Sooooo....what exactly is a Writing Workshop? (chapters 1-5)

Wow, that took me a while to read! I enjoyed the content of the chapters and what the author had to say, but that was overwhelmingly a lot to read! I cannot say I'm looking forward to reading that much this whole semester, along with all the other stuff we have to read for other classes. Oh well, I guess I will just have to get used to it. ;)

Prior to reading these chapters, I had honestly not taken much thought to the concept of a writing workshop in elementary school. I guess this is because I cannot remember having time just to write in those younger grades when I was growing up. Most of the writing we did involved another subject areas that we were instructed to write about. It was interesting to read the author's statements about how this is NOT a good way for writing to be taught in the classroom because writing during other curriculum areas causes content to be the focus instead of the "doing" of writing. This made so much sense to me and I was angry that my elementary school teachers did not give us the opportunities to just write. The author tells us how important a writing workshop is because students are choosing what to write about and they are gaining significant experience as writers. I personally am terrible at coming up with things to write about, and I actually wrote in my notebook for this class that I have never enjoyed free writing. However, I do see the benefits of students deciding themselves what they will write about in the writing workshop. Maybe if I had the opportunity of a daily writing workshop in elementary school, then I would have had more experience with free writing and would enjoy developing my own topic.

"Writing is something you do, not something you know." This quote from the textbook resonated with me because I have never heard writing described that way before. As I mentioned earlier, it was hard to read so much before writing this blog, but I do like how the author wrote this textbook and talks about the writing workshop conversationally because it is easy to read. I must admit that in Chapter 3 when it talks about the misunderstood definition of a writer, I was one of the people who thought this way: "It is someone who writes really well for audiences made up of lots and lots of people." I hate that that is the view that I've had about writing, but I am glad I will be learning more from this course and textbook. Writing workshops seem like they have so many benefits for helping children develop as writers, and I look forward to learning more ways throughout the textbook of how to successfully have a daily writing workshop. :)