Writing with Focus

Have you ever noticed that sometimes your brain is so full of ideas, that once you sit down to put them on paper they come flooding out and the focus becomes muddy? For a lot of students (especially mine), the answer to that question is a big, fat, Y-E-S! Through the years, I have noticed that my students have great ideas, but difficulty sticking to those ideas in their writing. Or, they try to write too big, and the interesting fall by the wayside in an effort to get down the events that happened on a particular day. That's why I had to share the awesome writing project we did earlier this year. I would LOVE to take all of the credit for this one, but I actually got this idea from a coworker who had been struggling with the same issue with her students. 

We wanted our kids to be able to pick an interesting topic, but then narrow the focus of their writing so that they could add great details and be more descriptive. Often times, when students pick a topic that they have a lot to say about, the writing becomes too general and jumps around. We wanted the students to "linger" in a specific moment in time with their audience. To do that, they had to focus their writing from broad to specific. To help my students understand this idea, we first viewed the book Zoom by Istvan Banyai. The students and I discussed that the more we "zoomed in" on each picture, the more details we were able to discover. I then related this to a microscope. As you zoom in on a microscope, you obtain more information about your subject than you would have gleaned by simply using your eyes. This visual reminder helped immensely as the students began their writing projects.

 Image courtesy of http://msmcclure.com/?page_id=6313

We started by picking events that we remembered very clearly. But, instead of writing about the entire experience, we "focused in" on a moment. It was challenging for the kids to not write about an entire trip or an entire day, but with some help they got there. I gave them a graphic organizer (see right) that was an upside-down triangle. I modeled the process of narrowing our writing focus with my own trip to the zoo during summer vacation. Rather than write generally about the whole day, I decided to write about watching the new baby gorilla playing in the pool of her enclosure. The narrowing of my topic went like this: Summer Vacation> Trip to Washington, D.C.> Zoo> Gorilla Enclosure> Watching the baby play in the pool.




Rather than have the students take off and start writing, we spent time developing good leads and then choosing the most interesting one. We discussed how to incorporate sensory language into our writing to help the reader feel as though they, too, we a part of our experience. We ended with how to write a conclusion, or "wrap," that tied back to our lead and brought our writing to a satisfying end. Below are some pictures of our final writing display, as well as examples of student work. 

 

 

I hope you find this post helpful and try it out with your students. Have you done any interesting writing projects this year?

New Discovery: Pic Lit!

This week, my kids used a really cool site I discovered (thanks to Twitter)! The site is called Pic Lit. There, you can search a wide variety of inspirational photos and create sentences (or paragraphs) that appear right on top of the photos. What I really like is there are two ways of doing this:

1) A drag and drop with provided words for those writers who need some inspiration


OR


2) A freestyle for writing virtually anything


Since this was the first time my kids had used the site, I just had them write what came to their minds when they say the picture. Here are some of the results:

I told them not to worry about spelling or capitalization this time, so excuse our errors. I just wanted them to be inspired. As I have thought more about this site, I feel like there are TONS of possible uses in the classroom. Some of these include:

• writing a full poem with the picture as a background
• collecting favorite book quotes and writing them into pictures that match
• writing sentences using sensory and figurative language
• writing sentences about "life" and life lessons
• writing themes of books

I needed to create a log in, and then I used our class name as the "Pen Name." When the kids log in, they log in as me, but they are all able to log on simultaneously. There isn't a print feature, so you can have them email you the pictures and then copy and paste the images into word if you want to print them. I use a program called MSWSnap to take pictures of them from the site and then save them. Do what works best for you. 

How do you think you might use Pic Lit in your classroom?

Week in Review 2/17/11

A thought occurred to me today: I do not post as often as I would like to. What I will *try* to do from now on is provide you with a "Week in Review." As I stated in my first ever blog post, this blog is primarily to share my teaching life- the good, the bad, and the sometimes ugly. I will share my ups and downs in hopes that you will benefit from what is (and is not) working for me in my educational endeavors. And, for fun, I may include some random stuff, too. 

This week, my kids and I started reading Phoebe the Spy. It is part of our anthology (which I am openly not a huge fan of), but it is a theme paper back instead of the textbook. I decided to dip into these paperbacks because my teammate (who is the math, science, social studies, and health teacher)just started a unit on the American Revolution with our kids. I wanted to support this in my room by reading some historical fiction related to that time period. The kids like the book, but I am not sure I like what I am doing with it. I originally got the idea from the Comprehension Toolkit. There is a lesson (I can't remember which off of the top of my head) in which you use historical fiction to complete a Fact, Question, Response (FQR) sheet. At first it seemed like a great idea, but this story is somewhat long to do this with. I may probably will abandon the idea next week and replace it with the tried and true sticky notes. 

