writing instruction

Even though it's January, some of my third and fourth graders still frequently struggle with generating or brainstorming ideas on what to write about.  (We did do a "detour" from Lucy's plan and do expositiory writing for a while.  So, we're just getting back into the swing of narrative writing.)  I know part of the problem is that many of my students have so much to worry about every day that they see many stories in their life as being too old and therefore not relevant.  But I cannot do anything about that.

I love the author David Shannon, who's well known for No, David. Yesterday, I read his book Duck on Bike to model writing a WASL (Washington's state assessment) short summary with three main events. As I read I emphasized the inner thinking and thought to myself, "This would be a great mentor text to show inner thinking. There's inner thinking on almost every page!" :-) All the animals have their own opinions about Duck's trick, which they only share in their thoughts.Want to try it?

What are some good mentor texts to use in Writer's Workshop?  As a new teacher, finding books that pair well with certain comprehension strategies and writer's craft is a continuing challenge.  Thank you librarian.  Thank you internet.

Let's share our ideas! And successes!

Dialogue:

Frog and Toad

Owl at Home

Poppleton

Because of Winn-Dixie

I just finished reading Because of Winn-Dixie by the amazing Kate DiCamillo.  If you've read anything by Kate DiCamillo you know that her stories are worth reading to children of just about any age.  If you need some convincing, here are some other ideas.

Lucy Calkins and the teacher's college reading and writing project folks recommend letting students use pens.  To me, this makes sense for many reasons: at the primary grades because kids like using pens since we normally make them use pencils; for classroom management and those students who like to avoid working (or just push too hard on their pencils) using a pen eliminates the time waster of sharpening pencils and allows me to worry about planning and prepping that doesn't involve managing the pencil sharpening job or worse sharpening pencils myself.

But I just read a better researched-based reason: THEY WILL WRITE MORE WITH PENS!!!!

My school received training in the Lucy Calkin's style writer's workshop by staff developers from the Columbia University Teacher's College Reading and Writing Project. The week of training was of course phenomenal. We also got either the K-2 or 3-5 Units of Study. These are my teaching notes straight from my plan book for the third graders I taught. My lessons are --eventually-- adjusted to meet the needs of these students in their first year of writer's workshop. The class had a large bilingual and high poverty population. Most of my notes are organized as teaching points (TP) or the day's writing goal/objective.

Part of being a reading teacher, for me, is reading the literature that my students are reading or that might serve as a good read-aloud or mentor text for writer's workshop. Since break came early with a snow storm, I got to my local library to check out some books, as well as extra time to read.

One of the books I checked out was by the great Kate DiCamillo, The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane. For those who don't know, Edward is a china bunny who through mishaps loses one owner only to move on to another, at least eventually. Through his journey Edward grows to appreciate life and others, most importantly, he learns to love.

As our contract continues with professional developers from Columbia Teacher's College Reading and Writing Project our PD day consisted of two workshops. Of course, not everything was pretty in the morning or well organized in terms of logistics. When we arrived, on time, there was basically no parking. After driving around for ten minutes the organizers were a little smart, telling us, "There's lots of parking on the other side." When I informed them it was full, we were hustled along.