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Avg. Customer Rating:(based on 23 reviews) Sales Rank: 5547 Category: Book
Author:Nancie Atwell Publisher:Boynton/Cook Studio:Boynton/Cook Manufacturer:Boynton/Cook Label:Boynton/Cook Languages: English (Original Language), English (Unknown), English (Published) Media: Paperback Edition: 2 Sub Number Of Items: 2 Pages: 560 Shipping Weight (lbs): 2 Dimensions (in): 9 x 7.4 x 1
Product Description Nancie Atwell reflects on the ten years of her teaching experience since writing the first edition of the seminal work, In the Middle.
Great resource for teachers October 24, 2007 This book is essential for any english or elemtary school teacher. I teach social studies and found many ideas within it informative and relevant. The book is written in an approachable way, filled with mini-lessons and examples of her own students writting. An easy read and needed guide for great practice within the classroom. I highly recomend this.
Excellent! October 9, 2003 7 out of 10 found this review helpful
A book that helped inspire me to become a teacher. Some other reviewers may not find it totally "practical" for them to adopt, but anyone with common sense would know that you take what works best for you from as many legitimate resources as possible and adapt.
Based on years of First Hand experience October 9, 2003 11 out of 14 found this review helpful
You can let students have choices about what to write and still have formal guidelines, unlike what the other reviewer/teacher wrote. Nancie Atwell's book is based on years of her own first-hand experiences in the classroom, and, as someone who assigns and reads well over 1000 formal essays per school year to over 200 students, I'll listen to Atwell's advice before some burned out teacher's rantings about the need to drill, drill, drill.
Condensed version, please July 27, 2003 26 out of 40 found this review helpful
I bought two copies of this book from Amazon, for myself and my class aide, on the strength of the other teachers' recommendations here. The book is as good as the most enthusiastic reviewers say it is, but it is seriously flawed, and to some degree self-contradictory, because it talks too much. As good as are the author's approaches, she doesn't really need 484 pages, plus numerous appendices, to get the message across. In fact, she buries the message in verbosity.
Note that other reviewers found the book easy to read. But if you are already convinced that you want to refresh your approach to teaching reading and writing, you may grow impatient with the overabundance of anecdotes, homilies and elaboration.
Teachers know there is no itemized recipe for teaching, but a book on teaching writing could at least demonstrate the virtue of being concise. Mrs. Atwell should read her own quotes and not "cloud the issues with jargon in place of simple, direct prose...." (p. 16). (This is one of numerous quotes of Donald Graves, who returns the favor by endorsing her book in an exemplary brief foreword).
As one who likes quoting great writings in every chapter, the author could have used and applied the Hellenistic Demos: "I will be moderate in all I attempt and do Nothing to Excess."
Summary: it's just too much of a good thing. I'm going to spring for the workbook (Lessons that Change Writers) and generate even more royalties for the author, in the hopes it is more to the point.
A Shift in Teaching January 8, 2003 18 out of 20 found this review helpful
Atwell's research and dedication to the true teaching of literacy in classrooms of all levels has changed my philosophy of teaching forever. Those who judge her approach without attempting to understand it, are only missing out on an innovative and fresh approach to how English should be taught.
In my own classroom of tenth graders, I have gone from yawns and glazed eyes to students who leave my classroom at the end of the school year saying "I could write for pages and pages about how you've helped me become a better writer." I still address grammar, literature, "5 paragraph" essay writing, and the dreaded (and overrated)state tests. Instead of being students who force themselves to read and write for a grade, they are readers and writers who are proud of the accomplishments they produce in literacy.
I recommend this book to anyone who is serious about changing the way literacy is taught in our schools, and creating not only engaged students, but people who love to read and write.
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