Writing Unit on Memoirs

Writing Unit on Memoirs

Lesson 1-Life Topics

It is said that authors always write about one of three topics. Students should go over their writer’s notebooks from the year to try and discover what those three topics are for them.

Students will write a short entry about what topics they find in their notebooks. Students will share their ideas with one another.

Lesson 2-Writing Small About Big Topics

Quickly go over life topics from yesterday by having students give the thumbs up if they were able to find those topics in their notebooks. Allow a couple students to share.

Talk to students about how when we write we want to write about specific stories (seed stories), not big ideas (watermelon stories).

Tell students, “The bigger the meaning, the smaller you write.” Look at texts to see how authors write big and small Discuss how authors can start out with seed ideas or watermelon ideas as long as we write our

way towards the other Have students practice going the other way in their writing by looking back at what they have

written in the past. After students find a story, they should practice writing the story again, but if it is a watermelon story they should turn it into a seed story and vice versa.

Lesson 3-Expecting Depth from our Writing

Talk about diving deeper when we write Have students think about “What don’t I know about what I know?”

o Give examples of this Have students share ideas about what they writers doing to dive deeper

Lesson 4-Literature to Inspire Writing

Talk to students about how one way to write deeper in our writing is to read literature and how reading a text that will evoke feelings in us and then writing will put those feelings into our writing

Read to them and then have them write. The teacher should also write on their own at this point. The teacher should do this to serve as a good role model. Then, allow one child to share what they wrote.

Have multiple texts around the room that students can use to continue practicing this strategy. At the end, students should share with a partner what the writing process has been like for

them so far in this unit. Ask students to plan for further writing with a partner.

Lesson 5-Studing Memoir Structures

Talk about finding patterns in writing Read texts and talk about its structure as a class Allow students to read texts on their own and jot down their observations on the structure of

them.

Part Two

Name of Unit: Memoir: The Art of Writing WellContent Area: LanguageGrade: Fifth

Strengths of the unit

The book that the unit came out of has more than enough information on teaching how to write a memoir and the lessons are nicely laid out.

There are coaching tips in the book to guide teachers though the writing process. The unit suggests books to use to enhance the lesson. There are tips on the writing and conferencing part of a writer’s workshop. The unit gives teachers time to write as a way to act as a mentor to the students. The unit uses mentor texts. There is research behind the nit. It was first tried out in New York. The unit is taught through a workshop model.

The needs of the learners in the classroom

How the current unit addresses those needs

How enhanced unit will address the needs of learners not addressed in the original unit

There are three students with IEPs in our classroom who are at lower ability levels.

There is a lot of discussion that goes on during the lesson. There are also multiple times within the lesson that students share information with a peer. This will help students with IEPs to gain other ideas. Furthermore, it is easy to accommodate the unit to student’s IEPs. Students with IEPs are not expected to write as much as other students. The unit does not ever say how long a piece of writing is suppose to be. Students are suppose to conference with a teacher. This allows the teacher to help the student with his/her individual needs. Finally, students are allowed to write at their own level.

For lesson 1, I will enhance it by creating a graphic organizer that will help students to organize what all their writing is about. When students are suppose to be reading texts, I will make sure that there is material at these students’ levels (Lessons 2,4,5). Finally, I will also make sure to always go to these students first after I let them go work (all lessons).

There are multiple gifted students in our classroom.

Since it is set up in a writer’s workshop mode, these students are able to write at the level they are currently learning at. Students are

When students are suppose to be reading texts, I will make sure that there are some more difficult reading levels as a challenge for the

suppose to conference with a teacher. This allows the teacher to help the student with his/her individual needs.

gifted students (lessons 2,4,5).

Not everyone is in class every day because they have to go to get help.

None of the lessons depend on the previous day’s lesson to complete.

I will find the students who missed language the day before and explain to them what they missed (all lessons).

Students are not always motivated to work.

The way this unit is set up, allows students to write about themselves and an event they choose.

