ABSTRACT
Preservice teachers support students’ nonfiction writing development during the writing clinic because the Common Core State Standards require informational/explanatory and argument writing as two of the three genres K-12 teachers is required to teach. While preservice teachers lead the tutoring sessions with elementary students through University-hosted or local-school writing clinics, the author leads parent-writer groups as informational sessions for families to support home/school literacy connections. Along with Serene, a few other preservice teachers joined the family sessions during the Fall 2014 semester due to low enrollment, which proved beneficial to the preservice teachers’ professional development. Shockley et al. highlighted parallel practices to showcase how students engaged in similar literacy practices at home and at school, parallel practices that honored families’ funds of knowledge. M. A. Zurcher encouraged teachers to welcome family support in the writing workshop. Not only would families see the teacher model writing for students, but Zurcher encouraged inviting families to provide feedback during writing conferences in class.
