Absolutely!
Trade Pages…Read….Talk
It is important that students read each other’s writing. For one thing, it can inspire greater effort in order to at least be “in the middle.” But, most importantly, we all try harder when we know that we will have an audience – a reason to write other than just for the teacher.
Students can read to each other, or trade pages and read. I like the latter, because it uses less class time. You’ll be the one to know whether your students will be able to read each other’s writing.
Asking students to respond in writing on a post-it as well does two things. It gets students to write more and it saves class time.
But, it might be worthwhile time to say, “You have one minute to respond to the writing. Shortest person first. Go.” Actually time it. Then reverse roles and time that for 1 minute. One minute is actually quite a long time for someone to respond to another’s work.
