[busybee4]

I am a vetran teacher 20 years. My town is adopting the Readers and Writers model this September. I watched a clip of Debbie Miller at an inservice day and I was hooked. Since then I have read her books and others trying to wrap my head around how to begin with September first graders. I did modify my instruction to try to practice teaching this way in April and May. My students were very responsive, but that was because they could write. How do I get them started with a 90 minute block in Septemeber? All advice is welcome.

[MrsJ]

A couple of years ago we had training from Teachers' College for Reading Workshop, and I wrote a document with suggested objectives and mini-lessons for each month. It sounds like you're familiar with the RW model, and these will give you some beginning mini-lessons. After you become comfortable with the approach, you'll get good at developing your own mini-lessons based on your students' needs. For writing workshop, we just got the units of study by Lucy Calkins. But if you get Stephanie Parson's First Grade Writers, you could use that and have a great program. Good luck- I love reading and writing workshop, and I've been teaching 20+ years, too!