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Follow this step-by-step lesson plan to teach your students how
With so many types and formats of writing that we ask of students, it can be overwhelming for them to know where to start, what kinds of language to use, and what the structure of
Make the most of your writing block with these funny picture prompts! Go here:
Teaching writing to fifth graders doesn't have to be intimidating. This post details exactly how I teach writing in 5th grade.
One of the things I do every year that really makes a difference in my students' learning is having them use notebooks to store notes, examples, work, and
Analyzing writing curriculums, planning writing workshop and teaching writing lessons can be overwhelming. You might think, how am I going to fit everything in and produce successful writers? Where do I start? What skills do they need? This post will share the 7 BASIC WRITING LESSONS that every teacher should teach! With this basic knowledge, students will be able to perform other writing assignments more effectively. The following skills are not only effective in upper elementary, they are often needed at the middle school level for review or the primary level for differentiation. So yes, every teacher should teach them! If you start with these 7 fundamental skills, it will set the expectations for your writing lessons and assignments throughout the year! Frequently Asked Questions What are the basic skills and what order should I teach them? Sentence Structure 1. Complete Sentences Lesson for complete sentences 2. Fragments Lesson for fragments 3. Run-ons Lesson for run-ons Paragraph Writing 4. Topic Sentences Lesson for topic sentences 5. Relevant Details Lesson for relevant details 6. Transition Words Lesson for transition words 7. Closing Sentences Lesson for closing sentences How much time should I dedicate to teaching these fundamental skills? I recommend one day for each skill. If you spend a whole writing block for each skill, students will benefit from the practice. How do I teach each skill? First: Start with an anchor chart explaining the skill. (See each lesson link above for effective anchor charts.) Second: Provide examples. Students can share examples too! Next: Students should take notes. I love using Interactive Writing Notebooks to take notes. Research supports the use of interactive notebooks through studies on multiple intelligences, the brain and note taking. Here are a few videos to Set Up Interactive Writing Notebooks. Click photo for the Upper Elementary Version. A Primary Version is also available. Then: Identify the skill. Provide practice sheets and task cards for students to practice identifying the skill in sentences and paragraphs. Last: Apply the skill. Students should have the opportunity to write their own sentence or paragraph to apply the particular skill. What if I can't fit the lesson in one writing block? If you can't extend the days to complete them, there are other ways to get the whole lesson in. You can put practice sheets or task cards in a center, or you can have students apply the skill for homework or morning work the next day. What if my students, some of my students, or absent students can't do interactive notebooks? Make a small anchor chart to put in their notebooks with the same information! If you don't have a printable poster, take a picture of the anchor chart you used in class and print them off! I hope you found this post helpful and your students become successful writers this year! Connect With Me! TPT Store Facebook Pinterest My Blog
If you have students who say, "I don't have anything to write about" then this writing activity could definitely work for you. It lends itself to pretty much any grade level. I was actually introduced
What are Weekly Writing Choice Boards and how will they boost your students’ writing skills? Read on to find out! Do you dread giving your students a writing assignment because you don’t want to hear the
150+ fun, creative and thoughtful 4th grade writing prompts to encourage children to express their thoughts and feelings.
I have always found writing to be one of the most challenging subjects to teach. More specifically, informative, or explanatory writing has always been my biggest nemesis!! My students often come to me with varying levels of writing background, their own unique styles, and a variety of topic interests. It has taken me many years to fine tune my craft for teaching informative writing. Over the years, I have developed mini-lessons to help my students to better understand this particular genre of writing, and to be able to effectively craft informative essays of their own. Today I would like to share 4 mini-lessons that I use in my classroom to get my students started with informative writing. Understanding the Genre First off, it is important that students understand the genre of informative writing. They need to be exposed to a variety examples of what informative writing looks and sounds like. I like to start off my unit of informative writing by "Diving Into Informative Texts." I provide my students with tons of books, magazines, newspapers, and other texts. I give them time to flip through the pages, skim the text, and just "explore" the contents. Once they have had a chance to explore, I ask them to record their observations. From there, they share in small groups, and eventually whole-group, continuing to add to their lists. Following this lesson, I usually have my students take notes on "What is Informative Writing?" This is much more teacher directed, but I know that I am getting across the information that I want them to have. Once they have experience with real life examples, and after our discussion, they have a much better understanding of the genre and what is expected of them when they start to write their own. Selecting a Topic You would think that selecting a topic would be easy for students. After all, they have so many interests!! However, it can be difficult to guide students toward selecting a topic that will lend itself to a meaningful informative essay. I like to start off by having students create lists of their interests. To guide it a bit more, I give them specific topics to focus their lists so that they don't end up with a list of their favorite video games!! (See pic below) Students are encouraged to list interests based on things like people, places, animals, historical events, hobbies and interests, and technology. This usually takes a bit of time, research, and discussion. Sometimes students are not prepared to think of ideas off the top of their heads. I like to give students time to take