Subject: Language Arts Grade: Third

Standard: # 6: Writing: Application

Key Concept: Details add support to main points in writing.

Generalization: Writing is clearer and more interesting when the writer supports the major ideas with details, regardless of the form of writing.

Background:

This lesson comes fairly early in the year. The idea of adding support to statements in order to strengthen them is the idea to stress here. In this lesson, students write different forms according to their interest. However, all groups work on using details to support main ideas in their writing. As a beginning activity, the teacher will read a short description of an event to the class. This can come from the newspaper, a newsmagazine, a favorite book of readings, or whatever source you choose. Students are then placed in tiers according to interest in forms of writing. Each student will complete an individual product. Group sharing can occur in the tiers and in the whole class after the products are completed.

This lesson is tiered by product according to interest.

Tier I: Journal Group

This group will retell the incident in their own perspective as if it happened to them. The product they will work on will be in the form of a journal. They will need to use supporting details in order to support the main point they convey in the scenario. They need to write at least three entries in their journal. Sequence of ideas and details they use are the important aspects of their writing.

Tier II: Newspaper Group

This group is interested in creating newspaper articles based on the information presented to the class. If the information was taken from a newspaper, they need to think about writing a different type of column. The main idea is to present a main idea and support it with convincing details. Four or five details are necessary to support one main idea in this column.

Tier III: Letter Group:

This group is interested in writing letters to someone who would be interested in the information presented in the scenario. A logical first step is to decide who would be interested in the information. Present the main idea and support it with details at least three details that would be interesting and understandable to the person receiving the letter.

Assessment: Students in each group have different writing products to will turn in. Attention to the form they chose is important in the assessment. They need to discuss how each of these products is written before they complete the product. A great culminating activity is to share these individual products with the rest of their group. Then if tiers want to share with each other in a large forum, great!

________________________________________________________________________

3LI-FAD