Writing and Publishing a "Slice of Life"

Writing and Publishing a “Slice-of-Life”

Author: Julia Bauer

Grade Level: 5th grade

Timeframe: This lesson will be implemented over an approximately 50 minute period each day for 3 weeks. The finished publication from each student will be ready to present and share on the last day of the final week.


Lesson Description or Explanation

The students will be introduced to “slice-of-life” writing and will be learning what constitutes this type of narrative piece. Students will come to know the characteristics of this type of writing and what makes it different from other genres by having access to various authors’ “slice-of-life” texts. The goal is for the students to author their own story. Students will have the opportunity to contact our mentor author, Jerdine Nolen, by exploring her website’s activities. They will email the author regarding questions about tips for writing, as well as questions and comments about her work. Through modeling, mini-lessons, and discussions, students will develop their own “slice-of-life” writing and follow the writing process in their writer’s folder.

Each student will then create a typed draft for peer edit and revision. Students will also type up their “author’s bio” and insert a digital photo of themselves taken during writer’s workshop. (students will be allowed to use digital camera during the workshop to photograph their peer authors at work.) Students will also create a cover page for their story. They may illustrate by hand or use clip art in any creative way they wish. The final published piece will be shared at our Author Celebration Day.


Indiana Curricular Standards

Reading: 5.1.1 Read aloud grade-level appropriate narrative text fluently and accurately and with appropriate timing, changes in voice, and expression.

5.3.7 Evaluate the author’s use of various techniques to influence readers’ perspectives.

Writing: 5.4.8 Review, evaluate, and revise writing for meaning and clarity.

5.4.9 Edit and revise writing to improve meaning and focus through adding, deleting, combining, clarifying, and rearranging words and sentences.


ISTE Standards

2) Communication and Collaboration – (a.) Students interact, collaborate, and publish with peers, experts, or others employing a variety of digital environments and media.

5) Digital Citizenship – (b.) Students exhibit a positive attitude toward using technology that supports collaboration, learning, and productivity.

Assessments

Formative - For this assessment, the students will be using a writing folder every day to record “noticings” of “slice-of-life” texts and begin their own draft. Each step of the immersion, writing, and publishing process will be monitored. Students will be provided a checklist to follow and fill in as they approach the revision stage at the computer. Each step on the list will earn points for the project and be included with the final rubric points for the piece of writing produced.

Summative – Debriefing will occur daily as students come together at the end of writer’s workshop with questions, ideas, and comments. Discussion will help students connect to the mentor authors and anchor text authors used in the study. Comparisons will be made to the real life work of authors during the creative and final publishing stages of the unit of study. Their final publication will be graded using a rubric that highlights the writing elements addressed in the study.


Prior Knowledge

Curricular Knowledge or Skills: Students will be assessed on their “noticings” made during a class charting of “slice-of-life” characteristics from texts. Students will report as a whole class the parts of story and parts of the writing process with which they are familiar after hearing several read alouds from the mentor author’s texts. A minimum of three entries will be made by the student in their writing folder based on their own “noticings” along with a copy of the email they send to the mentor author.

Technology Knowledge: Students will be assessed on prior knowledge of keyboarding/word processing through informal assessment thus far in the classroom. Emailing and digitally photography will be discussed to obtain students’ hands-on knowledge.


Technology

Internet Resources: http://www.jerdinenolen.com/contact.php
http://www.twowritingteachers.wordpress.com/

Hardware: Classroom desktop computers, computers with internet access, printer, digital camera

Software: Microsoft Word, Microsoft’s Assistive Technology Products (text to speech feature)


Procedure

Lesson Plan: Writing a “Slice-of-life”

Prior to beginning the unit, computers have the mentor author’s website bookmarked. The author (Jerdine Nolen) will have already been contacted about the children writing her this coming week.

Day One – Setting the stage. Students will gather on the front carpet where the mentor text will be introduced and read aloud. Facilitate discussion (What do you like about this piece of writing? What does this story make you think about?) Explain that the author has written a “slice-of-life” writing and why this is so. Here we will make text-to-world, text-to-self, and possible text-to-text connections. Distribute and discuss expectation handout so students know that they, too, will be writing and publishing a similar story soon. Finish up with another short story from mentor author. Students enter immersion of the texts until end of class time.