I will pick good, entertaining texts for all the read a louds that we do (lessons 2,4,5).

Some students have spelling issues. The unit is set up so this could easily be accommodated for.

Before students turn in a final draft, I will check students’ work for spelling mistakes, especially the students who continually spell words wrong. This will be accommodated for during our conferences.

We have a student with dyslexia. The unit does not do anything specific, but the way it is set up easily allows the teacher to accommodate for this need.

This student mostly has trouble with her spelling and letters. I will conference individually to help her with any spelling or letter mistakes she may have.

Some students have difficulty with organizational issues.

The unit teaches how to organize a memoir.

I can create a graphic organizer that will help students to organize their papers better.

LESSON PLAN- Life Topics

Name: Jackie Alexander

Date: 3/29/2012

Grade Level/Subject: 5th grade Writing

Prerequisite Knowledge:

Students will know how to read a text to determine what it’s about.

Approximate Time: 45 minutes

Student Objectives/Student Outcomes:

Students will determine which topics they write the most about.

Content Standards:

CC.K-12.W.R.9 Research to Build and Present Knowledge: Draw evidence from literary or informational texts to support analysis, reflection, and research.

Materials/Resources/Technology:

Writer’s Notebook Post-it notes Knuckleheads

Implementation:

Time

2 minutes Opening of lesson

“I know that a lot of you are having some trouble thinking about different topics that you want to write your memoir about. So todaywe are going to do an activity that will help us to come up with ideaswe might want to write about. First of all, I want to let you know that at the end of this unit you will be creating your own memoir usingyour own process and choosing your own genre. For example, youcan do this through poems, a picture book, an essay, a true story, etc. In this unit each of you will decide on what you want to say about your life and how you want to say that. You already know that toget started you need to find a way to collect entries that are worthy of

this final project. Today I want to teach you that when writers look for Life Topics, we often reread our writer’s notebook. We are looking for topics that occur in many of our entries and thread their waythrough much of what we have written.

35 minutes Procedures: “Someone once told me that most of us have three topics thatwe revisit repeatedly. I think this is true for me too, even when I talk. Most of what I free write about and talk about either has to do with traveling, teaching, or my family/friends. When we want to figure out what life topics we alwayswrite about, we reread our writer’s notebook. So today you are all going to be looking through your writer’s notebook to see if you can find what topics you always write about. Be careful when you do this. When you do this, you might think an entry is about one topic when in reality, it might be about another topic. For example, I might open my notebook and find a story about me going to a band concert where I was embarrassed by my father in front of other students, so I might think that I am writing about aband concert when in reality I am writing about wanting to fit in withother kids or my father who embarrassed me. Sometimes we have to digdeeper in our stories to figure out what they are actually about. For example,if we were to look through Jon Scieszka’s writer’s notebook, we might seestories about how he would always blame his younger brother for things hedidn’t do or how he would get old clothes from his older brother and thendonate his old clothes to his younger brother. At first we might think thesestories are about blaming someone else and donating clothes, when in factthey are about what it is like to grow up with so many brothers. So we wouldsay then that one of Jon’s life topics are his brothers. So what I want you todo now is to look through your notebook and look back at all your previousentries and reread them to discover what three topics you always write about. So you might want to write the themes of the entry at the top of the page.Then write the three topics you write about the most on a post-it note. Remember this is an important exercise to do because we can use the ideaswe find to help us write our memoirs. You will have about 35 minutes to dothis. If for some reason you get done a head of time, I want you to draw a line under your three life topics and brain storm other ideas you can write about. ”During this time, the teacher should go around the room and help studentsdiscover the topics they write about the most. The teacher should go to thestudents in Special Ed. first in order to make sure these students understandwhat they are suppose to be doing and have the help they need to do that.

