Writer's Workshop: Informative Writing

This year I have decided to implement (my own version of) writer's workshop for my writing instruction.  You can learn more about how I started by reading my post on Launching Writer's Workshop and my first unit: Narrative Writing in Writer's Workshop.  And honestly, each day gets better!  I am loving writer's workshop and can't believe I haven't been doing it this way all along!

I chose to focus on informative writing-(specifically "All About" pieces)-for the month of October and I will give you a summary of how it went!

I chose informative writing for October because this time of year naturally lends itself to learning about spiders, bats, and pumpkins.  Not only are there an endless amount of books and other reading material, but the kids are always so engaged with these topics.  Unlike my narrative post, I'm not going to list the mentor texts because for this unit, I find that you don't need to be quite as selective.  I went to the public library and my own bookshelves at home and pulled every spider, bat, and pumpkin nonfiction book I could find.

So just in case you haven't read my other blog posts (gasp!), the format for my writer's workshop is this:

Mini-lesson with use of mentor text

Modeled writing (concentrating on designated mini-lesson)

Independent writing/writing conferences

Sharing

The first lesson is always an introduction to the mode of writing with a mentor text.  Nearly any informative nonfiction book will do.  We, of course, started with spiders.  Students were then werenencouraged to think of their schema and things they already know about.  They made a chart of ideas to keep in their binders to refer to when starting a new piece throughout the month.

The first several lessons focused on the structure needed for writing an all about piece.  Students learned to have a topic sentence, at least 3 details, and a closing sentence.  Other mini-lessons focused on writing in complete sentences starting with a capital letter and end punctuation.   It was actually so fun for us to read our mentor text and point out every time we saw a capital letter and end punctation.  (They used the hand motions I taught them.)  We had a mini-lesson on strong topic sentences and a lesson on strong closing sentences.  Students referred to the anchor charts we created during these lessons quite a bit throughout the month.  We also had mini-lessons on many of the nonfiction text features (headings, labels, captions, table of contents, etc).  They LOVE labeling and it's so cute when they begin labeling all of their pictures.  I find that my "lower" students really enjoy labeling their pictures because it isn't overwhelming to them.  And they know it is something that real nonfiction authors do because they have seen so many examples in our mentor texts.  

One of the best parts of the writing workshop (I say that a lot though) is the integrated reading instruction that occurs.  We make sure to coordinate our reading block instruction with whatever we are doing in writer's workshop.  So last month while focusing on narrative writing, during our reading we read fiction books and identified story elements, described characters, talked about problem/solution, and retelling the beginning, middle, and end.  For our informative unit, our reading instruction has focused on nonfiction text as we identified nonfiction text features, identified main idea and details, etc.  One of my favorite activities I have done this year has been to let students identify nonfiction text features in books that they are reading.  I do this every year and every year, this lesson gets better as technology improves opportunities for students.  In the past I used to have students cut out examples from magazines or a to z books and glue them in a flip book under the specific tab.  One year I used iPod touches for students to take photos of them in actual books and printed the photos for them.  This year I had students use Seesaw to take a photo of a nonfiction text feature and then use the drawing and microphone tools to identify it.  I mention all of this because much of my instruction on those nonfiction text features was actually during writer's workshops.  Integrating reading and writing instruction strengthens students' understanding.

At the beginning of the unit I decided to introduce writing booklets for my students to use.  They could continue to use a single sheet of our primary lined paper or they could chose to write in a booklet when writing their informative pieces.  The booklet is simply a blank cover and 5 lined papers stapled together.  Most students did chose the booklets.  They liked to feel like they were making real books.  I liked the booklets because it gives a physical space for the topic sentence, details, and closing sentence. It also gave more opportunities to easily add headings, labels, and other nonfiction text features.  I wish I would have done this in the narrative unit to help students have a clear beginning, middle, and end.

One thing I wasn't sure that would go well is having students all writing about different topics of things they know about and all being at different places.  I have always loved teaching informative writing, but most often we would all write about the same topic.  For instance, we would spend several days reading and learning about bats and then students would each write their own informational piece about bats.  But I knew I was going to keep with the writer's workshop format and that meant students choosing their topics and working at their own pace.  They did GREAT!  I didn't realize how empowered they would feel by choosing their own topics.  They know a lot and they were excited to inform others through their writing.  It wasn't an "issue" at all!  It instead became one of the reasons they did so well right from the beginning of the unit.  They were writing about topics they felt comfortable and passionate about so it allowed them to be engaged and focused on the traits of informative writing.

Below are a couple of my student's very first attempts at informative writing.  I was impressed!

Notice the headings in this one about spiders!

And even if you are done reading first grade writing, you HAVE to read this last one.  It was written by my most "at risk" student.  Yes, I know the mechanics and spelling need work, but I couldn't be more impressed with this piece!  It clearly has a topic sentence, details, and a closing sentence.  She even included some labels!  And the best part is here her sense of PRIDE when she read it aloud.  This is the stuff that keeps me motivated!!!

I know about cats.

Cats have fur.

Cats can lick.

Cats have whiskers.

That's all about cats.

Writer's workshop is a part of the day that my students and I look forward to.  The structure is exactly what I feel my students need.  They learned so much this month.  We are so comfortable with the structure of writer's workshop.  And we even had the opportunity to take the second half of writer's workshop outside on a warm, October day.  They were just as engaged outside in the sunshine!

We ended our all about informative unit with a publishing party of course.  As students shared their piece with their classmates, I took a video to upload to their Seesaw account (digital portfolio.)  Students (and parents) then are able to make comments on each other's pieces.  It is simply amazing and I'm sure I'll do a post about how we are using Seesaw in the near future.  Next month, I will share details about individual goal setting and writing conferences.   November is informative writing with a concentration on "how to" pieces.  So many fun anchor lessons for how to writing...a how to blow a bubble with bubblegum sounds promising!

SaveSave