3rd grade teacher handbook orla

“Finding My Place in the World”Summer Bridge 2011

Teacher Handbook3rd Grade

www.cps.eduwww.chicagoteachingandlearning.org

City of ChicagoRahm Emanuel, Mayor

BOARD OF EDUCATIONCITY OF CHICAGO

David Vitale – PresidentJesse Ruiz – Vice-President

Members:Henry Bienen

Dr. Mahalia HinesPenny PritzkerRodrigo SierraAndrea Zopp

CHICAGO PUBLIC SCHOOLSJean-Claude Brizard, Chief Executive OfficerDr. Noemi Donoso, Chief Education Officer

Katherine Volk, Chief Officer, Office of Teaching and LearningElizabeth Cardenas-Lopez, Director of Reading and Language Arts

Claretha Washington, K-5 Manager, Reading and Language Arts Renita Carol Miller, Special Projects Coordinator and Literacy Specialist

It is the policy of the Chicago Board of Education of the City of Chicago not to discriminate on the basis of race, color, creed, national origin, religion, age, handicap unrelated to ability , or sex in its educational programs or employment policies or prac-tices. Inquiries concerning the Application of Title IX of the Education Amendment of 1972 and the regulations promulgated thereunder concerning sex discrimination should be referred to the Title IX Coordinator, Chicago Public Schools, 125 South Clark Street, Chicago, Illinois 60603. @2010 Chicago Board of Education. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America

©2011 by the Board of Education of the City of ChicagoAll rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America.

Curriculum Writers

Teaching and Learning Reading and Language Arts would like to acknowledge the following persons for their diligence and hard work in creating the Reading and Writing curriculum for Summer Bridge 2011:

Grade 3

Meghan E. Berry, CPS K-5 Writing Content Lead

Carissa Finn, Chicago Literacy Group

Maria Griffith, Chicago Literacy Group

Carolyn A. King, CPS K-5 Reading and Language Arts Content Lead

Grade 6 and 8

Amy Correa, CPS Reading Specialist/National-Louis Project CLIP Co-Director

Susanna A. Lang, CPS 6-8 Writing Curriculum Coach

Ryan Peet, CPS Teacher - Agassiz

Designer

Rob Residori, CPS Literacy and Technology Coordinator

Contributing Project Leaders

Kelly L. Jeffers, CPS Literacy Coordinator

Alva Smith, CPS Research Assistant

Olga Vasquez, CPS Literacy Coordinator

Additional Curriculum Contributors

Mary Q. Kovats, CPS Literacy Intervention Teacher - Linne

Astrid Thepsiree, CPS Literacy Intervention Teacher – Volta

Carol A. Coughlin, CPS Teacher - Drummond

Julie A. Hines-Lyman, CPS Teacher - Agassiz

C ongratulations to the Office of Reading and Language Arts for creating this new summer school pro-gram tailored to Chicago Public School goals, priorities, and students’ needs. This curriculum provides a significant opportunity for students to expand their interests and strengthen their reading and writ-

ing.

A recent study of children’s learning revealed that all children, regardless of socioeconomic status, learn about the same amount during the nine months of schooling. It is in the summers, however, that the more affluent children benefit from a range of extended learning opportunities – traveling with their parents, at-tending camps and clubs, and taking lessons. These children’s minds and imaginations are nourished during the summer months and they don’t evidence the drop in fall test scores that less affluent children do. This is one of the reasons many Chicago schools have moved to the year-round schedule; students are away from the nourishment schools provide for shorter periods of time and so experience less loss in learning. Another way the summer “doldrums” can be countered is through inviting and challenging summer school programs.

This curriculum developed by the Teaching & Learning: Reading and Language Arts Education team in CPS does just that; it provides all the students who participate the opportunity to continue learning by explor-ing new topics, reading widely in interesting materials appropriate to their reading levels, and by partnering and sharing ideas with classmates as they discuss what they read and write. Younger students will benefit from participating in guided reading groups and all will have fun engaging in independent reading, using fresh materials.

This summer program has been constructed by a team of excellent CPS coaches and teachers. Lessons were developed for teachers by teachers. They have selected new fiction and informational books so stu-dents can experience the joy of exploring new texts, topics and authors. The writing portions of the cur-riculum are also designed to strengthen the writing skills students need for success in Chicago schools: third graders will focus on narrative writing and the 6-8th graders will write persuasive pieces. These curriculum guides provide an excellent road map for making optimal use of the resources that are available. The ongo-ing professional development will also provide opportunities for teachers to collaborate in tailoring the use of the materials and curriculum guides to their particular students. My hope is that all teachers and students will enjoy exploring the books and activities provided, and that the shared discussions and writing will create memorable impressions and long-lasting learning experiences. Donna Ogle, Ed. DProfessor of Education,National-Louis UniversitySenior Advisor to CPS Striving Readers

Foreword

Daily Summer Bridge Schedule—2

The Gradual Release of Responsibility Model—3

Reading Workshop Rationale—4

Weekly Overview—5

Minilessons—13

Independent Reading & Conferring —14

Teaching Shares—15

Provisioning the Reading Workshop—16

The Role of the Interactive Read Aloud—18

Establishing Long-Term Reading Partnerships—19

Assessing Readers—21

Suggestions for End-of-Unit Celebrations—23

Reflection—24

Writing Workshop Rationale—26

Writing Narrative & Nonfiction Text—27

Assessment—29

Objectives & Overview—30

Weekly Overview—31

Writing Lessons

Day 1: Pre-Assessment: Plan and Draft—34

Day 2: Launch Writing Workshop: Rituals, Routines and Generating Ideas:

Important People—37

Day 3: Generating Ideas: Think of a Meaningful Place—42

Day 4: Writing Focused Narratives—47

Day 5: Writer’s Job in a Conference—51

Day 6: Stories Bit-by-Bit—55

Day 7: Choosing an Entry to Publish—59

Day 8: Looking to Mentor Authors to Revise Our Leads—69

tabLe of Contents

Day 9: Oral Storytelling and Acting Out Our Stories—66

Day 10: Look to Mentor Authors to Revise Endings—69

Day 11: Generating Ideas: Strong Feeling—72

Day 12: Developing Timelines—75

Day 13: Revising the Heart of our Stories—78

Day 14: Fixing Up Our Writing—81

Day 15: Editing and Getting Ready to Publish—84

Day 16: Celebrate Narrative —85

Day 17: Post Assessment: Confer with a Partner and Revise—87

Day 18: Launch Nonfiction Writing - Immersion—90

Day 19: Trying on our Nonfiction Topics—94

Days 20-23: Organizing our Ideas—96

Day 24: Revising our All About Books – Making Sure Our Information Fits—98

Day 25: Editing: Using Commas to Write Efficiently—101

Day 26: Preparing for Our Celebration—104

Day 27: Celebrate Nonfiction—106

Appendix—107

1Chicago Public Schools - Summer Bridge 2011

Rationale

In December 2010, the Office of Reading and Language Arts launched an initiative focused on “Every Student, Every Day,” which promises all of our students that they will have daily opportunities to:

w Read something they like and understand; w Hear a fluent adult read aloud; w Write about something that’s meaningful to them; and w Talk about what they’ve read and written.

Now, we are applying these principles to the design of our 2011 Summer Bridge program. Using expe-riences gained in the Office of Reading and Lan-guage Arts to guide our work, our teachers will be able to differentiate instruction for the variety of learners in our summer classrooms. Through the minilesson, teachers will provide short, explicit bursts of instruction to meet the needs of most students, then release them to spend most of their time practicing independently or in small groups. Differentiation is possible because students will be reading and writing at their own level during this extended period, with support from their peers and from their teacher. At the end of the lesson, teachers will reconvene the entire community of learners to share the reading and writing work ac-complished that day.

We read to understand, and we teach readers to read, not so they can meet the requirements for promotion, but so they will read throughout their lives. Reading should always start and end with making meaning. We must help our students orchestrate three cuing systems—meaning (what is happening in the pictures/book), syntax (what the book sounds like) and visual (looking at the word and using what we know about letters and sounds). Research also shows that active, thoughtful readers construct meaning by drawing on comprehension strategies such as Prior Knowledge, Visualization, Inferring, Questioning, Determining Importance, and Synthesizing. Readers of all ages need

explicit, long-term instruction in these strate-gies. Similarly, we write to share our thinking with the world, not to answer a prompt. The writing process begins long before an author puts pen to paper. Exploration is crucial to developing purpose, finding and focusing on a topic, deciding the genre (or form) to use, calling up models of language from life experiences and reading—just about everything related to creating a written text. The process is recursive; that is, writers’ cycle in and out of the various steps or stages. It is not a lockstep process as writers move back and forth on the journey to a final draft or published project.

To be effective in this model, teachers must first become acquainted with their learners, so the sum-mer program will begin with assessments designed to give teachers a snapshot of their students’ strengths and needs at the outset. During the pro-gram, teachers will frequently confer with students and review their readers’ and writers’ notebooks. Notes from conferences, classroom observations and review of notebooks will inform their planning of minilessons, small group instruction and one-on-one conferences. However, their planning must still allow students to work with authentic texts and to choose texts as well as topics for their writing. We must always allow students to explore their pas-sions while also gaining competence with text, in order to encourage their lifetime engagement with literacy.

2 Chicago Public Schools - Summer Bridge 2011

Daily Summer Bridge Schedule

Reading

writing

Number of Minutes Core Components

10 Shared Reading and/or other Engaging Literacy Activities

20 Interactive Read Aloud

45 Reading Workshop

7-10 min. = Minilesson

30 min. = Independent Reading, One on One and Small Group Conferring, and Partner Reading

5 min. = Whole Group Share

Number of Minutes Core Components

10 Guided Practice

40 Independent Writing & Conferring

10 Whole Group Share

The Chicago Public School Summer Bridge program is based on the principals of a balanced literacy phi-losophy where students read, write, think about and interact with text every day. Teachers’ expertise and knowledge of their students is essential for selecting and guiding literacy activities that meet the specific needs of their students. Therefore, teacher’s choice is built into the Summer Bridge Program. Teachers de-termine their students’ literacy needs though ongoing formative assessments such as teacher/student confer-ences, fluency snapshots, and observations of specific activities. Based on the information gained through these formative assessments, teachers will select the Read Aloud and vocabulary activities that best meet the needs of their students.

The schedule for the reading and writing sections of the day is below. This schedule is for the regular track schools. Track E schools will need to extend the times accordingly, and may allow for additional time for any components.

75 Minutes

60 Minutes


The Gradual Release of Responsibility Model

The Gradual Release of Responsibility is a re-search-based instructional model developed by Pearson and Gallagher (1983). In this model, the responsibility for completion of a task shifts gradu-ally over time from the teacher to the student. The whole/part/whole instructional model used by this Summer Bridge program incorporates this approach. For each of the techniques listed in this guide, the modeling phase is vital. By modeling

the technique and then providing ample time for guided practice both with a partner and indepen-dently, you are ensuring student success. Within the gradual release framework, the opportunity for peer learning occurs during a collaboration phase. Partner reading provides an avenue for students to work collaboratively at a common instructional level while consolidating their understanding of the text that they are sharing (Fisher & Frey, 2008).

The model below illustrates the four phases of learning as the responsibility gradually shifts from teacher to student.

Focus Lesson

Guided Instruction

Collaborative

Independent

“I do it”

“We do it”

“You do it together”

“You do it alone”

STUDENT RESPONSIBILITY

The CPS Summer Bridge program puts the student in the forefront of instruction. Using the model illustrated below, teachers spend time to model the instructional practices then gradually release the responsibility to the students. Giving students enough time to practice activities with partners facilitates collaboration and peer learning. Gradually transitioning to independent practice ensures student success. Additionally, this model provides teach-ers with multiple opportunities to observe students’ behavior, identify and address areas of confusion, and assess mastery.


Reading Workshop Rationale

Why Start with “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers?”

• The start of any unit should lure students into the work, allowing them to experience success and enjoyment. The start of summer school will invite students to see reading workshop as the part of the day where they have the opportunity to read books of their own choosing, at their individual independent reading levels, with ample time spent reading.

• Workshop teaching is highly structured so that students develop the necessary strategies to function independently as readers and writers. The lessons used from this unit will help teachers develop strong routines and structures so that young readers develop strong reading habits and stamina, allowing the teacher to work individually or with small groups of readers during inde-pendent reading time.

Why Navigating Nonfiction in Expository Text, Volume 1?

• This unit builds upon the natural enthusiasm kids have to learn about topics of interest and to teach others.

• Up to this point, most of the texts students have been reading have been fictional in nature, requiring that students use strong character knowledge and plot to comprehend. Now, students will have the opportunity to see that different genres demand different skills and strategies of readers. This unit will shift the focus for students, helping them to see how important text struc-ture is in reading nonfiction.

• The unit is organized in a way that scaffolds students’ ability to determine author’s purpose and main idea, not simply to scan expository text to identify cool facts or isolated details.

• The Common Core Standards encourage teachers to immerse students in a great deal of nonfic-tion reading and writing, for students of all ages. The goal, then, during the 3rd Grade Summer Bridge reading program, is for young children to learn about nonfiction reading and writing in a way that feels highly engaging and supportive, encouraging an ongoing desire for students to experience this genre. Because nonfiction can often be challenging for young readers and writ-ers, extra care needs to be taken to help students feel tremendous success and enjoyment while experiencing the nonfiction units during both reading and writing workshop.


Week Date Unit, SessionBefore

(Minilesson)

During (Independent &

GuidedPractice)

After (Share) Assessment

1 6/22 “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers”; Session I

Setting New Year’s

Resolutions for Reading (pp. 3-6)

Independent Read-ing & Conferring

*See section of guide entitled, “Conferring in the First Week”

Students share with partners; Teacher celebrates one student’s reading that reinforces teaching point of minilesson

*See section of the guide entitled, “Teaching Shares: What Does Each Day Look and Sound Like?”

*See Appendix A

6/23 “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers”; Session II

Choosing a Just-Right Book

(pp. 7-11)




*See Appendix A

6/24 “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers”; Session III

Getting Better One Step at a Time—Logs & Goals

(pp. 12-18)




*See Appendix A

2 6/27 “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers”; Session IV

Marking Our Spot—And Reading On

(pp. 19-22)


*See section of guide entitled, “Assessing Read-ers in the Sec-ond and Third Weeks”


*See Appendix B

Weekly Overview


Reading


(Minilesson)


GuidedPractice)


6/28 “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers”; Session V

Parts Go To-gether to Make a Book Flow

(pp. 23-27)




*See Appendix B

6/29 “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers”; Session VI

(introduction on p. 28)

Stepping Into the World of a Story

(pp.29-32)




*See Appendix B

6/30 “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers”; Session VII

Reading Is Like Watching a Mental Movie

(pp. 33-37)




*See Appendix B

7/1 “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers”; Session VIII

Keeping Track of an Unfurling Plot

(pp. 38-41)




*See Appendix B

Chicago Public Schools - Summer Bridge 2011 7

Reading


(Minilesson)


GuidedPractice)


3 7/5 “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers”; Session IX

New Parts of Books Fit with the Old

(pp. 42-46)




*See Appendix B

7/6 “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers”; Session X

(introduction on p. 47)

Bringing a Blurred Mental Movie Back into Focus

(pp. 48-52)




*See Appendix B

7/7 “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers”; Session XI

We Read Chunks of Meaning, Not Single Words

(pp. 53-55)




*See Appendix B

7/8 “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers”; Session XII

Reading with Momentum—Riding over a Hard Word

(pp. 56-60)

Independent Reading & Confer-

ring*See section of

guide entitled, “Assessing Read-ers in the Sec-ond and Third Weeks”


*See Appendix B


Reading


(Minilesson)


GuidedPractice)


4 7/11 “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers”; Session XIII

Retelling Our Books to Part-ners

(pp. 61-65 – on the printed version from the CD-ROM)


*See section of guide entitled, “Conferring in the Fourth-Sixth Weeks”


*See Appendix C

7/12 “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers”; Session XIV

Selecting Parts to Include in a Retelling





*See Appendix C

7/13 “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers”; Session XV

Reading as a Conversation Starter





*See Appendix C

7/14 “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers”; End-of-Unit Celebration

*See section of guide entitled, “Suggestions for End-of-Unit Celebrations”




*See Appendix C

7/15 “Navigating Nonfiction in Expository Text, Volume 1”;

Session I(introduction

to the unit is on pp. ix-xiii)

Reading Our Minds to Read Nonfiction

(pp. 5-15)




*See Appendix C


Reading


(Minilesson)


GuidedPractice)


5 7/18 “Navigating Nonfiction in Expository Text, Volume 1”;

Session II

Looking for Structure Within a Non-fiction Text

(pp. 33-40)




*See Appendix C


Session II Re-visited

*You may find that students need more support around yester-day’s teaching point. Today’s minilesson will repeat yester-day’s work, using a differ-ent text.




*See Appendix C


Session III

Choosing Just-Right Texts and Reading with Stamina, in Nonfiction

(pp. 50-57)




*See Appendix C


Session IV

Becoming Ex-perts and Teaching Oth-ers from Non-fiction Texts

(pp. 68-75)




*See Appendix C


(Minilesson)


GuidedPractice)


4 7/11 “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers”; Session XIII

Retelling Our Books to Part-ners





*See Appendix C

7/12 “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers”; Session XIV

Selecting Parts to Include in a Retelling





*See Appendix C

7/13 “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers”; Session XV

Reading as a Conversation Starter





*See Appendix C

7/14 “Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers”; End-of-Unit Celebration

*See section of guide entitled, “Suggestions for End-of-Unit Celebrations”




*See Appendix C


Session I(introduction

to the unit is on pp. ix-xiii)

Reading Our Minds to Read Nonfiction

(pp. 5-15)




*See Appendix C


Reading


(Minilesson)


GuidedPractice)



Session V

Grasping Main Ideas in Non-fiction Texts

(pp. 85-93)




*See Appendix C


Session V Revisited





*See Appendix C


Session VI

Talking to Grow Ideas About Nonfiction Texts

(pp. 102-108)




*See Appendix C


Session VII

Reading Differ-ently Because of Conversa-tions

(pp. 119-126).




*See Appendix C


Reading


(Minilesson)


GuidedPractice)



End-of-Unit Celebration

*See section of guide entitled, “Suggestions for End-of-Unit Celebrations and Reflection”




*See Appendix C

7/29 Reflection *See section of guide entitled, “Suggestions for End-of-Unit Celebrations & Reflection”

Students complete reflection


Students share their reflections

Student reflections


Reading


(Minilesson)

During (Indepen-dent & Guided

Practice)After (Share) Assessment


Session II

Looking for Structure Within a Non-fiction Text

(pp. 33-40)




*See Appendix C


Session II Re-visited





*See Appendix C


Session III

Choosing Just-Right Texts and Reading with Stamina, in Nonfiction

(pp. 50-57)




*See Appendix C


Session IV

Becoming Ex-perts and Teaching Oth-ers from Non-fiction Texts

(pp. 68-75)




*See Appendix C

Track E Teachers Only: Sequence of Lessons for Week 5


Minilessons

“While the content of minilessons changes from day to day, the architecture of minilessons remains largely the same, and it remains consistent whether you are teaching writing or reading. The architecture of a minilesson (as we have taken to calling the design of a minilesson) is easy to learn and provides enduring support across any minilesson you might ever write.” – Lucy Calkins, in A Guide to the Reading Workshop, p. 48

The predictability of this architecture allows students to focus not on the structure of the teaching but on the content. That structure, or architecture, is outlined in every session of the summer school reading and writing workshop curriculum. It is:

What Does Each Day Look and Sound Like?

Connection – The connection provides a “hook” for students into the work of the day. It connects the day’s teaching point to previous teaching and sets a purpose for learning. Connections might begin with language like, “Readers, I’ve been noticing…” or “Readers, last night I was reading and realized that something I do often as a reader was something I should share with you…”

Teaching Point – The connection ends with an explicit teaching point, one that is so carefully worded it can easily be repeated several times throughout the minilesson. Teaching points might begin with language like, “Today, I’m going to teach you that one thing strong readers do is…”

Teaching – The teacher models the behavior or thinking that was outlined in the teaching point. Reading is usually done with an excerpt of a text with which students are familiar (often from a text used during Interactive Read Aloud). The teacher usually begins the teaching by asking stu-dents to notice the work she/he is doing (“Readers, watch me while I…”) and ends with a debrief of what was modeled (“Readers, did you see how I…?”).

Active Involvement – The teacher gives children a chance to practice the strategy that was just modeled, often with the same or another familiar, excerpt of text. Most of the time, stu-dents will work with their long-term reading partners (see p. 22 of this guide) during this practice time, turning and talking about their thinking, while the teacher listens in on that partner talk. The teacher usually begins the active involvement with language like, “Now you try it…” or “Let’s prac-tice…” To close the active involvement section, teachers might highlight the good work of one read-ing partnership (“Readers, I was listening to… and they were doing some really good thinking…”).

Link – The minilesson closes with a restatement of the teaching point and a reminder to students that they can apply not only today’s teaching points but previous ones to their independent reading. Language you might hear in the link could include, “Readers, today and any day you are reading, one thing you can try is…”

For a further description of the architecture of a minilesson, please see pages 47-58 in A Guide to the Reading Workshop by Lucy Calkins.


Independent Reading & Conferring

Richard Allington’s research tells us that readers need at least 90 minutes of time spent reading in books they can read with accuracy, fluency, and comprehension across each day in school. The first weeks of school will focus on determining the reading level at which students can read books indepen-dently, so that students are well matched to books during independent reading time.

In addition, in A Guide to the Reading Workshop, Calkins shares research that shows that “of 100 fac-tors that contribute to student achievement, providing learners with feedback rates is in the very top 5%-10% of influences. That feedback is especially powerful if the teacher helps the learner know where he is going, what progress he has made so far, and what specific activities he can do next to progress toward the goal” (Calkins, pp. 59-60). That feedback, in the form of conferring, often takes on a pre-dictable structure. More information around assessment and conferring is provided in the “Assessing Readers” portion of the guide on pages 25-26 and Appendices A, B, and C.

What Does Each Day Look and Sound Like?

For a further description of the content and processes of conferring during independent reading time, please see pages 59-71 in A Guide to the Reading Workshop by Lucy Calkins.


Teaching Shares

What Does Each Day Look and Sound Like?“The most important word in the phrase, ‘a teaching share’ is the word share. The workshop ends with

a small amount of time for readers to work with clubs. This time is framed by a teeny bit of teacher-talk, and this sometimes takes the form of celebrating what a few readers have done in ways that

apply to other readers in other instances, providing the teacher with a chance to balance instruction.”

