Wednesday, May 8, 2013

Workshop Wednesday: Writing Love

Time for another Workshop Wednesday with Jivey!

Today's topic is about keeping the writing love alive in your classroom. These are some of the few things that I do to help encourage my students to keep writing.

One of the first things we do (like the first few days of school) is to fill out our heart maps.

Every student gets a heart, and I demonstrate how to fill it in with things I love, things I like to do, little reminders of funny stories (like the time the dog fell in the pool twice in the same night while going outside).

These go in the front of their writing binders where they can add to it and refer to it the whole year.


They love this! I do have to remind them that they are supposed to be sketches...not super detailed drawings-some of them love drawing so much!

Another thing we do is to track our progress on our writing steps pencil.

I got this from the Ultimate Writing Resource from Lesson Plan SOS (one of my first TPT purchases!). I have mini clothespins on it (from Walmart) with their numbers on it. Even though they are 10, they LOVE moving their clothespins down the pencil-only to have to start all over with a new piece :)

We also write a lot of Poetry in my class. I love exposing them to poetry, and it's also a great way to motivate those kids who really struggle with writing longer pieces, because poetry can be short, sweet, and not necessarily follow any format :)


I like to sprinkle poetry in between any major writing, sort of like a writing 'break' for their brains. They almost always cheer when I say we are doing poetry. :)

Another thing to keep them motivated-fun writing paper! Even the most boring writing assignment can be brought to life with some fun clip-art, borders and cute writing paper. I sometimes make my own, and the kids are always excited to see what I come up with :)
I made these!

These came from different products I bought or searching the internet

What do you do to keep the writing love going in your class? Link up with Jivey!

Smiles and Sunshine,
Kaitlyn

6 comments:

  1. YES! All of these things rock- especially the fun paper- there is just something about different paper that makes the same work even better! :-P
    Jivey
    ideas by jivey

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  2. I agree! I call it pretty paper in my classroom! :) The kids know their final copy is always done on "pretty paper!"
    Theresa
    Pinkadots Elementary

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  3. I am getting so many great ideas from this linky! I love the idea of making a heart map at the beginning of the year! Thanks for sharing so many cute and motivating ideas!

    Amanda
    Learning to the Core

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  4. It is a great idea to add poetry in between the big writing units. I don't do enough in my classroom and definitely want to add more poetry more next year. Thanks for sharing.

    Foreman Teaches

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  5. I love the heart maps too, only sometimes I forget to go back and use them later in the year :(

    Looking From Third to Fourth

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  6. Those writing papers are adorable! We always begin with the heart maps too. Great ideas!

    Jennifer
    Mrs. Laffin's Laughings

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