Finishing Up Non-Fiction!

So in my past 2 posts, I’ve shared how my Non-Fiction unit has been over the past few weeks in my classroom.  When we left off (the end of week 3), I shared with you how my students were finishing the “research” and “planning” stages.  These steps are very important, so make sure to not rush kiddos through this.  Occasionally, you also might want to tie back in how much research Gail Gibbons does in order to write her books (she posts about it on her website, listed in the post below!).  If need be, plan in a few extra “flex” days.  That way, you won’t feel stressed or guilty for pushing kids through this unit!

So now, finally on to week 4—a week for creating!  Once all students have completed their research, it’s time to write.  Again, I always begin by modeling to the students my expectations and directions.  Especially with a project like this, it’s best to give students small chunks!  If you simply say “go use your information and write”, 2^nd graders will not get your drift!

In this stage, I only have students work with ONE Graphic Organizer (concept) at a time.  I began by writing about the Owl’s attributes.  I have students watch while I create my paragraph.  This is a great time to also work in “Beautiful Beginnings”!  Even though we are writing Non-Fiction, we still can entice our reader within that first sentence!  See the Beautiful Beginnings FREEBIE below!  You can download it (at no cost!) on TpT:

I scale this down & have students glue it into their Writer's Notebook at the beginning of the year, so it is an easy resource to flip back to time and time again!

My students helped me come up with using an action & onomatopoeia together by starting with: “SWOOSH!  An owl can soar and swoop through the air with its broad wings.”  Aren’t they so creative?  They made me so proud! J

Then, I model how to form sentences from information on their Graphic Organizers.  I repeat to them that “we have already done all the hard work (research), now we just have to make sentences!”.  I walk step by step through my G.O., forming sentences one-by-one.  Then, I send students to their desks to get out their own Graphic Organizers and their Writer’s Notebooks. 

On this first page, I walk them through writing (even though they just watched me).  We come up with a Beautiful Beginning (then pencils up!).  Then, we write step by step through out Graphic Organizer (again, pencils up after each time—this is a helpful visual for me to see when everyone is ready to move on!). 

After we create our rough draft of the Attibutes page, I have students Pair & Share.  This is great for many reasons:

1.      They’re proud of their work so far—so let them show it off!

2.      It helps students find any of their own mistakes while reading out loud to a partner.

3.      It helps partners see what sounds good and get ideas from their peers!

When we all come back together after Pair & Share time, I randomly pick a few students to read their page out loud.  We give compliments and suggestions, then I let the class go back to their desks to make any changes for the day.

This cycle repeats itself until the class has written all of their rough drafts (generally one for each organizer, but occasionally, you can combine some that are similar).  Depending on your time frame, you may be able to create 2 rough drafts a day.  There are some days during this week that we only get to one, and there are others when we have lots of time (again, this is where that “flex” time comes in handy if you have it built into your plans!).

On Wednesday or Thursday of this week, it is all about the next stage in the writing process: editing!  I have students edit their own works with a fun colored pen.  Then they peer edit with a different color pen.  If need be, they can schedule time with me to edit, too.  During editing time, I am sure to show students my expectations for the finished product.  I ALWAYS create rubrics for major writing assignments.  I feel it makes grading easier on my end, AND it really does give an accurate grade each time!

Here are a few examples:

The Research Rubric is online at TpT; however, the Animal Book Rubric is not, because it is more specific to my class.  If you would like to view a copy or get some ideas for your own rubric, please email me!

Once editing is finished, it’s finally time to publish!  When publishing, I give students the same Authors as Mentors sheet as we used in week 3.  This year, I just deleted the top part so students would have more room to write (after all, they don’t need the directions “blurb” anymore).  Here are some examples of published pages:

When publishing, my students know we always write first, and leave illustrations for last!  This way, all the major work is finished, so if students did have to rush to finish at the last minute, they’re just rushing through their drawings (even though in an ideal world, students wouldn’t rush through anything J). 

Finally, we create our Table of Contents and our Cover/Title Page.  Friday generally tends to be a “catch-up” day for students.  This gives them time to tie up all the loose ends and to finish their project. 

They always turn out so great!  Here are some for you to see:

I am utterly in love with this project, and I'm always so proud of my kiddos' hard work!  It is such a great learning experience for students, and it is such a great assignment that blends different content areas together.  I ALWAYS have students bringing in information—some took notes on paper, some printed information from the internet, and some even went to our public library!  Also, I ALWAYS have parents tell me how much their child enjoyed the project (and how they went on to do more at home!).

I hope you enjoyed reading how this way laid out!  If you need anything, please feel free to contact me!  Also feel free to email me with any questions, comments, or concerns!  I love to hear from you! 

Keep Smiling! J

Notable Non-Fiction Continued!

