Writing Workshop Wednesday - Week 3

Young writers learn to plan their writing because we teach them to plan.  Storytelling is part of the planning for narrative writing.  You can read my post from last week about storytelling here.

These are the steps I use to help writers learn how to plan a story.  Whether your writers are early elementary or later elementary students, they probably need reminders and extra practice planning their stories.  This is another one of the mini anchor charts that will be in a pack that I'm working on s-l-o-w-l-y. 

I start by showing students an example of how I planned in the same way to write a story of my own 

(my real adult writing in my real writer's notebook).  Then I ask students to practice thinking of a true story from their own life.  I struggle with the silence sit patiently, while I give them plenty of time to think. Next, I ask the students to turn to a partner to either tell the story across their fingers or we use a blank pre-made book and ask them to tell across the empty pages.  

I also created a graphic organizer to help my students sketch across the pages.  You know, so their story doesn't end up all on one page.  My Sketch Across the Pages is a freebie in my Tpt store if you'd like a copy.

This tired girl has to be at school at 6:45 in the morning to finish setting up for professional development.  So, that's all for now...

Happy writing!