We also started working on an opinion piece about whether or not gum should be allowed in schools. We are currently in the research and outline phase. The technology integration teacher showed the students how to do a keyword search that would help them find sites that would contain facts supporting their opinions. They came up with "bubble gum benefits," "bubble gum facts," "bubble gum school," and "bubble gum bad." The kids are really into it and have found a lot of information that supports their opinion (the majority obviously think it is a GREAT idea). Our principal liked the idea and what she heard from the kids while she was in the computer lab with us so much that she is in the process of ordering enough gum for every student taking the state tests next month. I hope this helps them realize the power writing can have!

Things that "made my day" this week:

1. I had a nice hearty laugh when one of my kiddos came bursting into the room in the morning, excitedly announcing to his buddy that he had finished the first Harry Potter book and how he "couldn't BELIEVE that..." Only to be shushed by said buddy so he didn't "ruin it for everyone else." They then scampered off to our library to whisper secretly about the ending. SO cute.
2. After returning from a grade level meeting that took me away from my homeroom, I came back to a note from the substitute complimenting my class on how hard they worked and how well behaved they had been. This was, in the sub's opinion, "a direct reflection of my wonderful classroom management." That would make any teacher feel great, and I made a mental note to remember her words the next time I feel like my management is less than "wonderful." 
3. Our superintendent has agreed to be a guest on our televised school announcements for World Read Aloud Day on March 7th. He will read a poem or short story to the whole school. (We are also working on getting in touch with Ben Carson to see if he has some availability...cross your fingers and toes!)
4. My Donors Choose project has posted and is already receiving donations! I hope we raise all the money needs, our classroom library could use some sprucing up!

On a personal note, my mom just got me a fantastic belated birthday present from Etsy. I am in LOVE with all things Harry Potter (which is probably the reason behind my owl obsession, too). I found two necklaces that I fell in love with containing quotes form The Deathly Hallows. These quotes both still bring tears to my eyes. I could not possibly decide between them...so, my wonderful mother got both! *YAY*

I hope you all had a great week and are going to enjoy a nice three day weekend! 

An Exciting Opportunity!

I got some great news a few weeks ago. I can hardly contain myself! I just hope the kiddos find it as fascinating as I do!


Are you ready?????????


Our school is planning to host a Webinar with child author (and prodigy) Adora Svitak!!!



Ok, ok, ok...some of you may be thinking what I was at first: "Who?"




I am not too proud to admit that I wasn't sure who she was at first. However, I immediately began to research and was blown away. Adora Svitak began writing when she was very young, and published her first book at the age of seven! She also began reading chapter books at age three! She has written books meant to inspire other young writers which are full of her own short stories, poems, and writing tips. In addition to her writing, Adora also spends time teaching children about writing. She accomplishes this through school visits and webinars...which is what we will be doing!

Check out the video above of Adora talking about her reading and writing life (I love how well spoken she is!)

The Webinars will take place over the course several weeks. All fourth and fifth grade students will participate. There will be four one-hour sessions. Each homeroom will have the opportunity to Skype with Adora while the other students participate via livestreaming chat. The homerooms will rotate turns talking to Adora using Skype. Each week, Adora will be presenting the steps to write a short story. The students will be given an assignment to work on each week so that they are prepared for the next week's lesson.


I am very curious to observe how the students react to someone so close to their age who has accomplished so much. I truly hope it will be a motivating and inspiring experience. I am also interested to see how they perform on assignments given to them by a peer rather than a traditional adult teacher. Something tells me they might pull out all the stops to impress Adora!

It's a Bloggy Blog World!

This week, I had the most fun blogging with my students! Blogs are a fantastic resource because the kids forget they are "writing", therefore they enjoy it a whole lot more than when we whip out the pencils and paper! We have used blogs in the past to post book reviews and discuss stories, but this week we worked on expressing ourselves by playing "Three Truths and a Lie" in the blogging world. 


For our class blog, I use KidBlog. It's specifically designed for teachers to use with students. You can control comments and settings, which I feel is very important. 


The assignment for this blogging session was created by our Tech Integration Teacher (so lucky to have one!). We discussed the importance of choosing truths that were very unique and outrageous to match an outrageous lie, or picking a lie that sounded believable enough to be true and fit in with more "normal" truths. The kids did a great job! 


The kicker was that when they finished their own post, they then had to comment on at least five other blog posts. In their comments, students were told to single out the false statement and explain why they thought it wasn't true using thoughtful reasoning. 


Here are some of my favorite posts:

I joined in on the fun, too! Here is a screen shot of my post:

Not to brag, but I got the most comments! :) Once the kids get five or more comments on their posts, they are allowed to reveal the "falsehood" (yay vocabulary!). Can you guess which one was mine?

