One thing that I have really grown to love about my Tuesday Experience teacher is her ability to teach and really get her students motivated to write in the classroom. Since I have been there, I have seen nothing but cooperation, determination and success from 95% of the classroom. She uses a variety of techniques and really prepares them well for a variety of things such as story writing, journal writing, and the mandatory writing prompt that is to be distributed to every first grade classroom in West Hartford. Mrs. DiPietro really engages the students attention by her teaching process. Her preparation with the students in doing the writing prompt was fun to watch and I learned SO much from it. Mrs. DiPietro gave a minilesson on writing stories and a practice prompt to prepare the students for the actual one.
When she first told me about the writing prompt I was thinking "hmmm....how will she really get the children involved and wanting to write for a whole 45 mins." Usually the most writing the children do at one time is between 15 and 30 minutes at a time. Even though to us an extra 15 minutes is nothing, to younger children.....o, its a lot!
Mrs. DiPietro first sat the children down on the rug and talked about previous things they have done with their writing development. They talked about how they wrote their "small moments" story, their "ending" story, and how they can start a story off to grab the readers attention. She went over: question lead, action lead, taking lead and snap shot lead. Mrs. DiPietro gave a quick run through of examples and wrote everything down for the students. She emphasized how important it is for the students to have a strong, beginning, middle and end. She also emphasized the importance of using description!
After the review, she gave the children what they were to write about in their story. They were to write: "It is your birthday! You woke up one morning and found a present next to your bed. What is inside the box?" She asked the children their ideas as to what they want to have inside the box. She and the children also talked about and came up with ideas on how they could start their story with a strong beginning. I could tell the children's minds were going because they all were smiling and raising their hands to share their ideas!
She wanted to let the children know just how their work was going to be graded. On a large sheet of paper she wrote out the writing rubric for the children.
Score 1: beginning sense of main point, attempt at narrative
Score 2: may or may not be focused on prompt but readable, shows the beginnings of story of organization.
Score 3: fairly focused, sense of narrative, may attempt to add details or descriptive words.
Score 4: focused on prompt, good sense of narrative, details included.
Score 5: focused, all story elements are included, detail's. descriptive language, and fluency.
The minilesson took know longer then 20 minutes. Mrs. DiPietro planned it out so the children would be able to have the full 45 minutes to practice with this writing prompt in preparation for the real deal. The rules during the prompt was that they were not to leave their desks, talk to their neighbor, and they could not ask me or Mrs. DiPietro any help on spelling words.
During lunch time, Mrs. DiPietro and I reviewed the stories. The stories came out terrific! Out of 23 children, about 17 or so scored a 3,4 or 5. It was really amazing to see that kind of work!
Over spring break I went to Bugbee and continued to help Mrs. DiPietro with the writing prompt and setting up for parent-teacher conferences. She hadn't yet given the actual town writing prompt to the students, instead, she selected 4 of the stories the students had worked on for the writing prompt, made transparency copies of their work, used the over head, and did a minilesson on revision and how they can make their stories better and what the good things that they did in their stories. This I found to be such a great idea! She was teaching revision with students' work and showing them positive sides and negative sides. When reviewing their work, Mrs. DiPietro and I found that they did a better job this time around. Everything seemed to really sink in!
I was really proud of the students and saw for myself such an improvement!
I found that Tompkins gives a TON of ideas on the different ways students can engage in when reading and writing stories. Some of those ideas include “sketch to sketch” found on page 286, “character traits chart” on page 282, a “setting map on page 283, “a plot profile” on page 280, and “a beginning, middle-end cluster” on page 278. Each of those ideas helps reinforce the students’ comprehension to the stories and also aid in bringing new ideas and creations within their minds and in the classroom.
Has anyone been apart of a writing prompt like that? Does anyone else have any ideas they have seen or may have used when conducting reading/writing minilessons?
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I have seen the students in the second grade class I am in complete one writing prompt. When reading what the writing prompt was I feel that there should be less discription and really allow the students to create the story themselves. THe prompt was you are on a playground and you find a key what do you do with it? It is giving them the setting and an idea. I think it would be better to say you find a key what happens. This way the studnets are able to create their own beginning and not have so much guidence. The one problem with this prompt was most of the children simply recreated the lion the witch and the wardrobe. After that the teacher did a lesson teaching the students how to take a story that they have read and make it their own. WHile I was not there to see the lesson when talking to the students about it they really seemed to enjoy it. Also to help to students when they are writing there is always soft music?
Does anyone else find that their students will simply take a story that they have already heard and simply rewrite it?
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