Mechanically Inclined: Building Grammar, Usage, and Style into Writer’s Workshop
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Product Description
Some teachers like grammar and some despise it, but nearly all struggle to find ways of building the mechanics of English meaningful to kids. As a middle school teacher, Jeff Anderson also learned that his students were not grasping the basics, and that it was preventing them from reaching their potential as writers. Jeff readily admits, “I am not a grammarian, nor am I punctilious about anything,” so he started researching and hard the thoughts of scores of grammar experts in his classroom, gradually finding successful ways of integrating grammar instruction into writer’s workshop.
Mechanically Inclined is the culmination of years of experimentation that merges the best of writer’s workshop fundamentals with significant theory about how and why skills should be taught. It connects theory about using grammar in context with practical instructional strategies, clarifies why kids regularly don’t know or apply grammar and mechanics correctly, focuses on attending to the “high payoff,” or most common errors in student writing, and shows how to carefully construct a workshop environment that can best support grammar and mechanics concepts. Jeff emphasizes four key fundamentals in his teaching:
- fleeting daily instruction in grammar and mechanics within writer’s workshop;
- using high-quality mentor texts to teach grammar and mechanics in context;
- visual scaffolds, including wall charts, and visual cues that can be pasted into writer’s notebooks;
- regular, fleeting routines, like “prompt-lane edits,” that help students spot and right errors automatically.
Comprising an overview of the research-based context for grammar instruction, a series of over thirty detailed lessons, and an appendix of helpful forms and instructional tools, Mechanically Inclined is a boon to teachers regardless of their level of grammar-phobia. It shifts the negative, rule-plagued emphasis of much grammar instruction into one which celebrates the power and beauty these tools have in shaping all forms of writing.
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This book was very thought-provoking. We used it as a book discussion group for our high school English teachers.
Reader’s Rating: 4 / 5
Jeff Anderson presents a dynamic workshop on how to liven up a Language Arts classroom, and his book further describes how LA teachers can make learning fun, enjoyable, and effective.
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5
I wish I could use this better in my classroom. Sorry to say, I have small control over what I teach.
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5
Mechanically Inclined is a MUST HAVE RESOURCE for any teachers of writing from cr?che through college. Here’s the gist: children learn to write from analyzing quality examples of published writing. Students learn the mechanics of our written language by “trying on” skills they see authors use.
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5
So many teachers new to Writing Workshop (aka Writers Workshop) reflect that it’s just a free-for-all time of creative, non-directed writing. So far from the truth! The best teachers infuse mini-lessons which renovate the writer’s craft and skill set, and bring about real improvements in grammar, usage, and editing skills. For the teacher seeking to do this, Mechanically Inclined is highly recommended. You’ll find yourself amazed that langauage arts skills can integrate so easily into your writing program, lacking sacrificing student creativity.
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5