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Stating Your Case: Writing Thesis Statements Effectively
As a writer, if you have a weak introductory paragraph or thesis statement, you might lose your audience! Have your middle and high schoolers practice writing introductory paragraphs that include clear thesis statements in response to...
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Use The Polar Express to Develop Rich and Detailed Writing
Bring The Polar Express into your middle school classroom to spark the creativity of your emerging writers.
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Lesson Plan 13: Going Deeper Mini-Lesson
November is NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month! If your class is participating (or simply doing a narrative writing unit), this peer review lesson is part of a larger unit which can be easily found online. Once your writers have...
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Writing a Character Sketch
Combining descriptive and expository writing skills, middle schoolers create a character sketch about someone they know well. They use a graphic organizer to help them discuss a model character sketch and organize/write one of their own....
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Memoir Writing Based on Jerry Spinelli's Milkweed
Using chapter 1 of Jerry Spinelli's Milkweed, middle schoolers write a personal memoir based on Spinelli's style and a Six Trait writing activity. The lesson suggests several ways to activate prior knowledge, including a picture book and...
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Writing and Presenting a Fable Using Research
Elementary and middle schoolers research animal facts and use them in a fable. First, they pair-share to find animal traits to use in writing a fable. They then complete a prewriting worksheet. After going through the writing process,...
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Picture It: Teaching Descriptive Writing
There are many fun and effective ways to teach students to write descriptively.
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Details, Details, Details
Writing can become one-dimensional if authors don't involve all their senses. First, scholars observe a strange object which, ideally, they can touch and even smell. Without using certain words (you can create a list or have the class...
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Effective Writing Prompts: Getting Beyond the Dark and Stormy Night
Help struggling writers with strategies to reach different learning styles and reduce anxiety.
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Lesson Plan: Wide Open Spaces
What's the difference between city space and wide open space? Young analysts explore each space through writing, critical thinking, and discussion. They use what they learn to create collages that exemplify both worlds. Great discussion...
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Writing Skills: LETTERS HOME
Students compose a descriptive letter to their families. In this descriptive writing lesson students write a letter as if they have left their family for a new country and will try to convince their families to join them. They will...
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Characterizations: Indirect and Direct
Connect literature to narrative writing by researching descriptive writing techniques. Elementary and middle schoolers identify the importance of a narrator and voice in the storytelling process. They read writing samples and identify...
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An Imaginary Creature And Then Using Describing And Action Words for a Creative Writing Exercise
You have to collect lots of materials (boxes, bags, toilet paper rolls, etc.) for this lesson to work successfully. After modeling how to create an imaginary creature out of the collection of recycled materials, let your class search...
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How Do Authors Use Imagery to Shape Their Writing?
Esther Forbes' award-winning Revolutionary War novel, Johnny Tremain and excerpts from Julie Otsuka's When the Emperor Was Divine are used to model how imagery brings alive the setting of a story. The young writers then craft their own...
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Writing Fables
Young scholars write their own fables. In this writing fables lesson, students use handheld computers to write a fable. The class designs a spreadsheet to organize common elements of fables. Young scholars also edit each others' work.
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Writing a Television Advertisement
Pupils choose their favorite television show, craft and illustrate an advertisement for this show, and then write a short paragraph about why the show appeals to them. No provisions are made for children with limited or no viewing...
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Writing: Laying and Covering the Foundation
Your middle schoolers can become stronger writers with a lesson covering the basics. They compose effective thesis statements and introductions, discuss different ways to capture a reader's attention, and compare a poorly written...
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Describe a Journey
Students describe the sensory experience of a character's journey in an essay. In this precise details writing lesson, students explain the effects on the senses of weather, time of day, landscape, and other experiences. Students use...
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"Snapshot" Exercises & Sensory Detail Word Bank
Read a sample of creative descriptive writing to your science class. Discuss how writing can be used to record and communicate observations that scientists make. Reading selections and thought-provoking questions are suggested. Also...
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Boogie Woogie with a B: Using Alliteration while Exploring Patriotic Tunes
Are you looking for a way to bring writing into your history lesson plan - or history into your writing lesson plan? This cross-curricular activity is helpful and fun, no matter what class you're teaching! Using "Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy"...
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Writing Classroom Agreements using Inspiration & Word to Go
How can you foster a thoughtful learning community for your class? First, the class brainstorms a list of behaviors that will help make the classroom a great place to learn. Then learners group similar ideas together and come up with...
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Beautiful Noise Poetry
"What a beautiful noise comin' up from the street; got a beautiful sound, it's got a beautiful beat..." Use Neil Diamond's "Beautiful Noise" to guide your class through a Six Trait writing activity, in which they write an original poem...
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Lesson: Writings from a Room with No View
Learners examine art by considering how the subject matter and artists design choices affect the viewer's experience. They use the provided close-up images and notes to analyze the painting, Poppies. Afterward, they use the painting as a...
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Lesson: Unfolding Water Lilies
Comparing two different artistic mediums can be a welcome challenge. Learners compare Monet's The Water Lily Pond to three nature-inspired poems. They consider how each art form is interrelated, descriptive, and expressive. They then...