--Lucy Calkins, in A Guide to the Reading Workshop, page 17

Example of Teaching Share from Day 1, Session I

Gathering on the Rug:“Readers, I’m going to ask that you come and join me on the rug, bringing one book with you that you did some good reading work in today.”Class gathers on the rug.

Reminder about Today’s Minilesson“Readers, today during the minilesson, we talked about setting New Year’s Resolutions for reading—right in the middle of the summer! You shared with your partner your ideas for ways that you were going to be the best reader that you can be from this day forward. I want you to think back to your New Year’s Resolution for a minute, and then think about reading time today. What did you do during independent reading time that you are proud of? What’s one thing you felt like you did that is helping you keep your New Year’s Reading Resolution?”

Partnership Time“When you have an idea, go ahead and share with your partner. You might want to begin by saying, “One thing I did as a reader today was…” and say the thing that you are re-ally proud of. Remember to really listen to your partner’s thoughts—that way, you can always remind him of the proud work he’s doing in reading!” Partners share for 2-3 minutes.

Highlighting a Few Readers to CelebrateReaders, let me highlight for you what these readers in this partnership were discussing. Share each student’s example of reading behaviors that should be celebrated—staying focused when there are distractions in the classroom; really looking for a book that seems interesting; reading for longer than usual; etc. Teachers might want to chart some of these, as a way to celebrate and rein-force good reading behaviors.

This is one way that a teaching share could go following the minilesson, “Setting New Year’s Resolutions for Reading” and independent reading time.

Provisioning the Reading Workshop

Following are some suggestions for setting up the classroom and its materials for reading workshop.

Classroom Environment

Recommended Materials

The classroom library is the hub of the reading workshop classroom. Books should be organized in an inviting and accessible way. Most will be organized into leveled bins, to sup-port students finding books they can read with ease. Others will be organized in bins by genre, topic, author, etc.

Each day, students will gather for reading and writing workshop minilessons and Interactive Read Alouds. Ideally, they do so on a rug, at one end of which is a teacher’s chair with a space for the teacher to write on chart paper.

Classroom Library:

Gathering Space:

Chart paper:

Bins for Books

For a further description of the classroom environment in a reading workshop, please see pages 19-21 in A Guide to the Reading Workshop by Lucy Calkins.

Teachers will want to chart many of the minilesson teaching points, as well as chart students’ ideas. We recommend putting an easel with chart paper and markers in the rug area, ready for use while teaching minilessons, shares, and Interactive Read Alouds.

Teacher assessment and conferring materials: Using the materials in the appendices, as well as some of the leveled texts from the library, teachers will want to develop a notebook, folder, or box where they keep all of the conferring and assessment forms on individual readers.

At the start of summer school, before routines around using the classroom library are taught and implemented, teachers will want to place bins of books on the center of each student table. The bins should represent a variety of levels, genres, and topics, so that each student can experience the idea of “finding a just right book.”


Provisioning the Reading Workshop

Reading Folders & Reading Notebooks

Reading Logs

Post-its

Each student will need a reading folder, where they will keep their reading notebooks as well as their reading logs (see below).

Each student will need a reading log to record their daily reading. A sample of the reading log can be found in Appendix D.

Students will learn to jot their thinking about books on Post-its. Students can keep these in their folders, or the teacher may decide to keep them in a central location, like the in center of each table. Students should be taught how to access them quickly, without disruption.

For a further description of the materials recommended for the reading workshop, please see pages 21-23 in A Guide to the Reading Workshop by Lucy Calkins.


The Role of the Interactive Read Aloud

“How powerful it is to read aloud, right smack in the midst of the hopes and heartaches of a class-room, amid friendships that form and dissolve, invitations that come and do not come, clothes that are in or out of fashion, and parents who attend or do not attend the school play. Here, children work out their life and death issues. Doing so with books at their side is a way to help them makes sense of it all. Ralf Peterson, author of Life in a Crowded Place (1992), suggests that we respond to the challenges of elbow-elbow classroom living by using ceremony, ritual, and celebration to create a sense of community in the classroom, and he further suggests that one way to create that sense of community is to read aloud poems and stories as a way to cross the threshold, to mark the classroom as a world apart.”


Although there are many opportunities and forms of reading aloud to children, each day in summer school teachers will lead children through an Interactive Read Aloud, lasting about 20 minutes in length. An Interactive Read Aloud contains the following components:

•BookIntroduction:

•Student“Interactions” with the Text:

•Whole-Class Conversation:

•Teacher“Interactions” with the Text:

Teacher gives a brief summary that previews the text and sets a focus.

Teacher interactions involve teachers thinking aloud about the text they are reading (“What?! I can’t believe the characters just did that! That really is making me think differently about them. I’m now think-ing…”), as well as possibly stopping and jotting some of the teacher’s

thinking about a text (“First, I thought this character was mean, but now I’m realizing that she is just insecure and scared. I’m going to cross out the word mean and write insecure and scared on the chart next to their character’s name.”). Other teacher interactions might include a stop and sketch (such as sketching how we are picturing the character’s face) or a stop and stretch, where the teacher could act out a piece of the text. So as not to interrupt the flow of the Read Aloud, teacher interactions should be carefully chosen in places of the text that most warrant some form of stopping and thinking, and probably not exceed two-three, depending on the length of the text.

Student interactions usually occur after the teacher has modeled similar thinking first. For example, after a teacher has done a think aloud, she may read a few more pages or paragraphs of the text, and then ask students to interact with the text, by turning and talking,

stopping and jotting, stopping and sketching, or stopping and stretching. So as not to interrupt the flow of the Read Aloud, student interactions should be carefully chosen in places of the text that most warrant some form of stopping and thinking, and probably not exceed two-three, depending on the length of the text.

A few times a week, the class engages in a whole-group discussion after the reading of the text.


Establishing Long-Term Reading Partnerships

“Talking and writing both provide concrete visible ways for learners to do the thinking work that later becomes internalized and visible. Think about it. If you want to gain insights on your teaching, your family, your life—what do you do? You meet with someone to “talk things over.” If you want to become better at doing something, you bring in a coach, a tutor, or an advisor. Whomever the person is, what you will do is talk. In think tanks, study groups, in-quiry projects, graduate courses, seminars—what do you do? You talk. Talk is the medium in which we all outgrow ourselves, over and over.”


During interactive Read Alouds and reading workshop minilessons, students will sit next to their long-term reading partner. During the first two weeks of summer school, as teachers are getting to know their readers, student partnerships do not have to be set. However, as teachers gain more knowledge about each student’s reading level, reading interests, speaking and listening skills, and social skills, teachers will want to form reading partnerships that will span the remainder of the summer school session. It is recommended that teachers create a chart of “Reading Partnerships” and display it by the meeting area, reinforcing the idea for students. Most importantly, we want each student to benefit from the partnership, so it’s recommended to pair students who are able to read and enjoy the same level (or similar level) of text.

Suggested Interactive Read Alouds for Summer SchoolWhile the Interactive Read Aloud does not occur during the reading workshop (which has the three components of minilesson, independent and conferring time, and teach-ing share), the Interactive Read Aloud supports the teaching that happens during read-ing workshop. Therefore, teachers will want to choose books to read aloud that can also serve as examples during the demonstration, or teaching, portion of the miniles-son.

Weeks One and TwoDuring interactive Read Alouds this week, you’ll want to focus on building com-

munity and establishing routines for turning and talking in partnerships, as well as building readers’ enthusiasm by reading highly engaging texts. Teachers will want to choose some of their favorite books to read to the class—those they know very well and that they know 3rd graders will be highly engaged in and want to talk about, as well as those that could be used during the minilessons this week.

Possible Texts: KnuffleBunny, by Mo Willems* Those Shoes, by Maribeth Boelts*

*Teachers, please note that these texts will support not only the work of reading workshop but also that of writing workshop,

as excerpts of these texts are used for minilessons in the second and third weeks of the writing workshop.

Teacher gives a brief summary that previews the text and sets a focus.


Establishing Long-Term Reading Partnerships

Weeks Three and Four

Weeks Five and Six

During Interactive Read Alouds this week, you’ll want to model the kinds of skills, strate-gies, and behaviors that are being taught during the reading workshop. At this point, readers are being taught to translate the print on the page into richly detailed, vivid, active pictures in their minds – mental movies. You will be teaching students to monitor their understanding as they read, accumulating meaning across a text and using fix-up strategies when the mental movie in their minds becomes “blurry.” Finally, you will support kids in working in partner-ships to retell what they’ve read with increasing sophistication. Your students will benefit from your reading of a longer text during Interactive Read Alouds during these two weeks to allow them to practice accumulating meaning across text and monitoring their comprehension.

As you shift from reading narrative texts to expository nonfiction texts during the final two weeks of summer school, you will want to read aloud expository nonfiction texts to your students. During this time, students will benefit from seeing you model, and from practicing with partners, how we read expository text “not simply to find cool facts or answer specific questions, but instead reading to learn what it is the author wants to teach” (Calkins, NavigatingNonfictioninExpositoryText,Volume1, page x). As you will have gotten to know your readers better at this point in the summer, you may wish to pick texts around topics of special interest to them. In addition, this is an especially powerful opportunity to celebrate books representing a range of text levels. Care should be taken to select texts that represent expository nonfiction, as opposed to narrative nonfiction. In addition, it will not always be necessary to read the entire text aloud.

Possible Texts:

Possible Texts:

Launching the Reading Workshop with Young Readers utilizes excerpts from Fantastic Mr. Fox, by Roald Dahl, for many of the minilessons. You may wish to select Fantastic Mr. Fox, then, as the Interactive Read Aloud during this time.

An alternative possibility for an Interactive Read Aloud could be BecauseofWinnDixie, by Kate DiCamillo.

RedEyedTreeFrog,by Joy CowleyEarthquakes, by Deborah HeiligmanWolves, by Sally MorganVarious articles found on the CD-ROM, Resources for Teaching Reading, by Lucy Calkins


Assessing Readers

“This requires a stance toward teaching that means that always, teachers behave in classrooms as researchers. We must invent ways to study kids’ work, to research and reflect and discuss and imagine what good work entails; we must wrestle with what the pathways toward good work can look like, and we must help kids progress along those pathways. Assessment, then, like teaching, can’t be outsourced. And assessment can’t be something that occurs once or twice or three times a year. Instead, assessment is sewn into the fabric of our teaching.”

--Lucy Calkins from A Guide to the Reading Workshop, page 11

Conferring in the First Week

Assessing Readers in the Second and Third Weeks

Teachers will launch the reading workshop in the first week by teaching minilessons about setting a “New Year’s Resolution” for reading, choosing just-right books, and getting better with a reading log and setting goals for reading. After children return to their seats for inde-pendent reading time, where they will browse baskets of books, select one, and begin read-ing, teachers will want to make their presence felt in the room, quietly supporting and en-couraging readers. During that first week, teachers will want to move about the room with the “Conferring in the First Week” Form in hand, noting the behaviors and attitudes that students have about reading. The teacher will then take this week to compliment, compli-ment, compliment, both individual readers and table groups of students on the good choices they are making during reading workshop. The goal of the first week is to help students feel confident and excited to read, develop a sense of the routines and structures of reading workshop, and begin to form their identities as a readers, so we want all of our conferences to feel celebratory and encouraging (see Appendix A for the “Conferring in the First Week” Record Form for more information and tips for working with readers that first week).

Teachers will launch the reading workshop in the first week by teaching minilessons about setting a “New Year’s Resolution” for reading, choosing just-right books, and getting better with a reading log and setting goals for reading. After children return to their seats for inde-pendent reading time, where they will browse baskets of books, select one, and begin read-ing, teachers will want to make their presence felt in the room, quietly supporting and en-couraging readers. During that first week, teachers will want to move about the room with the “Conferring in the First Week” Form in hand, noting the behaviors and attitudes that students have about reading. The teacher will then take this week to compliment, compli-ment, compliment, both individual readers and table groups of students on the good choices they are making during reading workshop. The goal of the first week is to help students feel confident and excited to read, develop a sense of the routines and structures of reading workshop, and begin to form their identities as a readers, so we want all of our conferences to feel celebratory and encouraging (see Appendix A for the “Conferring in the First Week” Record Form for more information and tips for working with readers that first week).


By the end of the third week, teachers should have determined each child’s independent reading level, which should be communicated in a respectful and supportive manner to the child, so they choose books within that level (or in that range) for their independent reading time.

• To prepare for the assessment, select one fiction book at each level and put it in a basket. It is recommended to choose books that children will be least familiar with, as well as books that have 100 words or more. (This may not be possible for books in the lower levels. In that case, you’ll determine the accuracy rate by dividing the number of words students read correctly by the total number of words they read.)

• Count 100 words in each text, and then mark the 100th word with a Post-it or other re-minder, as you’ll want to stop the reader after they’ve read 100 words aloud to you. Note: If the 100th word is in the middle of a sentence, let the child finish reading through the sentence before stopping.

• Make many copies of the “Reading Assessment for Independent Reading Books,” found in Ap-pendix B, as one student may read three to four books before you are able to determine the appropriate level.

• Start easy—you’ll want a text that a child can read well and with confidence. If they read a level with high accuracy (at least 98% or higher), fluency, and comprehension, then you’ll want to test them with the next level of text.

• Once the student falls below 98% accuracy and/or struggles to fully comprehend the text (meaning they may not get both literal and inferential understandings from the text), you can stop assessing the child.

• To determine the INDEPENDENT READING LEVEL of each child, determine the highest/hardest level they were able to read with high accuracy, fluency, and comprehension. This is the “just right” reading level for the child.

Some Tips for Assessing Readers

Assessing Readers

Conferring in the Fourth - Sixth WeeksWith more knowledge about the child’s independent reading level, their reading attitudes and behaviors, their reading interests, as well as the wealth of teaching that has been occurring in minilessons, individual conferences, and teaching shares, it is a good time to begin doing some strong teaching during independent reading time. While children are reading their indepen-dent reading books, teachers should work with a few students each day, sitting down next to them and asking students about their reading work. During these conferences, teachers will want to uncover something the reader is doing well and name that specifically in a compli-ment, as well as then do some teaching, naming a teaching point and demonstrating it for the student. For further information, please see Appendix C, “Conferring in the Fourth-Sixth Weeks” Recording Form.


Suggestions for End-of-Unit Celebrations

Kathy Collins, author of Growing Readers: Units of Study in the Primary Classroom, suggests many ways to celebrate the endings of units of study. They include:

Children read their favorite book (or a favorite section of a book) to each other in small groups. Then, all can share celebratory snacks.

Caregivers can be invited into the classroom to read with their children. Children can give adults tours of the classroom, especially the library, and pick a favorite book to read to or with an adult. Then, all can share celebratory snacks.

A whole-class “Contract,” rolled up like a scroll or on a large posterboard, can be signed by students with colorful or metallic markers or pens. A photograph of the whole class standing with the contract can be taken. Then, all can share celebratory snacks.

To encourage reading beyond summer school, students can make individualized bookmarks, either one for themselves or two (one for themselves, and one to give to someone else). Then, all can share celebratory snacks.

Poll the class for a good idea for a celebration and list suggestions, then have the class vote on their favorite one. Be sure to consider ending the celebration with snacks!

Read-Around

Caregivers as Reading Partners

Reading Workshop Contract Signing Party

Bookmark-Making Party

Let the Kids Decide!


On the last day of summer school, teachers will want to lead students through a process of reflect-ing on the readers they’ve become. During the minilesson time, teachers will gather the class and tell them that they’ve learned a great deal about what it takes to be a great reader—setting goals, choosing just-right books, keeping track of reading, envisioning what’s happening while reading, read-ing chunks of text, and being a strong reading partner. In addition, students have learned that reading looks different when reading different genres – to be a great nonfiction reader feels different some-times than being a great reader of fiction.

Reflection

Then, teachers will tell students that for the final day of summer school, they are going to reflect and then share how they’ve grown as readers. Using the prompt, “I used to… but now I …,” the teacher should model one way that he/she has grown as a reader, perhaps by sharing that the teacher used to just choose books that he/she wanted to read, without ever taking the opportunity to talk with others about reading. Now, the teacher has decided to read the same book as another teacher in the building at least a few times a year, so she can talk with others and her thinking. (The teacher might then chart, “I used to just read books I wanted, but now I read the same book as a friend a few times a year, so that I have the opportunity to talk with another reader and push my thinking.”) Then, teachers will want to ask the students to do some reflection work. Using the prompt, “I used to… but now I…,” the teacher will ask students to think about what they’ve learned about themselves as readers over the course of summer school. When they have an idea, the stu-dents can share their thoughts with their reading partners.

After students have had a few minutes to share with one another, the teacher will remind students that one really important thing that readers do is reflect on their reading, which is what students are going to spend a few minutes doing today during independent reading time.

Send students off to their reading spots. In a notebook or on a piece of paper, students should write a response to “I used to…but now I…” in whatever format feels most comfortable. When they are finished, they can then read for the remainder of independent reading time.

For the share, teachers will invite students back to the rug to share their reflections. Students should take turns sharing their reflections. Teacher might want to record the reflections on chart paper.


Writing


Writing Workshop Rationale

The curriculum planned for 3rd Grade Summer Bridge Writing 2011 keeps in mind the work created and implemented during last year’s summer program, and builds on it by layering on a short two week Nonfiction: All About series of lessons. If you taught third grade summer school last year, or have Lucy Calkins’ Units of Study for Teaching Writing, then the curriculum for the next six weeks will be very familiar to you. Like any work that we do in our professional lives, this curriculum stands on the shoulders of writing from, and conversations with, staff developers at Columbia University’s Teachers College Reading and Writing Project and Chicago Public School’s Office of Reading and Language Arts. To both learning communities, thank you!

The decision to have a four-week narrative unit and a two-week non-narrative unit was made for several reasons. One, the writing units are aligned to the work students will be doing in Reading Workshop this year. Reading Workshop is a framework for teaching reading that most Chicago Public School teachers are not as familiar with. It is our hope that this writing curriculum is familiar to most of you so that you can put your energy into conferring with writers and learning as much about them as readers.

With the adoption of the Common Core, we also know that narrative and expository are essential genres for us to teach to prepare our students to write for college and career readiness.


Writing Narrative & Non-Fiction Text

Children are natural storytellers. From the moment they walk into our classrooms they are eager to share the daily events from their

lives with us. Beginning the summer program with narrative will help us build their enthusiasm and engagement. We will, in the coming weeks, teach them to write those stories from their lives using words that show exactly what happened, and to slow down moments to create movies in their read-ers’ minds. This powerful teaching, and writing, will transfer to writing well in other genres. Writing narrative well is an expectation of the Common Core Standards. In the first four weeks of the sum-mer, students will be working to produce pieces that tell a clear sequence of events with descriptive details and, with guidance and support from peers and adults, develop and strengthen their writing by planning, revising, and editing.

Why Narrative?

This short exposure to writing in a nonfiction structure is meant to show students another type

of writing. Writing all about topics they already know a lot about, are a personal expert on, allows the teacher to focus on teaching the structure of nonfiction texts without also layering on the diffi-cult task of teaching them to research. This short two-week immersion in writing All About topics of personal expertise provides a quick immersion in a new type of writing. We recommend subsequent nonfiction units be taught that couple writing to teach with writing to learn and teach. In the last two weeks of summer, we teach students to write and present like teachers. As required of the Common Core Standards, student will write informative/explanatory texts to examine a topic and covey ideas and information clearly.

Why Nonfiction: All About?


Writing Narrative & Nonfiction Text

Both teachers and students will be provided with a writer’s notebook and copy paper. For some stu-dents, providing single sheets of paper (with a box for a picture and lines) stapled together is more sup-portive than a notebook. The stapled pages serve as a graphic organizer, helps them plan, and supports the structure of their narrative. In addition, all classrooms will be provided with mentor texts. Those Shoes by Maribeth Boelts, Fireflies!by Julie Brinkloe, KnuffleBunny by Mo Willems, Glass: Melt It, Shape It by May Nelson, and Sharks by Catrione Clarke are texts that we have imbedded in lessons for you to use to provide examples and explain how the writers wrote.

If you do not already have a writer’s notebook where you write daily, you’ll want to start one, quick. Our students love to know more about us, and are often more engaged when we share our stories, especially stories from when we were their age, with them. Keeping a writers notebook, just as your students do, models for them what proficient writers do – collect entries every day on topics we might later develop, publish, and give to the world.

Materials

Preparation


Assessment

You will begin this summer by administering an on-demand writing activity. The purpose of the on-demand is to collect baseline data. You will want to know where they are develop-mentally in learning to write narratives. There are explicit directions for administering the on-demand located on day one (to be used as the pre-assessment), and then on day 27. After four weeks of instruction, you will return their pre-assessment to them, and they will confer with a partner and revise (this will be the post assessment). You will use the rubric included in the Appendix of this document to score both the pre and post assessment.

On a daily basis, you will be conducting formative assessments in the form of observation of students’ writing behaviors (teacher observation checklist in Appendix), your daily conferring notes (template in Appendix), and your review of student notebooks (rubric in Appendix), and using the information collected from these assessments to make decisions about instruc-tion. As with any thing we teach, your whole group minilesson should be what most of the students in front of you need. If the sequence of minilesson suggested in this guide presents a lesson that does not match what your students need, then consider the needs of your class and teach what it is that will lift the level of their writing.