their lists home and discuss with family members. I give them time in class to discuss different ideas in groups and eventually as a whole group. Once their lists are complete, I have them hang onto them for the year, so that they can refer back to them when it comes time to choose another informative writing topic. They can also add to them throughout the year, especially as they learn more and their interests grow in subjects like social studies and science. Once students have their lists together, they eventually have to pick a topic. I like my students to start out with a few. I explain to them that they want to choose a topic that is not too broad, but that will also allow them to write about a variety of subtopics. I have them pick their favorite three topics, and list either subtopics or more specific topic ideas that fall under the umbrella of their overall topic. I sometimes take it a bit further by having students create a T-Chart to show what they already know about their topic and what they hope to learn. (See pic below). If they are not able to generate subtopics, or complete their T-Chart, then we have to have the conversation about whether their topic is a good choice for a meaningful essay. Completing their lists of subtopics and T-Charts gives students a great starting point for the direction they want to take with their essays. Finding Reliable Sources Unless students are already experts on their topics (which might be the case with a how-to), a fair amount of research is necessary before they begin writing. With so many online sources out there, it is very important to teach students how to find those that are credible and reliable. I tell my students to look for the following indicators: Is the information current? Are sources cited on the page? Are credentials provided for the author? Is the website maintained by a reliable news source or organization? Students often need a lot of guidance and practice with this. We usually select a group topic to walk through each of the steps of informative writing. This gives us the chance to do some research as a class. We open up different sites, look for the indicators above, and critique the reliability and credibility of each source. By the time students get to their own topics they have become internet "detectives", and know exactly what to look for!! Writing a Lead I find that my students have the hardest time writing those first and last sentences of an essay. To help them out with writing a lead, I like to provide them with different strategies and examples. Some of my favorites for informative writing are: Ask a Question Interesting Fact Quote Set the Scene The examples help to give them an idea of how these sentences might look and sound. We also come up with examples for our whole-class topic that we take through the whole process of writing an informative essay. I then ask that they write a lead for each type, so that they have the opportunity to choose the one that would best fit their topic and the direction they want their essays to take. My students are always pretty excited about their leads, and this gives them the confidence they need to move forward with writing the rest of their essays!! These mini-lessons are just the tip of the iceberg. When I first introduce my students to informative writing, we usually spend several weeks going through the whole process. If you would like to learn more about other lessons for writing, visit my teacher shop. There you can find units for Informative Writing and Opinion Writing to help guide your students through these mini lessons, plus many more!!
5th grade writing doesn't have to be a struggle! This blog post will provide all of my best tips and ideas for teaching your fifth graders to succeed as writers. I’ve had classes where writing
By Presto Plans A few years ago I became a part-time student and enrolled in a master's course called Writing Instruction. The professor took a unique approach by having us, a group of English teachers, write our own poetry and fiction. It was an eye-opener. I realized that somewhere between high school and my first teaching job, I forgot the lonely and uneasy feeling of staring at a blank page, not knowing where to begin. When the professor allowed us to work with another teacher on the next writing piece, there was a sense of comfort in that I had someone to discuss, collaborate, and share ideas with. Collaborative writing not only broke down my reserve and hesitation, but also allowed me to foster a relationship of trust and partnership with my co-author. I wanted to bring this experience into my own classroom, so I made a point to allow more opportunities for students to write creatively with a partner or a group. Try 5 of my favorite engaging, low-prep collaborative writing activities that you can use in your class tomorrow. Snowball writing is an activity that your middle and high school students will always remember. It can be used with almost any writing genre and is highly-engaging for even your most reluctant writers. I use this method for narrative, poetry, descriptive, and essay writing. I even use it as an introductory icebreaker activity during back-to-school or a semester change! How It Works: - One student starts the writing process for a timed period decided by the teacher. - When time is up, the teacher tells students to crumple up their work into a “snowball” and throw it somewhere else in the room. Get ready to see lots of confused faces J. - Students retrieve one of the snowballs, smooth out the paper, and continue the writing process! (Tip: have students use a pen to make the writing easier to read for the next student) This process is repeated as needed. When all parts are completed, the paper goes back to the original writer who creates a final copy. If you want to know more about how I use this for narrative writing, read this detailed blog post that gives the step-by-step process in more detail. Have your students write a descriptive paragraph using vivid imagery with an activity called Shared Sensory Writing. How it works: - Put students into groups of three and give them an object to describe. - As a group, they decide which of the 3 senses they will focus on (sight, taste, smell, touch, hearing). Each person is assigned a sense, and they write a short paragraph describing the object based only on the sense they receive. - The group combines elements from each of the paragraphs to create a final descriptive piece. Download this activity for FREE by clicking here: Shared Sensory Writing One of the challenging parts of creative fictional writing is developing the story elements that will form