LEARNING FOCUSED SCHOOLS

LESSON PLAN GUIDE

TEACHER:
Brumfield / LESSON TITLE:
The Important Book Story Writing Project
UNIT: Creating an informational piece using a web to brainstorm and 4-Square Graph to organize / LESSON DATE:
SUBJECT:
Process Writing

Standards:

Focus 1.4.5.A, B, 1.4.5.C, 1.5.5.A, E., Organization: 1.4.5.A, B, C, 1.5.5.C, E.

Style: 1.4.5.A, B, C, 1.5.5.D., E Content: 1.4.5.A, B, C, 1.5.5. B, E

Informational: 1.4.5.B, 1.5.5.A, B, C, D, E, G. Grammar: 1.5.5.F

Key Learning: Effective writers use specific techniques to communicate or express their ideas and feelings in an organized and focused way.
Unit Essential Question: How can we write quality writing piece that conveys a clear message to our audience?
Lesson Essential Question(s):
How do I gather, select, and organize the most effective information appropriate for the topic, task, and audience?
How do effective writers develop substantial, specific, and illustrative content?
How do I engage and influence my audience in a compelling way?
How do we choose and arrange words and/or sentence structure to create tone and voice?
How can I identify correct grammar? How does correct punctuation and spelling impact one’s writing?
Activating Strategy: (see Appendix A for examples)
Read aloud: The Important Book. Have students identify observed text patterns and discuss text format of the paragraphs. Discuss having a topic sentence, supporting details, and conclusion sentence, and use the hamburger graphic organizer to show the parts of a nonfiction paragraph.
Teaching Strategies: (See Appendix B)
Lesson 1 Essential Question: How do I select/choose a topic for my writing piece? (Use a brainstorming web).
1. Explain the task (students will write an informational piece with a hook, three supporting paragraphs of information, and a conclusion that explains their most important characteristic. The three body paragraphs each contain a topic sentence, supporting details, and conclusion sentence.
2. Conduct Think aloud and teacher demonstration of brainstorming and listing topic ideas using the Smart board, overhead, or board (positive traits, strengths, or interests). (See example). Students will list 10 topic ideas of things they are good at doing, or positive traits they possess. Conduct conferences of lists.
2. Conduct a Think aloud as the teacher demonstrates on the Smart Board using a web (after narrowing the topic to one choice) and brainstorm the chosen final topic. Discuss that the topic needs to be meaningful to them and have substantial content to develop the topic. Model how interesting words and ideas can also be added to their webs as they think about them. Students will create a web of the chosen strong topic. Scaffold and conference with students while they are creating webs.
Then read and discuss the teacher’s example story and discuss its components.
Lesson 2 Essential Question: How do I engage and influence my audience in a compelling way? How do we choose and arrange words and/or sentence structure to create tone and voice?
5. Review the Hooks Lesson Slideshow using the Smart Board (previously shown in a lesson). Then Demonstrate (overhead/board/Smart board) how to create a hook for the writing piece teaching them not to give away all their information in the hook. Have students create a hook for their introduction and write it in the middle of the 4-Square. Scaffold and conference with students while they are creating hooks.
Lesson 3 Essential Question: How do I select and organize the most effective information appropriate for the topic, task, and audience? (Use a 4-Square graph)
6. Conduct a Think aloud and demonstration of completion of a 4-Square graph using the Smart board. Stress the need for a topic sentence, categories and supporting details, and a conclusion sentence. Compare to the building of a hamburger. Scaffold and conference with student creations of the 4-Square graphic organizer. Encourage them to write categories which can then be turned into topic sentences.
5. Discuss the genre of autobiography/nonfiction and ask pairs to Turn and Tell to discuss the audience. Demonstrate how this genre for this task requires factual information but the use of humor, adjectives, and vivid verbs are acceptable. Give a non-example by explaining a trait in strict factual form as opposed to using humor, adjectives, and vivid verbs.
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Lesson 4 Essential Question: How do I write a paragraph that has a topic sentence and supporting details?
5. Show the hamburger visual and use the Smart Board to demonstrate how to convert notes on the 4-Square graph to rough draft paragraphs containing a topic sentence, supporting details, and a conclusion sentence.
6. Scaffold and conference during student conversions of 4-Square graphs to paragraphs.
Lesson 5 Essential Question: How can I make revisions so my word choice achieves my writing? How do we choose and arrange words and/or sentence structure to create tone and voice?
7. Demonstrate how to improve the paragraph by adding descriptive adjectives and adverbs and changing verbs to vivid verbs. Read examples of paragraphs in novels that are interesting and compelling.
8. Scaffold and conference student improvements to paragraphs.
Lesson 6 Essential Question: How do effective writers develop substantial, specific, and illustrative content? How do we choose and arrange words and/or sentence structure to create tone and voice?
9. Using the Smart Board, the teacher will demonstrate how to create a conclusion paragraph that reflects the author’s voice and tone and integrates the topic sentence and three main points of their story without being dull.
10. Have pairs find interesting story endings using novels and share whole class what interests them about the passage.
11. Students will create the final conclusion paragraph to the story which integrates the topic sentence and three main points of their story.
12. Scaffold and conference with students about the final paragraph as they are written.
Lesson 8 Essential Question: How does correct punctuation and spelling impact one’s writing? How do I edit my writing for correct grammar?
12. Use poster on Smart Board to review editing symbols.
13. Use interactive site to make editing corrections.
14. Teacher model partner editing for punctuation and spelling errors.
15. Paired Heads edit each other’s work using a red pen.
16. Teacher conferences with students about editing.
17. Students rewrite the final draft of the story using the computer, have them spell-check and add a graphic.
Graphic Organizer/Foldable being used: Web & 4-Square graphs
Distributed Guided Practice/Summarizing Questions for Pairs:
See above.
Higher level question/s being used: Enrichment: How do you create a more exciting hook and topic sentence?
Summarize (culminating): (See Appendix C)
The Important Thing:
Ask students to write one sentence that best summarizes what they consider to be the most important information from the lesson.