Six Traits of Writing Model:
Teaching & Assessing
Instructor Name: |
Dr. Karen Lea |
Phone: |
509-891-7219 |
Office Hours: |
8 a.m. to 5 p.m. PST Monday - Friday |
Email: |
|
Address: |
Virtual Education Software |
|
23403 E Mission Avenue, Suite 220F |
|
Liberty Lake, WA 99019 |
Technical Support: |
Welcome to Six Traits
of Writing Model: Teaching & Assessing, a course geared primarily for
professionals (e.g., regular or special educators,
instructional assistants, school psychologists, counselors) working with
children and youth in any academic area. This course focuses on why
teaching writing is an essential skill for life, and
gives theory and practical steps to implement the six traits of writing in any
classroom.
This computer-based instruction course is a self-supporting
program that provides instruction, structured practice, and evaluation all on
your home or school computer. Technical
support information can be found in the Help section of your course.
Course Materials
(Online)
Title: |
Six Traits of Writing Model: Teaching & Assessing |
Publisher: |
Virtual Education Software, inc. 2017, Revised 2020 |
Instructor: |
Dr. Karen Lea |
Academic Work
Academic work submitted by the individual (such as papers,
assignments, reports, tests) shall be the student’s own work or appropriately
attributed, in part or in whole, to its correct source. Submission of
commercially prepared (or group prepared) materials as if they are one’s own
work is unacceptable.
Aiding Honesty in Others
The individual will encourage honesty in others by refraining
from providing materials or information to another person with knowledge that
these materials or information will be used improperly.
Violations of these
academic standards will result in the assignment of a failing grade and
subsequent loss of credit for the course.
This course is designed to be an
informational course with application to educational settings. The analysis of
how to teach writing and how to integrate techniques of writing are designed
for all grade levels, all content areas.
As a result of this course,
participants will demonstrate their ability to:
·
Analyze how to integrate
teaching the elements of Six Traits of Writing
·
Integrate assessing the
elements of Six Traits of Writing
·
Analyze how to integrate
teaching the ideas of writing
·
Analyze how to integrate
teaching the organization of writing
·
Integrate assessing
writing ideas and organization of writing
·
Analyze how to integrate
teaching finding voice
·
Analyze how to integrate
teaching word choice
·
Integrate assessing
writing voice and word choice
·
Analyze how to teach
sentence fluency
·
Analyze how to teach
English conventions
·
Integrate assessing
sentence fluency and conventions
This
course, Six Traits of Writing Model: Teaching & Assessing, will
discuss why writing is important and why teachers should include writing as
often as possible in all content areas. The course will also include practical
applications for assessing and teaching writing, including teaching students
how to self-assess their own writing. The first chapter of this course will
discuss why teaching writing is important and give you an introduction to the
Six Traits of Writing Model. Through chapters 2, 3, and 4 we will discuss the
elements of the Six Traits of Writing Model. Throughout those elements we will
look at practical ways to use this model in your classroom.
As a student you will be expected to:
·
Complete all four
information sections showing a competent understanding of the material
presented in each section.
·
Complete all four
section examinations, showing a competent understanding of the material
presented. You must obtain
an overall score of 70% or higher,
with no individual exam score below
50%, and successfully complete ALL writing assignments to pass this course.
*Please note: Minimum exam score requirements may vary by
college or university; therefore, you should refer to your course addendum to
determine what your minimum exam score requirements are.
·
Complete a review of any section on which your examination
score was below 50%.
·
Retake any examination,
after completing an information review, to increase that examination score to a
minimum of 50%, making sure to also be achieving an overall exam score of a
minimum 70% (maximum of three attempts). *Please
note: Minimum exam score requirements may vary by college or university;
therefore, you should refer to your course addendum to determine what your
minimum exam score requirements are.
·
Complete all course journal article and essay writing
assignments with the minimum word count shown for each writing assignment.
·
Complete a course evaluation form at the end of the course.
Chapter 1: Why
Teach Writing?
This first chapter will
focus on why teaching writing is important and the development of the Six
Traits of Writing Model. Your objectives are to be able to analyze why writing
is important in reading and careers, and to demonstrate an understanding of the
theoretical foundations of the Six Traits of Writing Model.
Chapter 2: Ideas
& Organization
Writing is also a way to
make our thinking and learning visual and understandable for other people, it
gives us a vehicle to explain and refine our thoughts and ideas. In addition to
these reasons writing is important, writing is also a form of entertainment.
There have been many models for teaching writing, but one that has been part of
the educational process for decades is the Six Traits Writing Model and that is
the focus of this course. The first two elements of the Six Traits of Writing
are Ideas and Organization. This chapter of the course will focus on those two
elements.
Chapter 3: Voice
& Words
Now that students have an
idea of what to write about and an organizational structure, educators need to
help students learn to write with voice and how to choose the best words. The
key is to not short change the first two steps: ideas
and organization. Those might seem the most tedious, but they are also the most
important in having in-depth written products. The next two elements of the Six
Traits of Writing are Voice and Word Choice. This chapter of the course will
focus on those two elements.
Chapter 4: Fluency
& Conventions
At the end of each course
section, you will be expected to complete an examination designed to assess
your knowledge. You may take these exams a total of three times. Your last
score will save, not the highest score.
After your third attempt, each examination will lock and not allow
further access. The average from your
exam scores will be printed on your certificate. However, this is not your final grade since
your required writing assignments have not been reviewed. Exceptionally written or poorly written
required writing assignments, or violation of the academic integrity policy in
the course syllabus, will affect your grade.
As this is a self-paced computerized instruction program, you may review
course information as often as necessary. You will not be able to exit any
examinations until you have answered all questions. If you try to exit the exam
before you complete all questions, your information will be lost. You are
expected to complete the entire exam in one sitting.
Writing Assignments
All assignments are
reviewed and may impact your final grade.
Exceptionally or poorly
written assignments, or violation of the Academic Integrity Policy (see course
syllabus for policy), will affect your grade. Fifty percent of your grade is determined
by your writing assignments, and your overall exam score determines the other
fifty percent. Refer to the Essay Grading Guidelines which were sent as
an attachment with your original course link. You should also refer to the Course Syllabus Addendum which was sent as
an attachment with your original course link, to determine if you have any
writing assignments in addition to the Critical Thinking Questions (CTQ) and
Journal Article Summations (JAS). If you
do, the Essay Grading Guidelines will
also apply.
Your writing assignments
must meet the minimum word count and are not to include the question or your
final citations as part of your word count.
In other words, the question and citations are not to be used as a means to meet the minimum word count.
Critical Thinking Questions
There
are four CTQs that you are required to complete. You will need to write a minimum of 500 words
(maximum 1,000) per essay. You should
explain how the information that you gained from the course will be applied and
clearly convey a strong understanding of the course content as it relates to
each CTQ. To view the questions, click on REQUIRED ESSAY and choose
the CTQ that you are ready to complete; this will bring up a screen where you
may enter your essay. Prior to course submission, you may go back at any point to
edit your essay, but you must be certain to click SAVE once you are done with
your edits.
You must click SAVE before you write
another essay or move on to another part of the course.
Journal Article Summations
You
are required to write, in your own words, a summary on a total of three
peer-reviewed or scholarly journal articles (one article per JAS), written by
an author with a Ph.D., Ed.D. or similar, on the topic outlined within each JAS
section in the “Required Essays” portion of the course (blogs, abstracts,
news articles or similar are not acceptable). Your article choice must relate
specifically to the discussion topic listed in each individual JAS. You
will choose a total of three relevant articles (one article per JAS) and write
a thorough summary of the information presented in each article (you must write
a minimum of 200 words with a 400 word
maximum per JAS). Be sure to provide the URL or the journal name, volume, date,
and any other critical information to allow the facilitator to access and
review each article.
To
write your summary, click on REQUIRED ESSAYS and choose the JAS that you would
like to complete. A writing program will automatically launch where you can
write your summary. When you are ready to stop, click SAVE. Prior to course
submission you may go back at any point to edit your summaries but you must be
certain to click SAVE once you are done with your edits. For more information
on the features of this assignment, please consult the HELP menu.
You must click SAVE
before you write another summary or move on to another part of the course.
Karen Lea holds a Ph.D. in education. Dr. Lea has fifteen years’
experience teaching at the K-12 level and another fourteen years’ experience
teaching education courses at the undergraduate and post-graduate level. Currently
she is an Assessment Developer at Western Governor's University. Dr. Lea has been professionally published
over fifteen times and has served on over a dozen panels and boards, including
serving on the NCATE (CAEP) Board of Examiners.
You may contact the instructor by
emailing karen_lea@virtualeduc.com or calling (509) 891-7219 Monday through
Friday, 8:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m. PST. Phone messages will be answered within 24
hours. Phone conferences will be
limited to ten minutes per student, per day, given that this is a self-paced
instructional program. Please do not contact the instructor about technical
problems, course glitches, or other issues that involve the operation of the
course.
If you have questions or problems related to the operation
of this course, please try everything twice. If the problem persists
please check our support pages for FAQs and known issues at www.virtualeduc.com
and also the Help section of your course.
If you need personal assistance
then email support@virtualeduc.com or call (509) 891-7219. When contacting technical support, please
know your course version number (it is located at the bottom left side of the
Welcome Screen) and your operating system, and be
seated in front of the computer at the time of your call.
Minimum Computer Requirements
Please refer to VESi’s
website: www.virtualeduc.com or contact VESi if you have further questions about the
compatibility of your operating system.
Refer to the addendum regarding Grading Criteria, Course
Completion Information, Items to be Submitted and how to submit your completed
information. The addendum will also note any additional course assignments that
you may be required to complete that are not listed in this syllabus.
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Course content is updated
every three years. Due to this update timeline, some URL links may no longer be
active or may have changed. Please type the title of the organization into the
command line of any Internet browser search window and you will be able to find
whether the URL link is still active or any new link to the corresponding
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Updated 6/8/20 JN