Always Write: Corbett's Writing

Welcome. My name is Corbett Harrison, and I have been an educator and a teacher-trainer since 1991. I specialize in writing and differentiated instruction.

I serve Northern Nevada for nine months of the year (September-May), and during summers, I hire myself out to school districts around the country.

For the summer of 2010, I am completely "booked" and am pleased to be presenting in five states this year. If you would like to check my availability for the summer of 2011, please contact me using my contact page.

home | email

Do your students see you write too? They should. It'll make a huge difference in what they turn in for class.

My students are required to build a writing portfolio each year, and I very visibly add to my own portfolio in their presence.

My students are required to keep a journal. I have one too, and sometimes I show students some of my entries on the overhead so that we can talk about my writing process.

It's not required, but I also encourage my students to keep a writer's notebook with them at all times. I show them how my notebook shapes ideas that I might eventually write about.

I believe that the biggest difference between a good writing teacher and a great writing teacher is simple. Great writing teachers write right alongside their students.

If you assign a compare/contrast essay, show them one that you've written. It can be on the same topic they will write about, or it can be about something totally different. Talk about where you struggled while writing yours, and where you felt you captured your best ideas.

If you ask them to write in a journal, be prepared to share from yours. The entries you share don't have to be written during that day's journal writing time. If you're like me, you use the time while students write in journals to take care of classroom business (like role and lunch counts). I make sure my students know I keep a journal, even though I am not writing in it at the exact same time they are.

To become a great writing teacher, you have to become an active member of your community of writers. This is a non-negotiable, in my mind.

On this page, I share some of the writing I share with my students throughout their school year with me. My students know I value my own writing portfolio, and they understand that I expect them to value theirs.

I also proudly feature a page at this website that shares some of the writing that was done by members of my family.

Writing You'll Find in my Portfolio:
(From the early years...)

Writing You'll Find in my Portfolio:
(From the later years...)

My First Grade Portfolio Cover
(Can you tell my mother was a "saver"? These are the the earliest writing samples I show my students, and I know I am lucky to have them! Thank-you, Mom.)

First Grade Narrative Writing:

First Grade Non-Fiction Writing:

First Grade Non-Fiction Writing:
(two weeks later)

An Original Poem from Fourth Grade:
(I remember being proud of this poem; Mr. Borilla hung it up for Open House. Near our house was the Festival Cinema, which is where I first saw Star Wars in 1977. My friend Eric accidentally called it the Vegetable Cinema one day, and it inspired this poem.)

Pages From My Mr. Stick Goes to Washington Journal, 1998
(I did a Fellowship at C-SPAN for a month one summer, and I was asked to keep a journal. Inspired by Amelia's Notebook by Marissa Moss, I created this journal to show my students what I thought their journals could become.)

(Each page of my journal had an original illustration, featuring Mr. Stick, my own classroom's margin mascot. You can read about margin mascots at WritingFix's Note-taking Page.)

A Travel Sonnet I Wrote
(I became really interested in sonnets in the late 90's, and I toyed with the format a lot. For a while, every time I traveled, I wrote a sonnet about the trip. Here is one of my favorite travel sonnets--about my visit to New York City.)

More to come! I am currently without a scanner!