So as not to overwhelm you, I was planning to break up my Non-Fiction Unit into 2 two week chunks.  After starting to explain week 3, however, I decided that I will go ahead and break it up into 3 chunks: Weeks 1 & 2, Week 3, and Week 4.  If you would like to read weeks one and two, please scroll down to my first Notable Non-Fiction post!
 

Before I get started with Week 3, I wanted to add one more resource for you to read.  If you’re a nerd like me, you will love this research article about the benefits of integrating Non-Fiction text.  Yes, it’s a little wordy and “college-esque”, but as always, skim it, read it, take what you need/want, and go on with life! J  You can visit Tiffany and Lemont Flowers’ article here (and as always, since I’m posting this link with their names, please don’t give me any credit it it!  I’m just an admirer—I had nothing to do with writing it!)

http://www.clemson.edu/centers-institutes/houston/documents/nonfiction.pdf

 

Okay, so now on to the next week in my classroom.  When I left off, I told you guys that at the end of week 2, it was a great time to gauge students’ progress.  I use the first few days of week 3 to really work with strugglers, and you’ll see why (and how there’s time!) in just a second!

 

Week 3 actually begins to incorporate Non-Fiction reading with 2 writing units: Non-Fiction writing (of course!) AND Authors as Mentors.  During the first few days of week 3, our classroom focuses A LOT on books by Gail Gibbons.  She writes AH-mazing Non-Fiction books for children.  Let me count the ways I love her books: 1. They are child friendly.  2. They layout is wonderful! 3. The topics are interesting. 4. While her books are non-fiction, they have accurate illustrations instead of real pictures.  This helps kiddos when they are trying to “model” her work (so they don’t become frustrated with their own illustrations!) 5. I could go on and on and on…….

 

But anyways, back to week 3.  The first few days, we spend time learning about Gail Gibbons and exploring her work.  Her website has a great biography, as well as some blurbs about her books!  You can view it here:

http://www.gailgibbons.com/index.htm

During these first few days, I also put out ALL my Gail Gibbons books for students to use.  Our school library has lots, and I’ve collected many at garage sales, thrift/resale stores, and at online sources.  Also, if need be, amazon.com always has many of her books at great prices!

Gail Gibbons on Amazon

While we are exploring her text, I always pick one book for ME to model with  mini-lessons to the class.  This year, I picked Owls.  I, of course, begin by looking for those Non-Fiction text features (which not all GG books have).  This is a good conversation starter about how not ALL Non-Fiction books HAVE to have ALL of the features we’ve talked about!  Then, we read and discuss how Gail Gibbons must have done a lot of research to write this book (they should already know this by reading her bio from her website!).  Finally, I bust out the Graphic Organizers for students to write a few facts from my Owls book today.  Once they finish at their desks, we come back together and share a few before I send them back out with a GG book of their own and a new Graphic Organizer.  Their job is to read, fill it out, then come back later to share.

During this time, I pull my small groups for extra support with NF text.  It is up to you how/what you want to concentrate on, because you know your kiddos better than me!  But, you should have a good chunk of time to work with your small groups for the next few days!

When we all come back together as a class, we share facts the facts students found.  THEN, (this is the fun part), we try to “guess the fact” from GG website under Teacher Resources.  The students love this game and are very eager to listen.  Sometimes, even, those facts lead them to reading that book later on in the day!

Okay, so this goes on for 2-3 days.  On Tuesday of this week, I have them use one of their Graphic Organizers to actually form and write a page.  The page I give my students looks like this:

My team is awesome and helps me come up with ideas like this one! (Props to SK!)

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Authors-as-Mentors-Write-Like-Gail-Gibbons

Generally, their facts are so well laid out that we do not need to pre-write.  But as always, it is completely up to you!

After this first “round” of research and writing, I am very careful to check students work.  Sometimes I get a student who likes to sneak in “facts”.  Yes, I put it in quotes because we all know those “facts”…..like “Skunks lay eggs”, or “Owls are cool”…. So even 3 weeks in, I still have to stress the difference between facts and not facts.

On Wednesday of week 3, I assign students a topic to begin their Non-Fiction research project on.  It tends to go hand-in-hand with another content area (I’ve done Savanna Animals and Money).  This year, our grade linked it up with the specific Science Habitats listed in our TEKS: the Woodlands, the Garden, the Beach, the Park, and the Lake.  Our class habitat was the Woodlands!

To begin with this project, I assigned multiple students to the same topic.  Students complete their writing and final project on their own, but having a partner or group really helped with the research part (I’ve learned this the hard way-- after wanting to pull my hair out, running around like a fool, trying to help 22 kiddos research all different topics!).

So again, we incorporate the graphic organizers, but this time, for our specific animal.  I am sure to model beforehand with MY animal (the Owl).  They watch me find information and record it on my sheet (4 different topics: Attributes, Habitat, Life Cycle, and Diet), then they go off and complete their own with my guided help.  I generally try to have kiddos complete 2 a day, since this project falls into the categories of Reading (using NF text to locate facts), Writing (planning a first draft by using Graphic Organizers), and Science (observe, record, and compare needs and characteristics of animals). 

