Teaching Writing: Children II

Lesson 1: Review of Writing Basics and Teaching Expository Writing

Teaching Ideas

Writing a News Article

News articles are a good way for students to polish their exposition skills. To begin, review or teach the elements of a good news article. A well-written news article contains the 5W and H elements. These are the Who, What, Where, When, Why and How of the event. These facts are critical to informing the reader. To begin, have students think of an upcoming school or class event. Using the 5W and H as headings, have them brainstorm the important facts about the event. A sentence or two about each of those elements will make a well-written start to a news article.

Next, discuss the fact that a good news article is written in an inverted pyramid style. The most important facts need to go into the first paragraph, with other interesting and supporting details being added to second and perhaps third paragraphs. You might want to tell students the newspaper editor's reason for this - if the article needs to be cut shorter due to space restrictions, the editor can simply eliminate the last paragraph or two without cutting out the most important details.

When the articles have been written, select a few volunteers to share with the class. Have the class listen for the 5W and H elements in each article.

Making a PBJ Sandwich

Here is a fun way to have students practice writing "How To" paragraphs. In this activity, you will ask students to write down the directions for making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and then you will follow them. The first time I did this activity was when I was teaching first grade! That was really interesting! Over the years, I used it many times in many different grades, and it was always a great way to introduce the "How To".

What makes this especially fun for the students is that once they have written their directions, YOU will follow them and attempt to make the sandwiches. The trick here is to be sure to follow the directions exactly as they are written without comment. So if the student says to put the jelly on the bread - you should do just that - put the jar of jelly on top of the slice of bread. Or if they say to spread the peanut butter on the bread - but don't mention the knife - then use your hand!! You will be pretty sticky and covered with jelly and peanut butter by the time you are done - and the kids will have a ball!

Once you've "completed" several sandwiches, stop to discuss what was good about some of the directions, and what needed improvement in others. Then allow the students time to make revisions on their paragraphs and chose a few others to try.

I know this idea has been repeated by many teachers of writing in many places, so I was not at all surprised to come across it while preparing to write this course. A version of it can be found here as well: http://teachers.infoplease.com/lesson-pl... And of course, you might want to have your students write directions for other "How To's" - how to make an ice cream sundae, how to get dressed to go out in the snow...I'm sure you can think of many others.

Interviews

The interview is another form of expository writing. When I taught fourth grade I was surprised to find that my students really didn't know much about what various members of our school staff did - like the principal, the custodian, the secretary! They had vague ideas, but nothing really concrete. So, I decided to have the students set up interviews with the various staff members and write character sketches about them. These were later complied into a class book on Who's Who at IEF (our school's moniker).

First, the class and I compiled a list of staff members they wanted to interview (I got permission ahead of time from various staff members who might be selected). Next, we brainstormed a list of general questions that could be asked. We also discussed things that should not be asked - how old a person was, how much they were paid, and other personal data that should not be questioned!

Students chose the staff member to interview, and formulated more detailed questions specifically for that person. It was up to each student to approach the staff member and ask to set up the interview, which was done at the staff member's convenience - I allowed time away from class for this purpose.

We also talked a bit about note taking while the interview was going on. I didn't allow tape recording, so it was up to each student to gather and record the important information. (This is a hard skill, and one that takes practice. I still have a bit of trouble with it myself when I am doing an interview for an article. Tell students it is okay to abbreviate, be messy, or even use initials and coding to get the ideas down - as long as they can decipher them later. If not, they'll need to check back with the person to clarify their notes - I occasionally do!)

After the interviews, have students write their character sketch paragraphs. Stress that these should not be in a question-answer format, but rather as a paragraph. When completed, you may wish to formalize them in to a booklet, as I did, or post them on the bulletin board. I think one year I even had students leave the person's name off the sketch and we made a guessing game out of the activity. Students read the sketches and tried to guess who the staff member was.

Interviews can also be done with family members, friends, coaches, and other important people in the students' lives. An activity on Family Histories can be found here: http://www.usu.edu/oralhist/oh_howto.html This one deals with recording interviews, but there are some good ideas for interview topics listed.

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