Wednesday, March 8, 2017

How to Use Word Banks During Writer's Workshop


How to use word banks during writer's workshop is a blog post explains how you can effectively use word banks collaboratively with your kindergartners, first & second graders. Great for ELL students & struggling writers. Students and teacher generate word ideas to write in the bank and record the words on anchor charts or display on SMARTboard or interactive whiteboard. Can be used with all genres of writing (such as opinion, narrative & informative) {K, 1st, 2nd grade, homeschool}



    Have you ever taught that great writer's workshop mini-lesson where you can hear a pin drop in the classroom as you are modeling what to write on the easel? You turn around and this is what you see:



The look of confusion on a quarter on those young faces...

I hang up the anchor charts and walk them through the steps of writing an opinion piece...

How to write an opinion piece for first & second graders. This sentene starter anchor chart is a perfet way to get your young writers going during writer's workshop as they learn the words associated with writing about their opinions. {K, 1st, 2md grade, homeschool.}

Then, we talk about possible ways we can start our writing:

How to write an opinion piece for first & second graders. This sentene starter anchor chart is a perfet way to get your young writers going during writer's workshop as they learn the words associated with writing about their opinions. {K, 1st, 2md grade, homeschool.}

Since at least now they have a starting point and a definitive path going forward, some of the confused faces seem to dissipate.

But by far, the most often asked question I get during Writer's Workshop is...

"Mrs. Pettersen, how do you spell....?"

For those that are reluctant to take risks, or for those struggling students/writers, word banks are a helpful tool.

As a class, we generate a "word bank" of words we think we will use in our writing that day during Writer's Workshop.  These are words that are not on our word wall and cannot be sounded out easily.  I also add my own suggestions to the list. I try to keep the list small, at only 8-10 words. Students should be sounding out the majority of the words.

For ELL students, struggling writers and the like, words banks have proven to be a helpful tool in our classroom. 

Sometimes we write them on chart paper:

How to use word banks during writer's workshop is a blog post explains how you can effectively use word banks collaboratively with your kindergartners, first & second graders. Great for ELL students & struggling writers. Students and teacher generate word ideas to write in the bank and record the words on anchor charts or display on SMARTboard or interactive whiteboard. Can be used with all genres of writing (such as opinion, narrative & informative) {K, 1st, 2nd grade, homeschool}

Sometimes I type them out as the students dictate them in a Word Doc and display them on our SMARTboard. This seems to be the easiest way, since the SMARTboard is located front and center in our class so students can reference it easily (and frankly....it looks neater).

How to use word banks during writer's workshop is a blog post explains how you can effectively use word banks collaboratively with your kindergartners, first & second graders. Great for ELL students & struggling writers. Students and teacher generate word ideas to write in the bank and record the words on anchor charts or display on SMARTboard or interactive whiteboard. Can be used with all genres of writing (such as opinion, narrative & informative) {K, 1st, 2nd grade, homeschool}

What tricks do you use to help your young writer's during Writer's Workshop?



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How to use word banks during writer's workshop is a blog post explains how you can effectively use word banks collaboratively with your kindergartners, first & second graders. Great for ELL students & struggling writers. Students and teacher generate word ideas to write in the bank and record the words on anchor charts or display on SMARTboard or interactive whiteboard. Can be used with all genres of writing (such as opinion, narrative & informative) {K, 1st, 2nd grade, homeschool}