8 minutes Summary/Closing:“Writers let’s come back to the carpet and share what themes we found in our

writer’s notebooks. Who is being quite that want to share first?” By onlyallowing students who are behaving and being quite to participate, you arehelping to encourage students to behave. “I want you to draw a line under thethree life topics you are write about. As we hear our fellow classmates share what they often write about, I want you to write down the ideas that sparkinterest in you and that make you think ‘Hmmm, I could write about that’.I want you then to turn these post-it notes in so I can take a look at what you write. However, I will give them back to you tomorrow, so that you can stickthem in your notebook to use as a reference when you get stuck on what youshould write about. If students forgot to bring their writer’s notebooks toclass, have them read the memoirs from the basket in the back of theclassroom. As they do this they should be writing down ideas of some of the topics those authors wrote about..

Student Assessment: To assess students, the teacher will look through thepost-it notes that they turned in, to see if students really did discover threetopics in their writer’s notebooks that they always write about. The teachershould also look to see if students were able to come up with an ideas ofother things they could write about from their classmates.

LESSON PLAN- Writing Small about Big Topics


Date: 4/3/2012

Grade Level/Subject: Writing


Students should have a small idea of what watermelon and seed ideas are.

Approximate Time: 55minutes


Students will be able to take a big event and write details about it. They will be able to go from something big to something small.

Content Standards:

CC.K-12.R.R.2 Key Ideas and Details: Determine central ideas or themes of a text and analyze their development; summarize the key supporting details and ideas.


Pre-Writing Activity Writer’s Notebook Post-it notes Memoir: The Art of Writing Well memoirs

Implementation:

Time

5 minutes Opening of lesson:“Yesterday many of you reread over your writer’s notebooks to find the big life topics that you always write about. Give me the thumbs up if you were easily able to do this. I want to give some more of you a chance toshare, so when I point to you, I want you to share one of the topics youfound yesterday. Today we are going to continue to prepare for writing amemoir. In writing we have big watermelon topics and small seed ideas. Who can raise their hand and tell me what they think this means? Yes, watermelon ideas are the big ideas that come from our writing, while seed ideas are specificexamples and details. There is a poet names Richard Price who once said,“The bigger the meaning, the smaller you write.”

40 minutes Procedures: “Today we are going to work on writing watermelon and seed ideas when we write. Writers need to write ideas that are both big and small.I’m going to read you a piece of writing that has both small and large ideas in it.” Read page 16 from Memoir: The Art of Writing Well. “What I want you to do is to look through some of the texts in our memoir basket and as youread through them. I want you to write down in your writer’s notebooks some watermelon and see ideas that they use. I am going to come around and put you into groups of 3-4 students and I am going to give you all a book to look at. I want you to talk to your partners about the big and small ideas that the author uses in her text. (Give students about 5-8 minutes to do this. As they are working in theirgroups, the teacher should go around and help some groups to discover how their author does this in their book. The teacher should go to any group witha Special Ed. student in it first. ) So what are some ways that we found thatauthors can go from a big idea to a small idea or from a small idea to a bigidea?” Now what I want you to do is to take a look at the pre-writing activitythat we did and think about whether you wrote about a watermelon idea or aseed idea. Once you know which one you wrote, I want you to rewrite it using the other way. When you rewrite the piece please write the new version inyour writer’s notebook. I will be collecting your pre-writing activity again.If you did not do this activity on Monday, take a look at another piece ofwriting you did or a piece that one of our memoir author’s wrote. So if your story is a watermelon idea, change it into a seed idea and if it is a seed idea,change it into a watermelon idea.

10 minutes Summary/Closing: “Ok writer’s lets come back to together to talk aboutwhat happened in our writing today. I will pair everyone off and I want you toshare, with your partner your first piece of writing and then your secondpiece of writing. I want the partner to listen closely and give feedback to their partner. So tell them things that they did well and things you would suggest they do to continue to work on.

Student Assessment: The teacher will collect the students writer’s notebookand pre-writing activity. As the teacher examines the two pieces of writing,they should see how well they were able to go from a watermelon idea to aseed idea and vice versa. The teacher should make some suggestions alongthe way.

