Persuasive Writing Ideas

Lots to think about persuasive writing before you teach your unit: 

http://writingeverydayworks.wordpress.com/2009/03/24/persuasive-writing-2/ 

http://mallonmessages.blogspot.com/2010/04/persuasive-writing-which-would-you.html

More ideas for persuasive writing:  http://mallonmessages.blogspot.com/2010/05/writing-with-purpose-persuasive-writing.html 

Mondo Publishing has many wonderful persuasive writing materials:   http://writingeverydayworks.wordpress.com/2008/05/11/persuasive-writing-mondo-materials/

Lucy Calkins writes about Persuasive Writing in her short text books:   http://writingeverydayworks.wordpress.com/2008/10/13/lucy-calkins-new-books/

Persuasive writing wikispaces:  http://firstgradecce.wikispaces.com/Writing+-+Persuasive

http://mallonmessages.blogspot.com/2009/04/persuasive-writing-beach-vs-pool.html

Independent Reader (Self-Selected Reading) Procedures

Read the book, Petunia, then establish the procedure that there is no FAKE reading during independent reading time by students.

Establish that students pick a book that they want to read instead of that the teacher assigns a book to the child.

Establish with the students what independent reading looks like and sounds right.  What are the expectations?  When we look around the classroom, what does the teacher see and hear?  What do the students?  How is the teacher holding the students accountable?

Read the book Wolf to establish what fluency understanding means. 

Just Right Books / Keep on Reading

 

Just Right Books

 

To help keep kids’ in seats instead of moving back and forth to picking out books during their self-selected reading time (or independent reading time), book baggies help.  Often, teachers will have their students place books that are at their level or are ‘just-right’ books into the baggies.  Some teachers will include nonfiction books, magazines, fiction books, picture books, even chapter books.

Confer

The goal of a conference is not to ask questions, it is to understand our students as writers.

Conferences are designed to give students time to ask questions and clarify their thinking, and it gives teachers the opportunity to shape instruction to meet students’ individual and collective needs.  The goal of a writing conference is not for the teacher to ask questions.  Remember that each student is different, and therefore you need to approach each conference differently.  Find out what that student needs to be a better writer.  Questions may come naturally once the conference has started, but questions should not be the objective.  I find myself coaxing some children into conversations by asking questions.  It just doesn’t work.  I find that silence works.  Students will start talking if I let them.  I have to remember to teach the writer, not the writing.    The Art of Teaching Writing by Lucy Calkins, 1994.  I also have studied Carl Anderson’s extensive work.  He encourages teachers to deliberately teach during the conference.  I agree.  This is a wonderful one-on-one time for the teacher and student.

Stellaluna Mentor Text

Mentor texts using picture books are effective and one of my favorite ways to approach teaching.  I label the teaching strategy simply first in one-three words, then find it in the picture book.  I explain the teaching strategy in simple, general terms.  Finally, I explain the writing strategy specifically combining the picture book and the writing strategy.  It sounds complicated when I write about it, but actually it is very simple for students and the teachers I train to understand.  I have numerous books done now.  This is one of the teachers’ favorite trainings that I offer now. 

Stellaluna by Janell Cannon is wonderful for a Mentor Text to use with grades 2 and 3.  I use Jeff Anderson’s book,  Mechanically Inclined and his book, Everyday Editing as resources. 

I hope you find this resource useful.  Many other teachers have found it useful.  I bought 25 copies of Stellaluna to model this lesson with teachers and students. 

View this document on Scribd

 

Stacey wrote about The Pencil on her site:  http://twowritingteachers.wordpress.com/2009/01/17/draft-of-a-new-craft-table-about-ahlbergs-the-pencil-a-work-in-progress/

I wrote about mentor texts and gave lots of examples of craft lessons on my other blog here:  http://debwritingcraftlessons.blogspot.com/

Who cares? Why did you write this?

“No surprise for the writer, no surprise for the reader.” Robert Frost

Donald Murray about Writing and Teaching For Surprise in his book, expecting the unexpected Teaching Myself – and Others - to Read and Write.  Don writes that his students become writers when they first write what they do not expect to write. 

