Running Head: IMPLEMENTING THE WRITING CONFERENCE IN THE

CLASSROOM

Workshoppin:
Implementing the Writing Conference in the Classroom
Josh Green
Summer Institute 2016
University of Mississippi

Running Head: IMPLEMENTING THE WRITING CONFERENCE IN THE

CLASSROOM

Introduction
I do not want to be the teacher who thinks they are sufficient, or even
excellent, in carrying out a particular skill, only to be blissfully ignorant of
my deficiencies in that area. I have gone through a two-year stretch, last
school year as well as this school year, in which I feel as though I wasted
great opportunities for my students to grow as writers. As is the case at
most colleges and universities as well, I am a teacher with a background in
literature tasked with teaching composition, and it is in this capacity that I
aim to grow as both a writer and writing instructor in order to produce
students who are not only good writers buthopefullylearn to enjoy
writing.
My writing instruction in its current form has consisted mostly of
helping proficient student writers improve their writing in the realm of
ideas and concepts while helping poor student writers improve grammar,
mechanics, and fluency. In this makeup, the student writers in the middle
stay relatively the same with some even becoming worse writers.
Conducting writing conferences were a way to combat poor writing, but due
to my gross ignorance, often became nothing more than consultation or
editing sessions. While this is obviously a problem, another issue was the
fact that these conferences were reserved only for struggling writers,
almost as a last ditch effort. Conferences with good student writers were

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conversational and often consisted of solid brainstorming and working
through ideas, however these conferences were few and far between and
normally only happened at the request of the studentrather than as a
result of a concerted effort on my end to actively monitor writing
progress.
For example, this past year in my English II class I assigned a literary
analysis essay on Chinua Achebes Things Fall Apart and during the
process, conducted individual teacher-student writing conferences as well
as peer review sessions. I created the peer groups based on writing
abilities, ideally trying to place within each group of three: one strong
writer, one mediocre writer, and one poor writer. They engaged in an initial
peer review session, two weeks later the one-on-one conference, and then
finally a week out from the due date, the last peer review session. Not only
did it not improve writing, but I felt as if in many cases the quality of writing
decreased. In my effort to atone for this I too often resorted to simply fixing
mistakes and pushing students towards thematic focuses/ideas.
Because of this I fear that many students who could have benefited
from a one-on-one conference not only did not but may have interpreted this
as a sign of their mastery of writing, or worse, taken it as a sign that I was
unconcerned with their writing(s). My flawed thinking stemmed from the
notion that while the first writing assignment (be it: short writing, essay,
etc) may be rough, after they get their corrected assignment back and see
all the red ink, they will quickly learn. This practice removed me from

Running Head: IMPLEMENTING THE WRITING CONFERENCE IN THE

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playing an active part in the process of writing and relegated me to a
passive role of judge and judge only.
My aim in my research was/is to find out how writing conferences
function and how they can serve as a way for me to actively monitor and
help improve student writing. Though I truly believe that exposure to good
writing goes a long way in helping students to improve their writing (by way
of reference points, modeling, and/or maybe even mimicking?), however, it
is most certainly not enough. Thus, my central question must be how can I
best engage with my students writing in an active way that both allows me
to guide them, but also encourages them to take control of their own
writing in a way that provides not only immediate success in the English
classroom, but in any and every piece of writing that they construct in their
future endeavors?
Literature Review
Three critical texts that I encountered have greatly shaped the way I
view the writing conference and the possibilities that come from using it to
improve student writing. These texts are: Carl Andersons How's It Going?:
A Practical Guide to Conferring with Student Writers, Nancie Atwells In the
Middle: New Understandings About Writing, Reading, and Learning, and
Donald Gravess Writing: Teachers and Children at Work. What surprised
me the most about all three of these texts is that the teachers work (or did
work) primarily with lower level grades, but the research, both empirical
and charted, are extremely applicable in any grade level setting, because

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great concepts are just that: great concepts.
Carl Anderson
Andersons Hows It Going? provided very practical advice on how to
go about conducting a writing conference in the classroom. He starts by
giving a foundational overview of the writing conference broadly, which is
very useful, particularly in my case as I am essentially starting from the
ground up. He asserts that the ideal structure of a writing conference, both
have a point to them and have a predictable structure (7). He frames
these structures in detail to allow for the teacher to conduct the most
effective conference. He leads with the notion that conferences are
essentially conversations and not one-sided consultations that aim to
creative a comfortable setting in which students are willing to be open and
honest about their specific writing projects as well as their experiences
during the writing process. Though he does make a point to highlight that
these conversations are not to be too loose, like small talk conversations
often tend to be, but rather they are to serve as a way for teachers to teach
students to conduct these same measures on their own in future pieces
(8), but overall wants to create a sense of community between the student
writer and teacher.
My experience with conferencing has usually been as more of an
editor rather than a fellow writer who can provide helpful advice that steers
student writers in a productive direction. Anderson seeks to eliminate the
teacher as editor framework and in this effort gives thoughtful sentence

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starters and frames that help teachers to drive the conversation initially but
resist the urge to simply everything that is wrong with their students
drafts. He also points out that in the ideal structure teachers and students
both have roles in the conference and these roles shift. The ideal model for
Anderson is when the student starts out in the lead role, setting the agenda
for the conference by describing his/her work. The lead role eventually
shifts with the teacher pursuing a line of thinking that is directed and
specifically focused on the students writing. This is both pragmatic (and
may seem obvious to some) and revelatory for me in that I have too often
willingly accepted the role of the proof-reader.
Nancie Atwell
Once again, though Atwell herself deals mostly with elementary
students, in Responding to Writers, in her text In the Middle: New
Understandings About Writing, Reading, and Learning she has a great set of
framing questions for self-conferencing that can work on any grade level.
This further expands my concept of the function of the writing conference.
As the proverb goes: Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day. Teach a
man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime. Viewing Atwells selfconferencing through the lens of teaching a man to fish proves to be very
valuable. The implementation of this strategy does not seem to mean that
the teacher is no longer necessary, but rather that the student can, at times,
adapt the role of the teacher and can also learn to work through issues that

