Book Review: Writing With Mentors by Allison Marchetti and Rebekah O'Dell
by: Chandra Verbic
This book,
geared towards the upper grades, is all about using mentor texts to guide your
reading and writing instruction in the classroom. “Mentor texts are model pieces of writing –
or excerpts of writing – by established authors that can inspire students and
teach them how to write” (Marchetti, O’Dell 2015, 3). In my elementary classroom, I used mentor
texts to introduce genres of writing or to cite specific examples, but after
reading this book, I was able to see how they can be so much more than
that. And arguably, they are the most
important piece of your literacy instruction. Not to mention, this book is filled with QR
codes that, when scanned, take you exactly to the websites and sources that are
being discussed. It’s a great
interactive feature that I found myself using more often than not.
In this review, I’m going to look at the various lessons and
strategies that Marchetti and O’Dell lay out for the upper grades and discuss
how I would best adapt them for grades K-6, and more specifically my first
grade classroom. Let’s jump in!
Sourcing Mentor
Texts
The first thing you need to tackle, in any classroom, is
sourcing your mentor texts. Where do I
find them? How do I ensure their quality? Will my students like them? Will they be engaged and inspired? These are all questions I had when I was
thinking about where to gather these mentor texts. Ultimately, “good writing is good writing,
regardless of the genre, so you shouldn’t have to look too far into these
engaging sources to find what you need to teach” (Marchetti, O’Dell 2015,
17). But for those times that mentor
texts don’t come easily or organically, there is a really helpful chart that I
found in this book:
Remember, you are choosing mentor texts to inspire your
students, give them a vision for their writing, and move them forward
throughout their writing process (Marchetti, O’Dell 2015, 23). Bonus points though if the mentor texts also
use digital savvy vocabulary (to connect to your reader), is a regular
publication (to keep your readers interest over time), and has a familiar
author (for reliability). I remember
recently how much more interested I was to read an article about how J.K.Rowling (a favorite author of mine) used Twitter to engage with her audience
-releasing her thoughts about conspiracy theories of Hogwarts, commenting on
things she’s working on, and giving insider information into the world of Harry
Potter.
Now, I’m not going to break down each chapter (although I
could… the book was full of wonderful strategies and roll out lessons for your
literacy block), but instead focus on my three favorite strategies and how they
apply to K-6.
Mentors Show
Students How To Plan
Mentor texts are your students' road maps. They guide them in the direction of becoming
better writers. But before we arrive at
any destination, we must plan for the journey.
When I taught first grade, I specifically focused and spent time
teaching students how to brainstorm.
Then how to narrow their focus, arrange their ideas into cohesive
thoughts, and begin writing their piece.
This is essential in any grade.
So how do mentor texts fit into this journey?
“Mentor texts help students generate ideas for writing. At the beginning of a new writing study, we
simply remind students that their mentor texts are one of the many resources
that might help them come up with something they are excited to write
about. Once students find potential
topics in the mentor texts that they’re reading, we encourage them to jot them
down on a running list of ideas.” (Marchetti, O’Dell 2015, 109)
When my first graders were doing their Wonder Bubble
research projects, they often struggled to find a topic. I would have them brainstorm and think about
what interests they had. But after
reading Writing with Mentors, I think
I would approach this brainstorming session a little differently. Instead, I would have them look at what types
of books they like to read about. For
example, I had a student who was always reading books about space. He liked to learn about the Solar System, but
more importantly, he had a fascination with the various galaxies and “other
life forms” out there. He ended up doing
his research project on Jupiter, which was okay. But had we used the mentor texts that he
liked to read as his “road map”, we probably could have narrowed his focus more
and got him excited more about the topic at hand. I get excited just thinking about all the
rich writing opportunities that would have came out of those mentor texts, vs.
just an arbitrary brainstorming session.
Read more and find the Wonder Bubble lesson here: http://cjayneteach.com/blog/2013/03/05/non-fiction-research-in-the-elementary-grades/
Student
Conferences with Mentor Texts
Writing conferences were a big part of my literacy
block. I would meet with my first
graders and we’d review all their writing up to that point. I would focus on what they were struggling
with and would push them further in their writing journey. I always enjoyed this individual time with my
students, but now I have a way to deepen this learning opportunity!
Marchetti and O’Dell have some great strategies for
conferring with mentor texts.
1.
Keep the students mentor texts in a binder (or
writing folder): What a great idea! Once your student has an article or book
title that he/she enjoys, keep it with their writing. That way you can refer to it as you
conference with them, reminding them of these additional models. You can even organize these mentor texts by
genre, topic, or technique using sticky notes or tabs.
2.
Keep the main thing, the main thing: If a student is struggling with a topic, use
the mentor text to generate ideas. If a
student doesn’t understand proper use of onomatopoeia, use the mentor text to
show how it’s incorporated to boost the story’s quality, not distract from
it. Whatever the struggle though, keep
the focus. There are so many things we can look for in a mentor
text, that it can be distracting. Pull
it out, highlight what you need it for, and move on.
3.
Be prepared to demonstrate and let the student
do most of the talking: These are two
things in one, but I think they are related.
If your student is struggling to plan or implement a strategy, bring
your own folder of mentor texts with you to the conference. Then show your student how the mentor text
inspires you or helps you plan your writing and do a live demonstration! After that though, switch sides. Let your student discuss what they noticed
you doing or express what they would like to try. Then pull their mentor texts to do the same
modeling activity with them holding the pencil.
Using Mentor Texts
to Publish Student Writing
Publication was always such a big portion of my writing
workshop. We celebrated each and every
published story with a celebration of all kinds – outdoor picnic, extra recess,
hot chocolate, pajama day, and my most favorite: dancing on our desks! It was my favorite time in my classroom.
Because mentor texts are published pieces of writing
themselves, they are wonderful examples of how a publication should look. But more importantly, your students can
examine what makes this text interesting to them. Why did they pick it up and read it? Why did they choose it as a favorite? Does their own writing do the same?
This chart, included in Writing
With Mentors, illustrates how authors incorporate visual effects into their
writing.
Students can choose to pull together these presentation
elements to elevate their writing (Marchetti, O’Dell 2015, 154). This forces your students to think about
their audience. Who will read this
piece? What perspective will they
have? And it opens the conversation up
about editors and publication houses in the real world. In Writing with Mentors, the authors even
delve into who to write a query letter (a proposal of writing ideas to editors,
agents, and publishing companies). I
think that this can be incorporated even into the elementary grades. My students used to submit publications to
the Scholastic, Kids Are Authors
contest each year. We used previous
winners of that contest as mentor texts to see what elements our story needed
to have. It would have been interesting
to extend that learning even further into the query letter and allow students
to think about the step after you get your ideas down on paper and to answer
questions such as:
·
What information belongs in a query letter?
·
Who are they directed?
·
How do writers make their query letters stand
out?
So many teachers end their units at publication, but after
reading this book, I can see how we can push and extend the learning even
further. And that’s where you hit the
potential student writers and authors and editors interest levels. You may have the next literacy agent of
Heinemann sitting right in front of you!
Overall, I thought this book had a tremendous amount of
lesson ideas and strategies to use in your literacy block for grades K-12. I think it is one to add to your personal
collection and one that can elevate your teaching style. It’s easy to get stuck in a rut during
literacy because the methods there are so tried and true. Once you find something that works, it’s hard
to veer away from it. But I think it’s
important to introduce new ideas into your classroom instruction for both you
and your students, using Allison Marchetti and Rebekah O’Dell as your
mentors.
Follow Allison Marchetti and Rebekah O'Dell on Twitter or visit their blog for new posts and updates.
