Sunday, October 25, 2015
Thoughts on my Narrative Unit, Term 1
I focused this unit on memoir. I posted these thoughts about it:
Then I would read Thunder Cake by Patricia Polacco, The Rag Coat by Lauren Mills, and Freedom Summer by Deborah Wiles to work through adding strong verbs, sentence variety, and figurative language.
Finally, we worked on making sure that we had a good reflection at the end. This is one thing I don't think I spent enough time on. I did have some examples for them, but I would go over this more next time.
At this point I did a peer review. I think the next time I do it, I'll have the peer reviewer take highlighters and mark dialogue with blue, thought and feelings with yellow, description with green, and to be verbs and has/have/had (weak verbs) with pink. Then I'll have them ask two questions and give one compliment and two suggestions for improvement. I didn't do a very formal assessment of the peer review, but I should have.
After the peer review they turned it in and I graded them. I had them submit on google docs, which does save you the pain of carrying around all those papers.
"Memoir is a window into life." William Zinsser
"In writing memoir we select moments that reveal our own
experiences of our lives."
Lucy
McCormick Calkins
"Memoir is how writers look at the past and make sense of it." Nancie
Atwell
"Memoir recognizes and explores moments on the way to growing
up and becoming oneself, the good moments and the bad ones." Nancie
Atwell
To brainstorm I had the student make list of "Aha" moments in their lives.
Some of them struggled with this, so I had a little helper list for them:
The one I picked to share was called "Chalk Face."
After we did that, I had the students pick a memory from their list that was 1. a slice of their life (a moment), 2. something they could remember enough of to describe adequately, and 3. a moment where they either learned something or their life changed course.
I didn't give a written assignment for this, but I think next year I should. It was more off the cuff because this year is made up as I go along, as it's my first year doing this.
After they picked the moment, we went into the writing lab and created a barf draft. I had them just get the story down as well as they could without worrying about how it sounded.
Next we focused on several things. I had them rewrite the beginning using several focused hook ideas.
This was hard work, but all of them agreed that it made their writing better.
Next we focused on adding description, dialogue, strong verbs, and generally making better sentences. I used several resources that I found online.
I didn't do this, but some great mentor texts to share at this time (with a document camera, which I don't have but which is a must have for next year, I think), would have started with Fly Away Home by Eve Bunting. Picture books are always great tools for teaching good sentences, as well written picture books have very carefully crafted and chosen sentences.
I would show the above version to students and then read aloud the version from the book (see version below). Then I would ask my students what they noticed about the differences between the two versions. Did they like the book's version better? Why?Some of them struggled with this, so I had a little helper list for them:
- What’s
your earliest memory?
- What
is the most important thing that has ever happened to you?
- What
is the worst thing that ever happened to you?
- What
is something you will never forget?
- What
is the moment where you were 100% happy?
- What
was a time when you felt brokenhearted?
- What
memory shows something important about your family or your friends?
- What
was a time when you’ve laughed harder than you’ve ever laughed before?
- Who
was the biggest influence (positive or negative) on your life?
- What
have you done that you never thought you would do?
- What
was the greatest challenge of your life so far?
- What
do you wish you had done differently in your life?
- Who do you wish you could see again?
The one I picked to share was called "Chalk Face."
After we did that, I had the students pick a memory from their list that was 1. a slice of their life (a moment), 2. something they could remember enough of to describe adequately, and 3. a moment where they either learned something or their life changed course.
I didn't give a written assignment for this, but I think next year I should. It was more off the cuff because this year is made up as I go along, as it's my first year doing this.
After they picked the moment, we went into the writing lab and created a barf draft. I had them just get the story down as well as they could without worrying about how it sounded.
Next we focused on several things. I had them rewrite the beginning using several focused hook ideas.
This was hard work, but all of them agreed that it made their writing better.
Next we focused on adding description, dialogue, strong verbs, and generally making better sentences. I used several resources that I found online.
I didn't do this, but some great mentor texts to share at this time (with a document camera, which I don't have but which is a must have for next year, I think), would have started with Fly Away Home by Eve Bunting. Picture books are always great tools for teaching good sentences, as well written picture books have very carefully crafted and chosen sentences.
Working together as a class, we would use the Adding Voice suggestions to see if the author used any of the techniques.
At this point I did a peer review. I think the next time I do it, I'll have the peer reviewer take highlighters and mark dialogue with blue, thought and feelings with yellow, description with green, and to be verbs and has/have/had (weak verbs) with pink. Then I'll have them ask two questions and give one compliment and two suggestions for improvement. I didn't do a very formal assessment of the peer review, but I should have.
After the peer review they turned it in and I graded them. I had them submit on google docs, which does save you the pain of carrying around all those papers.
Sunday, October 4, 2015
Learning is a Journey -- A Tour of My New Classroom
Each room in the building has a value outside of it. I'm loving the one I randomly ended up with.
|
As you come in and look to the left, you'll see a bookshelf and pictures. This is actually the tail end of my books.
|
I love this picture which says "A book sitting on a shelf in a room is like having completely different worlds at the ready waiting to be explored."
|
This shelf is where I keep my short story collections (yellow stickers) and my nonfiction books (purple stickers). I do love the covered boxes I made up on the top using modge podge and maps.
|
This corner is oddly shaped, but ended up perfect for putting my radio (great reception here by the window)
and my poetry collection.
|
A closeup of my little poet's corner. |
This was the perfect spot for some of those worthless, er, wonderful doodads that you tend to get as a teacher. |
I got these cute box labels from the website of an overachieving elementary teacher. A little tweaking, and each of my seven classes has an inbox (and a continent)! |
My containers with stickers. This was another buy at Lakeridge that traveled with me. |
The actual desk that was in the room is quite small. I shoved it right up against the wall and am using it as a storage cabinet only. I really like the Home Depot office supply organizer I made. |
Another view. |
I printed the file labels on maps -- it just made it so fun. They are laminated for protection. |
I was worried about the life of my cute stickers, so they are covered with modge podge. This makes it impossible for students to mess with them -- yes, I knew they couldn't resist. |
Finally, I added some appropriate hall passes with hall pass, office, library, and bathroom printed in several languages. They are permanently affixed to the clipboards and work well. |
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