Objectives & Overview

Unit Objectives

By the end of Summer Bridge, our third grade students will be able to:

• Write sequenced narratives that develop a real event with details;• Write an informational/explanatory text that examines a topic of personal expertise

and conveys ideas and information clearly;• Use the writing process to write focused, organized, narratives and simple nonfic-

tion texts; • Participate fully in a writing workshop

Overview of Daily Lessons

This overview follows the calendar for Regular Track schools. For Track E schools where the calendar includes five fewer days but a slightly longer pe-riod, we recommend:

• Cut Day 11, June 8th, Generating Ideas: Strong Feelings• Cut Day 12, June 9th, Developing Timelines • Combine the Editing Lessons on Day 14 and 15, July 12-13• Cut Days 22 and 23, July 22 and 25, Organizing our Ideas


Week Date MinilessonsIndependent Writing and Conferring

Share Assessment

1 6/22 On-Demand On-Demand Writing On-Demand Writing

Pre-Writing Inventory

On-Demand Writing- Launching/ Narrative Rubric

6/23 Establishing Rituals & Routines/Generating Ideas: People

Independent Writing, Compliment Conferences

Share: Establishing Partnerships

Teacher observation checklist

6/24 Establishing Rituals & Routines/Generating Ideas: Places

Independent Writing, Compliment Conferences

Share: Writing for longer and longer periods of time

Teacher observation checklist; conference notes

2 6/27 Writing Focused Narratives

Independent writing (one on one con-ferences and small groups)

Including Exact Details

Teacher observation checklist; review notebooks

6/28 Writer’s Job in a Conference


Conferring with a Partner


6/29 Writing Stories Bit-by-Bit


Share: An Author in Our Class

Teacher observation checklist;

6/30 Choosing an Entry to Publish


Share: Authors and their topics


7/1 Looking to Mentor Authors to Revise our Leads


Share with a part-ner

Teacher observation checklist; review notebooks

3 7/6 Oral Storytelling and Acting Out Our Story


Reading and Re-reading Aloud

Teacher observation checklist; conference notes;

Weekly Overview



Share Assessment

7/7 Looking to Mentor Authors to Revise our Endings




7/8 Generating Ideas: Strong Feeling


Share: You are the Boss of your Writing


7/9 Developing Timelines


Talking to Partners – Sharing our timelines

Teacher observation checklist; conference notes; review note-books

4 7/11 Revising the Heart of our Stories



Teacher observation checklist; charts

7/12 Fix Up Strategies Independent writing (one on one con-ferences and small groups)

Share: An Author in Our Class/Talking with A Partner


7/13 Editing and Getting Ready to Publish


Share: An Author in Our Class/Talking with a Partner


7/14 Publishing a final draft – Celebrating the work

Celebrating Celebrating None

7/15 On-Demand Part 2: Confer with a partner and revise

Peer Conferences + Revision

None Launching/Narrative Rubric

5 7/18 Immersion – Notic-ing What Other Authors that Teach do When they Write that we can try, too!


Share what we no-ticed and learned from mentor authors

Teacher observation checklist; conference notes)

Weekly Overview



Share Assessment

7/19 Try on our topics


Share: Committing to our Topic

Teacher observation checklist; conference notes;

7/20 Organizing our Ideas and Writing our Subtopics or Chap-ters







Teacher observation checklist;





6 7/25 Organizing our Ideas and Writing our Subtopics or Chap-ters




7/26 Revise by Taking Way




7/27 Editing: Using Commas to Write Efficiently




7/28 Prepare for Celebration


Prepare for Tomorrow’s Celebration


7/29 Celebrate Nonfiction

An Author Celebration

An Author Celebration

Nonfiction Writing Rubric

Weekly Overview


Prior to administering this on-demand, please be sure to have read over the directions, write the activity on the board or chart paper, and have all materi-als ready.

Instructional Activities

Since this is an assessment day, the start of the workshop will not follow the structure of a typical minilesson, and you will not be conferring with your writers during independent writing time. To ensure standardized administration conditions, this lesson contains oral directions that teachers will read to the students. You will provide students with loose leaf paper at their seats. You will have the following writing activity charted on the wall for everyone to see: Write your best personal narra-tive, your best true story, about one particular time when you did something that matters to you.

Preparation

Reading

Pre-Assessment: Plan and Draft

Materials:

•Chart with on-demandposted

•Loose leaf paper•Pens

Writing

Students will be able to:• Demonstrate their mastery of narrative writing and knowledge of the

qualities of good writing; and• Demonstrate their mastery of writing process by planning their narra-

tives before they draft.

Objectives

Look at the writing activity that I’ve posted. Read along as I read the activity, and then listen as I read the directions.

“Inthenext30minutes,writeyourbestpersonalnarrative,yourbesttruestory,aboutonepar-ticular time when you did something that matters to you”

Say:

Day 1


Reading Writing

Here are the instructions for this activity:

1. This is a writing activity that is going to help me get to know you better as a writer. Today is the start of a 2-day process to write a personal narrative story, a true story about your life. Today, you will plan and draft your story. After four weeks of studying and writing together this summer, you will confer with a partner then revise and edit your story.

2. Writeyournameand“Plan”ononepieceoflooseleafpaper.Taketen(10)minutestoplanyourpaper by making notes on this page. You may choose to do this using the tools you like best such as an outline, web, or student generated graphic organizer, etc.

3. On another piece of paper, write your name and “First Draft.” 4. Use everything you know about writing a story to plan and draft today.5. Thinkaboutwhathappenedfirst,thennext,thennext,andendinawaythatyourreaderswillknow

that your story is over.6. Today, you will not be able to talk with a partner, and I will not be able to confer with you.7. Ifyoufinishearly,taketimetorereadandreviseyourwork.Youwillhave30minutestoplanand

draftyourwriting,unlessyouneedanadditional10minutes.Remembertotakethefirst10minutesto organize what you want to say and write a plan on the page you labeled “Plan” before you write yourfirstdraft.

You may cross out and rewrite words or make other changes, but write clearly. It must be easy to read.

It is now time to plan and draft.

Independent & Collaborative Work

Providing Help to Students During the Assessment

When students have finished their work, collect both their plan and their first draft, making sure their name is on both papers, and set them aside for the end of the unit and the second day of the assessment. Thank them for the seriousness with which they have focused on their writing.

• Do not suggest ideas or topics, and do not comment on or evaluate student work during the process. Please note that neither dictionaries nor thesauruses can be used except as allowed by law for students who are English Language Learners (ELLs) and students with appropriate IEPs. The purpose of this activity is to gather an authentic representation of student achievement and process at the indepen-dent level. If students have questions about the activity, encourage them to read the assignment and directions carefully and do their best.

• This is a two-day writing activity (day two taking place at the end of the four week narrative unit); we encourage you to take notes on students’ writing behaviors that you observe, however, you are not ready to score the students writing.

Day 1

Say:


Reading

Writing

What if?

Assessment

If a student writes nothing at all, and/or seems frustrated, you may ask what s/he is thinking or feeling, and what support would be needed for the student to respond to the activity. If you do help the student to get started with their writing, make a note so that your support enters into your scoring of their work. You will learn more about them as a writer if they write something, even with your support, then if s/he writes nothing. For 3rd Grade Summer Bridge, the 8th District Wide Writ-ing Assessment has been adapted and this information will be used as the baseline assessment. At the end of four weeks of instruction we will ask you to conduct the post assessment, which will involve the students conferring with a partner, revis-ing and rewriting their piece. We will be looking at what they came to us knowing about qualities of good writing, process, and how they’ve grown as writers from our instruction.

AssessmentAfter you collect their papers, you will use the rubric included in the Appendix to score the papers, and the report form included in the Appendix to record their scores. These scores will be input into the CIM summer assessment document as the post assessment. Please make sure to include comments which will help you plan instruction: look for what your students already know how to do, and what might be the first issue to focus on in miniles-sons or small group instruction.

Day 1



Materials:

Reading Writing

Launch Writing Workshop: Rituals, Routines and Generating Ideas: Important People

Students will be able to:• Understand the rituals and routines of writing workshop;• Share thoughts/feelings about writing; and• See themselves as writers and understand that their lives are worth writing about

• Students’ writing notebooks, or folders pens, pencils • Teacher’s writing note book (decorated with several pages of writing) • Calendar with Publishing Party identified on July 14th• Chart paper and markers• Teacher observation checklist and conferring notes• Writing sample in Appendix – an important person

Be sure to have your own writer’s notebook with you – decorated and several pages entries already collected. Students will need to bring their writer’s notebooks to the meeting area to do some sketching and writing during the active engagement.

From the first day of collecting baseline data you should have an idea of where the writers in your class are developmentally. During the share of this lesson you will be establishing partnerships. We encourage you to place two writers together with similar abilities, but there is much to con-sider when establishing partnerships. Ultimately, you are the best judge of who works well together.

Objectives

Preparation

Introduce And Discuss The Structure Of WorkshopGather students in the meeting area. On this day, we’ll want to introduce students to writing workshop and build their enthusiasm for writing. Explain to them that every day this summer they will gather together as writers in this meeting area to learn one thing that they do as they write. They will then have time to try out what they are learning – writing independently. When they write independently, they will choose their own topics, start a new piece when they think they’re done, and talk to you and the other writers in this class about their writing. At the end of each day, we will all gather together again to share what we are working on as writers and how we’re growing as writers. Explain to them that they will be working hard writing every day so that by the end of the summer you can all publish one piece and celebrate it at a Pub-lishing Party!

You may decide to point to a calendar where you’ve identified the date of the publishing party.

Day 2


Reading

Writing

Minilesson (10 Minutes)Connection

Teach

“Class, can I have your eyes and your attention? Last night, I spent my evening pouring over the stories you wrote as part of the on-demand writing activity. As I mentioned on Wednesday, I planned that activity so that I could get to know you better as writers. We’ve been together for only a short time, but II’malreadyextremelyimpressedbyallofyou.Youknowalotabouttheworkthatwritersdo,andyouhave amazing stories to tell. This summer we’re going to study what writers in the world do that we can dotoo!”

“To be writers, you need tools that real writers use, and the most important tool is this: a writer’s note-book.”Holdupyourdecoratednotebookturningafewpagessothatchildrencanseepagesfilledwithwriting, sketches, and/or photographs.

“Like all workshops – artists workshops, pottery workshops, wood working workshops – we will spend time every day, just like professional writers do – coming together to learn a new strategy, and then go-ing off to practice that strategy, or other strategies we’ve been working on, and then the teacher goes from being a teacher to being a coach, helping all the writers in the room as they write.”

“Forthefirstfourweeksofoursummertogether,we’llbewritingtruestories,personalnarratives.TodayI want to teach you a strategy I use to help me decide which story to write – because writers aren’t usually given topics; we decide which stories we will tell. One strategy I use to get me started is this: I think of a person who matters to me and then I list small moments I’ve had with that person. I list the moments that, for some reason, have always stuck with me. Then I sketch the memory and write the story of that time.”

Strategies for Generating Personal Narrative Writing

Think of a person who matters to you, then list clear, small moments you remem-ber with him or her. Choose one to sketch and then write the accompanying story.

Explicitly demonstrate and think aloud for students how you use the above strategy. You might say:

“So it’s writing time and I’ve opened my notebook to a blank page and am stuck. I might pick up my penandalreadyhaveanideaofwhatIwillwriteabout–ifthat’sthecaseIjustgetstartedrightaway!But,sometimesIneedhelpcomingupwithanidea.Whenthathappens,whenIgetstuckanddon’tknow what to write about, I can look up to the chart and think ‘Hmm…what strategies do I know for generating narrative writing? And I can use a strategy to help me generate an idea for a story.”

Day 2


Reading Writing

...picking up a marker thinking of an important person- someone that matters – and jotting (think-ing out loud) moments of times with that person. After listing several moments, stop and say, “I could keep going, there are so many small, everyday moments that I could write about with my mom, but today I’m going to stop here. I want to get started with some actual writing. I want to stop listing moments and pick one that I’m going to write about today during independent writing time. I’m going to circle one, then watch me as I picture that moment in my mind, and then start telling the story of what happened in a step-by-step way.” (see writing sample in appendix)

Model

You may decide to create a chart that looks something like this (with your small moments of course): When Maura came home from

school and brought me gummy bears

Playing Dill Pickle Communion with Maura

When Maura taught me how to roller skate

Maura

As you demonstrate, you’ll want to add in little bits of advice, for example, encourage them to make a movie in their mind of the event, tell it step by step, sketching some images to help you plan then writing. You will not write out the whole story, but do show them how you get started writ-ing after getting down a quick sketch.

“So, writers, I want you to know that there are lots of ways to come up with stories to write. One strat-egy that I use often is I think of a person who matters to me and write that on my paper. Then, I list small moments connected to that person. I take one of these, one that I remember really, really well, andzoominonthepartthatIremembermost.ThenIsketchandwritewhathappenedfirstandlater.Did you see how I did that?”

Active Engagement Set the children up to try this strategy with their partners (at this point, their partner is the person sitting next to them. At the end of this session, you will establish more permanent writing partner-ships). “Pretend it’s independent writing time and you’re stuck – it’s a day when you’re not sure what to write about. Look at the chart to see what strategies we’ve learned. Right now, think of someone who matters to you? Now, try listing across your fingers two or three small moments you and that person had together.” Give students time to think. “Now choose one moment. Give me a thumb up when you’ve done this. Make a quick sketch of what happened first.” Watch as students sketch the beginning of their story. “Now make a second quick sketch to show what you did next. Now tell the person next to you the story, starting with what you did first. Tell it will all the tiny details you re-member.” Listen in as children turn and talk about the person and the story they’re thinking of that accompanies that person. As you listen in – think about which student’s story you can share with the whole class as another example of generating and orally telling a personal narrative.

Day 2


Reading

Writing

Link

“Sowriters,theworkyou’vejuststartedandwillcontinueforthenext6weeksisbigandimportant.BecauseofthisIfeeltheneedtocallyouwriters.Withoutwastinganothersec-ond of precious writing time, let’s start putting these stories onto the pages of our writer’s notebooks. Off you go…”

Remind students that this is the most important part of workshop-- time they spend actually writing. Your expectations are that they will be writing so that you can walk around and admire all the hard work they’re doing.

Independent Writing and Conferring (30 minutes)Circulate around the room complimenting the behaviors you hope all students dem-onstrate (i.e., quietly walking to their seats and getting started right away, taking time to think--then get started, jotting a list, sketching, etc.). Take notes using the Teacher Observation Checklist (found in the Appendix) on the behaviors you notice to inform your instruction. For the first couple of days of writing workshop you’ll be circulating and getting all the writers going. Once they’re all settled, and independently writing, you can sit alongside a writer for a one-on-one conference, or pull a small group of students together for a small group strategy lesson.

Mid Workshop Teaching Point (1-2 Minutes)

After about 10-15 minutes of the workshop, you may notice students losing stamina for writing. Use an attention getting devices such as “1, 2, 3 eyes on me…” to call their attention to you.

“Writers…” do not move on until you have everyone’s attention. “I want to teach you one more thing. I’ve heard some of you saying you’re done. Writers have a saying, ‘When you think you’re done, you’ve just begun.’ That just means that when you think you’re done, there is a lot more to do!Writers,whenthey’vecompletedonesmallmomentstory,think,“What’sanotherSmallMo-mentstorythatI’veexperiencedandcanwriteabout?’Then,theyopentoanewpageoftheirnotebook, or get a new piece of paper and start thinking, sketching, and writing. How many of youthinkyou’redonewithyourfirststory,yourfirstentry?Thumbsup.Fortherestofwritingtime I am going to admire what you do now that you know the saying, ‘When you think you’re done,you’vejustbegun.’Getbackwriting!

Say:

Day 2


Reading Writing

Students will go back to writing in their notebooks (or writing on stapled booklets as you’ve determined after looking at their on-demands) as you continue to compliment the work they’re dong as writers and encouraging them to keep going. These first sessions are meant to encourage them to keep going and be independent so you can eventually begin conferring with them one-on-one and in small groups. No conferring can happen unless students are independent and know how to function independently in the workshop.

Share (5 Minutes)

“WriterscanIhaveyourattention?Pleasefinishupyourthoughtandcomejoinmebackonthecarpet.Just like we began, we will end here together as a community of writers in the meeting area..”

“As you come to the carpet you’ll see your names and a number. Sit where I’ve put the paper contain-ing your name and your number. You and your partner will sit facing knee to knee, and hold the two corners of the paper.”

“Writers, these papers are really important because they signify that the two people whose name are listed will work together as writing partners for the summer. You won’t write the same stories, but you’ll talk every day and help each other write really great stories. The numbers 1 and 2 are to help us know whowilltalkorsharefirstwhenitistimeforaturnandtalkorpartnerwriting.Ifyouareapartner1,give me a thumb up. If you are partner 2, give me a thumbs up.”

Assessment

Teacher observation checklist and conferring

notes (in Appendix)

What if? If you notice students having difficulty thinking of stories from their lives you may spend a portion of the day doing some storytelling, or encouraging them to story tell with a partner.

If you notice students are struggling with partnerships (listening or responding respectfully) you’ll need to teach into those behaviors. Teach them to wait until they have the listeners’ full attention before continuing to tell their stories. Model effective listening. Be vigilant for even the tiniest shows of disrespect, and be ready to put on a show of shock that they would be anything less than respectful when other writers are sharing their stories.

Encourage students to take their writer’s notebook home and decorate it. Suggest that they put meaningful, words and images that will help them come up with even more topics to write about.

Homework

Day 2


Objectives


Preparation

Reading

Materials:

Writing

42

This lesson will be very similar to the previous lesson as it is a generating les-son. You will be explicitly demonstrating for them another strategy writers use to generate an idea for a story.

For today’s lesson, the students will need to bring their writer’s notebook with a pen tucked inside to the meeting area for the active engagement. You’ll notice in the connection we suggest how to manage that.


Preparation

Generating Ideas: Think of a Meaningful Place

Writing

Students will be able to:• Utilize rituals and routines and work productively alongside one another;• Generate ideas for stories; and• Talk with their peers about their writing.

Objectives• Chart paper, markers• Teacher’s writer’s

notebook• Students’ writer’s

notebooks or folders • Teacher Observation

Checklist and confer-ring notes

• Student names and #s for Partnerships

• Chart from yesterday with today’s strategy added (see page

Minilesson (10 Minutes)

ConnectionBefore calling students over to the meeting area, ask them to take out their writer’s note-book, and bring it with a pen tucked inside to the carpet and sit next to their writing partner.

“Writers can I have your eyes and your attention?” Wait for their attention before beginning. “Iwassothrilledatallthewritingyougeneratedyesterday!Icontinuetolearnsomuchaboutyou as people and as writers. I can’t wait to learn more. While we did great work yesterday it was hard. We learned this strategy (gesture to chart created yesterday) that writers use to help them get started and think of a story to write about.”

“Writers all sometimes get stuck – and need strategies to help them. Today I want to teach you another strategy that writers use when they get stuck thinking about what to write. They can always think of an important person as some of you did yesterday, but they can also think of a place that matters to them; then list small moments that occurred in that place.”

Day 3


Reading Writing

Teach

“Watch me as I do this.” Explicitly model demonstrating and thinking aloud as you use this strategy to generate ideas for small moments. In the same way you demonstrated yesterday.

(...picking up a marker thinking of an important place)- and jotting (thinking out loud) moments at that place. After listing several moments, stop and say, “I could keep going, there are so many small, everyday moments that I could write about when I think about being at the park, but today I’m go-ing to stop here. I want to get started with some actual writing. I want to stop listing moments and pick one that I’m going to write about today during independent writing time. I’m going to circle one, then watch me as I picture that moment in my mind, and then start telling the story of what happened in a step-by-step way.”

Model

You may decide to create a chart that looks something like this (with your small moments of course): Climbing a tree and eating crab apples at

the park

Playing tag in the park

Getting stuck in the swing at the park

The Park

Teachers, as you demonstrate, you’ll want to add little bits of advice, for example, encourage the writers in front of you to make a movie in their mind of the event, tell it step by step, sketching some images to help you plan then write. You will not write out the whole story, but do show them how you get started writing after getting down a quick sketch.

Say to the students, “So, writers, I want you to know that there are lots of ways to come up with stories to write. One strategy that I use often is I think of a person who matters to me and write that on my paper” Another is they can they can think of a special place and moments at/in that place.

Day 3


ReadingWriting

Writing

Active Engagement

“Nowit’syourturn!Let’spretendit’sindependentwritingtimeandyou’restuck–it’sadaywhenyou’renot sure what to write about. Let’s look at the chart to see what strategies we’ve learned. Right now, sittinghere,thinkofaspecialplace.Now,trylistingacrossyourfingerstwoorthreesmallmomentsfrom that place.” Give students time to think. “Now choose one moment, one time. Give me a thumb upwhenyou’vedonethis.Makeaquicksketchofwhathappenedfirst.”Watchasstudentssketchthebeginningoftheirstory.“Nowmakeasecondquicksketchtoshowwhatyoudidnext.Nowtellthepersonnexttoyouthestory,startingwithwhatyoudidfirst.Tellitwithallthetinydetailsyouremem-ber.” Listen in as children turn and talk about a place and the story they’re thinking of that accompa-nies that place. As you listen in – think about which student’s story you can share with the whole class asanotherexampleofgeneratingandorallytellingapersonalnarrative.

Link“So writers, I want you to remember for the rest of your life these strategies we’ve learned for generating an idea for a personal narrative story. Remember if you’re ever stuck and find yourself staring at a blank notebook page you can always look up to this chart and think of an important person, or a special place and think about moments that you associate with that person or place. Without wasting another second of precious writing time, let’s start putting these stories onto the pages of our writer’s notebooks. Off you go…”


• Think of a person who matters to you, then list clear, small moments you re-member with him or her. Choose one to sketch and then write the accompany-ing story.

• Think of a place that matters to you, then list clear, small moment stories you remember there. Choose one to sketch and then write the accompa-nying story.

You may have the chart already created:

Remind students that this is the most important part of workshop-the time they spend actually writing. Your expectations are that they will be writing so that you can walk around and admire all the hard work they’re doing.

Day 3


Reading Writing

Circulate around the room complimenting the behaviors you hope all students demonstrate (i.e. quietly walking to their seats and getting started right away, taking time to think-then get started, jotting a list, sketching, using the chart to use the strategy taught etc.). “I’m going to circle among you, noticing and recording what I’ve seen you’ve chosen to do. Let’s watch how quickly you all get started writing.” Use the “Teacher Observation Checklist and Conferring Notes” to collect data about the students’ writing behavior.

Mid Workshop Teaching Point

Independent Writing and Conferring (30 minutes)

“Writers, we’ve learned that there are a few strategies that writes use to come up with ideas for stories.Oneistothinkofanimportantperson.Anotheristothinkofanimportantplace.ButIalsowanttoteachyouthatthingscanjogmemoriesofstoriesforus!Forexample,IcanlookatwhatI’mwearing; my gym shoes, and have them remind me of stories. Like the time I was running in the park and I heard music. Or, the time I was running and I fell and got hurt and was worried that I wouldn’t be able to run anymore. Or, the time I gave all my old gym shoes to my sister because, at the time, she couldn’t afford new shoes.”

“Can you all try the strategy of taking an object and letting that object remind you of a Small Moment story? Just for a minute, look at what you’re wearing, or an object in the room. Let what you see re-mind you of a story. Now, you have another story you can write AND another strategy for generating idea. I’m going to add this new strategy to our chart:

Notice an object, and let that object spark a memory. Write the story of that one time.

Encourage students to keep writing – continuing with the story they were working on or starting a new entry as you continue to circulate complimenting their stamina and independence.

