I've done Genius Ladders and Oral Writing but don't know how to do 10 minute writing. Can anyone help?

Hi Paschuh,
The quality of the ten minute writing will depend on the grade level that you are teaching. For example, I teach lower grades. So, I simply do a summative writing and try to organize what was learned for the day, whole group. I am looking for capitalization, puncuation, and neatness. As my students improve on these three aspects, I will work on incorporating content. Finally, all of the above is always being addressed during the oral writing process, after each initial instruction. Hope this helps! Let me know:)

Heather Hansen
Wbt Intern
2011/12

Ten minute is 10 minutes of writing each day~ can be summative (as heather mentioned) OR you can take your complex sentence in the genius ladder & have students use that as a topic sentence OR you can do writing prompts similar to the style of the state writing test). Whichever way you choose to do 10 minute writing~ the important factor is the way you edit their work. Choose a focus (for example, heather said capitalization, punctuation & neatness~ which is a perfect starting point~ then u can add complete sentences, word choice, adjectives, etc< but the point is to choose one of these areas to focus on) & then tell students that is what you will be looking for for that day. Walk around with a red & green marker. Use the green to circle the things that are correct & red for the things that are incorrect. The goal is for students to improve & have less red marks for the focus area each day. What I love about the 10 min writing is the immediate feedback to students & the huge gains they are already showing in writing!!!

Great explaination Andrea. I wish I had my students longer than 30-40 minutes at a time.

Susan Floyd

That is a bummer!!! But it sounds like you are doing alot with that short amount of time~ ten finger woo with a lightening sizzle to you!!!