A Story About Coaching

I know a young girl who has been involved in gymnastics for many years. She enjoys the performance aspect and continues to pursue it still.  Although she learned many new skills, she often found herself disheartened after joining the junior varsity team.  She did not always know what she needed to do in order to improve or excel. This same girl also recently began to compete in high school track. She immediately loved the sport and made excellent gains in both pole vaulting and hurdles. What was the difference? The coaching. The track coach invested in her and every other member of the team. Following each meet, the coach sought out the athletes individually to discuss what went well and how they could improve for the next time. This was a new and impactful experience for the young athlete who had never really had one-on-one coaching before.

In the same way, teachers can directly influence the writing growth of students in their classrooms by meeting with them one-on-one in a coaching format. Once the student leaves the conference, she should know exactly what it is she is doing well and how to improve upon not only the piece at hand, but also future writing.  Good coaches often ask athletes what they think they need to work on in order to make sure they have a goal in mind and to help narrow down one specific skill or technique to practice. Likewise, students should not leave the conference without knowing how to grow and develop in their writing. Just as the young athlete above struggled through her gymnastics season due to a lack of direct guidance, writers may struggle without specific content information offered in the gradual release of responsibility mode during the conference time.  The writer may even decide to give up on writing, rather than continue to pursue it on her own.

In my own classroom, I have wrestled with the conferring aspect of the Writing Workshop. I have always made it a goal to meet with students individually, but too often, I find myself pointing out punctuation and capitalization errors (they are plentiful!) and I forget to focus on the craft of writing. After extensive research on the true art of conferring, I am now able to see the conference as a time to really connect with my students – to ascertain what is “near and dear to their hearts," to gain insight into their writing thinking, planning, and goals, and to coach them towards better writing.

What is Conferring?

What is conferring and how exactly does it work? 

Different teachers may approach the writing conference in various ways. As with many educational practices, there are a variety of perspectives to the conference approach. But almost all research says the student ought to be the focus of the writing conference, regardless of the technique.

According to Lucy McCormick Calkins, conferring is essentially having a discussion with the writer (1994).  Ralph Fletcher and JoAnn Portalupi tell us that writers need response (2007) and as teachers our first response ought to be to react naturally to our students’ writing. Instinctively, we laugh when the piece is funny, cry when it is sad, and so on. Sounds easy enough, right? But here's the twist...during this essential one-on-one conversation with writers, the teacher does not act as an editor. Rather he or she encourages the writer along in the writing process. 

In her book, No More "I'm Done!" (2010), Jennifer Jacobson notes that in order to fully listen to the message of the writer, she always has the student read his writing to her first. Jacobson says, 

If I look down at a sheet of writing, my brain becomes a convention detective and notes every missing capital letter, punctuation mark, or misspelling of a frequently used word…So instead, I ask students to read their work aloud and that allows me to focus on content.

Oh how I can relate to the pitfalls of becoming a "convention detective"! Can anyone else?

After the conferring discussion, Fletcher and Portalupi remind us “...the conference is simply the next utterance in a longer conversation." Ideally, that conversation continues once the student leaves the conference through dialogue with himself or with his peers in regards to his piece of writing and any future writing he does.

When it is a new concept for a writing teacher, conferring without a constant focus on editing can seem difficult and even awkward, at times. But, “...conferring with students is a skill we can all learn” (Fletcher & Portalupi). Effective instruction is linked to the gradual release of responsibility. During the conference the teacher gives individualized guidance within the student’s zone of proximal development. The level of scaffolding provided by the teacher is determined by the specific needs of the writer. Donald Graves (1994) suggests a “good conference” consists of the student speaking 80% of the time and teacher speaking just 20% of the time. 

Linda J. Dorn and Carla Soffos say the success of the writing conference is based on the teacher’s knowledge of the writer and the teacher’s knowledge of the process (2001).

So...there's more to conferring than just "simply" meeting with a student one-on-one. And there's so much more to conferring than editing a student's piece of writing. As I continue to research and learn about conferring, I aim to become more of a writing coach and less of a convention detective. 

What does conferring look like in your classroom?

References:

Calkins, L. (1994). The art of teaching writing. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Dorn, L. J., & Soffos, C. (2001). Scaffolding young writers: A writers’ workshop approach. Portland, ME: Stenhouse Publishers.

Fletcher, R., & Portalupi, J. (2007). Craft lessons: Teaching writing K-8. Portland, ME: Stenhouse Publishers.

Fletcher, R., & Portalupi, J. (2001). Writing workshop: The essential guide. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Jacobson, J. (2010). No more “I’m done!”: Fostering independent writers in the primary grades. Portland, ME: Stenhouse Publishers.