Professional Reading Reflection #4: Literature in the Writing Workshop

Writing Workshop: The Essential Guide

Chapter 7: Literature in the Writing Workshop

“Writing without reading is a little like seesawing alone. Without someone on the other end of the teeter-totter, it’s impossible to get off the ground.”

There are different ways and reasons to use literature in the classroom:

• Read Aloud
• Builds a sense of community
• Creates common experiences
• We learn about our students (their responses, interests)
• Independent Reading
• Students discover a genre or author they love
• Students discover a “taste” in books

• Book Discussions
• Where you link reading and writing together
• Using Literature During a Workshop Minilesson
• Make sure to choose book that students know well
• Focus on the writer’s craft
• Focus on topics from different perspectives or genres

• Using Literature in Teacher-Student Conferences
• You listen to the reader in the student
• The more you know about your students as readers the more you can challenge them to think about their writing.
• Students use literature to set writing goals
• Encourage them to talk about books

Using literature in a writing workshop is essential to develop quality writers. In our first grade class we have a book in our writing curriculum titled: “Authors as Mentors”. This unit focuses on using authors of quality books to showcase good writing, and encouraging students to use this in their writing. Using literature is my favorite part of the writing workshop. I almost always start my writing lessons by using books as examples. This chapter helped confirm the quality teaching that is being implemented in my classroom.