Thinking & Writing Wrinkles: Students Review Session 3

Students review this week's session. By the way, they were delighted to know that Mr. Richardson had written about their site. See here. And I took the liberty to do a little editing on these papers as the students had a short time frame to write their reviews. Gosh, these sessions are packed full! Students interviewed a new partner but used Inspiration to take notes. Then we discussed what I had written on this site and at the end, I told them that Will (Mr. Richardson to them, please!) had written about their site. I always marvel at their first reaction when they find out that someone cares about what they are writing. One of those good moments.......

Yoceline comments, "We got a very important news. Mr. Richardson read about what we have done. He wrote a letter back about us. It was very neat and interesting. I hope many more people write back to us. OK I have no more words!"

Luz say, "Jennifer is my parner for the day. She is a smart girl . I like to work with her. She does many things that are fun. We do many things today. We put things and put pictures about the things we put in the computer. That was fun."

Keith gets right to the point, "Today we went on the computer and made an Inspiration web."

Jerry responds, "Today we had new partners, and the FUN thing was we got to interview them (again). Except today we had new partners."

Emily gives a good synopsis. "We started out reading the "Wrinkles"site. That was fun seeing what Mrs. Davis put up on the site. After that, we started another interview with one of our peers. I chose Yoceline to be my partner. When I started writing I felt like a dictator jotting down all those notes! Mrs. Davis told us our home work, I started to get up. I heard her exclaim "Oh! I'm sorry I didnt tell you this. Mr. Richardson wrote about us. My body stood to a halt. Mr. Richardson helped last years group (which I was in). My face lit up with joy & surprise. I eagerly listened to the letter. I thought it was really cool hearing from him. After the letter was read, Mrs. Davis said her farewells & we all left."

Jennifer sums up the session.

"Today we changed partners again and my partner this week is Luz. Mrs. Davis informed us to interview our partner and see what he or she likes to do. (in other words, what a reporter does.) When I first got to the instructional lab this morning, everyone said that they were going to sit down and wait for Mrs. Davis. When Mrs. Davis got here she was astonished at what she had seen. We were sitting down calmly in our seats. We were ready to get started! I hope Mrs. Davis' meeting will go well on Thursday. I think this has been a great start for the Thinking and Writing Wrinkles group!"

Enjoy their Inspiration documents that will be listed right after this paragraph. This was the first time many of them had ever used this program. They will write about the person they interviewed for homework and use the Inspiration document to help. The visuals will help them with their writing as we go along. Inspiration and Kidspiration are great pieces of software to use for thinking and writing. And yes, I was astonished at how ready they were to go to work when I entered the lab! Astonished, impressed, and "tickled pink" tobe working with such a fine group! See you next Thursday!

Emily Interview Yoceline