Noticings

When you teach students about "Noticings" you are asking them to teach themselves. Students look at examples of different works and tell you what they notice. For example, when I teach dialogue, I often ask students to look at a page that includes lots dialogue and tell me what they notice about the punctuation and use of capital letters. Students will basically write the rules for you, but they find them themselves as opposed to you just telling them.

I've used "Noticings" in writing units as well. Looking at our persuasive writing stack, I ask students what they notice that all of the persuasive essays have. Then I ask them what some have. You come up with a list "All" and "Some." When students write their own essays, all of them will include things like titles, paragraphs, and examples. Some of them will include subheadings and pictures and quotes. It is student-led learning.

Noticings ask students to find the information themselves. I like teaching with Noticings because students are often surprised at how much they already know. When students feel like experts, they develop a stronger connection to the material and their learning.

Persuasive Writing Stack

I attended a great workshop in my early years teaching. It was all about teaching writing. The argument was that students should read examples of the types of text we ask them to write.

For persuasive writing, I supply students with a stack of persuasive essays. We use different colored highlighters to label the evidence as statistics, expert opinions, and examples for each reading. We also examine the structure and organization of the essays. Only after reading and examining a few examples of persuasive writing are students ready to write their own. Students get to choose one of the stack essays as their model essay (structure and organization) for their own persuasive ideas.

The persuasive stack below comes mostly from a book I received from the NYC Department of Education. Teen Ink was also a valuable resource in finding model personal essays and poems.

Persuasive Writing Stack

Key Terms Foldable!

Foldables can be a creative way to take notes that may otherwise just be a page of words. While not all foldables work for every situation, I have a favorite of the moment. It works particularly well with definitions and key terms. (Tip: The math teachers always know all the great foldables, ask them!)

Students fold their paper long-wise (hot dog style) and then cut to the halfway point for as many terms/boxes needed. 6 is a good limit because any more and the page gets a little flimsy. So the front will have tabs and the back will remain one sheet without cuts.

I like to write the term on the front with the definition on the page below. If it is a term with examples, I will often put the examples on the back of the term tab. They can still be hole-punched for student notebooks.

I used Photo Booth, hence the mirror image.

To start our persuasive writing unit, I am going to have students create this foldable and then identify different examples of each purpose using these worksheets. I think I'm going to create a class anchor chart as well where students can write the different worksheet examples for each category. I'm still deciding if I will have students write the examples or make this a cut and paste activity. I'll have to wait and measure the cooperation level of the class tomorrow...

Socially Aware Valentine's Lesson

A few years ago, I completed a "Love" themed unit in the month of February. Part of the unit asked students to use online resources to create brochures about relationship abuse and preventing such abuse. We watched some online interviews and found articles to incorporate statistics, expert opinions, and anecdotes in the brochures. I have always been a fan of the brochure as an informational writing assignment, and I liked that this one was very socially conscious. Students learned a lot about an issue that affects many men and women.

Bulletin Board including abuse facts and exemplary student work.