My niece Abby and I often confer about writing.  She writes.  She loves school.  She willing shares her writing with Aunt Debbie.  I appreciate her willing spirit.  I often ask her, “Who cares? Why did you write this?”  I remember the first time I asked Abby, “Who cares?”  She looked at me with a shocked look.  I wanted to know why anyone would care about her topic of choice.  She interpreted the question as if who would care about her personally.  It is interesting looking at our words from the child’s perspective.  Words matter. 

Reading Student Work

Donald Murray warns us not to do the student’s work.  Many teachers become experts at grammar and punctuation rules.  The longer we teach, the better we become at our craft.  The problem is that the student’s are not internalizing what we know.  When we are red penning the corrections and we are marking up the papers, the students are not learning how to correct their mistakes. 

Murray wrote, “The better I did my job the less my students learned. (page 128).”

When we focus on how we feel about about the mistakes or the draft, it is the incorrect focus.  The writing teacher has to teach the students to teach themselves about writing.  Writing is about thinking, looking at a draft and figuring out what they might need to draft a better one.  This doesn’t mean that the teacher is not teaching or not important.  The teacher is not the lion tamer, instead the teacher is a coach, interacting during the writing conference.  The teacher encourages the student writer to talk about the writing first.  These questions are listed on page 130: 
“What surprised you about this writing?” 
“What did you do differently in this draft than you’ve done before?”   
“What did you learn from writing this draft?”  
“What would you do differently if you had another chance at it?” 
“How was this written differently than if would have been at the beginning of the course?” 
“What are you going to do next?”

“The goal of reading student’s work is to to encourage students to learn (page131).”

Murray realized that as students learned to reflect on their writing by writing a reflection, it lead to better writing students and better writing. The students know what they have done and why. Often students do not realize that they know they know. The reflections force writers to pause and think about what they know about themselves as writers (132). Writing teachers do know how to reflect on our students’ writing, Murray teaches us to teach our students to reflect also.

expecting the unexpected teaching myself – others – to read and write by Donald Murray, chapter 13

Read Wisely Like Petunia!

Petunia does not realize that you must open the book to become wise until the very end of the book. I think this is one of the very best books for teaching children to open books, read the words and pay attention to the message of the book. It is necessary to read the words during self selected reading or independent reading to learn the message. One of the best teachers I know is reading one of my favorite books, Petunia, to a group of students and developing a list of criteria with her students. “Don’t be a Petunia! Read Wisely!!”

Writing asking questions to drive a writing conference

Doe this sound like something you have tried? I have! I know that when I ask my students questions, then they revisit a piece of writing, this piece of writing improves. Adding details to a piece of writing is a typical goal on all state tests. How do we help bridge the gap between adding details, asking questions and kids improving writing? So how do I improve their writing WHILE they write? How do I get my students to ASK THEMSELVES the questions or to INTERNALIZE the process?

First, I have to model how to ask questions of how to get the five senses involved. The teacher has to ask probing questions that stir memories. The main teaching point is transfer. The writer has to add details smoothly while writing. When a writer is actually including sense details while writing, we know that the writer has started to internalize the process.

A typical lesson -
Student wrote: Christmas was fun.

Questions generated by teacher or possibly the writer:
-How was it fun?
-Who came?
-What did they wear?

Think about Christmas. Again questions generated by teacher or possibly the writer:
-Could you hear the sleigh bells jingling.
-How did Christmas dinner taste?
-Was the turkey juicy or dry?
-Did your aunt’s special pudding make you gag?
-How did it taste?
-How did it smell?
-What sounds did you hear?
-What did you see?
-Was the present as big as a tree?
-Was the dinner disgusting or the best turkey you’ve ever eaten?

If your students are writing and you are asking the questions, then WHO is doing the work? When I think of this teaching example, I want my students to know about adding the five senses to their writing.

Instead a child who is thinking and asking the questions himself:

Now, the student is writing:

As I walked into grandma’s living room, my eyes bugged out at the present

(Child stops writing, pauses and thinks about the size of the present. Then the child keeps writing. When the writer is asked afterwards about this writing move, the writer reflects that he knew his writing partner would want to know how big the present is. Writer keeps writing…)

the size of a stove with my name on it. It didn’t even fit under the Christmas tree. The tree was filling the living room with evergreen smell. (Writer stopped writing after living room and paused. This writer asked himself what did I smell because maybe he thought my writing partner will ask me this question.)

The first lessons of asking yourself a question is in direct response to “what will my writing partner want to know?” Eventually students internalize the process and add details because it makes the writing better for the writing.