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they have traditionally gotten stuck on.
Atwells self-conferencing guide separates questions into basic
Questions about categories: Purpose, Information, Style, Leads, and
Conclusions. The student is to use this as a sort of checklist or guide and
ask themselves questions about their writing before conferencing. This is
something that I will use immediately and give to students as a way to keep
their writing directed and alleviate or clean up easier issues so the oneon-one conference can cover more ground.
Donald Graves
Graves may serve as my most valuable resource in moving forward
with implementation of writing conferencing. His text Writing: Teachers and
Children at Work aims to calm fears teachers may have about conducting
conferences as well as contest (and reinforce through examples) the notion
that there are specific questions that should or should not be asked during a
writing conference. He talks about speaking without words and doesnt
focus so much on what should or should not be said but rather addresses
things that one may not have even considered.
In this vein, he dedicates a considerable amount of time discussing
the arrangement of furniture within a conference setting. This was of great
interestand quite frankly, shockto me because I have never given
thought to the notion that simply changing a seating arrangement could
alter a conference. He talks about how a traditional dinner set up of
teacher and student across from each other can suggest to the student that

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the teacher is an adversary in the conversation rather than an advocate and
recommends a set up in which the teacher sits near and next to the child
and as close to equal height as possible. This is something that I will
adapt in both my classroom and writing center.
The Hinge
I know one thing: that I know nothing. Socrates
During my research there were several moments that made me
reevaluate some of the things I have been doing or not doing, but the most
important ah-ha! moment came when I realized just how little I know with
regard to pedagogy and what grounds why we teach the way we do. With
respect to conducting writing conferences, there are so many subtle things
in the way of groundwork that I have never considered to be relevant, much
less pivotal, in making writing
workshops and conferences work. For
example, Figure 10.1 below is a
drawing Donald Graves includes in
Writing: Teachers and Children at
Work.

This drawing shows the ideal setup for a writing conference as well as the
traditional setup and its cons. Where the two parties sit, a thing that I

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previously thought to be trivial or inconsequential is critical to the whole
process. Notice the title: The Language of Conference Settings. He aptly
uses the phrase language of when it is only a seating chart. Though not a
verbal word is uttered, he suggestsand I believe, rightlythat the
positioning of the teacher and student initially sets the tone of the
conference and can make all the difference in the world.
Concrete Strategies
Though the concepts that I will be employing in the upcoming school
year will be somewhat new for both me and my students, I feel that they will
play a critical role in improving student writing as well as become a natural
part of our classroom as well as the individual students writing process.
Regie Routmans concept of whole-share conferences (209) will both
strengthen classroom community as well as allow me the time to conduct up
to three times the amount of conferencing hours that I have conducted in
the past.
In conjunction with Carl Andersons advice on directed conferencing I
will utilize writing logs, as seen in this example:
Writing Progress Log
What Im working on:

(Post-conference) What I learned

today:

Where I was when I started:

Where I go from here:

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These will serve as a means to alleviate too much dead time during
conferencing but more importantly as a way for students to put down, in
writing, the trajectory of the writing assignment they are working on, to
which they can return to when needed. These writing logs will also give me
a chance to see, through their own words, what students get out of the oneon-one conferences.
I will also ensure that I setup one-on-one conferences in the way that
Donald Graves has suggested, sitting beside the student writer, rather than
across or above them. This will reaffirm the notion that we are a community
of writers as well as reinforce (either subconciously or conciously) that I am
an advocate, not adversary, of student writing.
Though I am sure that these concepts and strategies will be adapted
and/or revised accordingly throughout the year, I will still enter the year
with a much firmer grasp on the concept of writing conferences that will
allow me to better serve my students as a writing instructor and not only
improve their writing but hopefully give them some tools or strategies that
will allow them to continue improving even after they leave my classroom.

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References
Anderson, Carl. "Conferences Are Conversations." How's It Going?: A
Practical Guide to Conferring with
Student Writers. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 2000. 6-24. Print.
Atwell, Nancie. "Responding to Writers and Writing." In the Middle: New
Understandings About Writing,
Print.

Reading, and Learning. Portsmouth, NH: Boynton/Cook, 1998. 217-58.

Buranen, Lise, and Alice Myers. Roy. CHAPTER Perspectives on

Plagiarism and Intellectual Property in a
Postmodern World. Albany: State U of New York, 1999. 155-67. Print.
Graves, Donald H. "Make the Writing Conference Work." Writing: Teachers
and Children at Work.
Exeter, NH: Heinemann Educational, 1983. 96-148. Print.
Kellogg, Ronald T., Thomas Quinlan, and Alison P. Whiteford. "Does
Automated Feedback Help

Running Head: IMPLEMENTING THE WRITING CONFERENCE IN THE

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Students Learn to Write?" ERIC [OCLC]. Spring 2010. Web. 16 June
2016.
Mackiewicz, Jo, and Isabelle Kramer Thompson. "Methods: The Conferences
and
Participants." Talk About Writing: The Tutoring Strategies of
Experienced Writing Center Tutors.
Routledge, 2015. 45-52. Print.
Routman, Regie. "Conference with Students." Writing Essentials: Raising
Expectations and Results While
Print.

Simplifying Teaching. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 2005. 205-34.