Conferencing

      This week’s readings (Ch. 14, 15, 17) were an interesting read…and a much needed on. When we discuss conferring or conferencing with our students, I am usually concerned with how to go about it because we never actually get to practice it, which is understandable, I don’t think you can really practice what you talk about with your students because you never know what you’re going to talk about, like the book says. One of the main things I got out of this week’s readings was conferring with our students during writer’s workshop. I think conferring is a great idea and, definitely, a much needed one. Often times we aren’t sure about the struggles our students have in writing, we just see the final product. The beauty of a true writer’s workshop is that it allows time for student conferences with the teacher. A teacher can sit down with the student and talk, writer to writer, about the student’s work. This is a time that is really crucial to the teacher because, I think, it allows the teacher to see what her students are struggling with, what they need help with, what they are succeeding at, what they need to move towards. The book says that the purpose of conferencing is not to help the student; it is to teach the student. The book says “we don’t want our students to become dependent on our help to get them out of binds. As writer’s they need to learn that they will encounter difficulties that they have to figure out. (p. 157)” I completely agree, although, I look at teaching and helping as similar aspects, I can see the separation that needs to take place. We don’t want our students to become needy with us. As writers, they need to be able to get out there and figure it out for themselves, they won’t always have someone there to help them work through their problems, but the great thing about conferencing is that we are there to help/teach them if they need us too. If the student has tried to work their issue for themselves and they have asked friends and looked up stuff and they just can’t get it, that is where the teacher comes in as a guide to help them discover new strategies (or whatever the issue is) to teach the student so the student knows what to do next time it happens (or if it happens again).

      I like this whole idea of conferences, it’s a really interesting thing to entertain, I’m just unsure of how to really go about doing it in my classroom because I want to know specifics about the concept. For example, how often are we supposed to give conferences? Do we give them once a week to each student or once every two weeks? I know most of it would depend on your class size but that is an idea that concerns me. Another idea that raises concern to me is the amount of time. Conferences are supposed to be short, and I completely agree with that, but two to seven minutes seems, well, super short. Can we really teach them what we have to teach them in that short amount of time? I’m pretty certain we can, especially when we have had practice at doing it over a period of time, but I suppose I will have concerns with it until I can actually get out there in my own classroom and fiddle around with this conferencing idea for myself.

      Something that I found extremely helpful about conferencing is the questions that will help us, as teachers, make a decision about what to talk about with the student in conferences. These questions are listed on page 165. I think they are great guiding questions to help us narrow down what we need to discuss with our students during conferencing but they aren’t limiting questions either. For example, if you think a student needs help with something at one particular time and you plan a conference time to do it, and you get to that conference time, and the student is more concerned with something else. I think it is perfectly okay to, maybe, abandon your plan for the day and focus on what the student needs right then. That is what they are struggling with and, obviously, it is something that is important to them, and we don’t want to push that aside.

      Another and final thing (for this blog post anyway) I liked about the whole idea of a true writer’s workshop is the idea of sharing time. I think it is important for us to come together as writer’s to share our struggles and successes and plateau’s. The book says, “It’s a value I have about learning communities, and a writing workshop is a learning community. It is a place that I create where we learn together and where we support each other in that learning in important ways. (p.175)” I don’t think I could have put it better myself, we often talk about learning communities in our classes and how important they are. A writer’s workshop is a learning community within a learning community it seems where the student can feel supported in their writing (they should also feel supported in all aspects as well). I think that a writer’s workshop would help student’s feel more comfortable and willing to share outside of the writer’s workshop time, which will allow for a stronger, closer classroom- learning community. I can’t wait to get my hands into conferencing with my students and see what is going on in their writing world. I think it will definitely be interesting to discover.