Opinion Writing in Pre-K and Primary:

Introducing BECAUSE

Jean WolphLouisville Writing Project

2

Writing Reading Argument MINI-UNITEmphasis

# of Lessons

ARGUMENT SKILLS

PRODUCT ELEMENTS OF ARGUMENT CLOSE READING

STRATEGIESRESPONSE TO

READINGS TOPICS

Draft, Feedback, Revise, Reflect Close reading strategies

Writing & talking to develop knowledge on

topic or issue

Backing up an opinion

3 Lessons

Entering Skills:• Understandi

ng the difference between fact and opinion

Foundational Skills: • Generating

reasons to justify an opinion

Product: Sentence produced through drawing and/or writing

Using a reason to explain why

Listening to Read-aloud, reading pictures and chiming in

Scaffolded writing:

I like ___ because

___.

Or

I don’t like _____

because ____.

I like __ because

1 shared Reading

Mini-Unit Overview

Writing Standards Emphasized in the

Mini-Unit

• Write opinion pieces in which students state an

opinion (giving reasons).

One-Day Mini-Unit

• Read aloud the poem, “Things I Like,” helping students join in using the picture cues.

• Model the addition of a reason. Return to some (or all) of the slides and talk about why people do or don’t like these things.

• Give students a page with sentence stem and ask them to draw and/or write what they like and why (or don’t like and why).

Mini-Unit Instructional Sequence

Inquiry Question:

What do you like?Why?

Exploring Our Opinions

While we read a poem together, let’s listen for what the writer likes.

Do you like any of these things? A little later, we’ll talk about what we like and why we like these things.

Things I Like  

I like…

ice cream,

  

funny dreams, 

  

dusty moonbeams. 

  

I don’t like…

brain freezes, 

  

multiple sneezes, 

  

scabs on knees-es. 

   

I like…

friendly dogs,

   

   

ants on logs,   

   

morning fogs.   

    

I don’t like…

mean looks,  

    

polluted brooks,    

or mistreated books.

  

Best of all, I like

a river view,  

     

a sky of blue,

     

friends like you.

   

What do you like?

Do you like these things, too?   

Introducing our new friend BECAUSE!

BECAUSE helps us tell WHY.  

I like ice cream because it melts on my tongue.

Who else likes ice cream?

Why do you like it? 

  

We like ice creambecause _____.

  

We don’t like brain freezes because _____.

 

   

We like friendly dogs because ____________.

   

   

We don’t like friendly dogs because ____________.

   

    

We don’t like mean looks because _______________________.  

 

We like a sky of blue because ________________.

 

We like friends because ____________________.

Let’s Draw and Write Our Opinions!

I like ___________________ because ___________.

I don’t like _______________because __________.

I like ____________________________________

because __________________________________.

I don’t like ________________________________

because __________________________________.