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%, 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 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
chapter, 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. Your
final grade for the course will be determined by calculating an average score
of all exams. This score will be printed
on your final certificate. 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.
Instructor Description
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 by 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
organization's web home page.
Updated 6/8/20 JN