{"id":13590,"date":"2019-09-17T22:03:51","date_gmt":"2019-09-18T05:03:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/educatorinnovator.org\/?p=13590"},"modified":"2019-09-17T22:07:42","modified_gmt":"2019-09-18T05:07:42","slug":"todays-reasons-why-we-need-students-to-write-for-authentic-audiences","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/educatorinnovator.org\/todays-reasons-why-we-need-students-to-write-for-authentic-audiences\/","title":{"rendered":"Today\u2019s Reasons Why We Need Students to Write for Authentic Audiences"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Katie McKay<\/em><\/p>\n

Our educational context today is drastically different than it was at the turn of the century. And, unfortunately, those changes have not all been positive. NCLB, enacted in 2001, was built upon deficit beliefs about culturally and linguistically diverse students. Ironically, the high stakes testing that was branded as a policy to help our most vulnerable student populations, has done the opposite.\u00a0 Over the last 17 years, there has been wide-spread adoption of regressive, scripted curriculum, particularly in schools that serve diverse students. We are witnessing how these programs are growing disengaged, dependent learners and increasing inequities in access to high quality teaching and learning.<\/p>\n

With support from a LRNG Innovators Challenge Grant<\/a>, our team of 6 elementary teachers from rural Bastrop, Texas<\/a> and I, a Teacher Consultant with the Heart of Texas Writing Project<\/a>, embarked on a year-long journey of deep professional development to create responsive curriculum that grows authentic, enthusiastic, and motivated writers in our rural Title I kindergarten, second, and third grade classrooms. Together we designed, implemented, and documented original and responsive Writing Workshop units of study<\/a> that culminated in publication out in the local community and digitally.<\/p>\n

\"Project<\/p>\n

Here, you can view teachers\u2019 multi-modal slideshow documentations of their units of study.<\/a>\u00a0Using Buncee\u2019s user-friendly creation and presentation tool, teachers employed audio, video, text, and images to share teaching tips, writing conferences, anchor charts, student work, ideas for publication parties, parent feedback, and supporting research.<\/p>\n

Click here<\/a> to read more about our process of implementing and documenting these units of study.<\/p>\n

Engaging students in process writing toward real audiences isn\u2019t new. \u00a0For decades, peer-reviewed research around writing process pedagogy has spoken to the power of a deadline, an expectant audience, and an authentic purpose. An author\u2019s purpose for public writing is dependent on an anticipated reader. And, in schools, for that purpose to be authentic rather than, say, for the purpose of getting a grade or complying with an assignment, the primary audience must be a reader\u00a0other than<\/i> the teacher.<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s<\/i><\/b> Reasons Why We Need Students to Write for Authentic Audiences<\/b><\/h4>\n

And so, some of the reasons we have students write for authentic audiences today are the same motives teachers of writing have had for years. Students\u2019 voices, interests, stories, and experiences should reach real readers.<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s educational context, however, brings new challenges and, therefore, new significance to the work of going public with evidence of process writing. Today, going public with student work, when displayed thoughtfully and intentionally, can:<\/p>\n