Atwell's _The Reading Zone_

[SommerWind410@aol.com]

Has anyone else read this?  If so, what are your thoughts?
 
Our LA department is in the process of revamping our curriculum, so in my  
mind, there's a whole lot of chaos right now.  And I am still struggling to  
grasp -- as I have been for years -- how a reader's and writer's workshop could  
and would realistically work in a week of five 53-minute periods.  I've  
attended Atwell's seminar on _Lessons That Change Writers_ and Calkins's  
presentation on writer's workshop, and still, things do not totally gel for  me.  I 
especially have a hard time with fitting in regular in-class  independent reading 
time and sticking to a predictable schedule.
 
In this title, Atwell emphasizes that kids do need that  "predictable, 
bedrock schedule" and advocates three days of writing  workshop per week, two days 
of reading workshop, and thirty minutes of reading  for pleasure every night of 
the week.  She'd also squeeze in spelling study  and poetry wherever she 
could but would "give up vocabulary study and grammar  study...book reports, 
public speaking, oral reports, projects, dialectical or  double-entry journals..."  
All of this she deems worthless.  She  writes, "if a grade is being 
assigned," (IF?) it is based on three  items:  how well a student met his personal 
reading goals which  were set at the end of the previous marking period, 
"adherence to the rules and  expectations of reading workshop," and "the quality of 
thinking that shows up in  the letter-essays."  (Every three weeks, students 
write a letter-essay of  at least two pages to either the teacher or to a student 
of their choice about a  book they have *finished* reading.)  
 
It sounds as though she isn't doing much, if any, whole class or shared  
reading.  
 
I just finished the book this morning and am still trying to sift through  it 
and collect my thoughts on it.  Just wondering if anyone else had read  it or 
has any thoughts about these ideas.  Thanks in advance for any  responses.
 
Cathy :-)
 
 
 
 



************************************** See what's free at http://www.aol.com.