What’s this I’m hearing about Language Workshop?

Julie Schwartzbauer contributed this post. Click here for more of Julie's thinking.

In the Appleton Area School District, we have begun to build knowledge and understanding surrounding the big picture of language workshop.

This is what we have come up with so far...

Language workshop is a protected time of the day to build listening and speaking comprehension through reading aloud and thoughtful, collaborative discussions of complex texts. Teachers provide explicit instruction in grammar, punctuation, and conventions of language through literature and informational texts using the workshop approach.  In the process, students acquire knowledge of content, vocabulary, text structures, and language functions, including grammar and mechanics. This in turn supports the work we do in other workshops.

So you might be wondering how the standards fit into language workshop....

We feel that the language standards can be taught within language workshop, and woven throughout reading workshop, writing workshop, and other content areas.  They are taught through the following components: 

• Read Aloud / Shared Reading
• Wordless Picture books
• Poetry
• Mentor Authors
• Interactive Writing/ Shared Writing
• Phonics Lessons
• Words Their Way

With the anchor standard being the same for grades K-12, it is important for teachers to understand that the guiding principle is that core language skills should not change as students advance; rather, the level at which students learn and can perform these skills should increase in complexity as they move from one grade to the next.

We know that students in early grades can not jump over developmental milestones in order to master the anchor standard.  Therefore teachers must build their expertise in understanding the standards by completing a Standards Trace.  Please see a piece of a resource document my colleague and I created for K-6 teachers at one school, to assist them in completing a trace.

Teachers began with Language Standard 1.  They used various resources to help build their understanding of the standard, while meeting in their grade level PLCs.  Teachers filled in the column on the right with definitions and examples to to clarify their understandings.

A few weeks later all K-6 teachers came together at a late start and completed a trace by sharing out their understandings of standard one across grade levels.  Teachers also discussed how they would determine which of the above vocabulary terms would be critical for students to know and understand.

Here are some questions teachers had while completing the trace...

1. What is a modal auxiliary?
2. Can we have a list of common Latin and Greek words? (6th grade)
3. What are frequently occurring adjectives?
4. How do you teach plural nouns? (besides just add the s…especially for ELL students
5. Should we use common language? i.e. conjunction
6. What does demonstrate command of in writing or speaking mean?
7. What is the correct terminology? Linking or helping verbs?
8. What does spell grade level words mean? Is there a list? Is it the old No Excuse words?
9. What is proven to be best approach to teaching Greek/Latin words, can these strategies be shared across the district?
10. Irregular verb spelled with a t? verbs whose past tense and past participle are not formed by adding-ed, -d, or –t to present tense.

I am hoping that teachers will continue to build their understanding of the language standards and what they look like across grade levels.