Learning Center
writing
Make a summer to-do list
october 25, 2010
As you look ahead to next school year, what organizational or curricular tasks do you want to tackle before the first day of school? Here are some suggestions:
1. Prepare & carry a shopping list.
Keep the list of items you’re looking for within your purse/wallet so it’s always with you. These may include:
— Toys, triggers, and concrete objects to use as visual aids in mini-lesson instruction. TIP: Garage sales and discount tables are great places to search.
— Picture book titles you wanted to find personal copies of. TIP: These could be new or used books.
— Containers to reorganize areas of your literacy environment. TIP: Be sure to take some measurements before leaving your classroom.
2. Organize your mini-lessons.
Check out the Learning Center article on organizing your mini-lessons.3. Find anchor papers.
Identify student writing samples to correspond with mini-lessons you conduct. These could be writings from your own current students that you saved and photocopied or samples you acquired from online resources. Need help locating good anchor papers? Check out these additional web resources.4. Create a day-to-day start-up to your writing year.
What are the procedures you want to deliberately incorporate into your first weeks of school in order to improve the management of your writer’s workshop? How will you reveal the 6 Traits to your writers? Make a 20-day game plan that includes each day’s mini-lesson and students’ independent writing time activity.Need some support to create a beginning-of-the-year plan for launching your writer’s workshop? Kristina Smekens provides just that in her Launching the Writer’s Workshop 5-hour on-demand workshop for Grades K-2 or Grades 3-12.