Course III Teachers Guide.pdf - Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

ETTING STARTED 20Teaching TipsPrepare students for the writing components of Destination Reading and make sure they understand that their writing issaved and available to you, the teacher, to assess.When students are about to begin a new unit, consult the Lesson Plan to locate the Learning Objectives (found in blueboxes at the upper right of the lesson pages). The Learning Objectives indicate the kind of writing activities included inthe unit. If possible, preview the actual writing activity within the unit. Text entry activities are usually found toward theend of Lessons 1 and/or 4.As you introduce the unit to students, let them know what kind of writing they will be doing. Their responses will be of ahigher quality if you let them know what specific features of their writing you will be looking for in your assessment.Posting your expectations for their writing near the computer workstations can help students to focus on your goals fortheir writing. For example, you may wish to suggest:• using the sticky note feature for prewriting or drafting before they enter their response into the writing activity.• writing a specific number of sentences or paragraphs.• including clear topic sentences (or descriptive words, or active verbs) for a particular activity.Assessing WritingTeachers can view and print student writing through the RLMS system, shown below. When assessing studentresponses to the writing activities, teachers should consider the instructions provided by the courseware as well as theinstructions they may have provided to the students. Because writing is an ongoing part of the Destination Readingexperience, reviewing and discussing the student writing activities and your expectations for them with the class, soonafter the introduction of the courseware, will likely result in improved student writing performance.