LESSON PLAN- Expecting Depth from our Writing


Date: 4/5/2012 and 4/10/2012

Grade Level/Subject: 5th Grade Writing


Students will know what it means to dig deeper.



Students will learn strategies to dig deeper.

Content Standards: CC.K-12.W.R.3 Text Types and Purposes: Write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique, well-chosen details, and well-structured event sequences.


Memoir: The Art of Writing Well Strategies for Writing Deeper notes

Implementation:

Time

10 minutes Opening of lesson “Yesterday we worked on generating writing that focused on small moments and big ideas. You all did a very lovely job, but now thetime for has come for us to think less about just generating writing and moreabout writing that is powerful. Have you ever watched a duck swimmingacross the surface of a lake? It swims along very peacefully for a while andthen suddenly the duck tips its head down and dive deep underwater.Writers are like ducks. We often swim along the surface of a subject forawhile and then all of a sudden we make a deep dive. So today we will beworking on diving deeper in our writing. What does it mean to dig deeper?A famous memoirist once said, “Write what you don’t know about what youknow.” What do you think this means? As you write you should be askingyourself, What don’t I know about what I know?” So maybe there is a storyyou know, but what details within thatstory do you not know.”

35 minutes Procedures:Part 1Read entry on page 31 in Memoir: The Art of Writing Well.“How did this writer dig deeper in his writing? What type of strategies didhe/she use? Are there any ways that you found that he thought about what he didn’t know. How could you tell he was thinking deeper? Now I want you to each grab a memoir and start reading it. As you read, what do you notice thewriters doing to dig deeper? What kind of details do they give in theirwriting? What strategies do you want to include in your own writing?Students should write their answers down in their notebooks.

Part 2Then the teacher should hand out the Strategies for Writing with Depth notes. The teacher can also create a condensed form of the notes on chart paper inthe front of the room, in case some students lose their copy. The teacher willgo over the notes with the students, explaining to them what they text is all about. Also the teacher should ask the students whichsuggestion they think will help them the best.

At the end of each part of the lesson, allow the students some time to writetheir own memoirs.

10 minutes Summary/Closing:“Writers let’s come back to the carpet and share some of our ideas. If youhear a god idea from someone else. Feel free to write it down in yournotebook.

Student Assessment:Students will turn in their graphic organizer with ideas that either saw authorsdo to dive deeper in their writing or things that their classmates found.

Strategies for Writing with Depth

Many writers have few Life Topics that we return to often, mining these topics for new

insights, stories, images, ideas. We ask, “What do I write about again and again?” “What

might my Life Topics be?”

Sometimes writers look at seemingly unconnected entries and ask, “How might these

connect with each other? Oftentimes, there are underlying issues or truths beneath the

seeming separate bits.

Sometimes a writer finds he or she has one or two great images-places or objects or

scenes-within which the writer’s heart opens. We search for those images.

Writer’s remember, “The bigger the idea, the smaller you write.” Writers shuttle between

writing big insights and writing with minute details.

After a writer has written about a subject by advancing one idea or claim on that subject,

the writer may deliberately try to write about the same subject, advancing the exactly

opposite idea: I love to write, I hate to write. Oftentimes, two contrasting ideas can be

simultaneously true.

Writers take topics and territories we know well and think, as Eudora Welty has

suggested, “What don’t I know about what I know?” and “Where’s the mystery here?”

Writers write to explore new ideas and do so by asking and entertaining hard questions,

and by visiting a subject, repeatedly, from different perspectives.

Sometimes a writer thinks about a topic or a question by linking that one starting subject

to one thing, another, another (to a quote, a statistic, a memory, a classmate’s idea).

LESSON PLAN- Using Literature to Inspire Writing


Date: 4/11/2012



Students will know how to read.



Students will demonstrate that they understand how one piece of writing can evoke feelings and inspire another piece of writing.

Content Standards: CC.K-12.R.R.6 Craft and Structure: Assess how point of view or purpose shapes the content and style of a text.


Alone by Jacqueline Woodson in Memoir: The Art of Writing Well

Implementation:

Time

4 minutes Opening of lesson“Yesterday we talked about ways to make our writing more powerful. Today we are going to talk about another strategy that you can use to generate more powerful writing. Sometimes when a writer wants to take a deeper dive intheir writing, they will read or listen to other literature and then write. Why do you think writers do this?

20 minutes Procedures: Yes, part of the reason that writers do that is to get in touch with our deepestfeelings. A writer once said, “If you can’t cry, how can you read?” I ask you, “If you can’t cry, how can you write?” I do not literally need you to cry, but I want you to have feelings when you read and write. Show me that you care about what is going on in the story. A good strategy that writers will use is totake a text that they know will evoke feelings and then they will read that text before they start writing. They do not necessarily write about the text, they write off from the text. What does this mean? I am going to read a textcalled Alone by Jacqueline Woodson (see Memoir: The Art of Writing Wellpage 45.) After I read it, we are all just going to write. Feel free to write about anything that you want to write about. “So how did listening to this text make you feel? What type of feelings did you have when I read it?” Let a few students share what they wrote. Talk about how reading powerful literature can help writers write deeper. Add, “Sometimes writers read powerful literature too, and then in the wake of that reading we write. We do so hoping some of the magicrubs off on us” on the Strategies for Writing in Depth chart. Now I want youall to find a text from the memoir basket and read a page of it. Once you havedone that, please write some more and let the text you read inspire you. If you are having trouble coming up with a topic to write about, remember toconsult the post-it note we made with the list of topics we would write abouton it. Once you are done writing your story, tell what story you read and how it inspired you.

6 minutes Summary/Closing: Writers let’s come back together to talk. I would like a couple of you who are being quite to share. (call on 2-3 students). Raise your hand if you found this exercise helpful. Please put a post-it in your writer’s notebook where your piece of inspired writing is and put it at the back table for me to look at.

Student Assessment: The teacher will look over the work students did today to see how they were inspired by reading other texts.

LESSON PLAN- Studying Memoir Structure


Date: 4/13/2012



Students will know what lists, narratives, and other text structures look like.



Students will gain knowledge on how authors structure their memoirs, in order to have a better idea of how they can structure their memoir.

Content Standards:

CC.5.R.I.5 Craft and Structure: Compare and contrast the overall structure (e.g., chronology, comparison, cause/effect, problem/solution) of events, ideas, concepts, or information in two or more texts.


Memoir: The Art of Writing Well Copy of the page from The House on Mango Street(page 76 of Memoir: The Art of

Writing)

Implementation:

Time

2 minutes Opening of lesson“Writers you have learned that sometimes writers structure our texts as narratives- and you know how narratives go. You also learned that sometimes writers

structure our texts as essays- and you know what essays are. Basically writes structure their texts in many different ways. I’m even going to let you in on a secret. One way that we can learn how to structure our texts is by readingthe texts of other authors and by studying the structure they have used or made.”

18 minutes Procedures: “Have you ever seen a picture of the ground taken from the sky? When you see a picture of this, you can see the patterns in the ground below. It almost looks like patchwork or a quilt. It’s funny because you would think that when you are that high in the air and far above the ground,you would see less, but sometimes you see more. Although you might not see as much detail from up there, you can see the overall picture better. Forexample, we can see patterns and component sections. We can even seethe way that those sections fit together. I am telling you this because whena writer wants to study the ways that other authors structure their texts, weread the texts as though we are flying above them and looking down to seepatterns and structures in them.We are going to practice looking at a text to see what type of structure theyuse. I am going to read to you from Paul Auster’s memoir (read page 75 inMemoir: The Art of Writing Well). As I read, I want you to think about whattype of structure he uses. (read) What did you notice? How did he present his information? Yes, he told his story through a list. He listed what hethought of first and then second and third. You can tell this because hecontinuously repeats, “He remembers…” Some memories are longer than others and more elaborate. Some are described in two sentences, while others are just in one. Let’s compare some of the longer memories to see if theyhave the same structure (read two quotes from the bottom of page 75ofMemoir: The Art of Writing Well). Do you think they are patterned alike? I think that even though they are both long, they are not patterned a like inany way that I can see. Now I am going to give you an expert from The House on Mango Street.(Actually create a handout that you can hand to students.)I want you to read it over and talk about the structure of the text with your neighbor. For example, is it a narrative, an essay, a poem, a list, etc.?(Give students 2 minutes to read it over and talk about it with their neighbor.) Ok let’s bring it back together. Can someone explain their observations? Yes, I agree it starts as an essay and ends as a narrative.Let’s remember as we write our own memoirs that there are many differentways to write a memoir and it is up to you as a writer to choose which wayyou want to write it.

5 minutes Summary/Closing:Let’s go over some ways again that we can structure a memoir. I’m going togive you each a post-it note and I want you to write down the way that you

think you might want to structure your text and then give me a sentence onwhy this is. If you change your mind about the way that you want to structureyour memoir later that it fine. I just want to see that you are thinking about itnow.

Student Assessment:Students will be assessed on the post-it note exit slip. The teacher will look to see that they have thought about how they might possibly want to structuretheir memoir and that they have thought about their reasons why. It isimportant for authors to think about and have reasons behind the choicesthey make in writing.

LESSON PLAN- Extra Lesson 1- Pre-Writing a Memoir Entry


Date: 3/26/2012

Grade Level/Subject: 5th grade Writing-Memoirs

Prerequisite Knowledge: Students will have heard of memoirs before.



Students will discover what starting point they are at in this unit. Students will determine what they want to learn more about.

Content Standards: CC.K-12.W.R.5 Production and Distribution of Writing: Develop and strengthen writing as needed by planning, revising, editing, rewriting, or trying a new approach


Writer’s notebook Pencil

Implementation:

Time

5 Minutes Opening of lesson“Class we are going to start our new writing unit today. We are going to bewriting memoirs. Who knows what a memoir is? Who can give me examplesof memoirs you have either read or heard about? Do memoirs fall under thefiction or nonfiction category? Why is that?”

30 Minutes Procedures: “Today we are going to be writing a short memoir. I am going to give youmost of the remainder of the hour to just write what a memoir is. Do notworry, I am not grading this. I am using it to see how much you grow over thecourse of the unit. However, I do want you to do your best. Ok go write.”

5 Minutes Summary/Closing:“Alright writers let’s come back to the carpet so that we can share what wethought about this. Give me a thumbs up if you found this activity easy, asideways thumb if it was ok, or a thumbs down if it was hard. I am going tohand you a post-it note and I want you to write one thing that you want tolearn more about that would help you to write memoirs.”

Student Assessment:This activity has two different assessments. The formal assessment is apre-writing memoir exercise. I want to use this so that I can see what studentsknow about writing memoirs already to help determine what they still needto work on. I will also use this piece of writing to be able to compare it totheir final piece of writing in order to see how much they learned over thecourse of the unit.Then, the second piece of assessment is the informal assessment of writingwhat they want to learn on a post-it note. I think this counts as a type of informal assessment because it requires students to analyze their writing tosee what they could improve upon.

LESSON PLAN- Extra Lesson 2- Looking Through Memoir Texts


Date: 3/28/2012

Grade Level/Subject: 5th Grade Writing


Students should have previous knowledge of looking through books to find information about a subject.

Students should know the overall definition of a memoir.



Students will analyze memoirs to observe craft choices authors use in their writing. Students will read memoirs to distinguish the overall structure of memoirs.

Content Standards:

CC.5.W.9 Research to Build and Present Knowledge: Draw evidence from literary or informational texts to support analysis, reflection, and research


Worksheet Multiple memoir books from the memoir basket

Implementation:

Time

2 minutes Opening of lessonToday I want you all to become a little more familiar with memoir texts.Mrs. S. and I have created a basket of memoir texts in the back of the room.

43 minutes Procedures: In just a minute I want you to go back there and select a book to start reading. As you read the different memoirs that we have picked out Ihave a graphic organizer that I would like you to fill out. The differentcategories in the organizer are:

What the text is about? How is it told? Through stories, pictures, poems, etc.? What are some ways the author makes the text interesting? Is the text written as though it is happening now or in the past? How does the author show that he/she is reflecting back on the event? Is the book funny or serious?

What are some craft choices the author uses? What are some other things you notice about the text?

When you are filling it out, make sure you have something of quality writtendown for each section. If you finish reading a book before the time is up.You can choose another book from the basket to start reading. Alright have fun!

10 minutes Summary/Closing:Students please come back to the carpet. Let’s talk about what we read.

What the text is about? How is it told? Through stories, pictures, poems, etc.? What are some ways the author makes the text interesting? Is the text written as though it is happening now or in the past? How does the author show that he/she is reflecting back on the event? Is the book funny or serious? What are some craft choices the author uses? What are some other things you notice about the text?

Student Assessment:Students will be informally assessed on the graphic organizer that they weregiven. I want to see that they were able to answer all the questions and to seehow much depth they put into their worksheet. This worksheet will be gradedon completion and effort.

Name ________________________________________

What book are you looking at?_____________________________________________________

What the text is about? How is it told? Through stories, pictures,poems, etc.?

What are some ways the author makes thetext interesting?

Is the text written as though it is happening now or in the past?

How does the author show that he/she isreflecting back on the event?

Is the book funny or serious?

What are some craft choices the author uses? What are some other things you notice aboutthe text?

ResoucesChart paper

I love using chart paper in the classroom because it easily allows me to write notes for the students to reference later. Unlike using an interactive white board for students, chart paper is always assessable. When teachers use the interactive white board to take notes on, the computer and projector need to be on for students to reference the notes. However, when teachers take notes on chart paper, it is always there for students to access. Plus, if the notes on it are really important, the teacher can easily tape it up on the wall. Chart paper can always be found in our classroom at the front section of the library next to the interactive white board.

Throughout my unit, I will be using the chart paper to take many notes for the students about memoirs. For example, I will use the chart paper in lesson three to write strategies for the students to use to be able to write more in depth. Lucy Calkins has 8 different strategies she suggestion students use when they want to write more in depth. I want to put this on the board so that students can easily access it as they write.

Graphic organizer

I think that graphic organizers are a great way for students to organize their thoughts and observations. In our classroom, we have many students who have trouble organizing their thoughts. By creating a graphic organizer (such as the one in the second lesson I created), students can see what things they need to focus on as they read memoirs and they can organize those thoughts on paper.

During this unit, I want to use a graphic organizer during the second extra lesson (see resources for a copy of this resource). In this lesson students are suppose to be looking through different memoirs to see what they notice about memoirs. I think without this paper, many students will just read the memoirs and will not focus or think about some of the ways memoirs are organized. By focusing on the organization and structure of different memoirs, students will be better able to organize their own.

Strategies for Writing with Depth notes

This will be a handout that I will have for the students. I will print and hand out a copy to each student in our class. This resource is filled with strategies that writers can use to enhance their writing skills. It can be used as a reference as students write. It is my hope that they will refer to it often and hopefully through looking at it, they will remember the different lessons we learned and think about the example we used to add those skills into our writing.

I want to use it to enhance my unit because sometimes students forget some of the lessons we learned. If this is the case, I want to provide these students with a resource they can refer to in order to jog their memory. I decided to type up these notes instead of having students write them because we have a few slow writers in our classroom and I did not want to take half the class to let them copy the notes. Also by putting the notes into an electronic file, I can give students another copy if they lose theirs. Hopefully, this is will a valuable resource to the students this year and in their years to come.

Mrs. Doherty, the school librarian, and her collection of memoir books

One of the most valuable resources in our school is our librarian, Mrs. Doherty. Mrs. Doherty knows a lot about books and is knowledgeable on which books would be good for which students. She has in her library a large collection of books that I can check out to use in the classroom as resources for students to look at for a lot of the lessons. I am going to talk to Mrs. Doherty in hopes that she will have some suggestions on great memoir texts we can use throughout our lesson.

I want to use Mrs. Doherty and her collection of memoir books because she can help me to find books that will be at the appropriate reading level for all the students in our classroom. She helped me to find memoir books for both the lower readers and the higher readers. She also helped me to find books that covered a wide range of interests.

Basket of Memoir books

Throughout this unit, there will be a collection of memoir books in a basket in the back of the classroom. This basket will be composed of books, Mrs. Doherty, Mrs. Sokolowski, and I picked out. The books cover a range of reading levels and different people. Some of the books in the basket include:

House on Mango Street It Came from Ohio Knuckleheads Ruby Bridges 26 Fairmont Avenue

I want to use the books in the basket because they will help students to uncover some of the patterns and strategies authors use when they are writing their own memoirs. One of the best ways to learn about a subject is to observe how someone else does it. Throughout the unit students will have the opportunity to look at the memoirs to develop ideas for their own memoir. The first time the basket is used is in the second lesson when students will have the opportunity to look at many different memoirs and fill out a graphic organizer that will help them focus on the craft choices memoir writers use, how authors reflect on their own experiences, the subjects authors write about, and more. Students will again have the opportunity to use the books in this basket when they will read a text to evoke feelings before doing some writing of their own.

Lucy Calkins Book

Memoir: The Art of Writing by Lucy Calkins is the most important resource in this project. Now only does this book have all the lesson plans written it in in an easy to follow format, but it also has all the different pieces of memoir writing that I am suppose to read to the students in there. This makes the lessons really nice because it does not force the teacher to go out and find the same texts that Calkins used when she taught the lesson.

I will use Lucy Calkin’s books for lessons 2,3,4, and 5. All of these lessons encompass some type of activity where I will read an excerpt from the book to the student and then we will talk about it before I let the students go off and do the work on their work. I love how Calkin’s included this into her lesson plans.

Writer’s Notebook

The Writer’s Notebook (which students keep track of) is the notebook that students have been using all year to keep their writing organized in. The notebook is nice to use because it helps students to see how their writing has progressed over the course of the year. Additionally, it makes it easier for students to look back at some of their earlier writing.

I plan to use the Writer’s Notebook often. Besides the pre-writing memoir assignment, I plan to have students write almost all their entries into this notebook. This will enhance the unit because using it will allow the students to stay organized and build off their past pieces of writing. The notebook will also enhance students’ learning through the 3rd lesson/ Calkin’s first lesson. In this lesson, students are suppose to look back at their previous writings to discover what topics they usually write about. Many students have trouble thinking of topics to write about. So by teaching a lesson that encourages students to think about what they write about, there will be a smaller probability that students will not be able to come up with a topic to write about.

Post-it notes

Post-it notes are found all over our classroom. I have some with my resources in the back of the room and Katherine has her own stash at her desk. This resource will be used as an individual post-it note for each student to have as a way to communicate with me.

The post-it notes can be used in many different ways. The first way I plan on using post-it notes to enhance my unit is by having students reflect on the first lesson’s activity on them. In the first lesson students are suppose to write a short memoir without ever learning about how to write one. After the lesson, I plan on using post-it notes to have students write a sentence to me explaining what they would like to learn more about throughout this unit. By reading these mementoes, I can enhance my future lessons, by teaching students more about what they want to learn about.

Writing Unit on Memoirs

Documents

Transcript of Writing Unit on Memoirs