How to Write Those
Narrative and
Expository Writings
Without the F U S S !!

 “Attention getters”
 Students’ background knowledge
 Real-life situations and/or items to relate too

 Story hooks
 Graphic organizers
 Marzano’s findings –up to 45% gain in achievement with students

 Main Idea/Topic sentence
 Supporting details
 Use photographs
 Songs for common mistakes
 The Whole Summary Song
 Story Map Song
 Rapping Grammar
 YouTube videos

 Frame of a newly built house
 Use photographs of those new homes being built within the community
 Use the frame structure
 Roof- main idea/topic sentence
 Supporting Beams/ Supporting details

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Always conference
O Please only focus on one thing they are consistently doing wrong
O Teacher fixes everything else
Next conference
O Something else they are doing wrong
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O Teacher fixes everything else
Student tracks their own growthchart

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Use music- can be played on TEST day!!
Use stickers or reinforcements to promote growth in writing.
Use white boards to teach concepts for informal assessments.
Use rubrics that are shared with the students as the new writing assignment is introduced
O Rubistar (create your own rubrics)

O Website- www.writeguy.net
O Great songs for the classroom to promote punctuation and grammar
O “Stop in the Name of Love”- periods
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Background Music
O Meet Joe Black Soundtrack
Any suggestions?

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Reading A-Z
O Vocabulary, Grammar lessons, center work, intervention lessons
Brain Pop
O Writing lessons-
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Show Not Tell
Main Idea
Poetry

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Read a short selection from a book about a certain topic
Allow the students to fill out the “frame” graphic organizer
Allow the students to come up and place their supporting details on the frame house.
O They can use this for any expository piece of writing.
O Topic with 4 details to support it

O Wooden structure
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3- 1 X 2- 8ft. @ $1.15= $3.45
1-scrap piece of 1 X 8 X 8 channel cedar siding= $4.00
O Total cost- $7.45 = tax
O Cardboard house
O Hobby Lobby- $5.99 + tax

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Under-Resourced Learners
 Ruby Payne
Crunchtime
 Gretchen Bernabei
Reviving the Essay
 Gretchen Bernabei
Why We Run With Scissors
 Gretchen Bernabei
Sparklers
 Gretchen Bernabei
Mindset
 Carol Dweck
Teach with Your Strengths
 Rosanne Liesveld
How Full Is Your Bucket?
 Tom Rath

 Leticia Saunders
 Jefferson Elementary School- 4 th Grade
ELA/SS
 leticia.saunders@tisd.org
 Please contact me if you ever need anything!

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You are AWESOME teachers!!
TISD is the place to be!