Red/Green Writing

In WBT, writing is super important!! I know it seems like every thing we do is out load, oral repetition. BUT at some point students have to get all that knowledge on paper and compose intelligible coherent thoughts. One way to encourage this, while differentiating for your students is Red/Green writing. It's so simple it's almost silly: as you are waking around the classroom monitoring and conferring, you carry a red marker and a green market with you. (Side bar - I found single markers for sale at Office Depot during back to school! Bonus: their scented!!!)

So, anyway, you're walking around and conferring and walking and conferring. But where are the anecdotal records? Where is the visual feedback for the students? Insert markers here. Green means go. Red means stop. Use the green marker to dot anything the student does well based on his or her personal goals. (More on goals in a bit.) Use the red marker to dot a few (repeat with me: no more than two of three!!) things the students should avoid doing in the future. Like I said, so simple it's almost silly. But it's EFFECTIVE!! 

In conjunction with red/green writing, we have been practicing genius ladder sentences. Here are the results for our pumpkin writing today. My kids did all rotations and independent or partner work for the whole reading and writing block while I met with every child. Every. Single. Child. My kids were given the instructions: "Write a genius sentence about fall." (We haven't gotten to the detail adder sentences yet.)

I was IMPRESSED with my kiddos!! I hope you are too. Can you incorporate Red/Green Writing into your day?