What Do You Know About Being a Writer?

A kindergarten teacher and I just finished our six week coaching cycle.  She is a veteran teacher, but she is new to kindergarten this year.  Her goals for our coaching cycle were to 1) launch writing workshop in kindergarten and 2) teach her students to add words to their writing (as well as pictures).

We used a kindergarten writing rubric to pre-assess and post-assess the students’ writing.   We saw growth in all areas: sound-letter correspondence, spacing, handwriting, content and fluency.   However, in my opinion, the most meaningful measure of our work together came straight out of the students’ mouths at the end of our coaching cycle when their teacher asked them, “What do you know about being a writer?”  Here are some of their responses:

“I can copy words in the room.” ~ Alex

“You can write about anything you want!” ~Ryken

“I use stapled books.” ~Antonio

“I use my picture dictionary to help me write.” ~Shane

“I know how to draw a person.” ~Sabrina

“I make my characters talk by using speech bubbles.” ~Jordan

“We stretch out words using our Zoo Phonics chart!” ~Arihana

“Space kids help us put spaces in between our words.” ~Kamaya

“I label my pictures.” ~Christian

These kids are writers.  They are five years old, and look at the arsenal of writing tools they already own with confidence.  Yep, these kids are writers.