Literacy Journal - Expectations

One thing I have noticed in both my placements is the emphasis on reading and writing.  Perhaps emphasis is too light a word as each of my master teachers includes reading and writing each and everyday.  Both employ the writing workshop theme.  Both are sticklers for quality, and especially for work that is published or that goes home, which is nearly everything they do.  Routman speaks to this in chapter four.  No one in either class gets a free ride with sloppy or incomplete work.  Even those that struggle, or you might think we have low expectations for must produce a quality product.  In our dyad I spend a fair amount of time working with the strugglers, even to the point of scribing for them, and them copying it exactly to the project or assignment.  I am somewhat torn here, and wonder how this might be very frustrating to a student that for whatever reason can not produce work that would be considered the norm.  They get very frustrated with re-writes to be sure.  How far do we carry this?  I certainly can understand the reluctance to publish something in the hall or in a class bound project with the gambit of writing issues that are very obvious.  The other is sending work home that is edited and corrected for the parents to see.  Should the parents be insulated from this?  Are we doing them a disservice by not sharing the learners true level of literacy?  I don’t know but I will talk to my MT to better understand the reasoning behind it.

I do agree with Routman that we should always expect excellence from our students, and not accept mediocrity.  Perhaps by demanding it the student will learn that there are no shortcuts, and they had better put in the best effort they can.  I have also found it interesting how one teacher is concerned about spelling and the other is much less so.  I did ask the one why she is not, and she says that being overly concerned about spelling on the students part take away from the writing process itself.  Now there is a one grade difference in the two classes which might explain how one feels that at 3rd grade a student should be concerned about their spelling, and how at 2nd grade it is less of a concern.  My own feelings are that students should be actively engaged in getting cohesive, and connected thoughts down on paper first and foremost.