The Writing Process

In your child's Friday Folder, you may have noticed their Personal Narratives have finally made it home! (Side note: my apologies. These were meant to go home before winter break. They ended up in the wrong basket and got lost in the shuffle of January and February!)

We are SO proud of these pieces of writing, which took us most of Trimester 1 to complete. The process of writing we took was quite a journey, and not a simple one. To begin writing, students always brainstorm individually, and discuss with their peers. This can take some time, especially for these narratives which were personal accounts of a memorable time in their lives. 

Next, students work on drafting a timeline, a lead (to hook the reader), and the actual story. In the meantime, we discuss the importance of writing the "show version" instead of the "tell version". Have you ever read a story aloud to your child, perhaps a book with no pictures, and without even thinking, made a mental "movie" of the setting, characters, and events? That's because the story you read is the "show" version of the events. The author crafted his or her sentences so that you, as the reader, can see exactly what is happening in the story, down to the minute details. Oftentimes, stories allow you to use your 5 senses, which is the first step for some in crafting what we call "snapshots" in writing. Here's an example from the book Samuel Blink and the Forbidden Forest.

This blurb is a model example of descriptive writing. The goal during the writing process is for students to continuously add specific details so that their readers can make a mental movie in their mind while they read. 

At certain stopping points, students will begin to conference. There are two two types of conferences we run. During group conferences, one writer reads his or her writing to a group of 5-7 students, and the listeners (including me) ask questions and give feedback. During partner conferences, students work in pairs or groups of 3, and follow the same process. Throughout the whole process, students are constantly revising, rewriting, adding, removing, etc. The final product is one beautifully crafted, detailed, and descriptive piece of writing!