"Poem of the Week" Freebies!

At our school, our wonderful reading specialist provides a poem of the week every two weeks for both the primary and intermediate grades. She gathers poems and creates quick-writes to go along with them. The poems often have something to do with the season or an upcoming event/holiday. Each class works with the poems, and students hand in their work by noon on Thursdays. Then, our reading specialist chooses one primary and one intermediate students to share their response on our televised morning announcements. The kids all want to be picked, so they must make sure their responses are well thought out and well written.


 In addition to using the activities provided, I often use these poems for a myriad of other things: comprehension, practicing grammar skills, fluency homework, vocabulary instruction, etc. I have been given permission to share these wonderful poems and worksheets with you. Please see the links below, with topics in bold, to download the poems and activities.


Back to School:
Cleaning House in My Brain (Primary)
Cleaning House in My Brain (Intermediate)


Football:
Nightplayer (Primary)
Victory (Intermediate)


Fall:
Autumn Time is Coming (Primary)
Autumn Fires (Intermediate)
Five Little Pumpkins (Primary)
Haunted House (Intermediate)


On the weeks that we do not have "Poem of the Week," our special educator provides us with "Math Masters." I am not a math teacher, but as soon as I get her permission, I will write about these as well because I believe them to be great resources for everyone...they sure do motivate our kids! 

How do you plan on using these poems in your classroom?


Happy Reading!

Spook-tacular Real Estate Ads

This week, my students and I started a writing project that was inspired by a GREAT blog post/lesson from Clutter-Free Classroom. We're writing Real Estate Ads for...wait for it....


HAUNTED HOUSES!!!


My kids are TOTALLY into the idea! They really let their sick, twisted creative minds fly with this one!


I basically followed the lesson created by Clutter-Free Classroom, but added some of my own pieces as well.


We started out but reading a poem by Jack Prelutsky called "Haunted House." We talked about what they visualized when they read it. Next, we looked at some actual real estate ads and discussed how the writers of those ads try to make their home sound appealing. We talked about the various amenities homeowners look for, as well as the tone of the ads.


After that, we discussed who our target "buyers" would be for a haunted house. They came up with things like ghosts, goblins, zombies, etc. One of my students pointed out that those individuals probably wouldn't be looking for the same type of house a normal human being would. This idea led me right into the next phase, which was reading a short story about a haunted house that my colleague found. We read it together to find good adjectives they could use to describe a haunted house.


After we were all good and spooked, I set them loose to begin brainstorming rooms and amenities that would be found in their haunted houses, as well as "creepy adjectives" that they could use to describe their homes. They did a great job! Some ideas included a "slime pool," "bleeding ceilings," "undead butlers," and a "spell casting room." They came up with adjectives like "gory," "gruesome," "horrifying," "putrid," and "noxious" (which happened to be one of our recent "words of the day"...yessssss!). I then combined all of their thinking (TWO classes worth) into one chart to be displayed in the room.


 I can't wait to get them started on drafting!

What reading and writing related activities are you doing/have you done for Halloween?

Poems, anyone?

One of my new favorite things to do in my class is write poetry. The kids love writing poems, and it is a quick and easy go-to writing assignment. So far we have almost two poems under our belts. The first one we wrote was to piggy back off of a lesson we did on sensory language. My AMAZING teammate came up with the idea, and I loved it so much I am sharing it with you! It worked really well and I got some of the best writing I have seen from 5th graders since I started teaching!

The first thing we did was talk about how authors use sensory language to help readers feel immersed in their "world." A great book for teaching this is Smokey Night by Eve Bunting. This is the story of the Los Angeles riots told through the eyes of a child. We talked about what one would have seen, heard, smelled, and felt during this monumental event. 


After that, we talked about how colors can be described in a way that makes you see, hear, smell, feel and even taste them. We read part of the book I Love You the Purplest by Barbara M. Joosse for this activity. Joosse creates wonderful imagery through her use of descriptive sensory language. I got goosebumps! 


Finally we got to the writing. To complete their activity, the students picked a crayon with an interesting name from my box of 64 Crayola crayons. (I imagine this could be much more interesting if you had the oh-so-epic 120 count box...but alas, I don't.) We discussed how some colors were "cool" and some "warm." We talked about the mood that could be created by different colors. 


Using their crayons as inspiration (who wouldn't be inspired by colors such as "Purple Mountains Majesty" or "Tickle Me Pink"???), the students began drafting their poems using this outline from http://www.writingfix.com/:

After going through the writing process, we finally published the poems in Microsoft Word. I thought it would be neat to use the "outline" text feature for the color names so that the students could use their crayons to shade in the words. I also had them illustrate their work with pictures of what they had described. Below are some of the poems the students created: