What happens when we earnestly look to the text for learning?
I mean, really look to the text.
Not some sterile passage from a basal.
Not the occasional book that seems to coincide with our unit.
Not even the mandated whole-class novel, though I have heard merits on both sides (some pros here, cons here).
I mean full-blown looking to texts as our mentors day in and day out.
Starting out units immersing ourselves in books on every level and topic we can find (our school librarian was a saint in consistently helping me prepare for the immersion stage of our units).
Getting to really get to know the author–his/her style, favorite strategies, even personality — and then talking about what ____ is doing to make us feel or think the way we do?
Setting out each day for authentic discovery within the pages of the mentor text — which, of course, means we don’t necessarily know what our students will find?
Engaging alongside students as we also seek out examples of what we’re trying to better understand as readers and writers?
I have been on both sides of this approach to mentor texts. And I’d like to share a few before/after effects I observed in my students:
Before:
- I rarely, if ever, heard students refer to themselves as authors
- The writing strategies we were trying to learn about usually felt much more abstract with little context.
- As we inevitably turned to worksheets, our approach felt more contrived.
- Students looked to me for each day’s literary learning.
After:
- Students saw authors as people — people who were once kids like them that had to learn and hone their craft in the exact same way we were — which led to them referring to themselves as authors, too.
- We made it our daily mission to seek out clear context within books.
- The strategies we were trying to learn about felt much more natural.
- We all looked to the books for rich, co-constructed literary learning.
We become better equipped to find and share mentor texts when we read as much as we can as teachers. Whole language reading/writing workshops will also include plenty of examples of texts that coincide with each unit (One of the reasons I enjoyed Pam Allyn’s Core Ready series). But of course, there are also plenty of free online resources available, too! Here are a few:
Making the shift toward integrating mentor texts into our daily literacy learning has been pivotal for authenticity. After all, if we say it’s all about reading and writing books, shouldn’t books be our primary companions?
featured image: DeathToTheStockPhoto
