Writing Process Mentor: Ready-to-Go-Tip

Sometimes, things really do form organically in a classroom. I recently found myself flipping a switch on a tool for a much better purpose than I originally intended.

A Backstory

Teaching middle school writers presents challenges, but in the race for their attention and curiosity, I am often faced with a battle of their ideas vs. artificial intelligence (AI). Developmentally, it’s completely understandable that many students would be curious to try and write an essay or respond to a prompt using an AI tool and “trick the system.” It’s a game of wits. Lucky for me, I tend to stay in the loop on the technology game of teenagers. However, knowing doesn’t make it any easier to navigate, and technology is continually developing faster than many of us can catch up to.

I have found that after lessons on how to use AI appropriately and also sharing with students that I have many tools for reviewing their work, most don’t complete a copy-and-paste from ChatGPT! Yet, I still have to read student work with a new lens. Does it have the student’s voice? Does this match the planning work they did initially? What does the document history say? And here’s where it starts to get interesting. 

Behind the Scenes

There is an extension called Revision History. To give you a quick glance at what it shows, I made a short video (no sound) of the first version of paragraph one for this post. Take a look!

Cool, right? If you’ve never seen a tool like this, it’s fascinating to watch. Although it isn’t brand new, many teachers in grades 4-12 use this tool to check student work for various purposes.

The Context

I recently read, commented on, and graded a paragraph writing prompt assignment for my seventh graders on a novel we were reading in class. I came across a few pieces that indicated there might have been some large sections that were copied and pasted. One in particular led me to a great surprise. Take a look.

I watched it multiple times, intrigued by the process. The flow of ideas. The organization of one thought is later cut out because it leads to a new direction of thinking. Then, the drafting of that new idea and the pasting of the original writing follows. Watching the stream of revision captured in “real-time” along with all the little edits to follow. It was an incredible example of how the drafting process can include all aspects of a writer’s process wrapped into one. I had a new type of mentor text, not just a final draft, but instead the process of getting there.

One Final Thing

I shared this example with students and asked them what they noticed. I was thrilled to hear them say things like:

“They didn’t worry about spelling.”

“There was a lot of starting and stopping.”

“They moved things around.”

Afterward, we talked about the benefits of just writing out our ideas and letting them land. We can always go back and pick them up later. I’m looking forward to using this tool more with this newfound purpose and featuring students in class with their process, not just their final product.