Achieving Our Wildly Important Goals: Writing Workshop 4DX

Our daily whirlwind leaves all of the goals that we have set for ourselves, our students, and our organization in a pile of rubble in the back of our minds. We are so consumed with everything else that we have to do every single day, that we lose sight of the really important goals and changes that we were hoping to make to move everyone forward in a better direction. It is time to bring our WIGs back to the forefront of what really matters and make the plan on how we are going to achieve those goals clear so that everyone on the team is on the same page.

Clarity of Our “Why”

Goal Focus: My WIG is to incorporate authentic writing workshop activities, including a self-reflection journal/blog at least once a week in every classroom by the end of the 2022 school year. How teachers and students decide to incorporate authentic writing practices into their learning process is up to them. The overall result should yield more interest in using the writing process as a formative learning and reflection tool as well as improve the quality of student writing and test scores. This WIG is our team's personal motivation.

Motivations to Achieve our “Why”

Goal Measures: The following measures must be made in order to effectively achieve my goal. Through these measures we will be able to socially motivate ourselves as well as to help each other in the realms of their personal, social and structural capabilities.

Lag measures: Number of writing assignments/reflective journals posts achieved/in progress by students and staff each week.

Lead measure #1: Share writing ideas/prompts/opportunities with staff and students.

Lead measure #2: Create allotted time in the schedule solely for the purpose of student/staff writing and reflection.

Lead measure #3: Allow proper training to all staff and students about the way that a successful writing workshop operates.

Keeping Score: A visible scoreboard showing who has been successful in achieving their weekly goals will be kept on the bulletin board in the main hallway by the guidance office. This will help keep people socially engaged and invested in participating in incorporating writing into their lessons at least once a week in the hopes of achieving the WIG. This will also allow students to see and realize that we are serious about our writing initiative. Our team will use this scoreboard as a structural motivation tool.

Purposeful Meetings: Teams made up of members from different departments (preferably one person from each department to a team) will meet each week to discuss authentic writing assignments that they are using in their classes, how their weekly reflection process is going, and to ask questions if needed. At the end of each meeting teams will work together to create a plan for each other to help them meet their goal for the next week. Someone on the team will complete a google form with notes from their meeting and send them to me. I can then see how teachers are progressing/not progressing with their writing workshop goals as well as what areas they need more support in.

Launch: As much as no one wants to hear this, the launch point most likely would be during a staff meeting before the start or possibly even at the end of the previous school year. (Plan could then be implemented at the start of the next school year, giving staff ample time to start planning how they are going to begin implementing writing into their courses.) I would tell the staff my WIG as well as the measures that we will take together in order to achieve it. I will relay the message that this isn’t being done for the purposes of teacher evaluations or observations. We are strictly only doing this to better our students as well as ourselves.

Walking the Walk: Staff and students engage more in the writing process together and are finding that their hard work is paying off. Students are more engaged because they are writing about their interests in their field of study. Teachers are more engaged because their students are more engaged. Everyone is holding each other accountable because we are all working and discussing our writing with each other.

Working with Purpose: Students and staff begin to take on more challenging writing opportunities because they know that they will be able to achieve their goals through hard work and dedication to each other.

Routine: Writing Workshop becomes a routine practice in our daily teaching/learning environment.

I believe that if we take this plan one step at a time and work together as the amazing team that we are, there is no possible way that we can fail.

References:

Grenny, J., Patterson, K., Maxfield, D., McMillan, R., & Switzler, A. (2013). Influencer: The new science of leading change. New York: McGraw-Hill Education.

McChesney, C., Covey, S., & Huling, J. (2012). The 4 disciplines of execution: Achieving your wildly important goals. New York, NY: Free Press.