Andrew Weber

TE 803
14 February 2015
Case Study Action Plan
Due to the feedback I received from my interpretation plan, I decided to focus less on the
assessment element of my students writing and develop a better understanding of her
engagement with writing. Accountability being placed on Susie for her writers notebook may
benefit her if she is feeling comfortable with writing rather than the fear of assessment. Also, I
finally received her complete IEP form this week. According to the IOWA Basic Skills Test,
Susie is currently at a 4th grade reading level and 3rd grade writing level. I noticed that the IEP
used the term struggle a great deal especially when it comes her struggle in the area of
Written Expression. The IEP states that she struggles with mechanics and writing complete
sentences in her lengthy writing assignment. She also struggles to write a paragraph with more
than 3 or 4 basic sentences.
After reading her IEP, I decided that assessment of writing may not be the top priority for
the writers notebook right now, but rather finding a way for writing to be more enjoyable for her
(while maintaining the requirements of the writers notebook). The problem Susie is currently
facing is the incompletion of her writers notebook.
Course of Action #1:
For the writers notebook, students have to respond to prompts relating to the current
text/lesson we are conducting in the classroom. According to her IEP, Susie likes to write when
the topic interests her. So, instead of focusing on form (required length of the entry or
paragraph count) I could focus on the self-selection of content. George Hillocks, author of
numerous books about academic writing talks about the obsession with form and that students
need to learn to deal with content in creative and critical ways (247). I could implement freewriting activities and remove form requirements on some of the notebook entries. Seeing how
students react to just writing about what they feel like could help Susie, but I would like to
transition to prompts that provide a great deal of freedom when it comes to content. Free writing
isnt supposed to clean and concise and I think this would allow Susie to become more
comfortable with writing. During freewriting, I could also introduce the concept of personal

voice. Finding your voice in writing removes the dread of form and editing. I believe that
Susie feels uncomfortable with required writing prompts because she feels like there is a sense of
failure if she doesnt meet the requirements.
Course of Action #2
For Susies benefit, I could allow for self-assessment of her writing. Susie could evaluate her
own writing skills and how she feels she could improve them. I came across an assignment from
a first-year college writing course, in which students were required to evaluate the strengths and
weakness of their own writing. This type of self-reflection may be difficult for Susie but I would
like her to critically analyze her own skills to see if she can find improvement in her writing.
This could allow for some scaffolding activities for the whole class. Students can reference their
self-evaluation when moving onto focused writing. Before they write, the students write down
what they expect from their writing. For example, we are currently reading Night, which details
the authors experiences as a prisoner in Auschwitz during WW2. Many of the prompts deal with
the students responding to themes of the text (doubt, death, denial, etc.). Before the students
write based on a prompt, the students must first write what they want to achieve with their
writing.
Course of Action #3
Finally, I discussed about Susies apprehension to participate in class-wide discussions. For
class-wide discussion, I could to use think-pair-share activities. This alternative in discussion
could allow for a better way to scaffold discussion. It may not force Susie to speak directly to
the whole class but it allows her to discuss her writing with other peers.

Works Cited
Burkham, D. (2009, May 18). Student Self-Assessment of Writing. Retrieved February 12, 2015,
from http://www.crlt.umich.edu/sites/default/files/resource_files/WritingSelfAssess.pdf
Elbow, P. (n.d.). Freewriting. Retrieved February 11, 2015, from
http://faculty.buffalostate.edu/wahlstrl/eng309/Freewriting.pdf
Hillocks, G. (2005). At Last: The Focus on Form vs. Content in Teaching Writing. Research in
the Teaching of English, 40(2), 238-248. Retrieved February 12, 2015, from JSTOR.
Juzwik, M. (2013). Inspiring dialogue: Talking to learn in the English classroom. New York:
Teachers College Press.