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Write Beside Them: Risk, Voice, and Clarity in High School Writing

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Writer's Workshop. The term has almost become cliché among English teachers, and it means very different things to different educators. For a new take on this now-old warhorse (though Nancie Atwell shall be forever young in our minds!), teachers should revisit the writer's workshop as Penny Kittle runs it in her New Hampshire classroom.

In fact, this book will appeal to teachers across a wide spectrum: those who have never tried writer's workshop for a myriad of reasons, those who sampled the waters and ran out due to the chill of chaos, and those who still consider themselves practitioners but have nagging doubts about its effectiveness with the students. The benefit here is that Kittle is a borrower. She unapologetically stands on the shoulders of some familiar giants of the teaching/research field, including not only Atwell but the two Don's (Murray and Graves), the two Tom's (Newkirk and Romano), Jim Burke, Kylene Beers, Linda Rief, Lucy Calkins, and many others. As she describes how her classroom is an amalgam of their philosophies and puts her own imprint on them, Kittle literally "shares the wealth" and saves the reader a lot of personal research by showing highlights of their work in practice.

Though the workshop described is based on a half-year semester for seniors, it can be customized for any grade. Kittle assigns a short personal narrative followed by a longer one focusing on the elusive (for young writers) "So What?" as seen in a memoir. Then she turns to persuasion and argument, followed by a unit on multiple genres. As a foundation to her workshop, she uses a writer's notebook (quick writes) and model texts. Also essential (thus, the title) is the notion of writing WITH the students, then sharing the frustration, successes, and strategies that come with the hard work of writing.

Most teachers have mastered the mini-lesson, but the numbers are legion among those who struggle with conferencing. This book, which includes a generous DVD-ROM showing Kittle teaching her class, provides the good, the bad, and the ugly of struggling not only with conferences but with the workshop in general. In fact, Kittle's frank tone (yes, things sometimes go wrong and she provides graphic evidence!) is one of the book's strengths. It goes deeper than Atwell's seminal book from yesteryear, IN THE MIDDLE, and admits that some students can confound even the best of us with the best of strategies and intentions. In other words, it's not one of those rose-colored narratives where all the students are charming, hard-working, and cooperative. Kittle shares good with bad and earns our respect along the way because it looks much like the classrooms WE teach day to day.

Ultimately, Kittle's is an appeal on behalf of the students. She puts us in their shoes as students and as writers -- both very vulnerable entities. She helps us see the harm of commenting heavily on mechanics and lightly on content. She points out the foolhardiness of keeping papers forever, or of only marking up the final drafts. It all makes sense, of course, but we teachers are often so caught up in our own daily struggles (which can be depressingly enormous) that we often forget to walk a mile in their shoes.

Trying those shoes on is worth it -- as is this book. I can't imagine any English teacher who cares about writing skipping this. Agree or disagree with Kittle, you should at least hear her out. My suspicion is that many will be as convinced and as grateful as I was when I turned the last page knowing full well that this would become dog-earred in future years. Recommendation: buy and use.

Love this product - used it in a workshop and had to have a copy of my own. Has great ideas on setting up the writing arena in your classroom, and great activities to get students headed in the right direction. Makes the topics of voice and audience, which are difficult to most students, easy to understand, and obtainable.

Write Beside Them is written with voice, humor, and humility. Penny Kittle does not tell us she has the perfect class with the perfect student. She tells us how to stick with what we believe to help our students achieve their fullest potential.
I teach third grade (self-contained) and still gained so much insight into writing workshop with a constructivist approach by reading Penny's book.
The dvd is phenomenal! It has her first day of class, her conferring with students, student work . . .
I think writing teachers of grades 3 and up can gain from this book although it is geared to high school English teachers.
Penny also refers to the work of other great writing teachers - Don Murray, Don Graves, Tom Romano, Tom Newkirk, Linda Reif, Nancy Atwell; it helps to have all these resources that readers can turn to for more information.

Kittle modestly presents what she does within her creative writing classes while advocating the need for all teachers to write with students - to struggle with the students and be human in the writing experience. Instead of walking into class with a perfect model, Kittle shows a path of discovery she navigates with her students making the learning more powerful and authentic for everyone involved.

What a pleasant surprise! Penny Kittle shares anecdotes and examples in a way that makes writing workshop relevant, practical, and attainable in your own classroom. She shows readers the framework that works for her students with plenty of details and examples, but encourages readers to adapt and change the model to meet the needs of our own students. The passion and strategies she discusses will energize my classroom in the fall and she has given me the courage to write with my own students, showing them a writer's process, rather than always showing them finished products.

Kittle's authentic experiences with writers over the years provide a real vision for what writing workshop can do for adolescent writers. She challenges teachers, as the title indicates, to write beside our students and make time for writing every day (regardless of other time/testing pressures we may feel). I look forward to reading more of her work!

I recently read Penny Kittle's Write Beside Them. This book and CD spoke to my heart. I had been feeling overwhelmed with so many teaching responsibilities. Moreover, I was feeling like a fraud. I was assigning journals, short writing project, and research papers. I was reading journals, short writing project, and research papers. I was commenting on ways to improve writing...but I did not feel like a writer. My time was being consumed with my many obligations and I needed to change something. Penny Kittle's book forced me to rethink how I wanted to teach writing. I challenged myself to become the writer that I challenged my students to be. I wanted to "walk the talk" and to be authentic. I started by creating this blog - "Writers Rock." I began to post my writing on the blog and I invited my writing tutors in WCHS: The Writing Center to read and leave comments. I then expanded this idea and each writing tutor created their own unique blog - in turn, they told their friends and together we started an international blog movement! I have found the joy of writing again through this simple format. I have modeled vulnerability and I have modeled giving and receiving constructive feedback. This shift in "making" time to write instead of complaining that I don't "have" time to write has sharpened my powers of observation again, given new purpose to watching the news, added meaning to everyday chores - I'm always looking for my next blog topic.

Though I like what I've read in this book, I was very disappointed to find that the disk in my book is either damaged or unreadable. I have been troubleshooting for the last 3 hours, and though I can get the video to play in a regular DVD player, I have tried the disk on 3 different computers and all the files on it are unreadable (stall my computer in processing).

I had this book assigned for a college course I was taking last semester, I am studying to be a high school English teacher, and I cannot wait to go back and re-read it over the summer before I do my student teaching! Each chapter made me think about writing completely differently, and the provided DVD showed how Kittle actually runs her class and the students' reactions. I cannot begin to explain how much this book has helped me already, and I will continue to return to its wealth of knowledge as I try to help my future students with their writing!

This book has helped me focus my lessons and really reach those "hard to reach" students. The informational DVD that comes with it is exceptional, as well. I recommend this to anyone struggling with writing in the classroom, or if you are simply looking for more writing ideas.

This is a step by step guide for how to approach writing in high school classrooms. It has very valuable information on how to make lessons about writing truly get to the students and how to help them achieve their best and become successful at this skill. Having the perspective of a teacher that works on these strategies on a daily basis makes this book a very relaible source of information. This is a great buy!