Teaching Adolescent Writers

In an increasingly demanding world of literacy, it has become critical that students know how to write effectively. From the requirements of standardized tests to those of the wired workplace, the ability to write well, once a luxury, has become a necessity. Many students are leaving school without the necessary writing practice and skills needed to compete in a complex and fast-moving Information Age. Unless we teach them how to run with it, they are in danger of being run over by a stampede--a literacy stampede.

InTeaching Adolescent Writers, Kelly Gallagher shows how students can be taught to write effectively. Gallagher shares a number of classroom-tested strategies that enable teachers to:

• Understand the importance of teaching writing and how to motivate young writers
• Show how modeling from both the teacher and real-world texts builds young writers
• Provide choice of what to write, which helps elevate adolescent writing, and how to fit it into a rigorous curriculum
• Help students recognize the importance of purpose and audience
• Assess essays in ways that drive better writing performance.

Infused with humor and illuminating anecdotes, Gallagher draws on his classroom experiences and work as co-director of a regional writing project to offer teachers both practical ways to incorporate writing instruction into their day and compelling reasons to do so.

Kelly, a "baseballoholic" and a self-described expert at negotiating airports, is in his 33rd year of teaching at the high school level.

He currently teaches at Magnolia High School in Anaheim, California.

He believes that "there is no greater pleasure than teaching someone something." Teaching is "artistic, it matters a great deal, and I can never get the job down perfectly."

Kelly thinks that professional development should treat teachers as such - professionals. "I know in the classroom that good things happen when my students have meaningful discussions. I know as a teacher myself that my craft sharpens when I am given the opportunity to have meaningful discussions with my peers. And let's have a laugh or two while we are at it."

Writing his six books for Stenhouse was a solitary experience. "Though I have written outlines prior to each of my books, I have yet to follow any of them step-by-step. That is why I find writing rewarding - because the act of writing itself generates new thinking, and new thinking is always exciting."