As we move further into writing our Realistic Fiction drafts, we have revisited the writing strategy called Show, Don’t Tell.
So, what is Show, Don’t Tell? Watch the video below to find out!
After several examples and some practice work at home, too, students partnered with a buddy in class and looked closely at their own writing to find at least 1 example where applying the strategy would help bump up their work.
What an exciting day! The students have worked so hard to help make this book come together and today we celebrated by reading our books and sharing with our classmates.
Have a look at the action. Our classroom bulletin board will also have each student’s picture and paragraph on display this week to share with our school community.
Way to go, Grade 3s! I’m so proud of all of you.
Students have been busily writing their opinions on various topics. We brainstormed ‘hot topics‘. Some of the ideas that were generated in our class included:
We are learning to structure our writing with an opening sentence clearly stating our opinion followed by 3 reasons why we believe it to be so. Finally, we finish with a concluding sentence, restating our opinion.
Have a look below at the students engaged in a sharing activity called “Inside/Outside Circle” where the outside circle rotates and the inside circle stays. Students share their paragraph and receive feedback on their work.
What’s something you feel very strongly FOR or AGAINST?
Our students are thrilled to have pen-pals this year. We are partnered with a Grade 3 class from Texas. Our students brainstormed, drafted, and wrote their good copy of their very first pen-pal letter and also drew a picture to accompany the letter. We learned about the parts that make up a letter and how to properly address an envelope. Our letters should arrive in Texas on Tuesday. I will ask Mrs. J for her to take a picture of her class opening our parcel and reading our letters!
We are super excited to receive letters in return! We hope they arrive before Christmas.
What a special day it was today when, one by one, students’ stories were introduced to the class with cheers, applause, and proud smiles.
Celebrating our writing is an important part of the writing process, and what better way to do that than with a treat and reading each others’ stories.
Congratulations authors!
As we gear up for Christmas, our days are filled with plenty of learning, discussion, and activity. Students talk about their Elf on the Shelf, what their plans are for Christmas, decorating their tree, and get excited as we being to play Christmas music.
Check out our students in action in various subject areas over the past few weeks.
As we wrapped up our narrative unit, students were asked to work with a partner to share their work and use criteria to help them ensure their peer has all the important ingredients in their story. Students worked together to analyze the writing and see where they can bump it up!
We can’t wait to share our published stories with you!
In Writing Workshop, students have been working hard to create leads for their personal narrative.We’ve learned different ways to begin our story including describing the setting, using dialogue, or even writing an action. A lead helps your reader get into your story. It needs to ‘hook‘ your reader so they want to keep on reading!
Here, students are sharing their 2 leads with a partner and using their partner to help them decide which one is stronger.
We can learn a lot from what we call ‘mentor texts‘ which are texts written by published authors. Students listened to several examples of leads written by authors they are familiar with (ie. Charlotte’s Web author E.B. White, Ramona Quimby author Beverley Cleary). We can use these authors to help show us what are things that WE can try, too!
Do you have a lead of your own or from an author you like that really ‘hooked’ you to keep on reading? If so, please share it with us!
We had a special visitor to our school today…Mike Wade, the author of And Then It Happened series. He made us laugh and taught us about the writing process. Did you know he used to be a prison guard?
Mike really tried to make the students understand that truly anyone can be a writer. He only started writing in his early 40s and is now in his 50s. You can start writing at any age! He also stressed the importance of revision. He said the average number of times he revises is 7 times. Wow!
Mike has now written a total of 13 books and luckily our class has them all! Our school library does too. His stories are suitable for anyone who likes a good laugh. His characters, Gordon, Paulo, and I are always up for challenges and anything that sounds like trouble!
If you’ve never read a Mike Wade book, give it a try! You won’t regret it.
