Putting the Writer at the Center of a Writing Conference
A Hand Over the Page
While training as a literacy coach, I learned how to become a better teacher of writers and how to see myself as a writer from Mary Ellen Giacobbe co-author of Talking, Drawing, and Writing Lessons for Our Youngest Writers.
I have a very clear memory of my first writing conference with her.
Mary Ellen sat down beside me and slid my piece of writing into the space between us. Then she placed her hand over the page.
She looked at me, smiled, and asked, “So, what are you working on as a writer today?”
It was a simple question. But I hesitated.
Until that moment, no one had ever asked me that question. I had written plenty of things. But had I ever thought of myself as a writer?
No.
At the time, I thought Mary Ellen was simply keeping the words and conventions from becoming the focus of our conference by keeping her hand over my piece of writing. Twenty years later, I understand that her hand was doing something more important.
She put the writing aside—just for a moment—so I could see myself as a writer.
The Person Behind the Page
Mary Ellen centered every writing conference on the writer—not the piece of writing. Her hand remained on top of the page as she asked questions and listened:
- “Why do you want to write about this?”
- “What do you want readers of this piece to understand?”
- “Can you tell me more about _____?”
- “What led up to this moment?”
By keeping her hand over the page, Mary Ellen created a little space between the writer and the writing. In that space, I could talk about what I was thinking, what I was trying to communicate, what mattered to me, and what I hoped a reader might understand.
She listened for the places where my thinking had energy. When something made her curious, she leaned in.
- “Oh, boy, that’s interesting.”
- “If I had been watching, what would I have seen?”
- “If I had been listening, what would I have heard?”
- “What you just shared helped me be there, in that moment, with you.”
Only after she understood the writer did she lift her hand and return to the writing.
And the questions shifted:
- “Can you take me to the part about . . .”
- “As a writer, what would you like the reader to know here?”
- “Where might you include the part about __________?”
- “As a reader, it would help me if you added in the part about . . .”
She wasn’t telling me what was wrong with my writing. She was helping me notice the choices I was making—and choices I might make next.
The writing mattered. But the writer came first.
Seeing the Writer Before the Writing
I have thought about Mary Ellen’s hand on my piece of writing many times over the years. At first, I understood it as a teaching move—a way to keep conventions, mechanics, and the finished product from becoming the focus of our conference.
Now I see it differently.
Her hand created space for me to see myself as a writer: someone with ideas to share, choices to make, and something meaningful to communicate.
Before she responded to the writing, Mary Ellen listened to the writer. She wanted to understand what I was trying to say, why it mattered to me, and the choices I was making.
Before the Pencil Touches the Page
When we acknowledge the writer first, we listen for what the writer wants to communicate.
Writing is a process, not a finished product. It is a continual and recursive process of making choices. And the writer is the one who needs to make them.
Some of our most important decisions as writers happen before our pencil touches the page or our fingers touch a keyboard.
As I write this blog, I am reminded that my work as a writer isn’t simply producing one sentence after another. My work happens through all the thinking, remembering, wondering, questioning, revising, and editing that unfolds along the way.
Our students are doing this work too—even when we can’t see it on the page.
When We Sit Beside Writers
Donald Graves shares in Writing: Teachers and Children at Work that:
“If children don’t speak about their writing, both teachers and children lose. Until the child speaks, nothing significant has happened in the writing conference. The simple, yet highly complex act of helping someone speak can’t be left to chance” (p. 97).
When we sit beside students during conferences, we need to talk writer to writer.
We don’t need all the answers. We don’t need a script or a list of fixes. We need to create conditions for writers to talk about what they are doing, what they are trying to communicate, and what decisions they are considering.
Our job as teachers during writing conferences is to listen with curiosity and ask genuine questions that prompt writers to think and share more.
When students have space to talk about their choices, frustrations, questions, and strengths as writers, something important is happening. They are not simply talking about a piece of writing. They are developing their identities as writers.
Keep Your Hand Over the Page
I still think about Mary Ellen’s hand over the page. That small gesture is a constant reminder that there is always a person behind the page—a person with ideas, memories, feelings, experiences, knowledge, and something worth saying.
Perhaps that is what we give our students when we sit beside them as writers. Not answers, formulas, judgments, or a list of everything they need to fix.
But instead, a space to think, a listener who is curious, a reader who wants to understand, and the opportunity to discover, perhaps for the first time, “I am a writer.”
So, the next time you sit beside a student, remember to keep your hand over the page for a little while and make space for the writer sitting next to you.
Further Reading
For readers who would like to explore writing conferences, writer identity, and ways to support students as writers:
- Anderson, C. (2000). How’s it going? A practical guide to conferring with students. Heinemann.
- Fletcher, R. (2026). Tapping the writer within: Practical ways to help all students claim their wri-dentity. Corwin.
- Horn, M. & Giacobbe, M. (2007). Talking, drawing, and writing: Lessons for our youngest writers. Routledge.
- Villalba, S. (2026). Tell me more: Conferring with artists, writers, and storytellers. NCTE.
Reference
- Graves, D. (2003). Writing: Teachers and children at work. Heinemann.