Graphic Organizers are so useful for this project—they help guide the students to find the correct needed information, and they are very visual and well laid out!  This year, I used all of mine from Scholastic teacher resource books.  Here are some of my favorites (and one filled out):

You can find theses and more at http://shop.scholastic.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/SearchEndecaCmd

So with week 3 coming to an end, let me recap quickly: Monday and Tuesday, we begin Gail Gibbons, Tuesday or Wednesday, we write an example page by using our Graphic Organizers, Wednesday or Thursday, we begin researching our animal, and Thursday and Friday we research, learn, and record information about our animal’s Attributes, Habitat, Life Cycle, and Diet.

Whew!  Are you tired yet?  I keep reminding myself that week 3 is, truly, the busiest week.  Also, please remember that every classroom is different—so please tweak this to fit your specific needs! 

Thanks for putting up with all my Non-Fiction babbling!  Be sure to come back tomorrow to see how my class finished up this unit!  As always, feel free to contact me with any questions, comments, or concerns! 

Notable Non-Fiction!

After resting for the first few days of Spring Break (and of course, getting in all the errands that I know we all save until our time off), I’ve now jumped back into teacher “mode”.  For our district, grades are due next Monday, so I’ve spent a few hours the past few days tying up all those loose ends and entering the last few grades.

This has given me a great opportunity to take a step back and look at my students’ work as a whole, from the past 9 weeks.  And let me just say WOW!  I always forget how much I love teaching our non-fiction unit, and I always forget how awesome my kiddos do with it! 

I do have to admit, there are always some struggles at first, simply because 2^nd graders do not “interact” with non-fiction as often as they do fiction text.  Below are some great websites and blogs with helpful facts (that make you think “ah, so I’m not alone!”), helpful ideas, and helpful comments!

http://www.readingrockets.org/blog/37969/

http://www.standard.net/topics/education/2011/06/10/expert-nonfiction-should-be-kids-summer-reading-list

http://www.readwritethink.org/files/resources/lesson_images/lesson147/NonfictionBookReview.pdf

http://www.readwritethink.org/classroom-resources/lesson-plans/adventures-nonfiction-guided-inquiry-183.html

While I did not create, nor am I affiliated, with any of the above links, I do have them saved under my computer’s “Favorites”!  I especially like reading Nancy Van Valkenburg’s article, because it does help me remember why it’s important to instill a love of non-fiction to my students.  (I must be a nerd because honestly I could read it time and time again!)

With all that being said, let me give you a quick “run-down” of how we’ve been learning non-fiction!  My students began reading non-fiction about 4 weeks ago, so to not overload you, I’m going to break up my posts into 2 week “chunks”. 

During that first week, it’s solely a time for exploration and reflection.  I give students lots of time to read non-fiction books to themselves and with other peers.  Discovering and seeing AUTHENTIC non-fiction is key!  During this week, we also do lots of journaling.  We use sentence stems such as:

   I like…               I learned…            I realized…

   I noticed…          I think…                I found…

        

Futhermore, we use this time to compare fiction and non-fiction, with notecards, Venn Diagrams, T-Charts, and more!  ReadWriteThink.org always has great lessons to use with comparing.  Here’s just  one that I like:

http://www.readwritethink.org/classroom-resources/lesson-plans/comparing-fiction-nonfiction-with-889.html

During the second week, we start to talk about the specifics of non-fiction (i.e. the Features of Non-Fiction Text).  Each day, we have a few short mini-lessons about the features, then the students go out on their own to find whichever feature we have been discussing.  I normally give them a few sticky notes to "tab" pages where they find genuine examples.  After exploration time, we bring it back in again, and students can share their examples (by quickly flipping back to their tabs!).  Below are some great links for printables of features.  I always scale them down on the copier and have students glue them into their Reading Journals.

http://wlma2010.wikispaces.com/file/view/Nonfiction+text+features.pdf

http://page.reallygoodstuff.com/pdfs/157556.pdf

Towards the end of this week, I begin assessing their knowledge of non-fiction.  I do a lot of small group readings with the students (because non-fiction is always harder to read than fiction!).  I also integrate some worksheets and activities for grades.  Here are 2 worksheets that I’ve created:

You can view and dowload these sheets at
http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Just-Tinkerin-Around

At the end of week 2, I tend to get an accurate account of who’s succeeding with non-fiction, and who is going to need a little more focus during the first part of week 3. 

If you have any questions about my Non-Fiction Weeks 1 & 2, please don’t hesitate to ask!  I know it’s hard to type every detail that goes on during 10 weeks of lessons, and I also appreciate any comments or suggestions to add in the future!

I’ll be sure to post Weeks 3 & 4 tomorrow!  Thanks for reading!