Experiment with a wide variety of available writing tools to help your students develop their inner writer. Understand the secrets to picking good digital writing tools while working with classmates in a hands-on and non-threatening writer’s workshop format. Resources include a blend of videos, pedagogic articles, lesson plans, projects, and virtual face-to-face meetings to share suggestions with classmates in a collaborative environment. Strategies introduced range from conventional tools such as quick writes, online websites, and visual writing to unconventional approaches such as Twitter novels, comics, and Google Earth lit trips. These can be adapted to any writing program be it 6+1 Traits, Write Source, IB, Common Core, or other popular language arts curricula.

At the completion of this course, the learner will be able to:

• Use technology to drive authentic writing activities and project-based learning. InTASC 3,5,6,7,8
• Use traditional and non-traditional technology approaches to build an understanding of good writing and nurture a love of the process. InTASC 6,7,8
• Guide students in selecting writing strategies that differentiate for task, purpose and audience. InTASC 2,4
• Assess student writing without discouraging creativity via easy-to-use tech tools. InTASC 6
• Provide students with effective feedback in a collaborative, sharing manner. InTASC 1,3