In this presentation teachers are reminded of the importance of conversation in exciting children to write. Keith Pruitt shares three child-tested strategies for engagement. The video clips used in this presentation are from a DVD included in Children Want to Write by Thomas Newkirk and Penny Kittle.

1. Focus on Writing: Building the
Conversation
Keith Pruitt, Ed.S
www.woweducationalconsulting.com

2. Brain Gym
• We are going to play a quick 1 minute
round of boggle.
• The object is to write as many words as
possible in 1 minute.
• The letters may only be used once and
must touch in some direction.
• The word must contain at least three
letters.

3. X W S N
L G A E
A M E Y
W M S J

4. We want students to write, but have difficulty getting
them excited about the activities of writing.
What can I do as a
teacher to motivate my
students to write?

5. Some teachers seem to invite children’s conversation.
Children speak to them constantly; they try something and
almost immediately tell their teachers about it. I’ve tried to
observe what these teachers do that makes their students
such good informants. I used to think it was their
methodology. Now I realize that it is a kind of
philosophical stance, which children intuit in the teacher,
that inspires their confidence and invites their reactions to
their work.
--Donald Graves, Children Want to Write, p 72
…Build the Conversation!

6. The greatest missing
tool from most
classrooms is the
pleasure of talk.

7. “Float the learning on
a sea of talk”
--James Britton, Language and Learning (1970)

8. Here are
Three strategies for
Engaging
Talk in the
Classroom for Writing
1. Visual story
starter
2. What Do You
Know? What Can
you Ask? (Going
into Character)
3. Student
Conversation

9. 1. Visual Story Starter
• The teacher shows a picture to
students for just a few seconds.
• Students are asked to grab as
many details as possible
• They then discuss with each other
what they have seen as the
teacher asks specific questions
Let’s Practice!

11. Let’s look now at a conversation
between a student and Donald
Graves as he works one-on-one.
Look for how he gives her visual
cues and how visual she becomes.
from Children Want to Write, video Chapter 5, An Interested Audience

12. 2. Going into
Character

13. Abraham Lincoln
What you Know? What did you learn?

14. Abraham Lincoln Comes Home
What I Know About Lincoln What I Learned Questions?
1. He was President
Which one?
2. 16th
What else?
3. President during Civil War
4. From Illinois
5. Had a beard
6. Assassinated
By whom?
Don’t know—
John Wilkes Booth
He was an actor and
southern sympathizer
7. Buried in Springfield, Il.
1. 16th President of
United States
2. President During
Civil War
3. Assassinated by
Booth who was a
Southern
Sympathizer
1. How Did he come
to be President?
2. Why did Booth Kill
the President?
3. Where did this
happen?
Concept from Harvey and Goudvis, Comprehension Toolkit

15. Now instead of reading
this story to you, I’m
going to step into
character and tell you
the story of Luke
O’Brien.

16. Connect With Talk and Writing
• Have students tell their elbow partners what
aspect of the story impacted them the greatest
and why?
• Have the students write a paragraph about one
of these two ideas:
• According to the author, what emotions did the
funeral train solicit in Luke?
• Describe how the people along the tracks felt
about Lincoln.

17. 3. Student
Conversations

18. The Common Core State Standards
for English ELA and Mathematics
emphasize improving the quality of
student-to-student discourse as a
major feature of instruction. The new
standards specifically describe the
importance of students understanding
the reasoning of others and engaging
in meaningful conversations using
evidence for claims.
--Stanford University Online Course, 2014

19. But whatdoes this have to do
withwriting?
Video clip from Children Want to Write,
chapter 6, What the Story is About

20. Tell a friend one
learning observation
you made in reference
to this video.

21. Student conversation allows students
to:
1. Clearer understandings
2. Question the author
3. Make suggestions (but remember, it is my
story)
4. Politely correct something that might be
incorrect
5. Offer critique than can then extend the
learning for the author

22. So in this session we have learned three
strategies for getting students conversing and
writing.
Engaging students is much more enriching when
we turn them loose in the power of talk.
I challenge you to take away from this one idea
that will excite your students.

23. Thank You
Keith Pruitt
www.woweducationalconsulting.com