ShareIt is important that the children know they are to write and write for longer and longer periods of time. We want to build their stamina. A good analogy is to running. One thing that runners do is they try to run longer and faster every time they run. You can convene students back in the meeting area and discuss this analogy and the importance of writers asking themselves. “Did I write more to-day than on the first day?” You may also show them during the share that they’ll want to be sure to date their writing to know when they start and end their writing. Turn and talk with your partner, what are some other ways you might push yourself to write more?” If you don’t hear any partner-ships say the following you might add…

• When I finish one entry, I should start the other one because some of mine are little.• I think I worry about making it really good even if it is an entry, and that slows me down.• One day I wrote a lot and a different day I did not. I have to talk less.

Day 3


Reading

Writing

AssessmentIt is important that the students in front of you know that you love them and are invested in helping them become the best writers they can be. You have gotten to know them, and what they know about narrative writing from the on-demand writing activity. You now have two days worth of notebook entries to pour over. Try to see past the errors in their writing to what they CAN DO and what they KNOW. Always, when working with children, start with what they KNOW to teach them the NEW. Use the writing they’ve generated thus far to learn from them. Take notes using the conferring notes found in the appendix of this document and make some summer plans for them as writers.

What if? If it seems that students are struggling to stay focused throughout writing time and you’re overwhelmed by management concerns…ask yourself what the specific problem is, “What exactly is the problem? When does it occur? Who is having this problem?”

You might choose to let the whole class in on the problem and brainstorm with them strate-gies for fixing the problem. Certainly bring these issues to your meeting with your team and/or your summer school coach to continue to problem solve. Writing Workshop is a beauti-ful thing once it is up and going and all children know the rituals and routines. It is, however, challenging at times when both you and the students are learning how it goes.

Day 3



Materials:

Reading Writing

Students will be able to:• Utilize rituals and routines and work productively alongside one an other• Generate ideas for stories• Focus their stories to tell stories in scenes rather than summaries • Talk with their peers about their writing

Objectives

Writing Focused Narratives

• Chart paper, markers• Teacher’s writer’s notebook

• Students’ writer’s notebooks

• Teacher Observation checklist and confer-ring notes

The goal of the following lesson is to nudge our students to write focused nar-ratives – that is to lift the level of the structure of their narrative. There are other qualities of good writing (Elaboration, Significance, Craft) that we will address in fu-ture sessions and when we confer with them one-on-one and in small groups. Prior to the lesson, have an example in your notebook, or an idea ready in your mind, to model how you as a writer use this strategy.

Teachers, prepare the chart to the right for this lesson, or plan to cre-ate the chart with your students.

Preparation

• Write a seed story (The time I got stuck in the swing); don’t write all about a giant watermelon topic (All about my summer at the park).

• Zoom in so you tell the most important parts of the story – and tell those parts bit by bit.

Qualities of Good Personal Nar-rative Writing


Connection

“Writers, can I have your eyes and attention? Over the last few days we’ve learned lots of strategies for getting ideas for writing. We’ve learned that writers can think of a person, place or object that really matters to them and let that person, place or object spark a memory of one time when something hap-pened.ThisistrulyBIGwritingworkthatyou’llwanttorememberalways.Thesestrategiesforgenerat-ingideasforstoriesworkforyounowaswriters,andtheywillworkforyou30yearsfromnow!And,IknowthesestrategiesareworkingbecauseIcanseeyournotebooksfillingupfast!”

“Today I wan to teach you that in addition to strategies for coming up with ideas for stories, writers also havestrategiesforwritingreallygoodstories…storiesthatareaderwon’twanttoputdown.Specifically,I want to teach you that instead of writing everything you can think of about a topic, it helps to choose justonetinymomentfromanevent,andwriteinawaythatmakesthatmomentcomealive!Writerswanttostorytell–NOTsummarize!”

Day 4


Reading

Writing

“I’ve begun a new chart to help us hold on to this important work we’re learning – It’s titled, Qualities of Good Personal Narrative Writing and I’ve already got two bullets for us to try today.”

TeachDemonstrate explicitly how you use this strategy to write a focused “zoomed in” small moment narrative bit by bit.

Teachers, you might decide to draw a visual representation of this with an actual watermelon and seed. What’s important is that we chart our teaching with students, and providing visual represen-tation helps to make our teaching stick. It is also important that we reference these charts and encourage students to use them.

“When I use the strategy we learned yesterday and think of a place – I could write a big summary all aboutthatplace–forexample–ALLaboutmysummeratthepark(IthelpstoexaggerateAAALLLtoindicatethatit’snotasinterestingastorytowriteasummaryofyourtopic).But,Iwanttowritesome-thing that really brings a reader in and gets their attention. So, let me look at my Qualities of Good Writing Chart…a seed story – one time when something happened…(model thinking for a moment) Oh!I’vegotit!ThatonetimewhenIwasattheparkandgotstuckintheswing.Now,letmetellitbit by bit….I jumped off my bike and ran to the swing. My sister said, “Those are baby swings I don’t think you should play on them….” That works out better and helps me to really zoom in. I’m going to addthoseexamplestothechartsowecanseehowonekindofstoryisasummaryallaboutaplace,and one is a focused “zoomed in” story that tells the most important part of the story.”

Active Engagement

“Writers, now it’s your turn, can you show me with your hands the difference between ‘watermelon sized topics’ and ‘seed-sized topics’? (Give the children a moment to show you with their hands stretched then close in the difference between the two types of stories.) So, if I wanted to write all aboutmysisterMaura–showme,whichwouldthatbe,watermelonorseed?Yes!Bigwatermelon!Ok,whataboutallaboutmytriptoWisconsin?Yes!Watermelon!Now,whatifIwroteabouthowI sat on the front stoop of my house waiting for my sister to come home from school and bring me gummybears?(Pauseforstudentstothink)Right!That’sjustoneseed-sizedmoment…howaboutthese…

•AllthesillythingsmycatBetsydoesthatmakemelaugh•GivingBetsyabathwhenshedidn’twanttogetwet•Goingtothebeach•WhenIbuiltasandcastleatthebeachandmysisterknockeditdown

For today’s active engagement, we’ll be asking them to identify watermelon vs. seed ideas us-ing hand gestures. You will follow up on this lesson through conferences and small groups.

Day 4


Reading Writing

Link“Writers, as you work today, and always, remember that it is usually best to try to chose a little seed of a story to write about. If you have a seed in mind, carry it to your table and write about that in your notebook. If you need a little more help with this, some of you might want to stay in the meeting area with me. Off you go…”


It is still the beginning of the unit and some students may still need to be reminded to go quickly, quietly, and the most direct way possible to their writing spots. Continue to compli-ment the behaviors you want to see replicated by everyone, i.e., getting started the right way, putting the date at the top of their piece, not wasting a single second of precious writing time, etc. As an incentive, you may decide to let students pick their own writing spots – a spot where they know they can make good choices, and do their best writing.

You’ll also be making some big decisions – there will be several plates spinning – and you will not be able to possibly attend to every spinning plate. Keep your priorities clear – you want to empower students to feel independent and that they are capable of coming up with ideas for stories, telling them bit-by-bit. Today, make it your goal to meet and confer with students that are missing the mark and support them in getting some strong entries.

Mid Workshop Teaching PointTeachers, you may decide to share out (or have your students) share out the work they’ve done to focus their narratives. For example, a student that realized they were writing all about a person, place, or object and stopped to think about smaller moments and began writing again. Encourage students to pause and think about the entries they are collecting and if they are giant watermelon topics or tiny seed topics. You may decide to have them turn and talk with a partner to see if their partner can help give them advice.

Turn your students back into independent or partner writing and continue conferring.

Share (5 Minutes)

“Writers, can I have your eyes and attention? I want to share with you another very important thing that writers do.” Teachers, inside a workshop (both reading and writing) there are lots of opportuni-tiestoteach.Thisshareisseizinganothermomenttoteachthemaqualityofgoodwriting–wewillintroduce – writing with details, or precise words. We will not of course do a full minilesson on writing

Day 4


Reading

Writing

withdetail,butwewillhaveintroduceditinthisshareandcanteachitmoreexplicitlyintheformof a minilesson, one-on-one conference or small group. “Not only do writers come up with ideas andtrytowritefocusedsmallmomentstories–theyalsotrytowritewithexactdetailusingwordsthatshowthereadersexactlywhathappened.Thehardworkthatawriterdoesiswritewordsthathelpsthereadermakeamoveintheirmind.Forexample,Icouldhavesaidinmystory“IwasattheparkandIgotstuckintheswing.Mysisterhadtogetsomeonetohelpme.But,instead,Iwrote, I jumped off my bike. I ran to the swing. My sister said, “Those are baby swings I don’t think youshouldplayonthem.”“Idon’tcare!”IshoutedasIhoistedmyselfupandshovedmyfeetintothebabyswing.”DidyouseehowItriedtowritethewordsthatshowedexactlywhathappened?Couldyouseemystoryunfoldinglikeamovieinyourmind?I’mgoingtoaddthatqualityofgoodwriting to the chart so we’ll always remember it.”

• Write a seed story (The time I got stuck in the swing); don’t write all about a giant watermelon topic (All about my summer at the park).

• Zoom in so you tell the most important parts of the story – and tell those parts bit by bit. • Include true, exact details from the movie you have in your mind

Qualities of Good Personal Narrative Writing

Assessment

Teacher observation checklist and conferring

notes (in Appendix)

What if? You’ll notice in the link we’ve set up additional support if some of the students struggle with this strategy. It might be helpful to work with that small group and to take one of their ideas and brainstorm with them how to find the small moment in it. You can ask questions like “What’s the most important part? What part gives you the strongest feeling?” These ques-tions sometimes help get to the heart of the story and help students focus their narratives.

Day 4


Materials:

Reading Writing

Students will be able to:• Utilize rituals and routines and work productively alongside one another;• Understand their role in a writing conference; and • Talk about their writing.

Writer’s Job in a ConferenceObjectives

• Chart paper, markers• Teacher’s writer’s note book• Students’ writer’s note books• Scripts for conference role play • Those Shoes by Maribeth Boelts• Teacher observation checklist and confer ring notes (in Appen- dix) • Chart: Qualities of Good Personal Narra- tive Writing

One of the hardest things to do is to confer with writers. How do I decide what to compliment? What should I teach? HOW should I teach it? All of these questions perplex us when we pull up next to a child and ask, “What are you working on?” However, one of the best ways to get bet-ter at talking to kids about their writing is by pouring over their writing – with them in the form of conferences and small groups, with colleagues when planning for teaching, or alone snuggled up on your couch with a cup of tea. Whenever you look at a child’s writing you want to first look at it and think, “What are they approximating? What can they do?” and, “What can I teach them to lift the level of their writing?” The answer to those first questions is your compliment for the writer. The answer to the second question is the one thing you’ll teach them at that moment. Then, you must decide, HOW. How are you going to teach the strategy so that you’re showing them not telling them…

For this lesson, you will role-play with a student an effective and ineffec-tive conference


Preparation

Minilesson (10 Minutes)Connection

“Writers, can I have your eyes and attention? I want to share with you a story of when I was learn-ing something new. The other day I was working around the house and my husband Tony decided I was ready to learn to use a new power tool. He said, ‘Meghan, I’m going to teach you how to use this tool.’Heshowedmehowtouseitthensaid,‘Hereyougo…it’syourturn!’KindoflikeIsaytoyoueveryday,offyougo…it’syourturntowrite!But,Tonydidn’tjustleavemealonewiththistool…thatwouldn’t be good – I’d never used it, and I still needed help. So, he let me practice a little on my own but would come back to me after a little while to check in and give me some tips. He’d say, ‘Nice job making sure there’s nothing else around you. Remember to hold on to the saw tight so it doesn’t jerk

Day 5


Reading

Writing

youwhenyouturniton.’Yousee,hetaughtmereallyexplicitlyhowtousethesawlikeIdowithteaching you what writers do in our minilessons, but he also came back to check on me and give me feedback. In writing, those check-ins are called writing conferences, and they are to some people the most important part of the writing workshop.”

Teach“Today I want to teach you that our writing conferences are always going to go a typical way. That wayyoucanalwaysknowwhattoexpect.Asyourwritingteacher,Ialwayswanttoknowwhatyou’reworkingonandhowIcanhelpyou.So,Iwillpullachairupnexttoyou(I’llprobablyhavesomeofmyteacher tools with me like something to take notes on and some work from published writers I know reallywell)andI’llaskquestionslike:

•Whatareyouworkingonasawriter?•How’sitgoing?•Whyareyouwritingthispiece?•What’sthemostimportantpart?•Whatwillyoudonext?

Myjobinaconferenceistofindoutwhatyou’reworkingonandstudyyouasawritersothatIcanfigureoutwhattoteachyou.You’rejobistoteachme!”

“Watch me as Zahin and I role play this conference. Listen to how it changes once he’s learned to do this conference well (be sure to tell your students that this is not a true conference with this student, the he/she is helping you teach).

TeacherWhat are you working on as a writer?What are trying to do as a writer?Whatwillyoutrytodonext?

ZahinI’m writing about playing in the park.I’m writing about being on the slide.Write about sliding.

TeacherWhat are you working on as a writer?

What are trying to do as a writer?

Whatwillyoutrytodonext?

ZahinI’m writing a personal narrative about one time I was playing in the park and my friend pushed me down the slide and I fell and scraped my knee.

I’m trying to slow down my story and tell it bit by bit so that whoever is reading it gets a movie intheirmind!

I am going to act it out with a partner so that I’m sure to include all the small actions in my writing

“Now, compare that conference with this one. You’ll see that inthisnextconference “Zahin” has learned his job in a conference, and does it well.”

Day 5


Reading Writing

“Did you notice the difference between the two conferences? The difference was in the second confer-ence; Zahin knew what his job was – to teach the teacher about himself as a writer. He also used the wordswe’vebeenusingthislastweektotalkaboutwhathe’sworkingon!”

Debrief with the class:

Active Engagement

“Nowit’syourturntotry!I’mgoingtoaskyousomeofthesamequestionsIaskedZahin.Then, you’re going to turn and talk to your partner. Remember, It’s okay to say your writing topic, but your job in a conference is to teach the teacher what strategies you’re working on as a writer. You may want to look up at our charts and use them to help you talk about your work as a writer.”

Ask the student the first two questions you asked Zahin, giving them time to think and having them turn and talk to their partner to respond.

Link“Writers, can I have your attention back on me? From this day forward, when I confer with you, remember that you have a job to do in conferences. I’ll be working with you to help you with your writing,butIwillalsobeteachingyouyourjobinaconference!Offyougo…”


Independent Writing and Conferring (30 minutes)Continue to confer with students one-on-one or in small groups on generating narratives, focusing their stories to be zoomed in small moments told bit by bit rather than a summary, or writing with exact details.

(use an attention getting device)

For this mid-workshop teaching point we encourage you to highlight one of your con-ferences (asking the writer if it is ok to do so) and/or showing and example of a piece you wrote or a mentor text that shows story telling. Those Shoes by Maribeth Boelts has a great example of showing not telling when Jeremy is sitting at his desk and grip-ping his pencil so tight he thinks it might burst. Showing that example of writing and explaining it is another way to teach them to show not tell and write with exact detail.

ShareBring your student back to the carpet. For this share, encourage students to do some conferring in partnerships just as they saw you model in the minilesson and as they’ve experienced with you during one-on-one conferences. Remind them that their job as

Day 5

Say:


Reading

Writing

the writer is to use the charts in the room and what they know about good writing to talk about what they’re working on and what they plan to do next. When they are the writing teacher it is their job to listen carefully and give specific feedback. Again, using the charts in the room can help the writing teacher in the conference know what to teach!

Assessment

You’ll want to look over your students’ work at this time ask yourself the following questions:

• “How many of my children have learned to write about small moments, about events that begin and end within a short span of time?” Jot lists of the children who have and who haven’t yet learned this.

• Or ask, “How many of my children write a sequence of events, telling one after an-other?”

Make a pile of notebooks that do not contain much evidence of your teaching and make it your goal to lift the level of their writing this summer. Bring their notebooks to your team meetings and your weekly professional development. Ask colleagues for help in developing other strategies to meet the needs of these struggling writers.

What if? You notice your students are getting stuck not remembering the exact details of the story. For example, not remembering exactly what someone said. Teach your students that all writers sometimes get stuck, and one thing they can do is ask themselves, “What would the person probably have said?” Then, they keep going writing maybe not exactly what was said, but writing something similar to what was said.

If you’re students are asking lots of questions, waiting for you before moving on, in general – not working independently. You might convene the class either in a minilesson, or as part of your share and list the questions you’ve been presented this week. Ask them, who can answer these questions? After a couple of questions, remind them how quickly and easily THEY were able to answer the questions and problem solve. Remind them, from now on, that THEY are the first person to answer their questions. If necessary, they might ask their fellow writers – Ask three before me is certainly a management move that teachers have used to promote independence and problem solving.

Day 5


Materials:

Reading Writing


• Chart paper, markers• Teacher’s writer’s note-

books• Student’s writer’s note-

books• Chart with excerpt

from Those Shoes by Maribeth Boelts to show story telling and example of that same part of the story written as a summary

• Third grade high fre-quency word list

Students will be able to:• Utilize rituals and routines and work productively alongside one another• Attempt to write stories bit by bit rather than summarizing

Objectives

This is a crucial lesson, and one that you’ll find yourself coming back to and re-teaching in different ways. What often happens when a writer begins to write narratives is that they produce a summary of that time. Our goal in teaching them to write a narrative is for them to story tell the event bit by bit. Using words that show the small action and showing not telling their feelings. Think about your favorite author. The way they write allows you as the reader to get lost in the book – transported to a different time and place. That is, the way the writer wrote created a movie in your mind. That is exactly what we’re teaching these writers today. We’ll need to be sure then to have a piece of writing that models this.

Preparation

Gather students in the meeting area.

Connection


AssessmentTeacher Observation &Conferring Notes

Writing Stories Bit-by-BitDay 6

“Writers, can I have our eyes and attention? I took your notebooks home yesterday and could tell that you were working hard and pushing yourself to think about the kind of story you were writing. I could tell that you were pushing yourself to write about tiny seed stories rather than big – giant watermelon stories.”

“AsIreadoveryournotebooksIrealizedwhatIneedtoteachyounextthatwillreallyliftyourlevelaswriters. Today I want to teach you that narrative writers organize their writing by telling it chronological-ly.Thatistheytellitasasequenceofevents.Stories,ornarratives,arealmostalwaysorganizedtotellwhathappenedfirstandthennextandthennext.Onestrategythatwritersusetohelpuswritetruestories is to start by thinking back to the very start of the memory; then we make a movie in our mind ofwhathappenedfirst,thennext,andnext.“


Reading

Writing

Teachers, you will use a mentor text to show an example of writing step by step to create a movie in your readers’ mind. Now, we do not have the author with us to tell us why they wrote the way they wrote, but we can imagine why and explain that to the children.

(Summary example) Grandma and Jeremy were at the shoe store. Grandma was sitting on the bench and was upset because the shoes were too expensive.

Butthatwritingdoesn’thelpusgetamovieinourmind.Thatwritingissummarizingandcommentingonwhat happened in the story – not storytelling. Maribeth is the kind of writer that works really hard to bring herreadersintothestoryandtellitlikemovie.She’sthekindofwriterthatyou’reallbecoming!Onethatremembers a time when something happened, pictures that moment in their head, then thinks ‘What hap-penedfirst?WhatdidIdoorseeorhearfirst?’Likethis…

(Story telling example) At the shoe store, Grandma turns those shoes over so she can check the price. When she sees it, she sits down heavy. “Maybe they wrote it down wrong,” I say. Grandma shakes her head.

“Maribeth could have written –

Teachers, if necessary give another example of how Maribeth Boelts story tells rather than summarizes. The scene where Jeremy is sitting in his room writing spelling words is another nice example.

(Story telling example) At home, Grandma says, “How kind of Mr. Alfrey.” I nod and turn my back. I’m not going to cry about any dumb shoes. But when I’m writing my spelling words later, every word looks like the word shoes and my grip is so tight on my pencil I think it might burst.

“Writers, did you notice how Maribeth made choices about her writing? She could have written the story justcommentingandsummarizingwhathappenedtoJeremy.But,shedecidedasawriterthatit’sim-portant to story tell. To write what happened bit by bit, so that her reader gets a movie in their mind.”

Day 6

“Writers,letmeshowyouanexampleofwhatImean.Inthebook,Those Shoes, that we read aloud lastweek,MaribethBoeltsdoesthisreallyimportantworkofwritingbitbybittocreateamovieinour

mind. Take a look here on the page where Grandma and Jeremy are at the shoe store.”


Reading Writing

Active Engagement

Link


“Let’s try it together. Remember the other day - the first day of summer school - when we came to the meeting area and there was that mysterious box on the carpet? We could talk all about that morning and how we were so confused. But today we are writing stories. To tell the story of the mystery box, we need to recall what happened first. Think back to the first day of summer school. Picture that tiny moment in your mind. ‘What happened first? I’ll start you off and then you can try telling the story to your partner. “On the first day of summer school Ms. Berry said, ‘Class, please come to the rug I’ve got something to teach you.’ We all walked to the rug. Jamila pointed and said, ‘Why is there a box in the middle of the carpet?’ (Do you have the movie in your mind?) Keep going. Tell your partner what hap-pened, step-by-step, bit-by-bit. If you want - tell it across your fingers.

“Writers, I really loved the way you retold the story of our first day of reading workshop and the new box of library books. I was really able to make a movie in my mind as I listened to you tell the story across your fingers. You didn’t just say, ‘Last week we got a new box of library books. Ms. Berry opened it and let us look at them. Then we went off to read.’ No, you told it the way narrative writers do – story tell-ing it! “

“From now on writers – whenever you are writing true stories from your lives – I want you to push yourself to do this important writing work. You could chose to write stories that summarize what happened, OR you could decide as a writer to craft your story to be one that shows exactly what happened first, then next, and next. Off you go…”

Teachers, you have now been with your writers for over a week and have had the time to look at the work they’re producing in their notebooks. Take the opportunity today to think about those students that have similar needs as writers and pull small groups of children together to teach them. Remember, too, that conferences, table compliments and small group strategy lessons should not just be to re-teach that day’s minilesson, but reflect the cumulative content of your teaching. The charts that have been created during the previous days lessons serve as the footprints of your teaching – use them to guide your deci-sion making in conferences. The explicit and implicit modeling you do – using those charts – will encour-age your writers to be independent and do the same.

Say:

Day 6


Reading

Writing


Take this opportunity to share out a writer who has done some of this story telling work as another example/mentor. Be sure to first ask this writer if it is okay to share their work. Be sure, as well, to highlight a child that has not been highlighted before.

