Should My Raise Class Proposal

My RISE class proposal is based on the following question: How can teachers increase student engagement through student voice and choice in class design? Since ELAR has two parts (reading and writing), I will be answering the application questions through the two lenses of reading and writing.

First, I will discuss how I will incorporate more student voice and choice through writing. To help me design this aspect of this class, I read Project-Based Writing by Liz Prather, which gave me a variety of resources and ideas. The reason why I chose this instructional method for writing in my RISE class proposal is the use of student choice and voice throughout the writing process. Prather discusses in her book that writing isn’t a formulaic process.

Before I can begin this process, it is imperative I build a community in my classroom. Prather gives several ideas on how to effectively build a close-knit community among the class. This is essential in project-based writing because students, while completing the work independently, will be working with each other to revise, edit, propose, pitch, grade, and evaluate their writing. Students will not be able to honestly discuss each other’s writings unless you have trust built in the classroom among the students. While I was reading this very interesting and thought-provoking book, I made notes of how exactly this would fit into my RISE proposal. After taking some time to build that positive community and classroom culture, I move to the instructional framework of project-based writing. The first step is discovering an idea. Students would brainstorm for an idea they want to write about and why they want to write it. During the second step, students develop a pitch and proposal for their writing idea. When their idea is selected and approved by their peers, they will write a proposal that will include what they are writing and for what purpose. Planning their work and creating product-specific goals is the third step of the writing cycle. Then students will move into writing their rough drafts and researching information as needed. When students are finished with their rough drafts, we will move on to the revising and editing stage of the cycle, or as Prather calls it “Inquiry Week”. Students will use their goals to frame inquiry-type questions for their peers to answer while revising and editing their writing piece. They will have time to give each other the feedback and the answers to the inquiry questions during “Say-Back Sessions”. After revising and editing is complete, the students are ready to turn in their final