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Writer’s Workshop

Writer’s Workshop is a simple way to organize opportunities for young people to express themselves through writing. It is built upon a process similar to that which aspiring professional writers might use, including sharing writing with peers, conferencing and editing, and developing a writing portfolio over time. The workshop setting encourages children to view themselves as writers, becoming more and more skilled by writing frequently, for extended periods of time and on topics of their own choosing.  

Having an authentic audience beyond the classroom gives student writing more importance and helps students to see a direct connection between their lives and their literacy development. 

To power up your Writer’s Workshop, be sure to include all five stages of the writing process:

My Notebook

Literacy

The Notebook is a useful way to jot down notes as you go through the various topics available on the You For Youth website. If you'd like to use the notebook, please sign in if you already have an account or register now to join the Y4Y community!

Glossary

Literacy

Reading words in text with no errors. Part of fluency.
Strategies that require the reader to actively transform key information in text that has been read (e.g., summarizing, retelling).
The repetition of the initial sound of each word in a string of text (e.g., Harry the happy hippo hula-hoops with Henrietta).
Reading without conscious effort or attention to decoding.
Forming connections between the text and the information and experiences of the reader.
Strategies employed to emphasize the importance of preparing students to read text (e.g., activate prior knowledge, set a purpose for reading).
Understanding what one is reading, the ultimate goal of all reading activity. It is a complex process of simultaneously extracting and constructing meaning while reading text.
The act of deciphering a new word by sounding it out.
Strategies that help students engage the meanings of a text (e.g., asking questions at critical junctures; modeling the thought process used to make inferences; constructing mental imagery).
Reports factual information (also referred to as informational text) and the relationships among ideas. Expository text tends to be more difficult for students than narrative text because of the density of long, difficult, and unknown words or word parts.
Phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension.
Ability to read text quickly, accurately, and with proper expression. Fluency provides a bridge between word recognition and comprehension.
A phrase or expression that differs from the literal meaning of the words; a regional or individual expression with a unique meaning (e.g., it’s raining cats and dogs).
A feeling of interest or enthusiasm that makes a student want to complete a task or improve his or her skills
In a syllable, the onset is the initial consonant or consonants, and the rime is the vowel and any consonants that follow it (e.g., the word sat, the onset is “s” and the rime is “at”. In the word flip, the onset is “fl” and the rime is “ip”).
Refers to the act of speaking and listening. These skills are the foundation of learning to read and write.
The smallest unit of sound within our language system. A phoneme combines with other phonemes to make words.
The ability to notice, think about, or manipulate the individual phonemes (sounds) in words. It is the ability to understand that sounds in spoken language work together to make words. This term is used to refer to the highest level of phonological awareness: awareness of individual phonemes in words.
The study of the relationships between letters and the sounds they represent; also used to describe reading instruction that teaches sound-symbol correspondences.
These are words that are recognized immediately. Sometimes sight words are thought to be irregular (words that contain letters that stray from the most common sound pronunciation; words that do not follow common phonic patterns), or high frequency words (e.g., the Dolch and Fry lists).
During shared read aloud, teachers reveal their thinking processes by verbalizing: connections, questions, inferences, and predictions.
Vocabulary is the knowledge of words and word meanings in both oral and print language and in both expressive (speaking and writing) and receptive (listening and reading) forms.