Fortgang 1

Meg Fortgang

Professor Smulyan

EDU 017 – Curriculum & Methods

26 January 2011

Writing Workshop Microlesson

Context: Students are in the midst of a writing unit on informational pieces. Previously, students have read and identified elements of informational writers’ craft in short articles about penguins, animal mouths, and Harry Houdini. Each student has read, researched, and taken notes about a famous African American; each student has taken down notes about which article style they would like to replicate. Now students are working on formatting and sequencing their facts into a coherent piece of informational writing.

Essential Questions:

What does a piece of informational writing look like?

How is a piece of informational writing organized?

How can a writer look at their writing from a reader’s perspective?

Instructional Objectives:

Students will be able to recognize and locate elements of informational writers' craft (e.g., q&a, timeline, details, dates, etc.).

Students will be able to re-read their writing from the reader's perspective (e.g., identify questions the reader might have, find gaps where elaboration is needed).

Students will be able to recognize and locate critical elements of biography sequencing (e.g., dates, birth, childhood, family, life, accomplishments, future/death).

Students will be able to organize and draft a piece of informational writing.

Materials:

Colored pens

Print out of informational piece (text & captioned photos)

Document camera

Script:

We are going to practice writing an informational piece. All of you are writing about famous African Americans but I'm going to do a different sort of example. I'm going to write about somebody that I'm an expert on that you don't know very much about yet.

Here is the title of our informational piece - "Who is Teacher Meg?" (reveal title on document camera).

I wrote a little informational piece about what I do everyday. So, I'm going to be the writer of this piece and you are going to be my readers. To be good readers, you need to be curious and ask lots of questions to help me write a piece that has lots of interesting information.

To begin, here is my rough draft. Let's read it out loud and see what I've done so far. I want you to pay attention to: what questions have I already answered, what questions do you still have, and what type of writer's craft am I using (think about your penguin, Houdini articles).

Before Reading:

We’ve talked about structure and formatting. What elements of that do you see here? (paragraphs, captioned photos, headers, title)

What do you already know about this piece just based on the elements of format and structure?

(read informational piece aloud - students take turns reading)

After 1st Section:

What important pieces of information did I include so far? (birth, where I am from, what I’ve done, what I am doing, what I will do) Highlight with a pen the important facts that they identify.

After 2nd Section Say: Just like in the last paragraph I include a bunch of important facts.

What is the relationship between the first section and the second section? (timeline, question/answer)

What do you still want to know? (possible answers: how old am I now, where did I go to school when I was their age, who was my best friend, when did I meet my best friend, how old is my sister, etc.) Hypotheses about what is to come and I can add in with a pen the information that they are curious about that I did not include.

After 3rd Section: Say: Let’s think about the whole piece together.

Where could I add more details to answer your questions? (Demonstrate editing my writing for content by writing on my piece to indicate where I should go into more detail) I can add in with a pen the information that they are curious about that I did not include.

Wrap-Up Discussion:

What observations did we make that might help you write your drafts?

What aspects of writer’s craft might you take away from my writing?

Assessment (observational): Students will utilize understandings in drafting their own informational pieces of famous African Americans.