think Joshua would be great to help with the publishing and technology part of the OWP. Kathy, Sharolette, Debbie, and Michelle would be wonderful coaches for future fellows. Jenner, Genesis, and Melissa would do an awesome job presenting at future conferences. Stacy, I encourage you to create a writing center at your school! You will do a great job convincing your administration and staff that it is an essential program to improve writing in your school!

I hope everyone has a great school year and I can't wait to see you all in the fall!