This chart was created to help students form a topic sentence for analysis. This chart was created with literature in mine, but could be modified to work with informational text as well. The fourth graders (the first grade that has this standard) that worked on this chart had never analyzed written to analyze literature. Most of their writing about books… Read more →
Students seem to understand that narratives warrant rich, vivid, sensory language. Likewise, students recognize the argumentative nature of opinion writing and associate that with strong details and illustrative examples. When it comes to informative/ explanatory writing, students suddenly seem compelled to write in a sterile fashion. For some reason, the shift to informational writing results in papers filled with lots… Read more →
This chart was created with sixth graders. Students had written personal narratives during the week. Most of the students had written full stories, but typically just ended the narrative with the last event or big moment. While many of the stories had great arcs, they endings felt more like a letdown. They needed to tie the stories up in a… Read more →
