B&B 6-7

I had never heard of the six trait model before reading this chapter but it seems like a really good way for students to learn what makes a good paper. Chapter 7 also had some good ideas for hands on activities that are non-tradtional and fun for the students as well as instructive, such as making a brocure of their hometown or analyzing greeting cards. On Wednesday in my class at Hickman everyone brought in song lyrics to analyze using critical approaches, such as feminist, Marxist, historical, etc. and the activity was a huge success. It was fun both for us as teachers and for the students and a good change of pace, and also prepared them to apply those critical approaches to more literary works, which they will be doing in the near future. I always enjoyed activities like this when I was in high school and hope I am creative and forward thinking enough to come up with fun activities like this when I teach. Another nice thing about the six trait model is it provides is it provides a uniform way for grading student's work, so that everyone understands why they got the grade they got and eliminates the issue of fairness or inequality. It would be nice, even, if all English teachers could get on board using the same rubric for writing workshop so students are not confused from class to class. It gives students all the specific elements they need for a good paper and all they have to do is apply them.