Writing

~ Writing

I loved to write poems and stories when I was a child. I found myself day dreaming about adventures that I would like to pursue. Later, my first teaching position, as a 4th grade teacher was charged with teaching writing. I was ecstatic to show kids how to put their dreams and adventures on paper so others to go along with them.

Writing and Reading go hand and hand. They should be woven together when teaching.

Writing should begin early...

Kinder Writing - Pictures and Words

First Grade Writing - Words and Phrases

Second Grade Writing - Phrases and Sentences, poetry

Third Grade Writing - Sentences, Paragraphs, poetry

Fourth Grade Writing - Paragraphs into multiple-page Papers, poetry

Fifth Grade Writing - Papers, poetry

Revise and Edit - Revising and editing is a crucial part of writing. It is the clean-up or polishing stage of writing. Students need to practice revising and editing daily. This practice should begin in Kindergarten and continue throughout their education journey.
I used a daily program called ifixedit when I taught writing as a 4th grade teacher. The activity only took 10-15 minutes. Students corrected 4 sentences (that were written on the whiteboard) and then we checked their work as a whole group. The ifixedit program was also a helpful practice for 4th grade students' standardized writing test (revise/edit day).
ifixedit can be found at TeachersPayTeachers.com

Structure: (Words, Sentences, Paragraphs, Composition Papers)

Composition Styles: How-To, Narrative (story), Expository, Persuasive

Letter Writing - Business and Friendly

Creative Writing, Poetry (rhyming, stanza lessons) 
Snowman Poetry -Winter Stanza Activity - TeachersPayTeachers.com
Prompts- Story Starters

           Prompts for creative writing (group or individual) can be found at teacherspayteachers.com.

Repeat After Me... I will not use the words: said, very, good, awesome, bad, sad..... instruct students to stay away from the mediocre words that we tend to use in our vocabulary. Teach them to stretch their writing vocabulary and discover new words to express themselves. Replace the boring, mundane words with more robust vocabulary.

Avid/Good Readers are Avid/Good Writers - Don't underestimate the importance of Reading upon Writing. Students who read a lot are exposed to writing. As a teacher, Read Aloud to your students so that they can hear good writing.  
I read the Herculeah Jones Mystery Series to my students (along with other books)...they were interested in the story and we could talk about portions of the book that was good writing by the author...and how they could incorporate it into their personal writing.

Writing Prompts
As a teacher I loved to incorporate interesting writing prompts during writing time to bring out my students' creativity. It was interesting how students responded and wrote so differently to a given writing prompt. You can find out a lot about your students through their writing.
Fall Writing Prompts and Winter Inferencing Scenarios are two great activities that can be used with (creative) writing lessons in your classroom...they can be found at TeachersPayTeachers.com.
*Writing should be used in and practiced during other subjects areas (write during social studies, science, and math time)!