Here's a great way to offer your kids accountability, without taking away their freedom to choose. A couple of years ago I came up with this "menu" or as I called it, "road-trip" to use with my first graders. This was towards the end of the year when I began to notice more and more elaborate pictures and less and less real writing. Ahhh! Spring Fever! What to do? I came up with a fun way to review and viola! The Writing Road Trip was born!
This year, because I will be working with second grade students, I plan to use this early on to get writing started. When I first used this with my younger students, I first had to complete our introductory writings for each genre of writing. This is not meant to be used as a whole group "Road Trip". Part of what makes this fun,
is that everyone is hard at work, but doing what inspires them at the pace they wish to work. Can you say differentiated instruction?! In a snap, which allows you to feel free to hold those conferences you have been meaning to get to.
For those students of your who are driven by reward, this is a great way to inspire and get the writing samples you desire. I offered a small reward (sticker, token, charm, etc.) for each "exit" (writing sample through the publishing phase) completed and the Author's Spotlight/Author's Chair.
***Brilliant Brainstorm!***
* You could collect these charms/tokens/etc. on key chains! How fun! I am so doing that this year!*
I then offered a much bigger reward for the completion of the entire menu. Students were able to earn things like 2 free choice writings, "Go on Tour"(student can choose 2 teachers to read their writing to), Author's Showcase (student writing is scanned in to be displayed on class website along with a blurb About the Author--written by none other than the winning student!), etc. As you can see, all "rewards" encourage and foster more writing! The kids have such a blast with this! Check it out at my TPT shop. How do you foster and encourage authorship in your classroom?
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