Day Two – During whole class, the teacher will read aloud mentor text again with children having a copy of the text in front of them. The teacher will model her thinking as she begins to notice details in the writing. She will model how she leaves a trail of her thinking with post-it notes. Immersion continues with the texts. Students will begin to independently identify “noticings” with post-it notes provided by the teacher. After reading immersion, the whole class will come together to share and pass the texts and discuss their noticings.

Day Three – In whole class setting on carpet, teacher will share another author’s story from the anchor texts. Students will have a copy of the text in their folders to follow along. Small groups of students will chart “noticings”. Then whole class will generate a list of characteristics for “slice-of-life” writing. Teacher will later type up chart and distribute to students to place in their folders. List will highlight five main writing characteristics the children are to work on using in their writing.

Day Four- In whole class setting, students will be told that today they will choose their own mentor text to support their writing. The teacher will also model ways to narrow down a topic. Have students share their ideas of possible topics. Writing begins today.

Day Five – As a whole class, we will review our chart of “noticings” about “slice of life” writing. Students will continue independent writing today. Extended time will be given for this process. Students will show evidence of current work in their folders for formative assessment.

Week 2 – More in-depth close study of book and introduction of Jerdine Nolen’s website (mentor author). Student’s post questions and comments to author through email. Students will be working on their first and second drafts. Students will receive small group lessons on using descriptive words, order of story, and punctuation/capitalization as we peer edit/discuss. (one-on-one writing conferences between student and teacher will occur to check for clarity) Students will take turns digitally photographing “authors at work”.

Week 3 – Students will be taking turns editing, revising and then publishing at the computer with their peers. Students will work in pairs one day to support editing efforts. (teacher one-on-one conferences will continue) Students will prepare their short bio and insert digital photo. Students will create cover page with illustration.

Final Day of Week 3 – Author Celebration Day! “Café style open –mic day for volunteer readings of “slice-of-life” stories will occur. Digital images of the authors holding their book will be displayed on the television screen through Powerpoint throughout the afternoon. Each child will be presented with a whole class book containing the collection of the class members’ stories.


Differentiated Instruction

ESL/ELL

EL Learners will be encouraged to write their story in both English and Spanish to share in their publication. Be certain to have multi-cultural responsive texts available in the texts collection for the immersion. Some could also include English/Spanish text. Informal assessment and one-on-one conferencing to have students read aloud their work with the teacher as he/she progresses will support their writing. Whole class instruction and sharing of read aloud while all students follow along with the text will support graphophonic and syntac clues for EL Learners.

Microsoft’s Assistive Technology Products could be used to provide the Text-to-Speech feature and the Show Sounds in the classroom to ELLs or any student for reading support. The text captions or icons would add another opportunity to increase their literacy capabilities. This additional environmental print could elevate literacy skills by increasing letter/sound recognition and vocabulary support in general. Text-to-Speech would allow for a student to hear his typed text to check for syntax and support awareness of graphophonics [sic] to support the students’ drafting and publishing efforts.


Challenge/Extend

Although the whole class discussions/debriefings and mini-lessons of writing will occur on a schedule, the remaining independent and group time of writer’s workshop will be open-ended allowing students to progress at their own pace. Time for reflection and questions will occur daily and can be added to their writing folders. Students may choose to extend their story or emphasize parts of the story such as dialogue or punctuation with different fonts and sizes to further express “the author’s explicit intent” of his writing. Students may wish to write more than one story and begin a collection of “slice-of-life” stories. Besides using handmade illustrations and/or clip art, students may find time to use the digital camera to photograph an object at school that relates to his story. He may then insert self-generated picture into his cover page.


Special Needs

Shorter, modified goals will be written out daily for students needing extra time and direct support in their writing per their IEPs. Students with special needs may also be paired with a peer on a rotating basis. A resource teacher may be present or available in the classroom with these students during this reading/writing time. Support in scribing/typing will be offered when necessary per IEPs.

The “text to speech” feature can support students needing writing and comprehension support.

The peer editing process will also support these students. Students with behavior issues will be refocused and redirected towards specific goals each day. Their daily achievements will be highlighted and congratulated as will all the students’ work of the workshop.