6+Plus+1+Writing

media type="custom" key="7359197" Online Resources for Using Trait Writing in All Content Areas 6 + 1 Writing Traits
 * FAQ**

It's the language, the shared vocabulary that adds such a rich component to our teaching and assessing of student writing. The traits help students and teachers understand what is working well and what needs to be improved in their writing. The traits give teachers a focus for their writing instruction. The traits give us all a common language for talking about and celebrating writing.
 * 1. What's the best thing about the traits?**
 * 2. What are our expectations for implementing 6+1 Writing Traits across the curriculum?**

Communication Arts teachers provide expert instruction in writing. The language and strategies of all traits should be explicitly taught in the Communication Arts classroom. The language of the traits should be seamlessly imbedded in every aspect of the literacy classroom.

The traits are also used to support writing skills across the curriculum. Ideally, students should read and write in some form every day in every classroom. Teachers should utilize the trait(s) that best support the writing experience of an assignment. The language and strategies of the traits should be used to support and enhance the literacy experience across the curriculum.

No! You do what makes sense for the assignment given to the students. For example, you might be working on ideas, organization, and voice for a period of time and only want to have students focus on those traits. Or perhaps you will want to take it even more slowly and work on one trait at a time. The beauty of an analytic system is you can take the pieces apart, examine them, and then insert them back into the larger picture. It is impossible to look at one trait without feeling the impact that other traits have on the piece as a whole, but it can be very useful, for instructional purposes, to look at one, two, or even three traits in "isolation" as students are learning to see what you see in their work.
 * 3. Do I have to assess all six traits for each piece of student writing?**

From time-to-time, you may wish to assess a piece of student writing on all six traits for your own diagnostic purposes. Certainly assessing at the beginning of the year and the end of the year to show progress makes a lot of sense. But, periodically, you may also want to assess a piece for all six traits to get a sense of how students are doing. How much and how often is up to you and the needs of your students. One of the great things about using the six-trait model for assessment and instruction is the flexibility you have. Assess for one trait, several, or six, it all works!

Yes. Absolutely! They must. The division of traits in order to do focused revision and working on one trait at a time is artificial, we admit. But it's a way of making revision manageable for students, who often do not know where to begin. Writing process steps aren't really separate either. Prewriting, drafting, revision and editing aren't really mutually exclusive; we separate them to make the writing process easier to understand and put into practice.
 * 4. Is there ever a time all six traits come together in students' revision?**

Similarly, real writers do think about organization and ideas at the same time; when they revise ideas, the voice also improves; when they alter the wording, that change affects fluency, and so on. Writing is a unified whole, but thinking about it in components makes something very BIG easier to deal with, especially for less experienced writers. Eventually, with practice, students will come to see many possibilities for revision all at once. In any learning situation, it is essential to focus on improvement and use assessment to guide instructional practice. Clearly, the most important element of the 6 Trait model is using the language of effective writing to support the continuous improvement loop of instruction, revision and assessment. This instructional focus would be true of any learning experience. However, scoring systems of percentages and letter grades are deeply ingrained in our educational structure. Education stakeholders commonly view the letter grade as an authentic representation of skill proficiency. With this in mind, it is often necessary to translate the language of any scoring guide into a grade book score. Teachers should do what makes sense for the assigned task and balance the reality of assessment for grading with the best practice of assessment for learning. I recommend the following translation of 6 Trait language into grade book scores: 50 (__points earned__) + 45 = % (points possible) 5 = 95% A 4 = 85% B 3 = 75% C 2 = 65% D 1 = 55% F
 * 5. How does 6 Trait scoring translate to the school grade book?**

IDEAS _ Are the examples and supporting details you use convincing and engaging? _ Do any of your ideas need further development? _ Do major ideas receive adequate attention? Have you spent too much time explaining small details? ORGANIZATION _ Does your essay have an introduction, a body, and a conclusion? _ Are your ideas and supporting details arranged in a thoughtful, logical manner? _ Are your paragraphs unified and coherent? Have you included transitions to relate each paragraph to the next paragraph? VOICE _ Who is your audience? Have you provided enough information so that your audience will understand your topic, but avoided repeating information they probably already know? _ Does your essay take into account the possible attitudes your audience may have about your topic? _ Is your tone suitable for your topic? SENTENCE FLUENCY _ Do you begin your sentences with different words? _ Are there sentences of a variety of lengths and levels of complexity? _ Have you read the piece aloud to see if the essay flows and is easy to understand? <span style="color: #000000; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">WORD CHOICE <span style="color: #000000; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">_ Are there any unnecessary words or repetitive sentences that need to be trimmed from your essay? <span style="color: #000000; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">_ Is your language clear and precise? <span style="color: #000000; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">_ Have you used interesting verbs to convey your meaning? <span style="color: #000000; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">CONVENTIONS <span style="color: #000000; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">_ Have you proofread your essay for misspelled or missing words and correct punctuation? <span style="color: #000000; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">_ Do paragraphs begin in the right places? <span style="color: #000000; font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">_ Do your subjects/verbs and pronouns/antecedents agree throughout the essay?