the plot. Use the graffiti fiction brainstorming technique as a way for students to work together to spark fictional writing. How It Works: - Set up 4 chart-paper stations around the room with the following titles: Conflicts, Character Traits, Settings, and Themes. Break the class up into 4 groups and have each group go to one of the stations. - The group members work together to “graffiti” the page with potential conflicts, character traits, settings, and themes that could emerge in a fictional story. I fill in a couple of my own examples to get them started. - Have each group spend 3-4 minutes filling the chart paper up with their ideas. Then, have them all circulate to the next station to repeat the process. - When they are done, have each student select one character trait, conflict, setting, and theme from the graffitied pages to develop a unique narrative. You can choose to have them write independently or with a partner. Tapestry poetry was developed by Avril Meallem (of Israel) and Shernaz Wadia (of India). The two women started writing tapestry poetry collaboratively via email. The form consists of two authors writing a 9-line poem based on the same title, and then working together to meld it into one seamless finished product. How It Works: - Put your students into pairs (or let them choose a partner). - Have one of the students select a title for the poem. This student who selects the title is the only one who has the option of using it in the poem (to avoid repetition). - Both students write a 9-line poem. - When they are done, the pair works together to interlace the poem into one. All 18 lines must be included. Students are permitted to make grammatical changes (singular to plural, verb tenses etc.), and adjustments to adjectives and adverbs, but the majority of the poems should remain the same. Download this activity for FREE by clicking here: Tapestry Poetry Sketch and scribble writing is meant to be used with descriptive/narrative writing and will particularly appeal to those artistic students in your classroom. How It Works: - Have students form a group of three. Give each of the students a picture as a writing prompt. The picture prompts below are the ones I use. The images should allow them to use a narrative voice to describe a scene. They should keep the prompt hidden from the other members of the group. - Once the time is up, each student passes the writing to another student in the group who will read it and draw the scene based on the description (no words allowed). - When the drawings are done, they are given to the final student who must write a paragraph based on the drawing. In the end, have students compare and contrast the drawings to the original picture writing prompt as well as the two pieces of writing. Want even more ideas for collaborative writing? Check out these activities from some of the other Secondary English Coffee Shop bloggers! Tandem Writing from The SuperHERO Teacher Group Writing Challenges from Room 213 Two Truths and a Lie from Secondary Sara Round Robin Writing from Nouvelle ELA Have other ideas for collaborative writing? Click the comment button at the top of the post to join the conversation! SaveSave SaveSaveSaveSaveSaveSaveSaveSave
So often, students just tell about the large picture of an experience. They get so caught up in listing all of the “moments” of the experience that they forget to really hone in on each
My students are always using and referring to different writing tools. I created these individual writing toolkits with lots of free writing resources.
Three quick and fun writing activities to help energize student writers. Get those creative juices flowing with these easy lessons!
With so many types and formats of writing that we ask of students, it can be overwhelming for them to know where to start, what kinds of language to use, and what the structure of
I don’t mind shoveling snow from my driveway… once. But come on, three times in a day? We get our share of snow in Indiana, but a whole...
Did you think teaching students to write would be a snap? I mean, you are a college-educated, certified individual. How hard could it possibly be? Well, it’s a challenge, especially when just starting out. In my classroom,
Teaching the Writing Process to Upper Elementary Students Teaching writing is a skill that may be difficult to many. I love sharing some tips that I use to help getting started teaching the writing…
Teaching writing to fifth graders doesn't have to be intimidating. This post details exactly how I teach writing in 5th grade.
When I look back to my first experience teaching five paragraph essays to fifth graders, I can remember how terribly unprepared I felt. I knew that the five paragraph essay format was what my students needed
Fun and creative invitations to write.
So often, students just tell about the large picture of an experience. They get so caught up in listing all of the “moments” of the experience that they forget to really hone in on each
How often have we heard our students say that writing is boring? It doesn't have to be so if we instil a passion for it at the outset. Teachers are often not taught how to teach writing, consequently, many of us find this task of teaching students how to write on a particular genre particularly challenging.
These are my favorite, and most effective, ways of teaching writing to elementary students. You may decide that teaching writing is
Teaching writing to fifth graders doesn't have to be intimidating. This post details exactly how I teach writing in 5th grade.
Refer your students this free Types of Writing printable to introduce to or remind them of the 4 main types of writing: narrative, expository, persuasive, and descriptive. Each type of writing includes a short definition. Great for writers’ notebooks! Just print and use! You Might Also Like:Reading Comprehension PassagesFree Printable Graphic Organizers for ReadingGraphic Organizers for ... Read More about Four Types of Writing Printable
As adult writers, we have a clear idea of how we each personally attack a piece of writing. For me, I know that I tend to spend a lot of time collecting information, using sticky
Learn Round Robin Writing & Editing Idea. Visit for more!
Did you think teaching students to write would be a snap? I mean, you are a college-educated, certified individual. How hard could it possibly be? Well, it’s a challenge, especially when just starting out. In my classroom,
Each classroom brings students of multiple learning styles and backgrounds. It is our job to provide opportunities that reach all of the many different learning styles that come to us. For this reason, it is
