BOOKS AND BAKED ZITI
LITERARY ESSAY
GRADES 3-5
PRESENTED BY JESSICA GRIFFITH
What is the writing process?
1.) Gather ideas
2.) Plan writing
3.) Draft writing piece
4.) Revise writing
5.) Edit writing
6.) Publish and celebrate
This is the process that it used regardless of
genre. Today we will be applying it to literary
essay.
Gathering
Essayists gather ideas for essays by thinking about complexities in
characters. They know that characters are seldom just “good” or “bad”,
but are complicated.
One way that we can gather ideas about our characters is by thinking
about words that we can use to praise them, and words that we can use
to condemn them.
Cinderella
Words to Praise
Cinderella
Words to Condemn
Cinderella
Helpful
Helpless
Gathering
Writers use thought prompts to help them develop their ideas about
their characters. They write long about what they are thinking.
Could it be…
On one hand…On the other hand…
At first I thought…but now I think….
It seems to me…
One one hand Cinderella is a helpful character because she does so
much for her stepsisters. She is constantly assuming their
responsibilities by doing things like mopping the floor, cooking
dinner and helping to make their dresses. On the other hand
though, Cinderella is also pretty helpless. She can’t really seem to
improve her life. It’s only when the Fairy Godmother comes that she
is able to gain the ability to attend the ball and meet her prince. It
seems to me that she is heavily relying on others.
Planning
Writers plan their essays by looking across their ideas and developing
3 strong reasons to support their idea or claim.
______________is ______________ because _________________________
and
_______________________
and
______________________
Remember, reasons are BIG categories that hold our smaller examples.
Cinderella is both helpful and helpless because:
1.) She does everything for her stepsisters (helpful)
2.) She can’t improve her life on her own (helpless)
3.) She struggles to stand up for herself (helpless)
Planning
Writers plan their essays by going back over their post-its, free writes and
into the text to find specific examples to support their reasons. They ask
themselves:
What specific action
piece of dialogue or interaction
inner thinking
description
proves that this reason is true?
Cinderella is both helpful and helpless because she does
everything for her stepsisters.
In the text it says that “Cinderella knelt down beside her evil stepsister
and started to tie her shoes. The mean woman couldn’t so much as tie her
own shoes without Cinderella’s help.”
This shows that Cinderella is helpful because she is doing so much for
her stepsisters. They can’t possibly survive without her.
Drafting
Writers draft essays by carefully adhering to essay structure. They know
that essays start with an introduction, followed by 3 body paragraphs
and a conclusion.
Writers draft introductions by thinking about how they can set their
readers up to follow their thinking and understand the structure of their
essay.
In the fairy tale Cinderella, Cinderella is both a helpful and helpless
character. She is helpful because she helps her stepsisters with
everything they need to do. She is helpless because she struggles to stand
up for herself and she can’t improve her life on her own.
Drafting
Writers draft conclusions by reminding their readers of their
claims and the reasons that they have to support them. They
can also make a connection to themselves or the world or talk
about what they can learn from the character.
As you can see, Cinderella is both helpful and helpless. She is helpful
because she helps her stepsisters with everything they need to do. She is
helpless because she struggles to stand up for herself and she can’t
improve her life on her own. I think that in creating a character like
Cinderella, the author is teaching us that it is good to help others, but
that we also have to stand up for ourselves, and help ourselves to
improve our futures.
Revise
Writers revise their essays by zooming in on their examples and
making sure that they are as strong as they can possibly be. They
ask themselves:
Do all of my examples fit with my reasons?
Do all of my reasons support my claim?
Is there another example that I can add?
Is there a stronger example that I can use instead?
Edit
Writers edit their writing by whisper reading it to a partner
and asking themselves and their partner:
Does this sound right?
Is my punctuation and capitalization correct?
Am I trying all of the strategies that I know to spell words correctly?