Check in with Mrs G

Teaching Special Education & Social Skills

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Classroom Books: Birthday Book, Welcome Book, Thank You Book

Say Thank You, Welcome and Happy Birthday as a class

Say Thank You, Welcome and Happy Birthday as a class! So much of building our classroom communities comes from recognizing the people within it! Small gestures like saying Thank You to generous classroom volunteers, Welcoming new students and celebrating Birthdays set the foundation for a classroom community that is cohesive, supportive and kind.

You have to have those warm and safe feelings if you want students to be vulnerable enough to learn. I use classroom books to help my students get in the habit of communicating these emotions. I am a huge fan of using writing in the elementary and special education classrooms to insert social skills lessons where I can (you can read about it here!). These books are just another way I like to sneak it in 🙂 

Each book contains pages with primary lines, pages with standard lines, and graphic pages. This way students are able to work on a page that matches their ability level and everyone is held accountable for contributing. These writing tasks are both engaging and meaningful! More than that, they lend themselves nicely to the creation of a classroom culture that students can thrive in. You can try a sample of my Classroom Welcome Book, Classroom Thank You Book, or Classroom Birthday Book for free!

Say Thank You, Welcome and Happy Birthday as a class Say Thank You, Welcome and Happy Birthday as a class

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Do you Teach Writing Fluency?

Early on in my teaching, I was torn when it came to teaching writing fluency. In particular, in determining whether writing fluency as an IEP goal was appropriate.

After all, being able to write words quickly tells us nothing about the quality of sentences. For some students writing fluency is completely useless. Because the second you bring a timer out, you have lost many students to anxiety. It is painful to watch the stress fall over their faces while they watch the seconds tick away. I feel for those kids. I was that kid. 

My first year of teaching special education, I would have advocated to change the writing goals for all of my students. But, like so many times in my teaching career, my students knew best. They taught me. I listened.

writing-fluency

Some of my students who are the most severely impacted in their writing abilities excel in writing fluency. Grammar, punctuation, and spelling plague them. As one student told me, “It is not creative if I have to stop every one second and think of exactly how to spell something!”

It was one of those moments as a teacher where you pause because you know you have heard the truth. For some of my students, fluency is their greatest area of success in writing. It gives them permission to freely and quickly spill their ideas onto paper and be celebrated for doing so.

I Teach Writing Fluency

So, in my room we do monthly testing in writing fluency. I don’t do it for the kids who struggle or even for the kids who excel. I do it because that is how their lives will be, isn’t it?

Students will move on from my room to other classes where they will take timed tests. They will have timelines for projects. Deadlines at work. So, we practice writing fluency. We talk about building our skill set around doing things quickly. We talk about the difference in done well and done quickly. And, my students understand the difference in done perfectly and not done at all. It is a balance. For some, it is a challenge. It is a task that I will help them face like any other task that will come their way.

Resources for Teaching Writing Fluency

writing-fluency

Writing fluency and I have settled our differences. In my classroom we practice writing fluently with a timer. We talk about what stress is and how it makes us feel. The students track their own progress and count every single word. On Fridays, (we don’t use the data) and we try to distract each other during our two minutes of writing. It is built into the culture of our classroom. We make it a game. I have writing prompts with and without pictures. They enjoy the freedom of fun writing prompts. I get data, they build their muscles. It is a win. So while I teach writing in some capacity everyday (read about it here!), I also teach writing fluency.

writing-fluency

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Help your Writing Resistant Students

“But, I Don’t Know What to Write”

Isn’t this how it goes… You introduce a writing topic to your students. Students get excited about the sentence you want them to come up with. You show an example on the board. Then, you turn them loose looking forward to greatness! Within ten seconds you hear the dreaded phrase… “I don’t know what to write”. Such is the life of a teacher. 

Writing Interventions

In teaching special education, I have needed to find a concrete ways to help students write. Here are my top three tips to try with students who are resistant writers:

  1. Use a sentence stem! Ask students to complete a sentence and providing them with the first few words.
  2. Take the pressure off! Remove time limits when you can. No more, “you have to do this before lunch.” Instead be sure students understand why it is important in the big picture.
  3. Break it down! Even with older students, start at the very beginning. Make sure their grasp is a tripod. Have them highlight first if needed. Allow them to choose from one of two preselected topics. Given them a visual and written prompt.
writing-interventions

Resources to Help Students Start

Ugh, for some of my resistant writers this is the hardest part of their day. It is painful to watch them struggle through it while their classmates scribble away. With these students in mind, I created two scaffolded writing journals as a part of my Elementary Writing Bundle. Both Writing Journal I and Writing Journal II are meant for Pre-K-2nd grade students and have visuals to support each prompt and are set up like this:

writing-interventions

1: Highlight the sentence.

2: Trace the same sentence.

3: Copy the sentence.

4: Complete the sentence with support from the picture.  

Try It for FREE

What I have found is that this scaffolded approach helps remove that initial “I don’t know what to write” barrier and helps students find confidence. Print a free sample of this journal by clicking here. I hope it reduces some writing anxiety for your students! You can extend the learning by having students complete writing morning work everyday! You can read about it here:)