Blog 9

I enjoyed the Juska reading in WTL this week. I've never really thought about prison life or the availability of classes for prisoners, but it's intriguing. I liked how she walked through each step of the writing process and then related it to how she and the inmates taught each other. It was also interesting how they wouldn't talk about what landed them in prison in the first place, and would ask Juska for grammar and writing rules since they'd missed out on other important rules throughout their lifetime.

Spandel's writing on assessment was helpful. We've talked about rubrics in class, but Spandel's descriptions really made it click for me. Some of her ideas have been discussed already, like being perceptive and compassionate when delving into the writing. However, I like the idea of having the class help you create the rubric they'll be assessed with; I think that would help them better understand not only what you're looking for, but what they'll want to keep an eye on while revising and editing.

I will admit, I'm interested in how Kentucky assesses its students. It makes so much more sense to let students take their time creating pieces they actually enjoy than to give them topics and a time period to write in. Shows respect for the writers, yes, and also allows students to show off what they can really do. Sometimes magic happens when you're given a set amount of time to write in and a topic you enjoy; but other times, if you give them junk to work with, you'll get junk in return. And the idea that teachers/administrators aren't always the ones reading state assessments? That just doesn't seem right to me. It feels like it would be common sense to have teachers, who know what to look for in these writing assignments, assess and grade the essays.

Smith was actually easy to get into this week. He went over a lot of the topics we've covered so far this semester and added some good tidbits. I never realized that students only write about half a page per day in the classroom, even though it makes sense when I think about it. You take notes on the reading, take down what the teacher is saying, but that's usually about it unless you have a test or some kind of classwork.