Category: Writing

Every Friday I’ll send you a wonderful website that my classes and my parents love. I think you’ll find they’ll be a favorite of your students as they are of mine.

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Students type a report for their class on one of their units of inquiry (i.e., animals) using MS Word. Use this lesson to introduce MS Word, margins, page breaks, centering, fonts. Show students how to add pictures from the internet (using copy-paste), from the computer (using insert). Takes a few classes, depending upon how long the report is (more…)

Use a first-grade or second-grade story. Show students how to add description to it, setting details, sensory details, characterization, so it sounds more mature and interesting. I use thought bubbles to make it more fun.

Click on them for a full size alternative. Or visit the original post on Ask a Tech Teacher (more…)

Use the Quick Publication template to make a fast cover page for a report, project, etc, in the classroom. Pay attention to layout, grammar, spelling, design.

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Use the Quick Publication template to make a fast cover page for a report, project, etc, in the classroom. Pay attention to layout, grammar, spelling, design.

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Create a ten-sentence story, using characters, setting, plot, rising action, climax and resolution. One sentence per page with a picture to communicate the idea. Include a cover, About the Author. Use this lesson to teach students how to use Publisher’s design gallery

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Drop by every Friday to discover what wonderful website my classes and parents loved this week. I think you’ll find they’ll be a favorite of yours as they are of mine.

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UPDATE

Another problem for cursive in schools: Common Core is ‘silent’ on it, according to the Alliance for Excellence in Education. That’s like the Fat Lady warming up, but not sure when she’ll be performing.

Studies show one in three children struggle with handwriting. I’d guess more, seeing it first hand as a teacher. Sound bad? Consider another study shows that one in five parents say they last penned a letter more than a year ago.

Let’s look at the facts. Students hand-write badly, and don’t use it much when they grow up (think about yourself. How often do you write a long hand letter?). Really, why is handwriting important in this day of keyboards, PDAs, smart phones, spellcheck, word processing? I start students on MS Word in second grade, about the same time their teacher is beginning cursive. Teach kids the rudiments and turn them over to the tech teacher for keyboarding.

I searched for reasons why I was wrong. Here’s what I found:

• 1 in 10 Americans are endangered by the poor handwriting of physicians.
• citizens miss out on $95,000,000 in tax refunds because the taxman can’t read their handwriting
• Poor handwriting costs businesses $200,000,000 in time and money that result in confused and inefficient employees, phone calls made to wrong numbers, and letters delivered to incorrect addresses.

Read on:

Schools: Less cursive, more keyboarding

BROWNSBURG, Ind., Aug. 28 (UPI) —

Officials in an Indiana school district said cursive writing lessons will be scaled down this year in favor of computer keyboarding.

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They’re user-friendly, kid-tested, organized by grade and topic. Just click this link to Great Kids Websites and scroll down until you find your grade and subject.

Send me an email with any websites you use with your students:

If kids are inspired to write, they get better at writing. The trick is to make writing fun.

Blogs do that. The students get to interact with their favorite toy–a computer–and go online for legitimate purposes. They get to see their thoughts in print. What could be more appealing. Blogs and online forums are a teachers dream.

The problem is how teachers use these tools. Like every good skill, blogging and online writing requires a bit of explanation. Start with these simple rules:

1. Be concise in a blog. Readers don’t go to blogs to read a novel. They want something that will help them in, say, a minute (that seems to be the average time people spend on a post)
2. Be pithy. Readers don’t want to waste even that sixty seconds. They may get tricked the first time by a snazzy title, but not again. So, students must put their thoughts together in a cogent and concise arrangement.
3. Be knowledgeable. There are so many bloggers out there, students must come across as intelligent on their topic and smart enough to discuss it in that one minute the reader gives them. How do they do that?
   1. Watch grammar and spelling.
   2. Pick a topic they know about. If it’s an opinion, pick something they have ideas about.
   3. Don’t tear down the other guy’s opinion as a way to promote their own. This sort of mean-spiritedness turns people off.

For more great reasons why blogs are good for kids, visit Educational Blogging Wiki–including helping them find their voice and empower their maturing identities.

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