Finishing Up Narrative Writing

This week we have been wrapping up our narrative writing unit.  We spent some time at the end of last week trying out different types of endings.

During each minilesson I model how to apply the strategy with my own writing.  Then I give writing partners the chance to try out the skill on another part of my story or in their own story.  The above picture shows my original ending, 'Then we walked home.'  We spent some time discussing how many times writers just slap on an ending such as: then we went home or then I went to sleep.  We studied endings by looking through some picture books by mentor text authors to see how they wrote a powerful ending.  The endings we learned about were: ending in the moment, ending with a feeling, ending with a reflection. Below you can see how I revised my ending.  

Below are pictures of writing buddies working together to try out the strategy in their own writing.  I love listening in to partners share, discuss, and provide helpful feedback to their buddy.   

Another lesson we had completed was studying what our mentor author, Jane Yolen, had done in her book, Owl Moon, to make it such powerful writing.  Partners were given copies of two pages from her book to study.  We created a chart of what she did well such as:  made us feel like we were there by adding what the character saw, heard, and felt, and stretched out a small moment by writing step-by-step.  I then modeled how I can learn from her writing and try out one of these techniques in my writing.  Later, students tried to apply what they learned from Jane into their own stories. 

This week students were given a second grade narrative writing checklist to use to finalize their small moment stories.  We broke down the three sections (structure, development, and language conventions) over a course of three days.  Each minilesson I would model how I go through my story and check off if I haven't done it yet, am starting to, or yes I have this in my story.  

On Friday, the class worked for a longer period of time putting the final touch on their writing.  They completed some last minute edits, colored the pictures, and created a cover page.  In second grade, students will not be rewriting their final copy.  You will be able to see all of the hard work, revisions, and edits that went into making their story.  

Since they worked so well during this time I thought they could use a brain break.  So, the class gathered on the front carpet to have a shake break to get out any fidgets from sitting and working for a long time. 

Finally at the end of the day the class gave Annie a big hug, since it was her last day with us before she moves.  We will miss her!!!!!

Well, I'm off to go to a baby shower, but will be back with a Halloween post and what we've been up to in Reader's Workshop, so stay tuned!  Enjoy the rest of your weekend!