Another option for your share today is to have them turn and talk to a partner – acting out their story. Be sure to remind them to give each other a compliment. You might provide the following to help them get started talking with a partner – ‘I like the part where you…’

Share

What if? If you have students who struggle with oral storytelling or with sequence of event providing them with several pieces of paper that have a box for a picture and lines underneath serves as a nice scaffold. Samples of this paper can be found in the appendix of this document. Teach these students to think of a time when something happened, touch the pages as they tell the story, then sketch the story. Finally, teach them to write the accompanying story. That is, teach them to Think, Touch, Sketch, and Write.

Teaching students to spell phonetically those words that are not high frequency words is a valuable lesson. They ability to hear and feel the sounds that a word makes and writing the letter that represents that sounds is work we want to teach our writers to do so that they can continue spelling as best they can. In addition, the mid workshop teaching point teaches them that they must also, as a writer, spell words correctly that they’ve been taught. Please use your teacher judgment, if giving them a third grade word list is too much for the writers in your summer school class, then reduce the number of words. We would recommend teaching about 5 words per week explicitly through word study instruction. However, this is summer school and we must assume they’ve had explicit word study instruction on most, if not all, of these words during the school year. Students that are having great difficulty with spelling high frequency words correctly, or spelling less known words phonetically, should be pulled as a small group for additional support.

Day 6

“One, two, three eyes on me. Writers, I want to remind you that you are writing for readers. You’re writing so that everyone can understand you easily. When you are writing it is important to spell words you know – words you’ve studied in Kindergarten, First, Second and Third grade correctly. I’ve got a tool that will help you to be sure to spell these high frequency words cor-rectly whenever you write. Words that come up a lot when we read and write that we need to know automatically.” Pass out a third grade high frequency word list for them to tape into their writer’s notebook, or keep in their writing folder. Then, quickly, teach them how to use it. “If you aren’t sure how to spell a word, look at this word list. But, instead of just copying the word letter for letter, when you look at the word, picture it in your mind, think about what you notice about it, close your eyes and try to imprint it in your mind, say the letters out loud, check to see If you were right. When you have the right spelling in your brain, then write it. After this, for the rest of your life, remember that it is important to get into the habit of spelling the words you use a lot correctly.”


Materials:

Reading Writing


Choosing an Entry to Publish

Students will be able to:• Reread their notebook entries and select one to develop into a finished piece of writing

This day will require students to bring their notebooks to the carpet for the active engagement. Today, you will be modeling how writers look through all the entries they’ve been collecting in their notebook and decide on the one that they’re going to spend time developing into a powerful story.

Objectives• Chart paper, markers,• Teacher’s writer’s note books• Student’s writer’s note books• Teacher’s first draft ex ample on loose leaf• Post it notes• Loose-leaf paper• Two pocket folders

Preparation

ConnectionMinilesson (10 Minutes)

“Writers,lookhowhardwehavebeenworkingforthelastfivedays.(Pointtothecalendartothe days you have been writing.) We started last week living like writers thinking about people, places and objects that spark memories for us to write. Then, we zoomed in and have worked towritesmallmomentsbitbybit–writingexactlywhathappened.Tomorrow,we’regoingtobegin a draft of our writing (hold up a one-two page draft of your writing on separate loose leafpaper,outsideyourwritersnotebooks)sothatwecanreviseit,editit,andpublishit!”

“Today, we’re going to reread all that we have written so far and select one seed idea to grow into a wonderful story to publish. Today, I’m going to teach you a few different things that writ-ers do to get ready to write their best stories. Writers don’t just write one entry and then write another and another as we’ve been doing. After collecting several entries and ideas they reread andfindonestory,oneentry,thatespeciallymatterstous,andweselectitandmakeacom-mitment to make it our very best writing.”

Day 7


Reading

Writing

“ThefirstthingIwanttoteachyouishowtorereadyournotebooksrememberingallthatyou’ve written.”

Teachers, demonstrate running your hand over your notebook pages recalling the sto-ries that you’ve written. Model how you take time to look back at everything you’ve written thinking about what you really want to choose for your seed idea. You might decide to model quickly flipping through your notebook pages as what not to do. You might also model thinking aloud, ‘Does this entry really say something about me? Which story really describes an event that matters a lot to me?’

Teach

Active Engagement

“Writers, you’ve probably noticed a lot of strategies I used to select a seed that I want to develop. Turn and talk to your partner now what you noticed me doing to decide on a story.”

Listen in as students discuss what they noticed you doing. You’ll want to make the following steps for picking a seed idea explicit so that they can replicate what they’ve seen you do.

Selecting a Seed Idea1. Take time to carefully reread your notebook entries2. Look for an entry that means a lot to you3. Think about whether you have more to say about this topic

Link“Today, and whenever it is time for you to stop collecting entries and commit to one – remember theses steps and pick one that really matters that you can work on longer. Off you go to reread, discuss and decide.”

Minilesson (10 Minutes)The independent work time today will look a little different. If some students need to continue col-lecting stories than encourage them to do so. If not, most of your conferring today will be on helping them to commit to one story that they think they can make better. This is an important decision. If they pick any story, one that is not that meaningful to them, they will have difficulty sticking with.

Day 7


Reading Writing

Coach them to choose wisely. This day will also look different because you won’t possibly have enough time to conduct research, decide, and teach one on one conference with all of your writers. You will more likely be trying to see as many students as possible to help them with their selection, but possibly scheduling time outside of writing workshop to meet with hem.


“One,two,threeeyesonme!Writers,raiseyourhandsifyou’vechosenyourseedidea?Great,I’mgoingto give you a post it so that you can mark your entry. Tomorrow we’re going to come out of your writer’s notebookandworklongeronthisentry.Rightnowthough,Iwantyoutoturntothepersonnexttoyouand tell your story – tell it bit by bit. Partner one (1) start. Partner two (2), close your eyes. Try to create a movie in your mind of your partner’s story.


ShareConvene the students back on the carpet. “Wow! What incredible writing conversations we’re hav-ing. Picking one entry to stick with is BIG important work. In the next couple of days we’re going to take these pieces and bring them out of our writers notebooks.” Teachers, you may decide to share out a few of the decisions the students have made for the pieces they’ve chosen to work on and make better. Also, have them star or mark the piece they’ve chosen to develop in the margins or at the top of their notebook.

AssessmentTeacher Observation

&Conferring Notes

What if? If students struggle to decide on a piece to choose, pull them into a small group and teach them that another way to think about choosing a piece to publish is thinking about their audience. Often, when we write and think of our audience it gives us a purpose to write. So you might ask, ‘Did you have someone that you were writing for when you were collecting entries in your notebook? Look through your entries and think about which one you can work on longer and give to that person.’

Day 7


Preparation

Reading

Materials:

Writing


Looking to Mentor Authors to Revise Our Leads

Students will be able to:• Understand that they can look to mentor authors for ideas to include in their

own writing• Generate several leads for their piece and determine which one best conveys

what they want to say

• Chart paper, markers• Teacher’s writer’s note-

books• Student’s writer’s note-

books• Chart with excerpts from

mentor text of different leads

• Mentor text: Fireflies by Julie Brinkloe, Peter’s Chair

by Ezra Jack Keats, Those Shoes by Maribeth Boelts

You will need to have charted the different leads that various authors have used. Children will also need to bring their writer’s notebook to the carpet with them today for the active engagement.


ConnectionCelebrate that your students’ stories sound like literature. Read the beginning part of one of the

student’s pieces OR your own to illustrate how the writing sounds like “literature”.

“Writers often improve their leads, or beginnings, by studying the work of their favorite authors and then apply that skill in their writing. Writers improve leads by studying the work of authors and then try that technique.Leadsinstoriesmatterbecausegreatleadssetthewriteruptotellagreatstoryfromthebeginning. Good writers study leads from other authors and then try making their leads better by asking, ‘WhatexactlyhasthisauthordonethatIcouldtry?’”

Writing

Objectives

Preparation

Day 8Day 8

Writing


Reading Writing

Demonstrate how to study the work of mentor authors. Show students that setting, dialogue, and action in leads can create mood. Gesture to the chart you’ve already created to show how different authors start their stories in an effort to grab their readers’ attention. Talk about the effect each lead has.

Teach

In the story Fireflies, Julie Brinkloe, starts with the setting to help cre-ate the mood of her story...

In the story Peter’s Chair, Ezra Jack Keats, starts with the character doing a small action…

In the story Those Shoes, Maribeth Boelts, starts with the main char-acter thinking and saying some-thing…

On a summer evening I looked up from dinner, through the open window to the backyard. It was growing dark. My tree house was a black shape in the tree and I wouldn’t go up there now. But some-thing flickered there, a moment—I looked, and it was gone.It flickered again, over near the fence. Fireflies!

Peter stretched as high as he could. There! His tall building was finished. CRASH! Down it came. “Shhh,” called his mother. “You’ll have to play more quietly. Remember we have a new baby in the house. “

I have dreams about those shoes. Black high-tops. Two white stripes. “Grandma, I want them.” “There’s no room for ‘want’ around here – just ‘need.’’ Grand-ma says. “And what you need are new boots for winter.”

Tell your students that these authors thought long and hard about how they wanted to start their story. They tried on a few different leads and chose the one that they thought did the best job of grabbing their readers’ attention. They, too, can look back at their entries and revise or re-see their leads, or beginnings of their stories to make them better. They can add action, dialogue/thinking, or the setting of the story to the beginning of the story to grab the reader’s attention.

• Describe a certain place to create mood (setting)• Write what you or an-other character was saying or thinking (dialogue, internal thinking)• Show what you or another character was doing - an action (action)

Ways to Start a Story

Chart Idea!

Day 8


Everyday students draw on all the strategies they have accumulated, not just the one they learned today. However, today is an exception. You will want all the students to work on revis-ing their leads for their selected entry. Everyone will be studying and drafting leads. Remind students that you will be conferring with them during this time.

If children have practiced this strategy in the piece they’ve chosen to develop remind them to keep trying the strategy in other stories they collected, or as they continue and write more entries.

Active Engagement

“Writers, open up your notebook to the entry you’ve chosen to develop into a draft. With your partner, try starting your story thinking about the different leads we’ve learned

about today. Turn and talk.”

Say:

Teachers, listen in as students ‘try out’ different ways to start their stories. Bring them back together before sending them off and share a another example of a writer who is going to try starting their story with dialogue, setting or small action.

Link


Restate the teaching point: Writers improve leads by studying the work of authors and then apply those techniques to their own writing. Send students back to their seats to ‘try on’ leads, or revise their current leads, using the techniques they have learned from mentor authors. Add a bullet to the already created chart:

Qualities of Good Writing• Write a seed story (The time I got stuck in the swing); don’t write all about a giant

watermelon topic (All about my summer at the park). • Zoom in so you tell the most important parts of the story – and tell those parts bit

by bit • Include true, exact details from the movie you have in your mind • Begin with a strong lead -- maybe use setting, action, dialogue to create mood.

Day 8

Writing


Reading Writing

(Use an attention getting device) Teachers, since part of the demonstration today was showing student that authors sometimes begin their stories by starting with dialogue, you may choose to do your mid workshop teaching point on teaching them how to use quotations conventionally.


Take this opportunity to share out a writer who has done some of this story telling work as another example/mentor. Be sure to first ask this writer if it is okay to share their work. Be sure, as well, to highlight a child that has not been highlighted before.

Another option for your share today is to have them turn and talk to a partner – acting out their story. Be sure to remind them to give each other a compliment. You might provide the following to help them get started talking with a partner – ‘I like the part where you…’

Share

What if? What if students don’t attempt more than one strategy? You may decide to do some conferences with students, to coach them to try out different leads. Or, re-teach this teaching point with your own piece of writing – showing them another example of how to use the strategy. For example, in my story about waiting for my sister to come home with gummy bears I could start a few ways:

(Internal thinking and small action) ‘I can’t wait for Maura to come home from school with gummy bears.’ I thought to myself as I twiddle my thumbs and stared up into the sky.

(Setting) A warm breeze blew and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky as I sat on the front stoop of my house. A bee buzzed about in the flowers that had sprung up as a result of my mom’s gardening efforts last spring. I sat on the stoop and waited patiently for Maura to get off the train from school.


&Conferring Notes

Day 8


Materials:


Oral Storytelling and Acting Out Our Stories

Students will be able to:• Write a first draft outside their notebooks • Oral story tell and act out their stories as a strategy to story tell and add detail to their story

Be sure to have read through the lesson and have all materials gathered and ready to go for the minilesson.

Preparation

Objectives

• Chart paper, markers• Teacher’s writer’s note books• Student’s writer’s note books• Loose-leaf paper• Two pocket folders • Teacher’s draft on loose leaf paper with skipped lines


Connection

“Writers, you’ve learned what writers do when they’ve chosen a seed idea that they want to get ready to write as a really great true story. It can help to think, ‘What am I trying to show in this story?’ Today I am going to teach you how writers write a really great draft. What I do, and a lot of writers do, when I want to tell story really well is I think back to the time and make a movie in my mind of what happened, keeping in mind what I want to show – even act it out to make sure I include all the little details. Then, I write it all out.”

Teach“Let me show you what I mean. The last two days I’ve worked to select my seed Idea, and I’ve

committed to my story about playing in the hallway with my sister and I’ve tried out different leads – different ways to start my story.”

“Today, I want to remember that time, and get the memory in my mind head.” Model thinking back to that story. ”Now, I want to go back to the very start of the memory and tell it bit by bit- and act it out.”

Writing

Day 9


Reading Writing

Teachers, act out and story tell whatever story you’ve chosen to develop and draft today. Be sure to start with a lead that grabs their attention. See samples in the appendix.

“Writers, did you see how I didn’t just talk about playing with my sister in the hallway of our house, but I thought about it as a movie and I acted out what we said and did?”

Active Engagement“Let’stryittogether.Let’srememberthefirstdayofsummerschoolandstorytellandactoutwhenweopenedournewboxoflibrarybooks.You’llneedtothinkrightnow,‘Whathappenedfirst…actitout!Whatdidwesay?Whatdidwedo?’

Link

“Writers, today you’ll take the seed idea you chose the other day – the one you marked with a star or post it. Then, you’ll do this work that writers do a lot – make a movie in your mind of what happened, remember what happened first, then what happened next, then next. You’ll write the whole story bit by bit on the loose-leaf paper. Start your story with one of the leads you tried on yesterday, then copy your favorite version of your story onto the first page of this paper. So, you’ll rewrite the lead, then tell the story. Look at my example….” Teachers, show the class your draft with already completed on loose-leaf paper (with lines skipped). Describe how you wrote your draft skipping lines so that you have room to continue to make changes…it is still a draft and there’s a lot of work still to do.

Independent Writing and Conferring (30 minutes)Teachers, continue to confer with students and see as many as possible as they begin to draft. Conduct one-to-one conferences, meeting with one student at a time. OR meet with a small group of students who need the same conversation in a strategy lesson. Use the conferring notes found in the appendix to log who you will meet with and when.

Mid Workshop Teaching PointYou may decide to address a management issue, or take these 2 minutes to teach something you’ve taught in a one-on-one conference.

Day 9


Reading

Writing

Share (5 Minutes)Convene your class back in the meeting area and have them reread their pieces like they’re reading to an audience. of times.” Following the share, have them put their drafts in their folders.

Convene your class back in the meeting area and have them reread their pieces like they’re reading to an audience. “Reread your writing like it is a masterpiece. Reread parts of your writing that you know show feeling. Find parts you are proud of because you have found therightwordstoexpresswhatyouwanttosayinthisway.Pretendyouhaveanaudience.Use your best reading voice. Give the characters different voices. Slow down when com-ingtodramaticparts.Speedupvoicewhencomingtoexcitingparts.Chooseaphraseorsentence you particularly love, either because of the way it sounds or because you think it isexactlytrue.Readthelineorphraseorsentenceacoupleoftimes.”Followingtheshare,have them put their drafts in their folders.

What if? If students think they’re done – they can always go back to their writer’s notebooks and continue collecting entries. Be careful though to keep their first drafts separate in their folders.

Day 9


Materials:

Reading Writing


Look to Mentor Authors to Revise Endings

Students will be able to:• Look to mentor authors to get ideas to improve their writing; and• Craft the endings of their stories.

Teachers, you could decide to teach this lesson much the same way you taught them to develop their leads. You may find several mentor authors to show them examples of the kind of writing they might do and explain what those authors did and what affect that has on the reader, or why they chose to write in that way.

Students will need to bring their drafts to the carpet with them for the ac-tive engagement.

Objectives• Chart paper, markers• Teacher’s writing note book• Students’ writing note books• Chart with various endings – Fireflies by Julie Brinkloe, Those Shoes by Maribeth BoeltsPreparation

Minilesson (10 Minutes)ConnectionRemind students of the writing work they are doing in preparation for learning some-thing new this session. Congratulate them on their leads. Congratulate them on writing their first draft. Remind them how fast and furiously they wrote yesterday/last week.Tell the students you will teach them to think about endings today. Teach the stu-dents that narrative stories have a plot, action, and a resolution. A good story needs a good beginning and a good ending.

Teach“Writers, the ending of a story makes a lasting imprint in the reader’s mind, the last thing the readerthinksabout,evenaftertheyputdownthebookorstory.Endingsthatwritersaddtotheir stories should cause readers to show their feelings toward the characters. Therefore, writ-ers sometimes spend more time thinking and researching endings of their favorite authors. Just as we did when we were crafting our leads.”

Teachers, just as you had shown examples of different leads and explained what the author had done – do the same when discussing the different ways authors think of ending their sto-ries in a way that brings closure to their piece.

Day 10


Reading

Writing

Iflungoffthecovers.Iwenttothewindow,openedthejar,andaimeditatthestars.“Fly!”Thenthejarbegantoglow,green,thengold,thenwhiteasthemoon.Andthefirefliespouredoutintothenight.Fireflies!Blinkingon,blinkingoff,dippinglow,soaringhighabovemyhead,making circles around moon, like stars dancing. I held the jar, dark and empty, in my hands. Themoonlightandthefirefliesswaminmytears,butIcouldfeelmyselfsmiling.

For example, in her book Fireflies, Julie Brinkloe, ends in a powerful way. Let’s read it and reread it studying what she did….

Explain to students that to make endings better, writers often think about what other writers do. They add important actions, important dialogue, images, and a short reminder of the whole story at the end.

Active Engagement“Writers, look closely at your drafts here on the carpet. Mark spots in your story that seem to

be especially important-the ending will want to relate to important places in the story. Turn and share your thinking with your partner.”

Link

After a few minutes of them sharing the ideas they’ll want to think about when revising their endings, send them off to revise their endings. They may try out different endings in their notebooks before adding it to their first drafts. Remind them of the strategy of creating effec-tive endings. Restate the teaching point. “Today and every day, remember that writers work on their endings by writing two or three alternate endings they could use.”

• Write a seed story (The time I got stuck in the swing); don’t write all about a giant water-melon topic (All about my summer at the park).

• Zoom in so you tell the most important parts of the story – and tell those parts bit by bit. • Include true, exact details from the movie you have in your mind

• Begin with a strong lead -- maybe use setting, action, dialogue to create mood.

• Make a strong ending – maybe use important actions, dialogue, and images that make a lasting impression.

Qualities of Good Personal Narrative Writing

Add to the chart: Qualities of Good Personal Narrative Writing

Day 10


Reading Writing

Think about the patterns you see across students’ pieces. You might decide to pull small groups to support the following –• Details that do not support the topic they chose, • Watermelon topics rather than seed stories, • Summarizing rather than storytelling,• Leads, endings, etc.

Show them an example from your own writing (or use an example from the appendix) of what you want to teach the small group. Direct students to try the strategy you worked on with them right there before you send them back to their seats so you can monitor their progress and understanding of strategy.


Mid Workshop Teaching Point (1-2 Minutes)(use an attention getting device)

You may decide to address a management issue, or take these 2 minutes to teach something you’ve taught in a one-on-one conference.

ShareReconvene students in the meeting area. Read the endings of one or two children who wrote several possible endings, trying to be sure they referred to important actions, dialogue, images from the story. It is not necessary to read the entire story, just the parts you want to highlight with the class to get your point across.

Remind students of the teaching point for the day:

“Today and every day, when you want to work on your ending, you can reread the whole nar-rative, pay attention to what it was that the you really want to say in the ending. Draft two or three possible endings. Select the best of the three. Add that ending to the current draft.”


&Conferring Notes

What if? Sometimes students will not be all that I invested in their piece. They’re writing because they have to, and that’s not the purpose of anything that we do. We must ask those students, “Why are you writing this piece? Why this story of all your stories? Does this story really matter enough that you have to tell it?” If students don’t have an answer to these questions, it may meant that they need to go back to their note-books and pick a new piece to develop, or collect more entries until they have one that has meaning and significance to them.

Day 10


Materials:


Reading

Writing

Students will be able to:• Generate new stories by thinking of a strong emotion;• Elaborate in their writing to show not tell how they’re feeling; and• Continue collecting stories in their writing notebook when they think they’re done.

Teachers, this lesson teaches the students another strategy for generating stories – thinking of a strong feeling and times when they had that feeling. We suggest they try this strategy in their notebooks and perhaps not on loose leaf or with their drafts. They can of course keep working on their drafts.

Objectives

Preparation

• Chart paper, markers• Teacher’s writing note book• Students’ writing note books• Chart created first week of summer school: Strategies for Generating Personal Narrative Writing • KnuffleBunny by Moe Willems

Generating Ideas: Strong Feeling

Minilesson (10 Minutes)ConnectionCelebrate that students are sharing their entries with each other. Remind them, too, of what you taught them about a writer never being done. Today you’re going to teach them a strategy for continuing to make their drafts the best they can be, but it will also help them if they think they’re done and need a strategy for collecting more entries.

“Today I want to teach you another strategy writers use to generate powerful personal narratives. This strategy is good for generating or creating entries that can be turned into really powerful, true stories about you. You are writing stories about small moments that are important to you. It isimportanttothinkfirstofastrongfeeling,suchas,embarrassment,excitement,sorrow(sad-ness), surprise, etc. Then write the story of that one time.”

Teach“Watch me as I write a feeling word at the top of my page and ask myself: ‘Can I remember one

particular time when I felt that feeling?’ Then I can write about that time.” Tell students about a time whenyouneededhelpgeneratingideasandusedthisstrategy.Afterexplicitlydemonstrating,restatethe steps of the strategy. It helps our teaching stick if we can name the steps we took when using a strategy.

Day 11


Reading Writing

“Writers, It’s your turn to try this strategy. Think about a time you had a strong feeling: sad, happy, mad, surprised, angry, etc. Thumbs up when you have a feeling and a time when you felt that feeling in your mind.”

