Writing About Birds

Today we wrote about the Snow Goose, since we have 
been seeing flocks of them fly over the school.

During this last nine weeks of school I will have the students focusing on reading books and doing more writing.  First, I teach the lesson and then they take turns going to four different centers/activities.  This week I have them writing four sentences about a bird using mostly the Reading words that they have to know.  

I chose a bird that is in our area now or will be showing up soon in migration.  They copy the sentences, draw the bird and then practice reading what they wrote.  They really like this activity!  The next step will be for them to come up with sentences on their own. Being able to be a good writer is very important for the Common Core Standards and for testing when the students are in third grade and above, so it is important that they practice writing their thoughts or write stories as much as possible.  This would be a good thing to work on over the long summer break as well.

Here is a nice example.  Yesterday at playtime the kids had snuck some drawings into my bookbag.  They asked me if I saw them.  I commented that Mr. Preheim jokingly said that he never gets any cards from his students {high school}.  This is what was snuck into my book bag today.  I love how she sounded out the words.  It is how they might say.  The idea is to get the kids to write what they think in "kid" writing.  Then as they grow they will learn how to spell and we will show them.  This is very good for a kindergartner!