Every Albany eighth and ninth grader gets writer coaching!

Six years ago, Albany High School became the locus of WriterCoach Connection's first expansion from its original base in Berkeley. And three years after that, the program expanded again, two blocks to the northwest, to Albany Middle School. The program is now firmly embedded into the English curricula at both schools. Here's how it looked as the 2008-09 school year began.

The WCC site co-coordinators at Albany High, Teresa Barnett and Peg Healy, tell this story about the beginning of the program's sixth year at AHS:

"Wow, I misssed this -- it's so good to be back working with students again," beamed one
returning coach after working with three different students on a challenging Maltese Falcon
essay.  The other coaches on the team echoed the sentiment, and spent a few minutes debriefing and sharing ideas with the two newest coaches to join the team. As we start the sixth year of writer coaching at Albany High School, the usual irregular and fluid conditions prevail. We coach on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, primarily meeting with the sixteen 9th-grade English classes, with three of the five teachers new to the 9th grade program. We're also occasionally available for seven other mixed-grade classes of English language learners, whose students and teachers are especially appreciative.  Of our roster of 45 wonderful and flexible coaches, 11 are new to coaching this year. Between mid-October and November 6th we completed over 330 individual coaching sessions! We hope to see most 9th grade English students about six times each by the end of April.

Over at Albany Middle School, site co-coordinator Karen Larson can hardly believe the program is already heading into its third straight year; she was the original site coordinator at AMS, and she's still there. Karen and her coordinating partner this year, Nancy Whitney, sailed into the program with the same degree of gusto that has characterized the program every year, buoyed by the staunch support of Albany Middle School principal Robin Davis, herself a writing teacher, and her dedicated staff of four eighth-grade English teachers. Here's what Karen and Nancy have to say:

Sometimes the fall brings heat and sometimes it brings rain, but one thing is sure: at Albany Middle School fall brings writer coaches to the 8th grade English classes!

 

Newly trained coaches join an ever-growing cadre of experienced coaches in our third year at AMS.  So far this year we have been able to work on several assignments that have helped us to get to know the students. We have coached them on an essay exploring “Three Sides of Me,” where the students write about one of their characteristics from the perspective of someone who knows them well. We started working with them on their Mandala project where students explore their sun and shadow sides through animals, weather, plants, and so on. We also got to know what is important to our students in the letters they wrote to the next president to be published on Google Docs.

Students have also been able to bring their own voice to history studies by writing a children’s book describing Columbus’ first meeting with the Americans. Their creativity is stretched on their work on a newspaper inspired by their reading of “The Light in the Forest,” written partially from the perspective of the Native Americans and in part from the perspective of the white settlers.

We have been in every 8^th grade class so far. In the 375 coaching sessions conducted so far, we have been able to coach almost every 8^th grade student at AMS. Not a bad way to kick off the fall!