Active Engagement

Give wait time. When you see most students ready coach them to turn and talk to their partner about the feeling and one time they felt that way. Listen in to a few part-ners retelling and coach them to story tell that time thinking about what happened first then next then next.

Link

“Writers, can I have your attention. I want to remind you that you now have a lot of strate-gies for generating ideas for stories. So, while we’re working to make our drafts as powerful as can be, when you think you’re done you can always go back to your notebook to collect more entries. Today, you learned another generating strategy. You learned that you can think of a strong emotion or feeling and write about the time you had that feeling. Let’s add it to our chart for ways to get ideas for stories so we won’t forget what we learned today.” Teacher, add a bullet to the class chart that you began the first week of summer school (below).

“Writers, did you notice how I… •Thoughtofastrongfeeling;•Wrotedownthatfeelingwordatthetopofmynotebookpage;• ListedtwoorthreesmallmomentsIrememberedwhenIhadthatstrongfeeling;and•Afterjottingafewideas,decidedononethatseemedthemostsignificant.

Now I can do that important work of remembering the time as if it were a movie in my mind, think about what I said, and what other people said, felt, or did that could get the action started.”


• Think of a person who matters to you, then list clear, small moments you remember with him or her. Choose one to sketch and then write the accompanying story.

• Think of a place that matters to you, then list clear, small moment stories you remember there. Choose one to sketch and then write the accompanying story.

• Notice an object, and let that object spark a memory. Write the story of that one time.

• Think of a strong emotion (happy, sad, angry, surprised) and times when you felt that

feeling.

Day 11


Reading

Writing

Independent Writing and Conferring (30 minutes)When you survey the room during independent work time, try to notice your students’ levels of en-gagement with their writing. Watch the students to see what disrupts their concentration or distracts them from their writing focus. This is a time you will become an observer of your students’ learning and writing behaviors. It will be helpful to remove possible distractions from your students so they may focus on their writing. Record your findings in your conferring notes.

Mid Workshop Teaching Point(use an attention getting device)


“Writers, I’ve loved watching some of you really take charge of your writing. I’ve noticed some of you continuing to add to your drafts to make them the most powerful stories they can be. And, I’ve noticed some of you go back to your notebooks to begin collecting more stories. These decisions are important. They’re important because you’re the boss of your writing. You’re the writer and you need to decide – “Am I going continue to revise my draft? Perhaps researching what other authors do. Or, am I going to gobackintomynotebookandbegincollectingmoretruestoriesfrommylife.”Nextweekwe’regoingtofinalizeourdrafts.Butalwaysrememberthatyouasthewritermakedecisionsaboutyourwriting.Ifyou’re going to keep working on one piece, or put it to the side for a little while and begin another.”

ShareReconvene writers in the meeting area.


&Conferring Notes

What if? Teachers, this is an opportune time to teach them explicitly – if you haven’t already – the writing process. That writers cycles in and out of stages or steps (Collecting Entries, Drafting, Developing, Revising, Editing, Publishing) until they celebrate their writing with their class or the world. This lesson is meant to remind them that while they are still working to improve their drafts they can always continue writing and collecting in their notebooks.

You may decide to go a whole different direction and, instead of teaching them another generating strat-egy, teach them to elaborate by showing not telling how they, or the characters in their stories, felt. Moe Willems does a beautiful job showing not telling how Trixie was beside herself when she lost her Knuffle Bunny and her daddy wasn’t understanding her. He uses speech bubbles and capital letters to show her yelling and the phrase “she went boneless” is an excellent example of show not tell. Moe could have said. “Trixie was upset.” But instead, he chose his words carefully and wanted to write exactly what happened with true words.

Day 11


Materials:

Reading Writing


Students will be able to: Develop a timeline to plan and structure their narrative.

Objectives

Teachers, be sure to think through the piece you’ve chosen to publish and how you’ll demonstrate creating a timeline of events that accompany that story.

Preparation

• Chart paper, markers• Teacher’s writing note book• Students’ writing note books


ConnectionSummarize the work students did last week on using strong feelings to provide context for today’s lesson. Tell them you read their entries over the weekend and would like to teach a new strategy that will help them keep track of what happened first, next, and last. You’ll teach them another way to develop their draft to make it as powerful as can be.

“Writers use another strategy for developing a story idea: making timelines using their own writing ideas. Writers can pull out one event, one dot, from their timeline and elaborate on that one moment or event.”

Developing Timelines

Teach“Watch me as I try out the strategy of using a timeline to further develop my draft.”

Demonstrate the strategy of developing an idea by making a timeline with a familiar entry from your writer’s notebook that you have shared from earlier sessions. Alternatively, you can show how you develop a timeline of your draft. Highlight that creating a time line is a tool that writers use to revise. As they finish the timeline, they think to themselves, “Are all the dots on this timeline impor-tant to the real story I want to tell?”

Day 12


Reading

Writing

Active Engagement“Writers, did you notice how I thought about the story I’ve been working on and then thought about

the events of the story to create a timeline? Did you notice, too, how I thought about whether every dot on my time line was important for the main story I want to tell? Open your notebook or take out your draft to an entry you wrote recently. Find one important part in the story. See if you can zoom in on that one place, that one dot, and make a movie in your mind of what happened inside that single moment. Try to remember the tiny little actions in it. Tell the story so your partner can make a movie in his/her mind of your little actions. Thumbs up when you’re ready. Okay. Try it. Turn andtalk.Partner2,sharefirst-tellthestoryofjustonepartofthatstoryorevent.Explaintoyourpartnertwoorthreedotsonyourtimelineoftheevent.Tellwhathappenedfirst,thensecond,thenthird,andsoforth.Useyourfingersasdotsonthetimeline.Partner1,seeifyoucanmakeamovie in your mind of your partner’s tiny actions.”

Link

Reconvene the class. Remind the students that making timelines should only take a few min-utes because the real focus is on the writing of the story. Remind the students that when they are finished making their timeline they have a lot of strategies to refer to get started writing: • Try writing different leads and endings• Tell the story draft to yourself over an over, thinking “How can I tell this story really well, even better than the last time?”

“Remember, after you select a seed idea, you can use your repertoire, your toolbox of strategies to begin developing that idea.”

“Writers,sometimeswhenyouwrite,youarenotsurewheretogonextinyourstory.When that happens to you, you look at what you have written and ask yourself, ‘Are all the dots,

events on my timeline important to my main story?’ If not, you take them out. If one or two are missing, you add them in.”

“Making timelines can help you plan and draft stories. You can make timelines to help you figureoutwhathappenedfirst,thennext,andnext,andsoon.Makingtimelineshelpsyouthink about what other details are important to your story. These details should be added at the most important parts of the story. This is another way to think about elaboration, writing details in your story.”

Model drawing a timeline on chart paper of one of your entries from your writer’s notebook, or your draft. Add dots of time on the line. Add the events that are most important to your story onto the timeline. Remind students when they write they can use a timeline to remember what hap-pened first, next, all the way to the end of their story. Model listing the events across your fingers as dots on the timeline.

Day 12


Reading Writing

Independent Writing and Conferring (30 minutes)Walk the room assessing which students do not appear to understand the nature of timelines and need to meet with you regarding their timelines. Do a strategy lesson with these students. Record your conference notes. After your strategy lesson, direct students to begin writing their time-line while they are still in the meeting area or conference area with you so you can monitor their understanding before sending them back to seats to work independently. During the conference or small group strategy lesson, you may discover other problems are being revealed about their small moment personal narratives. Record what you notice on your conference record sheets.

Allowing students the time to work on timelines gives you the opportunity to meet with all the stu-dents about their drafts or entries in their writer’s notebooks. It is not necessary to focus on the timeline when you confer with them. Look at their writer’s notebook or draft. Allow the student to lead the conference and find out what they are working on. Their answers will lead you toward a conversation, compliment, and teaching point.



ShareReconvene writers. Celebrate students imagining various starting points for their narratives. Explain that timelines can be used to help writers focus and revise our writing before it is even written. Have them turn and talk to their partners to discuss the work they did today as writers.

Direct students to ask themselves questions and respond to questions: “Is this part an important detail?” “How can I help my readers understand?”

Remind students to consider revising the timeline of their story if events are not important, are not about the story main idea, or are unnecessary details. Remind students to use the strategy indepen-dently when they write.


&Conferring Notes

What if? This strategy helps students see different entry points for their narratives. If they are using this timeline to revise their draft, they may discover significant parts to add, take away, or re-sequence. You’ll want to coach them, perhaps in the mid workshop teaching point, for keeping track of the timeline of their draft so that they can incorporate that writing and thinking into their final piece.

Day 12



Materials:

Reading

Writing

Students will be able to:• Revise by adding details to the most important part of their story.

Teachers, it is crucial at this point that you have gone over all of your stu-dents’ drafts. These next lessons will be to prepare drafts for final publication. Reviewing what they’ve written will help you plan to teach what most of them need. You’ll want to pinpoint who needs more help, and plan on pulling them as a small group. You’ll also want to look for how partnerships could be adjusted to better support individual students. For example, if you’ve got a writer who is very strong writing a focused story bit by bit – you may decide to partner him/her with a writer that is struggling with this quality of good writing and they may act out their stories together.

Revising the Heart of our Stories

Objectives

Preparation

• Chart paper, markers• Teacher’s writing note book• Students’ writing note books


Remind writers of the work they have been doing. Celebrate their energies toward adding detail and revising their leads and endings. Remind them of the timelines they wrote to help develop their ideas, the elaboration they have been trying, and the writing process they have been using in their drafting. Tell them that today they will be continuing to revise their drafts.

“Today I want to teach you how writers revise or re-see to get to the heart of the story and get the wordsdownthatreallyshowthemeaningofwhattheywanttosay.Revisionisnotaboutfixingerrorsormistakeslikespellingandpunctuation.Itisaboutfindinganddevelopingreallygreatwriting, sometimes by adding more details to the heart of their story by adding those details to their timeline. Today we’re going to revise, or re-see, the most important part or the heart of story.”

Day 13


Reading Writing

TeachTeach students that writers sometimes make a more detailed timeline out of one dot on their timeline since it was the most important part, the part the writer wants to focus on, the heart of the story. To do this, the writer can play the movie in his mind of what happened inside that one dot. Explain that somewhere in their story is the heart of the story, the part that really matters to them as a writer and to the reader.

“Revisionisnotjustaboutfixinguppieces;itismoreaboutfindinganddevelopingpowerfulwriting, by adding more to the important parts of the story. Writers strive to be precise; and writeexactlywhatthecharactersaw,heard,feltatthatpart.”

“Watch me as I try this strategy…”

Write an entry on chart paper from your writer’s notebook to illustrate an unfocused story. Point out the dot you wrote on the chart from yesterday’s minilesson. Read your entry to students to show how the topic is big (a watermelon) with few details.

Model your thinking of how you found the heart of your story. (You may also refer to the timeline you wrote yesterday.) Think aloud the details of that moment (the heart). Write the revised story, the added details, on chart paper. Read the revised focused story to the students.

“You may need to eliminate dots of unnecessary information. Consolidate or combine two dots into one if there is not enough detail to say about each individual dot. Add dots if some impor-tantdetailwasoriginallyomittedorleftout.Expandthemostimportanteventstoexplaintheheart of your story.”

Explain revision and the strategy taught today. Also, repeat the steps of the strategy to help your teaching stick.

List the steps in the revision strategy:• Return to the draft they are thinking about revising. • Reread it. • Decide where the heart of the story is (This will become the part that will get further revisions and clarity).• Add details to this part.

Active Engagement

“Writers, it’s your turn to try this revision strategy: • Reread your story. • Withapartner,findtheheartofyourstory.• Make a movie in your minds of what happened at that part. • Tell your partner how you would stretch out that part.”

Day 13


Reading

Writing

LinkSummarize the lesson in a way that directs students through the steps of using this strategy. Remind students that every time they have a really good draft, they can stretch out the heart of the story by adding details.

Independent Writing and Conferring (30 minutes)During conferences one question you might ask is, “What are you working on as a writer?” The reason we suggest this question is because it focuses us on the writer – not the writing. It is a phrase often used by Lucy Calkins. We want to always keep in mind that we are teaching the writer – not the piece. Record notes on your conferring notes. Results of revision work are often remarkable, and students feel great when you read what they have written and praise their efforts. Continue as you’ve done every day conferring with individuals or small groups. Use the conferring tips found in the appendix of this document.



ShareDraw attention to one student’s writing who took the minilesson to heart. Tell the story of that writer’s work in a way others can learn from it. Show the teacher’s revisions on her/his piece to illustrate how the heart of the story was built out with suspense, words, and de-scription. Remind the writers in the class that the strategy they learned today can help them today, and every day, as they work to write true powerful stories from their lives.


&Conferring Notes

What if? For students who are ready for a more elaborate strategy lesson, use your writing to show them how to find the heart of your story, the part that matters most, cut the page at that place, tape a lot more paper into that important section of the draft, reread up to the blank lines, make a movie in your mind of exactly what happened, add details to the story at that moment, story tell that part by stretching out the impor-tant moment slowing down the action to explain, give details, feeling words, and description.

Day 13



Materials:

Reading Writing

Fixing Up Our Writing

Students will be able to:• Find and correct spelling errors in their writing by rereading their draft out loud.

Make copies of the editing checklist found in the appendix of this document. You may also decide to provide a different color pen/pencil for them to edit with. The different color pen/pencil is another tool that often gets them excited and helps them see that they’re doing a different kind of writing work. They’re ‘fixing up’ their pieces.

Objectives

Preparation

• Chart paper, markers• Teacher’s writing note book• Students’ writing note books• Student and teachers draft• Editing Checklist • Different color pen/s or colored pencils (if available)

Minilesson (10 Minutes)ConnectionSet the purpose for today’s lesson by talking about self-help books that you can find in the bookstore. Point out that students have their own personal collection of self-help books too; they are the charts full of strategies.

“Today I want to teach you that some writers use a checklist for editing to be sure their drafts are easy for their readers to read. They think about what they know about punctuation and spellingandfixwhatneedstobefixed.Onewaytheymakesuretheirwritingisascorrectaspossible – and easy for their readers to read is by rereading their draft many times, each time lookingforanotheritemtofix.”

Remind students that many new writers rely on an editing checklist. Give each writer an edit-ing checklist. Teach them that each item on the checklist will help remind them of a “special lens” they can use to reread and revise their writing. Teach them that this checklist is a kind of personal coach to revising and editing to fix up their paper.̀

Day 14


Reading

Writing

Teach

Demonstrate how to read your draft aloud quietly using an item on the checklist as a lens. Show them how to look at each item on the checklist, reread the piece, and then make needed changes.

“Watch me as I use our new tool, our editing checklist to check the spelling in my piece. We need to remember when tackling long and challenging words that we try to record every sound we hear in the word. Writers also think, ‘Have I used what I know about how other words are spelled to help me spell parts of the challenging word? Have I reread my spelling and circled the parts of words that I think could be wrong? Have I used spellings I know (and especially those on the word wall) to help me tackle words of which I’m unsure? “

“WatchmeasIrereadmydraftquietlyaloudjustfocusingonwordsandspellingthemsotheyarecorrect, or spelling them as best I can putting as many sounds as I hear down on the page.”

After modeling rereading and reading aloud checking for errors in spelling, move to the next item on the checklist. So, if there are four items on the checklist, writers may reread their piece four times, once for each item to see what they need to make changes in their papers.

Teach the steps of editing:• Read your story.• Watch for places where there may be some confusion.• Go back and rewrite those places so they are clearer.

Active EngagementDirect students to read through their drafts with their partners, focusing on the first item on the checklist. Partner 1 reads the first item of the checklist. Partner 2 spreads out his/her piece. Both partners look for ways to fix up the writing as sug-gested by that item on the checklist.

Link

Reiterate what was taught about checklists: Checklists are like self-help books. They can function as personal coaches to each other. They give the writer a to-do list of ways to check their drafts.

Reiterate the process of revising and editing: Reread the piece with the checklist in hand. Look for ways to correct the first item on the checklist; make corrections. Look at the next item on the checklist. Reread looking for that item in their piece, make corrections. Continue this process all the way through the checklist. Reread once more to be sure you are saying what you want to really say to your reader.

Day 14


Reading Writing


Independent Writing and Conferring (30 minutes)Confer with students. Pay attention to the revisions students make in their drafts. Compliment each writer; (re) teach one strategy, record conference notes.


ShareReconvene students. Direct students to show each other what they have done, what they have learned, and what they have decided to do next. Tell students that they may turn in their edited drafts today or will finish editing tomorrow and turn in their revisions and edits to the “copy editor” (the teacher) before leaving for the day. You will act as the copy editor and read their stories before class tomorrow.

What if?

What if students don’t edit perfectly? They won’t and we shouldn’t expect them to. It is our job to teach them HOW to edit and WHY we edit. There are always students who don’t see any errors. You might decide to model by editing one small segment with the child (or part-nership, or small group) and then release them to try again on their own.

What if checking for all four items on the checklist is too much? Focus on one – prior to this lesson you’ll have read through their pieces and have conferred with them over the last couple of weeks so you may decide to only teach one editing strategy, i.e., just spelling high frequency words correctly.


&Conferring Notes

Day 14


Reading

Materials:

Writing


Editing and Getting Ready to Publish

Students will be able to:• Re-write their drafts as final pieces that they will celebrate and share.

Teachers, today is the final day before celebrating the narrative stories they’ve been working on for the last 4 weeks. You may decide to do another editing lesson exactly as you did yesterday picking another item on the checklist that most of your students need. For example, you may decide to show them today how to edit for punctuation by reading their piece aloud and putting a period wherever they feel themselves take a breath. Or, you may reserve this day for them to begin rewriting their drafts on loose leaf putting together all their final revisions and edits. Either way today is a day to get their pieces ready (rewrit-ten on as a “final” copy) to celebrate at tomorrow’s publishing party. Tomor-row, there is no more conferring, revising, or fixing up – only celebrating the hard work they’ve done cycling through the stages of the writing process.

Since you will need to design this lesson to fit your students’ needs at this moment, use the architecture of a minilesson template in the appendix of this document to develop today’s lesson.

Objectives• Chart paper, markers• Teacher’s final draft• Students’ final draft• Loose leaf paper

Preparation


ConnectionTeachActive Engagement

LinkIndependent Writing and Conferring (30 minutes)


Share

Use the format below to design your lesson for the day.

Day 15


Materials:

Reading Writing


Celebrate Narrative

Students will be able to:• Read aloud their piece clearly and so that the audience can hear; • Listen attentively and actively as an audience member; and • Ask a pertinent question based on another student’s reading of their personal narrative story.

Some teachers decide to bring in (or ask parents to provide) a juice drink or some sort of snack. This is the day of the writing celebration – there should be some element of party.

Coach students to form a circle in the meeting area and place their final drafts in front of them.

• Chart paper, markers• Teacher’s final draft• Students’ final draft• Loose leaf paper

Preparation

Minilesson (10 Minutes)ConnectionStart the day by building up excitement toward the approaching celebration. Convene stu-dents to the meeting area.

“Todaywearecelebrating!Therewillbenomoreadding,takingaway,fancyinguporfixing.Today,weonlycelebrateallourhardwork.Nextweek,wewillcontinuewithanotherkindofwriting,buttodaywesay‘Hoorayforus!Hoorayfordoingourbestpersonalnarrativewriting!’”

TeachThen, explain how it will go: All of the authors will be invited to share a portion of their story with the whole group. Model how you read aloud a portion of your piece – your favorite part. Be sure to remind them that you can’t start reading aloud until you’ve got everyone’s attention. Tuck in teaching here about reading aloud effectively and listening attentively.

Remind students to allow a moment of silence so the story can sink in. After a moment of silence, students will be invited to raise their hands to ask a question or pay a compliment. The writer/reader may select one student to ask a question or make a comment. Remind students to compliment naming something specific the writer tried. Not just, “I liked it…” They’ve learned many strategies, and we want to encourage them to talk like writers. The charts will be up in the room, and the students can be encouraged to use them to give com-pliments to their peers.

Objectives

Day 16


Reading

Writing

Active Engagement

Repeat the same process for all the students to read their pieces.

LinkRemind them of reading aloud effectively and being a good listener. Send them off to share more of their pieces in small groups. Encourage them to share their stories with classmates that may not be familiar with their story because they sit at a different table.

Independent and Collaborative Work (30 minutes)The room will be buzzing with talk. Circulate as they share their pieces continuing to coach in to their reading and providing each other with compliments about what they did well as a writer.

ShareAt some point, bring the writers back together and summarize the journey they’ve been on develop-ing their personal narrative stories. Remind them to live every day of their lives seeing all small mo-ments as stories to write.

Day 16


Materials:

Reading Writing


Post Assessment: Confer with a Partner and Revise

Students will be able to:• Demonstrate their mastery of personal narrative writing by completing a writing activity; and• Demonstrate their mastery of writing process by conferring with a peer and then revising their own story.

Review the procedures for the writing activity, which will be used as a post assessment for Summer Bridge. Decide how you will partner your writers for the peer conferences (they may be the same partners they’ve been working with for the past 4 weeks), and how you will con-figure your room to allow students to see each other’s papers and hear each other read aloud.

Preparation

Objectives• Loose leaf paper, pens and pencils • Sentence stems for peer conferences (appendix)

Minilesson (10 Minutes)Since this is an assessment day, it will not follow the pattern of the writing workshop. To ensure standardized administration conditions, this manual contains oral directions that teachers will read to the students. Before you begin, distribute the plans and drafts that students wrote on Day 1, and the handout of sentence stems to support their conferences.

1.ThisisthesecondpartofthewritingactivitywebeganonDay1ofSummerBridge.Today,youwillconferwithapartnerbeforeyoureviseandeditthestoryyouwroteonthefirstday.Thewritingworkyou do today will help me see how you’ve grown as a writer after these four weeks of learning about the strategies that good writers use.

2.Youhavebeenseatedwithapartner.Youmayreadyourdraftaloudinasoftvoice,orexchangepapers with your partner and read your partner’s paper silently. On a new piece of loose-leaf paper, write “Conference Notes.” You will use this paper for notes to your partner. It may be helpful to use some of the sentence stems on the handout to start your conference.

3.Youwillhave10minutestoreadyourpartner’sfirstdraftandprovidewrittenfeedback.After10minutes you will give your papers back. Read your partner’s comments and discuss the suggestions. If you want to read your paper aloud to your partner, you may do so in a soft voice.

4.Afteryourconference,write“FinalDraft”onanotherpieceoflooseleafpaper.Youwillhave40min-utestoreviseandrewriteyourfirstdraftonthatpage.Considerthecommentsmadebyyourpartner

Say:

Day 17


Reading

Writing

and other revisions you feel you need to make, to show your best effort as a writer at this point. This willbeyoursecondandfinaldraft.

