1 Descriptive Writing and the 100th Day of School Resource Type: Instructional Resource -- Best Practice Discipline: English Language Arts Ohio Standards Alignment: Grades K–2 Professional Commentary: Learning to write nonfiction text is an important literacy skill for primary level students. This lesson guides students in writing descriptions about their 100th day bottles.... 2 Write Right Back: Recognizing Readers' Needs and Expectations for E-mail Replies Resource Type: Instructional Resource -- Promising Practice Discipline: English Language Arts Ohio Standards Alignment: Grades 1–2 Professional Commentary: Beginning writers find electronic communication highly engaging, and educators recognize the power of e-mail as a tool for literacy learning. E-mail is well-suited to teaching audience awareness—recognizing what readers need to know in order to reply to messages.... 3 Writing Poetry with Rebus and Rhyme Resource Type: Instructional Resource -- Promising Practice Discipline: English Language Arts Ohio Standards Alignment: Grades K–2 Professional Commentary: If you've ever drawn a heart for the word "love," you've written a rebus. Rebus, writing which substitutes images for words in the text, is a well-known technique used by authors to write books for young readers able to identify only a limited number of words, so why not use this same rebus technique to teach writing? This lesson uses rebus poetry as a strategy to reinforce students understanding of rhyming words.... 4 Teaching Adjectives with LUNCH Resource Type: Instructional Resource -- Promising Practice Discipline: English Language Arts Ohio Standards Alignment: Grades K–1 Professional Commentary: This lesson engages students in generating, classifying, and using describing words. Using the picture book, Lunch by Denise Fleming, students develop a familiarity with different types of adjectives and an understanding of their usage.... 5 A-Hunting We Will Go: Teaching Rhyming Through Musical Verse Resource Type: Instructional Resource -- Promising Practice Discipline: English Language Arts Ohio Standards Alignment: Grades K–2 Professional Commentary: Singing and songwriting can support early literacy instruction. This lesson makes use of the song "A-Hunting We Will Go" to teach rhyming. The lesson first uses the original verses of the song and students are asked to identify the two words in each verse that rhyme. Students then brainstorm and create their own rhyming words and additional verses to the song. In the next session, the students use an online site called "Sing a Song" and listen to other popular songs and identify the rhyming words in those songs. Finally students use an interactive tool called "Construct-a-Word" to create their own lists of rhyming words and new verses for other rhyming songs. Ideas for extensions and assessments are available. (author/jlkrause)... 6 Acrostic Poems: All About Me and My Favorite Things Resource Type: Instructional Resource -- Promising Practice Discipline: English Language Arts Ohio Standards Alignment: Grades K–2 Professional Commentary: In this lesson, students write free-verse acrostic poems about themselves using the letters of their names to begin each line. They then write an additional poem about something that is important to them, also using the letters of that word for the beginning of each line.... 7 A Getting-Acquainted Activity Using My Teacher's Secret Life Resource Type: Instructional Resource -- Promising Practice Discipline: English Language Arts Ohio Standards Alignment: Grades K–2 Professional Commentary: Children thrive in an environment where they are active participants in their learning. In this kindergarten activity, the children listen to a read aloud of My Teacher's Secret Life, discuss the content, and make predictions about what the teacher and their peers do when they are away from school.... 8 Note Writing in the Primary Classroom Resource Type: Instructional Resource -- Best Practice Discipline: English Language Arts Ohio Standards Alignment: Grades K–2 Professional Commentary: Focusing on the integration of authentic writing opportunities into daily instruction, this lesson encourages teachers to promote and model the use of informal writing to inspire students to write short notes to themselves, friends, teachers, and family members. Students write short notes, to remind, plan, request or compliment, providing many natural opportunities for meaningful writing and practice in encoding/decoding written text.... Resource Type: Instructional Resource -- Promising Practice Discipline: English Language Arts Ohio Standards Alignment: Grades K–2 Professional Commentary: This set of six lessons integrates language arts, science, technology, and the visual arts as students explore life in the deepest parts of the ocean. Students learn about the sea as they listen to fiction and nonfiction texts, explore picture books, hear poetry, do research, learn vocabulary, write stories and poems, produce artwork, and present what they have learned. The lessons require that you navigate through links that contain EDSITEment-reviewed sites. These websites offer rich information and are helpful to both teachers and students. Resource lists are available for picture books, poetry collections, online nursery rhymes, research books, and additional related websites. (author/jlkrause)... 10 Using Songwriting to Build Awareness of Beginning Letter Sounds Resource Type: Instructional Resource -- Promising Practice Discipline: English Language Arts Ohio Standards Alignment: Grades K–1 Professional Commentary: In this lesson, students use familiar songs to reinforce their understanding of letter-sound correspondence. Although presented as a multi-day lesson, the components of this lesson can be customized to match the specific needs of beginning readers at various stages of reading development.... |