Join us for an engaging and comprehensive workshop series designed to empower secondary teachers in enhancing adolescent writer development. This series focuses on creating supportive environments that foster student decision-making and ownership in writing. Participants will collaborate in teams to explore innovative strategies, tools, and practices that can be integrated into their classrooms to support students as writers.

Dates

• August 12, 2024
• August 13, 2024
• October 29, 2024
• April 8, 2025

Facilitators

Mark Dziedzic is a Senior Outreach Specialist and the director of the Greater Madison Writing Project, University of Wisconsin–Madison’s affiliate of the National Writing Project. He has been facilitating professional learning and teacher action research with pre-K-12 educators from across Wisconsin with the School of Education’s outreach office since 2009. Prior to joining the outreach office, Dziedzic was an elementary and middle school teacher in Colorado and Wisconsin. He also taught a methods course and supervised student teachers in the UW–Madison Elementary Education program.

Bryn Orum is the Outreach Program Manager for the Greater Madison Writing Project where she coordinates programs for youth and educators. Key projects include Rise Up & Write: a youth advocacy writing summer camp, and the College, Career, and Community Writers Program (C3WP): a National Writing Project program that supports the teaching of evidence-based argument writing. Previously, she co-founded and taught high school English at Clark Street Community School in Middleton, Wisconsin. Orum studied literacy and English at the University of Wisconsin–Madison where she earned her bachelor of arts and master of science degrees. Much of her work in education has focused on equitable and innovative environments.

Objectives

Evaluate Current Writing Practices:

• Assess current writing practices and identify areas for improvement.
• Explore collaboration and partnership opportunities.

Enhance Content Area Writing:

• Discuss writing within specific content areas and develop skill-specific strategies.
• Support teachers’ growth as writers.

Implement 2020 Writing Standards:

• Review and apply the 2020 DPI writing standards.
• Promote low-stakes writing and writing as a thinking tool.

Foster a Community of Writers:

• Develop practices for sharing writing and building peer writing communities.
• Celebrate student writing achievements.

Integrate Reading & Writing in Content Areas:

• Differentiate content area literacy from disciplinary literacy.
• Conduct writing inventories and refine writing assignments and rubrics.

Set Goals and Action Plans:

• Establish commitments and plan for the school year.

Assess and Improve Writing Instruction:

• Analyze student writing to inform instruction and assessment.
• Discuss content-specific challenges and successes.

Promote Authentic Writing Practices:

• Implement authentic audiences, multimodal writing, and AI-resistant practices.
• Create writing-rich tasks and assignments.

Support Peer Response and Assessment:

• Facilitate effective peer response and summative assessment strategies.