Possible K–2 Focus Lessons
Workshop Management & Procedures |
Author’s Craft/Writing Strategies |
Conventions |
Creating a Community of Writers ● Talking about our writing histories ● Giving a tour of your notebook ● Sharing entries from a previous student’s notebook ● Talking about your writing with another person |
Generating Ideas ● Making different types of entries in Writers’ Notebooks/folders ● Using entries in a Writer’s Notebook/folder as a springboard to writing projects ● Choosing meaningful topics ● Exploding a moment |
Spelling ● Reading your piece aloud ● Reading your writing backwards looking for spelling errors ● Using dictionaries and spell checkers to fix your own mistakes ● Learning strategies for studying spelling words ● Noticing spelling patterns, rules, and rule breakers |
Procedures ● Using notebooks and/or writing folders effectively ● Using classroom writing resources: dictionaries, thesauruses, spellers, computers, word walls, clipboards, Alphasmarts™, etc. |
Composing ● Placing like ideas in a paragraph ● Using strong verbs to improve writing rather than simply adding lots of adjectives ● Creating visual images with words (snapshots) ● Focusing your writing on one particular thought or idea ● Playing with the passage of time in a piece of writing ● Showing ideas in writing versus telling something ● Adding voice to your writing ● Writing in a variety of formats ● Writing in third person ● Using mentor texts ● Using variety in sentence construction |
Grammar ● Finding and repairing run-on sentences that were not intended to be written as such ● Using commas (most important rules) ● Using a consistent point of view ● Using quotation marks in dialogue |
Revision Techniques ● Organizing ideas ● Checking for appropriate pacing of stories ● Using a title that reflects the writing topic ● Using specific words and precise language (e.g., name of bug instead of just bug) ● Rereading the sentence that tells what the piece is most about, and then finding the 1 or 2 sentences that have the least to do with the main purpose ● Taking a long draft and making it shorter ● Breaking the story into chapters ● Writing the story from a different point of view ● Focusing on audience ● Working on strong beginnings and endings Trying techniques of mentor authors |
Mechanics ● Capitalizing proper nouns ● Placing appropriate punctuation at the end of sentences |
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Publishing ● Typing or recopying ● Completing final illustrations ● Completing dedication page, author page, and cover ● Reading your piece to your audience |