Romeo, O’ Romeo. . .

Submitted by tiffanie.miley on

Forbidden love and tragedy. These things can be found in Mrs. Rice’s ninth grade Honors English classes. Mrs. Rice’s sixth and seventh period classes have been studying The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet. They took a break from the story to explore ideas from the text in a writers’ workshop. Writers’ workshop is an experience to improve one's writing ability by choosing an idea from a book and exploring that idea in a text. When asked about writers’ workshop, Jennifer Bate, ninth-grade student, said, "I feel that it’s interesting to dig deeper into the meaning behind the pages of the story."

Writers’ workshop helps improve the students’ writing abilities. According to Mrs. Rice, students’ writing improvement is dependent on three factors: opportunity, instruction, and feed back. Writers’ workshop provides an opportunity to customize these factors for each student.

During writers’ workshop students explore the idea that they have chosen in a text; like a journal entry, poem, or an interview. The student then conferences with the teacher and receives feedback on how to improve their writing in the type of text that they have chosen. This helps students improve their writing in areas that interests them. According to Kayta Wagstaff, ninth-grade student, writers’ workshop is her favorite unit because you get to work with others and help each other.

Attributions
Joee Lowe, SJHS Staff Writer