Embracing Feedback by Pauline Schmidt

Like most university professors, I am an over-achieving perfectionist who would never admit to needing help with writing. 

I can recall the anxiety I would have as I sent a chapter revision to my dissertation advisor, about a decade ago...Wwhy I was so nervous? I may never know. But, there it is.  The fear of being wrong. Or, maybe it was the fear of getting feedback?  Maybe thinking my work wasn’t good enough? 

After completing the National Writing Project's Invitational Summer Institute in 2015, I realized that feedback doesn’t necessarily imply that anything is bad or sub-par, it just can be better. The reader has questions or thoughts. They are interacting with the text in a meaningful way.

I embrace feedback now! 

In fact, instead of stewing over a revision or hiding the fact that I am stuck, I noticed that I look for help.  For example, I am working on a chapter in an edited collection about teachers in stage productions and I got to a point where I couldn’t see where I was going. I made salient points about my subject, reinforced my stance with evidence from the script and libretto, but just didn’t see how to bring the chapter to a conclusion.

The old version of me would have just written gibberish in the hopes that the editor would help to shape it; this time, I just put a side note in the text directly to the editor.  And, when I received her feedback, she addressed my problem with clarity. 

I have grown into my writer-identity and I know that, for me, writing does not happen in isolation. It requires the help of an informed reader.



Pauline Schmidt is Associate Professor of English Education at West Chester University. She is the Director of the Pennsylvania Writing and Literature Project and the Co-Advisor of the NCTE Student Affiliate. She is fanatical about chocolate, Harry Potter, and advocating for quality public education for all students.

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Five Ways to Use Noticing to Build Curiosity by Georganna Rapaport

 

Curiosity is the wick in the candle of learning.  – William Arthur Ward, American writer

As we ask students to notice the world around them, what we really hope to instill is a sense of curiosity and wonder. To be curious is to wonder, think, and to want to learn something.  While it seems a difficult skill to teach, we must remember that learners come to us naturally curious; we just need to let it flourish. 

Here's how:

Model Your Own Curiosity!   Students should see our excitement for things we don’t understand and our drive to “figure it out”.  Equally important, is the comfort we model when we notice we don’t have all the answers.

Question, question, question… As lead learners, we must frequently question the world around us asking “I wonder why?” or “How does that work?”   Classrooms are spaces where questioning is not only accepted but also encouraged. 

Notice that curiosity takes TIME!  We need to build time into our day for noticing, inquiry, and wonder to support deeper understanding and personal relevance.  Our classrooms need to be places of calm where students can be present in the moments around them.

Teach students to be curious about the moves of their favorite authors.  We can model our reading in a way that visualizes our sense of inquiry into the author’s writing strategies.  What did this author do to make this story so wonderful?  We can help them to name the author’s effective techniques and try them in their own writing. 

Help students notice what they are doing well as writers.   Students need support noticing where they are in their learning process.  Students become the drivers of their personal writing process though compliments and feedback.   As their guide, we celebrate alongside them when we notice they have tried a new strategy in their writing.

Georganna Rapaport is a fourth-grade teacher in Palmer Lake, Colorado.  She believes learning is the vehicle by which we find purpose to enrich our lives and works to empower students to take control of their learning.  She is a happy wife, proud mom, and an avid reader and writer.  She shares her writing at Purpose: Find it, Live it.  Follow her on Twitter @grapaport.