Teaching Tip Tuesday ~ 3 Writing Ideas for the Beginning Writer Moving Towards Independent Writing

Idea #1 ~ Shared Story

Materials Needed: a die, paper (with criss-crossed lines drawn to make small boxes is optional), pencil

What To Do:  Take turns with your child rolling a die.  The number that is on the rolled die is the amount of words that the roller gets to write of the story.  Encourage your child to write the words that she is able.  If your child wants to write a word that she does not know how to spell, then there are a few options: 1) write the word on a whiteboard and have her copy it, 2) spell the word orally while she writes the letters, 3) allow her to try to spell the word phonetically and then show her the correct spelling by writing it above her word.   This has been one of my children's favourite writing activities.  Below is a sample of one of our first stories ever written, completed about a year ago.

Idea #2 ~ Daily Journal Entry with Personal Dictionary

Materials Needed: Hilroy notebook, personal dictionary printable, pencil

What To Do: Provide daily opportunities for your child to write in a journal. You may leave the writing topic open ended, or you may choose to provide a sentence starter that is relevant to your child. Set a timer for a short amount of time {2-5 minutes}and inform your child that she only needs to write for the length of time set. When the timer goes off, immediately go over your child's writing with her. Remind her about capitalization and punctuation, and write the correct spelling above any misspelled words. Add any misspelled words to the personal dictionary page that is attached to the front cover of the journal so that your child can reference challenging words in the future.

{Please email Mrs.Holder for your own printable personal dictionary.}

Idea #3 ~ Sing a Super Sentence!

Writer's Way has a neat idea for helping your child practice writing interesting sentences - sentences that include an adjective, noun, action verb and a prepositional phrase! This website has many great writing ideas to browse through.  To access the instructions for Sing a Super Sentence, click here: Writer's Way, scroll down to the writing activity table, and find Sing a Super Sentence in the 3rd column, 4th row of activities.

Enjoy!