5.Ifyouneedadditionalspace,pleaseaskmeforadditionalpaper,beingsuretowriteyourfirstandlastname at the top of each piece of paper.

6.Checkthatyouhavecorrectsentences,punctuation,andspelling.

Youwillhave60minutestoconferwithapartner,revise,andrewriteafinaldraft.Takethefirst10minutes to read your partner’s piece or read your draft aloud. Write notes on the sheet you’ve labeled “ConferenceNotes.”Takethenext10minutestodiscussyourfeedbackwithyourpartner.Remember,you both need an opportunity to talk and receive feedback.

You are to write your story on the loose-leaf page(s) you’ve titled “Final Draft.” You may cross out and rewrite words or make other changes, but write clearly. It must be easy to read.

It is now time to begin the conference. Please keep your voices low so everyone can concentrate.

Independent and Collaborative Work (30 minutes)Teachers, after twenty minutes, say to students: Finish up your last thought and begin writing your second draft independently and silently. You will have 40 minutes to write your final draft.

Providing Help to Students During the AssessmentDo not suggest ideas or topics, and do not comment on or evaluate student work during the process. Please note that neither dictionaries nor thesauruses can be used except as allowed by law for students who are English Language Learners (ELLs) and students with appropriate IEPs. The purpose of this activity is to gather an authentic representation of student achievement and process at the independent level. If students have questions about the activity, encourage them to read the assignment and directions carefully and do their best.

Day 17


Reading Writing

AssessmentYou may want to take notes on the students’ behav-

iors during the conferences: what you see them doing, and what you hear them saying.

After you collect their papers, you will use the ru-bric included in the Appendix to score the papers, and the report form included in the Appendix to record their scores. These scores will be input into the CIM summer assessment document as

the post assessment. Please make sure to include comments which will help you plan instruction:

look for what your students already know how to do, and what might be the first issue to focus on in

minilessons or small group instruction.

What if? If students do not offer each other useful feedback, remind them that peer conferences are only one tool they can use in revising their papers. They should reread their personal nar-ratives and think about what they know about narrative writing to evaluate their partner’s comments and decide on changes they will make in their second drafts.

Day 17


Materials:

Reading

Writing


This lesson should feel a little different than the previous lesson because you are – in essence – launching a new unit and immersing them in a new genre. You will be shifting gears to give the student a quick exposure to nonfiction writing. The goal of this unit is not to have student research a topic then write to show what they’ve learned, but to see all the different kinds of non fiction texts out there in the world and write to teach a topic they already know a lot about. This lesson is an immersion lesson where we encourage them to pour over lots and lots of nonfiction texts noticing how they’re different than stories and discussing what they notice and why the author used the features s/he used. The writing today will be on Post-its jotting what they notice about nonfiction texts. Prior to the lesson, create baskets of non fiction books that you’ve pulled from the classroom library, or checked out of the public library. Place those baskets at their tables for them to immerse themselves during the independent writing and conferring time.

Students will be able to:• Notice and identify the features of nonfiction text that distinguish them

from stories • Participate in partnership and small group conversations about what they

notice from studying published authors

What We Notice

What It’s Called

Example From A Mentor Author

Author in Our Class Who Tried it in Their Writing!

Launch Nonfiction Writing - Immersion

Preparation

• Chart paper, markers• Variety of nonfiction

texts pulled from the classroom library (and perhaps a few more from the public library)

• Sharks by Catriona Clarke

• Melt It, Shape It Glass by May Nelson

• Post it notes • The start of a chart with

the columns listed below (Text Features/Noticing Chart)

Objectives

Day 18


Reading Writing

“Writers, we’ve spent the last several weeks of the summer living like writers looking for true stories that we could write about our lives. That is – we’ve worked long and hard reading and writing personal narratives. Last week, we also spent some time read-ing books that authors have written to teach us something that they know a lot about. For example, Melvin and Gilda Berger taught us everything they know about healthy eating, Vanessa York taught us all about plants we can eat, and May Nelson taught us what she knows about melting glass.”

“That is, these authors thought of something – a topic – that they know A LOT about, and they wrote a whole book about it. This is a different kind of writing work. This writing is special because the author is writing to teach.”

“Today I want to teach you how writers look to other writers to see how they write. Then, they think to themselves – ‘I wonder if I can do that same thing in my writing?’”

Connection

Teach


Say:

“Watch me as I look at some of these books – and think ‘I wonder if I can do that same thinking in my writing?’ Hmm..I’m looking at the book Melt It, Shape It Glass by May Nelson. Inoticethatthetitlegivesmeacluethatthisbookwillbeallaboutglass.LetmeflipthroughthepagescontinuingtonoticeandpostitnotetextfeaturescommentingonwhyIthinktheauthor chose to include that feature in their writing.”

Day 18


Reading

Writing

What We Notice & Why we think the author wrote that way

What It’s Called Example from a Mentor Text

Author in our Class Who Tried It In Their Writing!

-Title that tells what the book is all about Because: They are an expert on that topic

All about title Melt it, Shape it Glass

-Photographs/real pictures Because: Photographs help

to teach about the topic Photographs

List of different sectionsBecause: helps the reader

see how the book is or-ganized and find informa-tion

Table of contents

Chapters or Sections

Arrows and Labels

Bold wordsHeadingsA How-To PageA different-kinds-

of-something page

A parts-of pageA fun-facts page

Teachers, adapt this chart and make it your own. Be sure to make it with your class. It can become quite big, especially after you make copies from the pages of mentor texts and post copies from your students’ examples, but it is a highly effective chart for teaching students to notice what other authors do, think about why authors include certain features in their writing, and celebrate them as authors approximating what they see in the world.

Day 18

Teach continued


Reading Writing

Active Engagement After demonstrating how you look across a nonfiction book noticing text features and thinking aloud about what you’ve noticed – have your student turn and talk about another page of the text.

“Writers, now it’s your turn. Let’s look together at the book Sharks by Catriona Clarke and think about what we notice in this book about how the writer wrote.” Flip through several pages of Sharks then have them turn and talk. Listen in then bring them back together and add another fea-ture to the chart. Perhaps some students notice bold headings and the words underneath all about that heading.”

Link

Share

Remind them that today and everyday they can do this work of studying the way other writers have written to get ideas for how they might write. Send them off to their tables where they will continue immersing themselves in the work of studying mentor authors, marking what they notice with a post it and discussing what they notice with a partner.

Independent and Collaborative Work (30 minutes)Circulate and participate in table conversations about what they’re noticing. Lift the level of their conversations by giving them the words often used to describe the text features they’re noticing and why authors use those text features. For example, pic-tures with words underneath = picture with captions – captions give the reader more information.

Mid Workshop Teaching Point Use the mid workshop teaching point to handle any issues with management, or to name out a noticing a table had about nonfiction text features.


Bring the class together and add to the chart you started during the minilesson. Explain to students that for the last two weeks of summer school they’ll be doing a different kind of reading and writing. The authors they studied today will help them as they write on topics that they know all about. Encourage them to think tonight about topics they think they could teach someone all about. Perhaps they are an expert on shoes, birthdays, parties, sleepovers, making friends, soccer, the park, the beach, etc. Tell them tomorrow they’ll have to pick one of those topics that they know all about and teach it to the class!

Day 18



Materials:

Reading

Writing


Trying on our Nonfiction Topics

Students will be able to:• Decide on a topic they know all about; and• Draft a table of contents of possible sections for their All About.

You’ve now had 5 weeks with these writers. You’ll know who are the recess experts, who loves soccer, and who knows all about sleepovers. You will help guide them today to think, and choose, topics that fit them. Remember, this unit is teaching them to write in the structure of nonfiction – not teaching them to research then write about that research.

• Chart paper, markers,• Teacher’s writing note book• Students’ writing note books• Teacher’s first draft example on loose leaf• Post-it notes• Loose leaf paper• Two-pocket folders


“Writers, thumbs up if you think you know what your All About topic is? Yesterday we spent writing workshopstudyingwhatnonfictionauthors–authorswhowritetoteach—dowhentheywrite.Wenoticedhowthenonfictionbooksinourlibraryarealotdifferentthanstories.”

“TodayIwanttoteachyouhownonfictionwritersdecideonatopictowriteabout.TodayIwantyouto watch me as I try on different topics before I decide on the one I’m going to stick with and write longer on.”

Teach

Preparation

Objectives

Gather students in the meeting area.

Model for students how you “try on” several different topics before deciding on the one that fits. The goal here is to show kids that just because they think a topic is cool it also needs to be a good fit for them to write about. For example, a child that does not own a horse will not have a whole lot to write about and for them to write about a horse they’d have to do some research. For this brief two-week unit – we want them thinking about their personal expertise – not a topic that will require us to teach them how to research.

“Watch me as I think about topics I know a lot about and list the things I might write about. “Possible Topics to Chart:RunningShoesDogsThe violin“Now let me think about what I can say about each of these possible topics.”

Day 19


Reading Writing

Active Engagement

Link“Today, try on each of your topics. Talk about the different topic choices with your partner. If you have a topic that feels like it might work, then you can get a blank table of contents paper (hold up a piece of table of contents paper). “

Independent Writing and Collaborative Work (30 minutes)

.“Writers,whenIlookatthechartsinourroom,I’mremindedoftheworkIneedtodothenexttimeit’stimeformetowrite.TomorrowwewillcontinueworkingonourAllAbout:PersonalExpertisebooksusing the charts in the room to help us. Today though, I want us to share the topic we’re going to write longer on. Today I want us to choose the topic we’re going to write about and teach others about.”


Model, counting across your fingers the various sections or headings you might elaborate on if you were to choose each of the possible topics. Model, too, not being able to say much about one of the topics. For example, I could write about different kinds of shoes, places to buy shoes, how to tie shoes, shoes from around the world, etc. But, when I get to the topic of the violin, while I like the violin, I can’t say much about it, so it’s probably not a very good topic for me to write all about.

Have the students start by thinking of what they are an expert at -- what they know a lot about. Then, have them turn and talk and say across their fingers to their partner all the things they can teach someone about that topic. Listen in and assess – are they choosing top-ics that will sustain them, or are they choosing topics that will require further research.

The students will spend the time talking with a partner and independently writing, trying on their topics. As they do, circulate and provide assistance where necessary. It may require you to pull small groups of students together to guide them as they ‘try on’ their topics.

You may decide to address a management issue, or take these 2 minutes to teach something you’ve taught in a one-on-one conference. Highlighting a student that thought about one topic, but then changed his/her mind to a topic that was a better fit would help reinforce the lessons. You may prompt the writer to do the talking for this mid workshop teaching point.

Share Reconvene the writers in the meeting area.

Using chart paper, jot down the students’ names and their All About: personal expertise topic. This recording helps you and them remember the topic they’ve committed to. The rest of the sessions will be creating the sections for their All About book for this topic (and others if they finish early).

Day 19


Materials:

Writing

Students will be able to:• Plan out there subtopics (or their chapters); and• Choose paper that helps them organize their ideas.

• Chart paper, markers• Different kinds of paper• Students’ writing folde• Various nonfiction texts• Pens

Objectives

The next four sessions will be guiding students to take the various things they noticed from the immersion activity and trying out those features as they write to teach.

For example, across the next several days you’ll want to teach them how some nonfiction writers like May Nelson on page 24 & 25 of her book includes a how-to- section to teach her readers how to make clay fish. If they want to teach someone how to do something that relates to their topic they might think about which paper might help them best organize their how-to writing.

They may notice that May Nelson also shows us different kinds of object made from glass on pages 6-7. Or, in the book Sharks; they may notice the author organizes information by using bold headings that tell what the page section is all about.

Throughout the next three days, develop the above into minilessons and use the independent writing time for students to organize their ideas choosing paper that most helps them. You’ll want to coach the children in front of you to think about their various subtopics and choose paper that helps them best organize their ideas. Use the teaching points and examples below to guide you.


Minilesson (10- 15 Minutes)

Connection

Teach

Organizing our IdeasDays 20-23

Writing

Preparation

Preparation


Reading Writing

Listed below are possible teaching points and examples for the next several days (Day 20 - 23— July 20th -25th) Use the Minilesson template in the appendix to develop full minilessons.

Teaching

Point

Writers think of specific things to do for that topic then they

write a how to - to teach some-one. (How To – For example,

How to Tie a Shoe for All About: Shoes).

Teaching

Point

Writers think about all the dif-ferent parts of their topic and

draw a diagram and label all the different parts. (Diagram – For example, diagram shoelaces, heel, rubber bottom, etc.).

Teaching

Point

Writers organize their informa-tion into sections with bold head-

ings then write the information that goes with that heading. (Bold Headings – For example, Running

Outside and all the details one might need to know for

running outside).

Teaching

Point

Writers think about the different kinds of their topic then draw pictures and write captions to teach the reader about the different kinds of that topic.

(Different Kinds – For example, running shoes, heels, sandals, ballet slippers,

etc., with captions that say more about each kind of shoe). Active Engagement

LinkIndependent Writing and Collaborative Work (30 Minutes)

Mid Workshop Teaching Point(use an attention getting device)Share

Days 20-23


Objectives


Preparation

Reading

Materials:

WritingWriting

Revising our All About Books – Making Sure Our Information Fits

Students will be able to:• Revise their All-About books taking away information that doesn’t fit.

Today’s revision lesson will be a bit different than the revision lessons we conducted in the narrative unit. You, and the children, will have to decide on the different pages that they will revise and ultimately make into their final All-About: Personal Expertise book. Then, they will read aloud the different sections of their book to make sure all the information in that section fits. Be sure to have read through the pages they’re collecting so that you can plan your conferences and small group work.

Objectives

Preparation

• Chart paper, markers• Nonfiction paper choice• Folders filled with sections/chapter of their all about book• HealthyEating by Melvin and Gilda Berger


Connection

“Writers, can I have your eyes and attention? You’ve been doing some really important work study-ing what published authors do and trying to see if it gives you ideas for how to make your work evenbetter.I’veheardsomeofyoulooktothemanynonfictionbooksintheroomandsay–‘Icandothat!’”

“Today I want to teach you how to revise the sections of your All About books to make sure that you’resayingwhatyouwanttosay,andthatalltheinformationyouhaveineachsectionfits.WatchmeasIdothisimportantrevisionworkofmakingsuremyinformationfitstogether.Thatis, watch me check to make sure my writing is organized to make sure it’s sorted out right.”

Writing

Day 24


Reading Writing

Teach

“The other day I was organizing my desk drawer and noticed that everything in the drawer was just kind of thrown together. The paper clips were in with the pushpins and I had pens andmarkersalltogetherwithclipsandpost-itnotes.Everythingwaseverywhereanditwasverydisorganized.Becauseitwassodisorganized,Icouldn’tfindanythingandIbecameveryfrustrated. Well, sometimes our writing can feel like that. Sometimes, the information we’re writingaboutournonfictiontopicgetsputintothewrongsection–anditisourjob–astheboss of our writing – to be sure that our information is organized and in the right place.”

“Watch me as I reread my different sections and think, ‘Does all the information I’ve just read fittogether?’”

Teacher, read aloud a chapter of your All About book where you’ve got random infor-mation that doesn’t belong to show them how to cross out information that does not go with the rest of the information on the page. Model how you simply cross out the information with a single line. We don’t want to black out the information entirely because it might be information we go back to.

Active EngagementHave the students turn and talk to decide if another section of your book has information that doesn’t belong. Demonstrate how you decide and, ultimately, cross out information that doesn’t belong.

Link

“Today, writers, you will get your books right now, and while you’re on the rug, will you start rereading them? Remember, first reread the chapter title then reread what is under the title, asking, ‘Does this go here?’ You will have to cross things out like I did, and move things too. This work will be really important for you to do for the rest of your life, when-ever you write in chapters or categories. Get started, when I see you well on your way, I’ll send you off to continue in your writing spots.”

Independent and Collaborative Work (30 minutes)Based on your review of their pages, pull small groups of students together to teach a strategy les-son. Perhaps some students are still writing narratives; you’ll want to coach them to think about writing like a teacher, thinking perhaps of someone that doesn’t know about their topic and what they need to know. For example, if you have a student that is an expert at video games – have him think of his mom or dad and what information they need to know.



Day 24


Reading

Writing

Share (5 Minutes)Reconvene the students in the meeting area. Share out and highlight an author in the class that has tried out the minilesson.

What if? What if your writers are struggling to write in this new genre? You may decide to provide the struggling writer with more support by showing him/her an A/B level nonfiction text. For example, HealthyEating by Melvin and Gilda Berger with a picture on the top of the page and one sentence on the bottom. We want to have high expectations, but appropriate. If the variety of paper is overwhelming the writer, make it easer by providing just picture space and lines and the lines teach what is in the picture. Low-level texts, like the one mentioned above, are great mentor texts for less sophisticated writers.

Your writers are more sophisticated and zipping through this unit. Provide them with more options. For example, encourage them to write an About the Author Page, or include a Pic-ture Glossary. More sophisticated writers can certainly have more pages. Our goal is not to have every single AllAbout:PersonalExpertise they publish at the end of these two weeks look exactly the same!!

Day 24


Materials:

Reading Writing


Editing: Using Commas to Write Efficiently

Students will be able to:• Edit their nonfiction sections and use commas to write efficiently

Teachers, be sure to prepare the chart ahead of time so that you can use it to demonstrate during the teach portion of the lesson.

Objectives• Chart paper, markers• Nonfiction paper choice• Editing checklist • Chart with sentences that list facts and sentence that uses commas to list multiple facts

During recess we play tag. We also play catch. Many of us like to play hopscotch, too. We also like to jump rope.

During recess we play tag, catch, hopscotch, and jump rope.

Preparation


ConnectionConvene the students in the meeting area. Summarize the work of the last week and a half.

“Writers, can I have your eyes and attention? These last two weeks you’ve put forth great energy thinking through a topic that you could teach someone else about. You’ve studied the work of mentor authors and thought, ‘What have these authors done in their writing that I could do, too?’ You’ve also worked hard to organize your ideas so that allyouinformation‘fits.’”

“Today, I want to teach you a strategy to polish up your writing. To make sure that it is the best it can be before you give it to the world. Whenever you write, you want to make sure that you spell words as best you can, and you spell those words we’ve studied correctly. You also want to make sure that you use everything youknowaboutpunctuation.JustaswestudiedtheworkofothernonfictionauthorstolearnhowwemightwriteourAllAbouts,wecanalsostudymentorauthorstofigureoutpunctuationmarks.”

There are many places to buy ice cream. Grocery stores sell ice cream. You can buy ice cream at Baskin Rob-bins, too. Sometimes, you can buy ice cream from a vendor at the beach.

You can buy ice cream at the grocery store, Baskin Robbins, and even at the beach.

Day 25


Reading

Writing

TeachLet’slooktogetheratthewaythisauthorusespunctuationtowritehisnonfictionpiececlearlyandefficiently.Let’sstudyhowheusespunctuationmarks.

Chart: During recess we play tag. We also play catch. Many of us like to play hopscotch, too. We

also like to jump rope. I’ve used four sentences to teach information. But, because all the sentences teach about

what we like to do at recess, there’s a more efficient way to combine the information. Take a look at this sentence.

Chart:During recess we play tag, catch, hopscotch, and jump rope. “What do you notice about the two different ways that I wrote those facts. What differences do you

notice about the punctuation marks I used? Turn and talk.”

Teachers, we encourage you to let the children make their own discoveries, however, you might point out the fact that there is only one sentence instead of four and that the commas allow for us to list the information.

“When you have more than two facts that group together around an idea, you can combine them by using commas. You put a comma after each fact. Just before you get to the last fact, you also use the word and to let the reader know the list is complete.”

Also, say,

Active Engagement“Let’s try a few together to see how easy it is to use a comma to list information around and idea

together.”

There are many places to buy ice cream. Grocery stores sell ice cream. You can buy ice cream at Baskin Rob-bins, too. Sometimes, you can buy ice cream from a vendor at the beach.

You can buy ice cream at the grocery store, Baskin Robbins, and even at the beach.

Day 25


Reading Writing

Link

“So, today when you go back to your seats, you will be getting your books ready for pub-lishing. There are many ways to use a comma, and today you’ve learned that commas can make our sentences more efficient. We can use them to list information that goes together. I’m going to pass out our editing checklist again for you to check off items that you’ve edited for.”

Independent and Collaborative Work (30 minutes)Confer with students and pull them into small groups based on what they need. Perhaps you’ve got several students that are still struggling with spelling words correctly, or have not mastered other forms of punctuation.



Share Direct students to show each other what they have done, what they have learned, and what they have decided to do next. Tell students that they may turn in their edited drafts today or will finish editing tomorrow and turn in their revisions and edits to the “copy editor” (the teacher) before leav-ing for the day. You will act as the copy editor and read their All About texts before class tomorrow.

Day 25


Materials:

Writing


Students will be able to:• Put together and organize all the pieces of their All About Drafts; and • Revise by rewriting their pieces for final publication and celebration tomorrow.

Have ample copies of different kinds of paper available for students to rewrite their final drafts.

• Chart paper, markers• Extra copies of nonfic tion paper choice • Students’ drafts• Teacher’s draft (sloppy copy with revisions and edits)• Teacher’s final draft (clean copy)


Connection“Writers, can I have your eyes and attention? The last two weeks of writing workshop have been soexciting.You’vebeenwriting,talking,ANDteaching!Todayisourfinaldaybeforewecel-ebrate. Today is the last day we have to organize our All About: Personal Expertise books and make them ready to give to the world.”

“Today,Iwanttoteachyouourfinalstepinthisshortnonfictionwritingunit.TodayIwanttoteachyouhownonfictionwriterslayoutalltheirsectionsanddecideonhowtheirbookswillgo.Watch me as I do this work of looking across all the pages I’ve written and decide which sec-tions will go where, which sections I’ll keep, and which sections I’ll put away and not include this time.”

TeachTeacher, demonstrate and think aloud as you lay out the various pages of your All About text. Model how you decide which section goes first, then next, then last. Also model how you may put some sections aside for use later because they’re not complete, or don’t fit with what you want your book to be. Then, model stapling the pieces to together and beginning to rewrite.

Preparing for Our CelebrationDay 26

Writing

Objectives

Preparation


Reading Writing

Active EngagementThis lesson will have an extended active engagement. Transition the students back to their writing spots to begin this work. The workshop today will be busy and you’ll need to be cir-culating and coaching students to get their pieces organized and ready for the publishing party tomorrow. Some students may not need to rewrite every section. Some students may want to color in their pictures. Some may want to practice reading their piece aloud to get ready for tomorrow

LinkRemind them that this is a necessary step whenever getting ready to publish their nonfic-tion. They must look at all the different sections, then think about what order makes sense for their book.

