The second grade teachers will be using the Writer’s Workshop process to teach writing at Pearl Lean Elementary. As in a professional writer’s workshop, each student in the class is a working author. The teacher is a writing professional and peer coach, guiding authors as they explore their craft. Writer’s Workshop is designed to emphasize the act of writing itself-students spend most of their time putting pencil to paper, not just learning about it over time, students learn to choose their own topics and to manage their own development as they work through a wide variety of writing projects in a sustained and self-directed way.
Each unit, students will publish one piece from their collection. At the end of the year, we will have an author's celebration where the students will choose their favorite story to publish in a hard cover book. |
Opinion: Using the Power of Reviews
Young children naturally speak in persuasive ways. It is as if they are natural salesmen - arguing for a later bedtime, debating why they should be able to attend a special event or campaigning to be a proud owner of a pet. They give their opinions about books they read, places they visit, movies they watch, and video games they play. This natural tendency to argue for what they want or to share their viewpoints is elevated in this unit by teaching young writers that opinions must be substantiated with reasons.
By studying reviews in the real world, young writers learn categories to include in specific types of reviews, qualities of good writing that make reviews more interesting and compelling, specialized language and vocabulary, and how to research to give credibility to their pieces. Students love "living the life of a reviewer" and begin viewing the world around them in a new light. They further develop and strengthen their writing by cycling through the process of planning, revising, editing, and publicly sharing their opinions with a real audience.
By studying reviews in the real world, young writers learn categories to include in specific types of reviews, qualities of good writing that make reviews more interesting and compelling, specialized language and vocabulary, and how to research to give credibility to their pieces. Students love "living the life of a reviewer" and begin viewing the world around them in a new light. They further develop and strengthen their writing by cycling through the process of planning, revising, editing, and publicly sharing their opinions with a real audience.