I'll bring you up to speed...I have been reading Talking, Drawing, Writing by Martha Horn and Mary Ellen Giacobbe, wow! It has really been pushing my thinking out of the comfort zone and I am on a new path for writing workshop.
The goal? Create exceptional excitement about writing to get a good product instead of trying to get a good product in hopes that students will enjoy the process.
Today I revisited the drawing lesson and talked about how to revise their picture. It went well and I was very excited to watch the students make decisions about whether to start a new drawing or add to the one from yesterday. Most chose to start a new drawing, I suspect because they knew they could do it better, and many added better detail this time around. My reprogramming is beginning to take shape and the improvement today was awesome. I could see the amazement in some of their faces, they couldn't believe they were drawing people...that actually looked like people. I used Mo Willems, Knuffle Bunny story as a model of some other ways to draw people. Tomorrow I am using a book illustrated by Lois Elhert called, Thump Thump Rat A Tat Tat. She uses basic shapes to make people in her illustrations, should be a nice accompaniment for those still figuring out their own technique for drawing a person. Below are some of the students drawings of people following the day one and day two lessons. I was excited!
Day One: How to draw a person. She is definitely trying out what I demonstrated. Her improvement today was great to see and her proud smile was even better!
Day Two (same student): How to add details to a drawing
You can see that the clothing on her people today is more detailed, even a striped shirt. She forgot to draw a body on the first person, but made the decision to add clothing to create more of a body shape.
This was a student's Day One of the drawing lesson sample. You can see that he has some fine motor issues but more pressing was he needed support to draw a person in the way I demonstrated.
However, check out his drawing from today a little further down!
5 comments:
Although I taught way older students, I loved that the visual had so much importance in their writing, or planning for writing. How great that you have new plans & new inspiration. It always works for me. Same old thing is dull! Thanks for the illustrations; they meant a lot.
What a neat idea!!
That has been a book on my radar to get, now I know I must have it. The difference in the drawings is amazing and how proud the kids must be when their drawing looks more like the vision they had. Thanks for including the pictures.
I recognize this same sort of growth in my students' narrative papers after writing conferences, but it is not so fun to show the changes in those papers as it is to see the growth in those drawings. You captured it perfectly and I love the use of the term "reprogramming."
I love seeing the work from a classroom of students similar in age to mine! I haven't read that book yet but it was on my summer reading list - now it will be on my winter break reading list for sure! I'll put a link to your blog on my teacher blog - One Sunflower - so my colleagues can see your work!
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