Independent Writing and Conferring (30 minutes)Conduct one-on-one conferences and small groups with students as necessary. Use the non-fiction conferring teaching points found in the appendix to guide your conferring work.


Interrupt today’s workshop as necessary to keep students moving toward getting their pieces ready for publication.

Share

Bring students back to the meeting area and have them form a circle. Explain that tomorrow is the last day of summer school and they’ll be celebrating not only the amazing summer of writing they’ve had, but how they’ve learned these last two weeks to write as a teacher does – teaching others something they know a lot about. Discuss with them how tomorrow they will read their pieces aloud and that tonight, for homework, they should finalize their pieces and read them aloud to someone at home practicing reading like a teacher.

Day 26


Materials:


Reading

Writing

Celebrate Nonfiction

Students will be able to:• Read aloud their piece clearly and so that the audience can hear; • Listen attentively and actively as an audience member; and • Ask a pertinent question based on another student’s reading of their AllAbout:PersonalExpertise pieces.

Have ample copies of different kinds of paper available for students to re-write their final drafts.

Objectives• You may decide to add an element of party: juice, pretzels, cookies, music, etc.

Preparation

If you’ve invited parents, convene them in the corner of the room and summarize the teach-ing you’ve done this summer. Give them some things to look for in their child’s writing. For example, have them look for how the students created pictures and captions to give more information, or how they drew a diagram of their topic and labeled its parts, or how they in-cluded a How To section. Be sure to tell them that today is a day of celebrating all their hard work – there is no more conferring, correcting, or fixing. We are celebrating what they CAN do and what they have done independently as writers.

Remind the children that today is one of the biggest days of an author’s life. Today is the day they as authors are giving their pieces to the world. Today is especially important, too, be-cause they are going to be giving texts that teach to the world. So, not only are they writers, but they are teachers!

As with the narrative unit, you may decide to have students pick one part of their All About, and read it aloud clearly to the class to teach them a little about their topic. Or, you may decide to divide the class into four groups and have the students share with small groups of their classmates (different classmates than those they sit with everyday).

Remind them of what it looks like and means to be an effective listener and speaker.

Celebration!

AssessmentPublished All About: Personal Expertise Project (rubric and report form in Appendix)

Day 27


Appendix


Appendix Reading

“Conferring in the First Week” Recording Form—109-110

Reading Assessment for Independent Reading Books—111-112

“Conferring in the Fourth-Sixth Weeks” Recording Form—113-114

Student Reading Log—115

Questions to Consider for Assessing Reading Habits, Volume and Stamina Levels L-Z—116

Teacher Observation Checklist: Student Participation—117-118

Writing

Part Two: Post Assessment - Talk Stems For Peer Conferences—119

Launching/Narrative Writing Rubric for Pre & Post Summer Bridge 3rd Grade Writing—120

Summer Bridge Pre-Assessment: Report Form—121

Summer Bridge Post-Assessment Report Form (Part 2 On-Demand)—122

Conferring Notes—123

Teacher Observation Checklist: Student Participation—124-125

Editing Checklist—126

3rd Grade High Frequency Word List—127

Architecture of a Minilesson—128

Architecture of a One-on-One Conference—129

Narrative Writing Conferences—130

Nonfiction Writing Conferences —131

3rd Grade Weekly Rubric for Writer’s Notebook—132

Small Moment Narrative Writing Sample—133

Student Writing Samples: Narrative—134-144

Narrative – Paper Choice: Picture Box 4 Lines—145



Nonfiction: All About – Paper Choice - Table of Contents—148

Graphic Organizers—149-151

Student Writing Samples: Nonfiction—134-144

Resources—173


Reading Behaviors and Attitudes to Observe:

• Browsing for books—How long does this take the reader? Does the child study the covers, reading the titles, looking at the pictures, and pausing before making a decision about whether to choose or put back? What books create a reaction in the reader (where they want to share with a neighbor, or they seem disgusted or annoyed by one title)?

• Reading the chosen book—Does the child spend some additional time with the cover? Does the child seem to be really reading the text (as opposed to “fake” reading), spending the appropriate time on each page? How long does the child read before losing interest in the text, sharing a page with a neighbor, or putting the book back?

Sample Compliments/Conversations for Individual or Groups of Readers:

• I love how you really study the cover when selecting books! Once you found one that seemed interesting, you just started reading, really giving it a chance.

• I can see that you are working really hard to stay focused during your reading time. You didn’t even look up when that loud siren went off right outside. That’s what great reading looks like!

• I saw how you put back a book that seemed too challenging. I do that too! If I’m finding myself struggling with too many words, than it’s not a good fit for me. You just did what a smart reader does – smart readers go back into the bin to look for a book that feels just right. Bravo!

• I love how you are selecting books without worrying about what any other reader is doing. I, too, like different books from my friend – she always likes to read about books with witches and ghosts, and those are way too scary for me. So, even if she’s reading one of those books, I still stick to the ones that I prefer. I’m glad you are doing the same—just sticking with what YOU like to read!

• I’m starting to learn about you as a reader based on the books that you are picking – I can already tell that you like to read about books with animals. I’ll keep that in mind over the next few weeks and make sure to pull some books from our library out that you might enjoy.

“Conferring in the First Week” Recording Form(page 1)

Appendix


Reading

Appendix

Student’s Name Observations about Student’s Reading Behavior & Attitudes

Compliment(s) I Gave

“Conferring in the First Week” Recording Form


Reading Appendix

Reading Assessment for Independent Reading Books* NAME:______________________________________________ LEVEL:______________ DATE: ____________________________ CLASS: _______________________________ TITLE OF BOOK: __________________________________________________________ ACCURACY: ______ % To assess the student’s accuracy, simply mark off 100 words in the selected leveled book and ask the student to read the section aloud to you. You will need to read over the student’s shoulder and record any errors, or miscues the student makes below. Count the miscues that were not self-‐corrected.

100% accuracy 99% accuracy 98% accuracy 97% accuracy 96% accuracy 0 miscues 1 miscue 2 miscues 3 miscues 4 miscues

Note: Unusual names or repeated mispronunciations/miscues do not count as more than one error. Independent Reading Level: 98% or higher Instructional Reading Level: 97%-‐95% Frustrational Reading Level: 94% or lower You may also wish to check these boxes as the student reads, if you see evidence of these skills: ____Flexible word-‐solver ____Reads in phrases rather than word by word ____Miscues make sense ____Miscues fit the syntax or structure of the sentence ____Miscues look similar to words in the text *This tool is intended to assess a student in the independent book he or she is reading. For the assessment to be valid, the student needs to be well-‐matched to the book and the teacher needs to know the level of the book, if you are intending to use this assessment to get an approximate reading level for the student. If the accuracy or comprehension raises alarms, then you should re-‐assess them in a lower level text.


Reading

Appendix Appendix B

FLUENCY AND INTONATION If you wish to assess the student’s fluency and intonation, listen for how the student reads. This information may help you decide if the student is struggling a little at this level, is fluent, or would benefit from some instruction and coaching in reading fluently, either in this text or a more familiar one. To double check if it is their fluency or simply the newness of the text, you may give them a chance to pre-‐read or rehearse, or ask them to go back and pick a favorite page to read to you. ____Responds to punctuation by changing his/her voice ____Reads dialogue with phrasing and expression ____Reads in phrases rather than word by word ____Changes voice to mark shifts in mood or tone ____Changes voice to reflect meaning and understanding COMPREHENSION You will want to assess the student’s ability to tell you the big events of the story so far, or in this section, and then you will probably want to ask them what they’ve noticed so far about the character – this will give you some information about whether the student is able to insightful yet at this level. If they can explain character’s feelings, motivations, or relationships, this lets you know that they are reading between the lines. Some questions you could ask to gather this information: 1. Tell me what has really stuck in your mind so far (what seems important): 2. Explain why that part seems important: 3. Where does the story take place? What kind of place is it? 4. Tell me what you know about the character so far: 5. At this point in the story (or an important part the reader mentioned), what do you imagine the character might be feeling and why? 6. Tell me about any themes or issues that you are noticing: 7. Are there any lessons so far that you think the character is learning or could learn? 8. How would you describe this genre and what do you know about it? A teacher doesn’t have to ask all of these; however, this is a sampler of questions that will help in understanding the student’s comprehension of the text. The first four questions are literal and inferential, the last four indicate that the student is able to be quite insightful in this text.

rom http://tc.readingandwritingproject.com/public/themes/rwproject/resources/assessments/additional_tools/in_book_assessment.pdf


Reading Appendix

The Research Phase Teacher wants to uncover what the child is doing as a reader (the skills, strategies, behaviors that they are using), rather than the book topic or content of the reading. For example, has the child selected a just-‐right book? Is the child reading with appropriate fluency? Envisioning while they read? Reading in chunks and not just word for word? Possible Stems: “What are you working on as reader? That is, what are you trying to do as you read?” “Tell me about what you are thinking about during this part.” “Can you show me where you were doing that?’

The Decision Phase Teacher decides what the focus of the rest of the conference will be. If the teacher still feels like she needs to confirm what the child is doing as a reader, she might ask some further clarifying questions. Possible Stems: “So, what I hear you saying is…” “Would you say that when you do…., you find yourself…”

The Compliment Phase Teacher compliments the reader on one thing that she is doing well, specifically naming the skill/strategy/behavior that she is using. Possible Stems: “The smart thing you are doing as a reader is…” “I love the way you…”

The Teaching Phase Teacher names the teaching point and then demonstrates how a reader does that skill/strategy/behavior. Teacher then has the reader try it, while teacher coaches and guides. Possible Stems: “Can I give you one tip? Often, readers… This will help you…” “Can I show you one thing that readers do?” “Now it’s your turn to try…” “Make sure you…” “Remember every time you read…”

Adapted from A Guide to the Reading Workshop, by Lucy Calkins

“Conferring in the Fourth-Sixth Weeks” Recording FormPage 1


Reading

Appendix

“Conferring in the Fourth-Sixth Weeks” Recording Form

Page 2

Name Research(What You Notice)

Compliment(What the Student Can

Already Do)

Teaching Point(What the Student Needs to Know Now)


Dat

eTi

tle o

f Boo

kLe

vel

Page

St

arte

dPa

ge

Ende

dM

inut

est

Read

Gen

re

Nam

e:St

uden

t Rea

ding

Log

Appendix


Reading

Appendix

Questions to Consider for Assessing Reading Habits, Volume and Stamina Levels L-Z

Next Steps/Comments:

Did the child log her/his reading every day?

Yes No

Was there evidence that the child reads at home?

Yes No

Was the child reading books that fit with the unit of study that was being taught?

Yes No

Does the child tend to choose books that are below instructional level (too easy) At independent level (just right) Above independent level (too hard)

Yes No

Does the child choose books that she/he enjoys?

Yes No

Does the child always/usually finish books?

Yes No

About how many minutes per day does the child read?

______ minutes

Does the child read an appropriate number of pages in an appropriate amount of time for the level of text?

Yes No

Use information from conferring notes and book logs:

Reader’s Name: Date:


Teacher Observation Checklist: Student Participation

The teacher observation checklist is an opportunity for you to record your observations as you move around your room, reading over your students’ shoulders or listening in to their conversations. It is a record of their on-task behavior:

• Does the child work independently and take initiative? After the minilesson, does s/he have needed materials and get started reading quickly?

• S/he can read independently for at least 30 minutes.

• After finishing a book, s/he knows to begin a new book or reread one in their book basket.

• If they are working in partnerships, or small groups, are they following the norms you’ve established for collaborative work?

• If this is a celebration, are they offering to share their thinking? Responding appropriately to others’ thoughts? Looking at the speaker, keeping their hands and mouths quiet?

There is also a column for notes where you can record your conferring notes, or notes from a guided reading group.

At the end of the week, you will tally your marks for a participation grade.

Students Mon Tues Wed Thurs Fri Comments

Appendix


Appendix AReading



Appendix


Reading Appendix

• I like the part where you…• I’m confused in this part because…

• I’d like to know more about…• I don’t think you need this part because…• What’s the most important part? Can you add to that part?• Make sure you reread before revising, editing, and rewriting.

Part Two: Post Assessment - Talk Stems For Peer Conferences


Reading

Appendix

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Reading Appendix

Student Nam

es Content

Planning Qualities of Good Writing

Genre Mechanics

Writing

Process Language

Total Com

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Summ

er Bridge Pre-Assessm

ent: Report Form


Reading

Appendix

Student Nam

es

Content

Planning

Qualities of

Good

Writing

Genre

Mechanics

Writing

Process

Language

Total

Comments

Sum

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Bri

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Reading Appendix

Name Research(What You Notice)

Compliment(What the Student Can

Already Do)

Teaching Point(What the Student Needs to Know Now)

Conferring Notes


Reading

Appendix


The teacher observation checklist is an opportunity for you to record your observations as you move around your room, reading over your students’ shoulders or listening in to their conversations. It is a record of their on-task behavior:

• Does the child work independently and take initiative? After the minilesson, does s/he have needed materials and get started reading quickly?

• S/he can read independently for at least 30 minutes.

• After finishing a book, s/he knows to begin a new book or reread one in their book basket.

• If they are working in partnerships, or small groups, are they following the norms you’ve established for collaborative work?

• If this is a celebration, are they offering to share their thinking? Responding appropriately to others’ thoughts? Looking at the speaker, keeping their hands and mouths quiet?

There is also a column for notes where you can record your conferring notes, or notes from a guided writing group.

At the end of the week, you will tally your marks for a participation grade.




Reading Appendix

125

Reading Appendix



Reading

Appendix

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riting3-5

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list


Reading Appendix

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3rd Grade High Frequency Word List


Appendix

Connection: “Yesterday we….” “When I was looking over your writing last night, I noticed…” “And today I want to teach you…” Teach: “Watch me as I… “Did you notice how I...” Active Engagement: “Tell your partner what you saw me doing that you could do too…” “Get started doing that right now, while you’re on the carpet. When I see that you have a good start, I’ll send you back to your writing spot to continue…” Link: “And so I’m hoping that today and every day…” “From this day onward, whenever you….” Mid-Workshop Teaching Point: “While you were writing just now, I noticed that you were…” “That_____ (student’s name) used… (name of strategy)…” “Get together with your writing partner to talk about…” “Hey, everyone, could I stop you?” Share: “Let’s gather back together and share…” “Hey everyone, today _____ (student’s name) did the coolest thing…” “Let me show you how (s) he did this…”

Architecture of a Minilesson


From: Calkins, Lucy. Units of Study for Teaching Writing Grades 3-5

Architecture of a One-on-One Conference

The Research Phase Takes place at the same time as Decision phase. The child is not working on the topic, but the skill/strategy/goals. “What are you working on as writer?” “Tell me about your writing.” “Is that what you mean?” “What are you working on? That is, what are you trying to do as you write?” “Are you trying to, “___________” or “________” or “_______”, or what?” “Can you show me?” “What led you to add that detail?” “What specifically were you trying to do with that sort of detail?” “What kind of details do you think are important?” “Do you add details all over the draft, or do you add them in particular places?” “Why did you choose these particular details to add?”

The Compliment Phase What has the child done, gestured toward doing/almost done, or approximated? Extrapolate something that child will replicate or that is transferable. “I love that you added…”________” “I love the way you…” “I love the way you reread and added details that help your reader create movie in their minds of exactly what happened.” “You made it so I can picture “______” “That’s just what good writers do…” “Whenever you write, add details like these…” “You didn’t just say, you added details like these…” “You told me exactly what was said…”

The Decision Phase Takes place at the same time as Research phase. Decide what to compliment/what to teach. Act very pleased over his accomplishments. Compliment an end goal. Compliment a “half way” goal. Say: “Can I show you one thing that writers do?” “I have one suggestion to make…" “Can I teach you something…?”

The Teaching Phase Name the teaching point and provide as much support for that teaching point as I think is necessary. “Can I give you one tip…? One very important tip…that I think will help you a lot?” “One thing that I do when I want to “_____” is that I…” “When writers put details in their personal narratives we add true details that we really noticed when the event was actually happening.” “Always remember that good writers can…” *I reread my story chunk by chunk…” “From now on, do exactly what you did here….” “Get started while I’m here. Test it out. I’ll watch, okay.” “Always remember that writers can…”

Appendix


Reading

Appendix

Qualities of Good Writing • Writers focus on small moments, seed stories instead of big watermelon topics. • Writers visualize, then story tell, instead of summarize. Writers start by telling an

action that they did at the beginning of the story. • Writers stretch out the important parts of a story. • Writers try and include tiny specific details in each step of their small moment by

saying what they did, what they said, and what they were thinking. • Writers write with specific details. Instead of saying, “I played a game,” the writer

names the game, “I played Monopoly.” • Writers include dialogue using the exact words the person said. • Writers show their feeling rather than tell them by adding what they said, thought,

or did when they felt that way.

Independence • Writers try to solve their own problems, inventing solutions rather than simply

lining up behind the teacher. • When writers are finished with their stories they go back and reread and add

to their pictures and words before starting a new story

Conventions • Writers use the word wall to help them spell words correctly. • Writers spell unfamiliar words by saying the word slowly and writing down the

sounds they hear § Writers punctuate as they write by rereading it aloud, paying attention to where

they take a breath (where their thought ends), and putting a mark at the end of the sentence.

From: Calkins, Lucy and Collins, Kathy. Resources for Teaching Writing CD-ROM Grades 3-5. Firsthand Heinemann, www.firsthand.heinemann.com

Narrative Writing Conferences


Reading Appendix

Nonfiction Writing Conferences

Structure • Writers choose a focused topic by thinking:

§ About the parts of their topic § About the different kinds of their topic § About different times with their topic

• Writers keep a topic small § By planning and sketching first § By starting and ending in the same place

• Writers keep their book in order by § Using time order words § Acting it out and making sure it makes sense

Elaboration • Writers add by talking by giving advice to their reader (i.e. Mom always says…._ • Writers add thinking by answering questions their reader might have (i.e. You might

wonder…) • Writers add setting by thinking about where their nonfiction book is happening and

adding details like where and when • Writers use small actions by describing HOW the readers should do things • Writers show not tell by acting out and writing what their body did Craft

• Writers make important words BIG and BOLD • Writers use interesting punctuation to make a point

Meaning

• Writers think of WHO they want to teach by § Thinking of someone who needs to learn something § Thinking of someone who needs help § Thinking of someone who has a problem § Thinking of someone who wants to do the same thing they do

• Writers try on a topic by thinking about if they have a lot to say or a little Writers think about a time they learned something and teach that


Reading

Appendix

Trait Writer Teacher Comments

Did the writer decorate the writer’s notebook?

Yes No Yes No

Does the writer date each entry?

Yes No Yes No

Does the writer write in the writer’s notebook every day?

Yes No Yes No

Does the writer write true stories from his/her life?

Yes No Yes No

Does the writer try the strategies taught?

Yes No Yes No

Dear Writer,Your writer’s notebook is a place where you can collect and grow your ideas. It is important that you write often to build fluency and stamina, and you do this by generating thoughts that inspire you to write. Weekly, I will monitor your writer’s notebook to see how you are growing

Name Date

3rd Grade Weekly Rubric for Writer’s Notebook


Reading Appendix

Summary:One spring day I sat on the front stoop waiting for my sister to come home from school. She always brought me treats and played with me. I went to look for her when all of a sudden she was there! She yelled out my nickname, picked me up and gave me gummy bears.

Storytelling: “I can’t wait for Maura to come home from school.” I thought to myself as I twiddle my thumbs and stared up into the sky. I hopped down from the front stoop I had been sitting on and began walking down the block in the direction of the train. All of a sudden I heard, “Hey, Tutti Frutti!” I looked up from staring down at the sidewalk as I walked. It was Maura! A smile came across my face; I loved when she called me Tutti Frutti. I ran toward her. As I reached her she scooped me up into her arms and twirled me around. “Have you been waiting for me all day?” “Yes!” said. “I couldn’t wait for you to get home!” “Hmmm…I wonder why that is, Tutti Frutti?” she said. With that, Maura reached her hand into her purse and pulled out a bag of gummy bears. “For me?” I said with glee. “Yep. For you.” Maura replied with a grin and a hug.

Small moment – Student SamplePage 1: One Tuesday morning I was at home by myself. I was waiting for my mom. (Speech bubbles: When is mom going to come?)Page 2: Then somebody knocked at the door. I got scared. I kept saying to myself, “Maybe it’s a rob-ber?” I started crying.Page 3: My stomach started hurting. My heart started beating faster and faster. I was frightened. Then the phone started ringing. Page 4: The door started to open more and more and more. My heard started beating faster and faster. Until….Page 5: My mom popped out from the doors. I screamed, “Mom!” I was happy. My mom asked me why are you crying. I said, “It’s a long story.”

Small Moment Narrative Writing Sample


Reading

Appendix

Student Writing Samples


Reading Appendix


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Narrative – Paper ChoicePicture Box – 4 lines


Reading

Appendix A



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Appendix

Table of Contents

Nonfiction: All About – Paper Choice


Reading Appendix

W1.

2.

3.

4.


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Appendix A


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Resources

Boelts, M., Jones, N. (2007). Those Shoes. Cambridge, MA: Candlewick.

Calkins, L. (2010). A Guide to the Reading Workshop. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Calkins, L. (2010). Resources for Teaching Reading. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Calkins, L., Tolan, K., (2010). Navigating Nonfiction in Expository Text: Determining Importance and Synthesizing. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Collins, K. (2004). Growing Readers: Units of Study in the Primary Classroom. Portland, ME: Stenhouse Publishers

Common Core Standards

Cowley, J., (1999) Red-Eyed Tree Frog. New York, NY: Scholastic Inc.

Dahl, R. (1970) Fantastic Mr. Fox. New York, NY: Puffin Books

Ehrenworth, M., Khan, H., Mooney, J., (2010). Constructing Curriculum: Alternate Units of Study. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

DiCamillo, K. (2000). Because of Winn Dixie. New York, NY: Scholastic Inc.

Heiligman, D., (2002) Earthquakes. New York, NY: Scholastic Inc.

Morgan, S., (2009). Wolves. New York, NY: Scholastic Inc.

Teachers College Reading and Writing Project, “Reading Assessment for Independent Reading Books,” http://tc.readingandwritingproject.com/public/themes/rwproject/resources/assessments/additional_tools/in_book_assessment.pdf

Willems, Mo., (2004). Knuffle Bunny: a Cautionary Tale. New York: Hyperion for

Children.

3rd grade teacher handbook orla

Documents