A trip to Animal Park

Last Saturday, my Grandpa and Grandma took me and my little brother Aiden to lazy 5 ranch to feed the animal.

When we just got there, at the entrance it looked like a grassy field and a few camels.  We didn't see people.

We found out the animals not in the drive thru such as the peacock,  turkey were full. We threw food at them but they didn't eat. If you go to the drive through, they want you to  feed the animals. We saw lamb, baby deer, lama, zebra and Emu. The animals came close when they see the car coming. They sniffed around the car window to search for food and a lama even left bb on my car window, Yuck! If  the  window was closed, they went to  the next car. When I hold the food in the bucket and reached out from the car for the Emu, I almost dropped the bucket! I was afraid it would peck me with its beak but it didn't. There were lambs that weren't tall enough to reach the bucket, so I threw the food to the ground for them to eat.

I  was getting carsick after the ride and I threw out 4, 5 times.

Before we left, the animals were full because they were resting and sitting.

Anchor paper (Grade 1): Description

What is your classroom at school look like? Write a description of your classroom for your teacher. Tell what you see, hear and feel.

My classroom is a neat place! The desk and chairs are in small groups. My teacher's desk is made of metal. Her desk is by the round art table. There are six tall windows. Four bushy plants grow by the window. I like the reading corner the best. It has many books, a bright blue rugs and soft pillows.

Sometimes my classroom is as quiet as an ant. I can hear the clock tick. Sometimes the classroom is very noisy. You would like my classroom too!

words collection

words for weather:

Sleet  Rain  Cloudy  Overcast  Sunny Snowy  Rainy  Tornato  Thunderstorm Windy  humid  foggy warm  hot  cool  cold

words/phrases for smile:
Grin  laugh  beaming  smile ear to ear  giggle

phases described the "nervous"

Teeth chatter

Use crayons to teach color word thesaurus

Books to teach 6 traits

Many teachers utilize Jane O’Connor’s Fancy Nancy to teach word choice and target precise language. It’s a fabulous picture book for the trait of word choice. But many have asked for a “boy book” that targets the same word choice skills but is a little less girly. Found it! White Oak Elementary (Avon, IN) teacher Amy Stowers shared with me two fabulous alternatives. I Stink and I’m Dirty (both books by Kate & Jim McMullan) use trucks as main characters. Within I’m Dirty, the dump truck is decked out with “steel arms, hydraulic rams, and a specialized, maximized, giant-sized loader bucket.” What word choice! The whole book’s like that. You’ll love them both.

How strong is your vocabulary?

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Beginning & Ending

Let’s dive into the second most common reason students don’t pass — their writing lacks cohesiveness or completeness. In other words, they don’t have the 3-part combination including a beginning, middle, and end. They may have a beginning (or hook sentence), but after developing the middle, the piece just stops with a canned one-liner, like “The End” or “That’s all I know. Hope you liked my story,” or “Good-bye,” or “Thank you for reading this.”

If your writers are not habitually writing beginnings and endings for their middles, it’s time to make that a specific focus of instruction.

Teach the beginning & ending as one component, not two separate ones. Target beginnings and endings as a single unit. Offer students a structure for creating beginnings and endings. One idea is to encourage them to use the same type of beginning and ending. For example, if the writing begins with action, it can end with action. If it starts with a sound effect, it can end with a sound effect. If it begins with sensory description, then it can end with sensory description.

Describe this as the yo-yo effect. Releasing the yo-yo represents the beginning. The spinning at the bottom of the string represents the middle. And the yo-yo spiraling back up to the user’s hand represents the ending. However you start, you can end. However you send the yo-yo down, bring it back up the same way.

To help students get some practice with this concept I start by sharing an oral story about a bike crash I experienced:

I was riding my new bike faster and faster. Then, all of a sudden, my wheel hit a pothole and I went flying. End over end I somersaulted in the air. When I touched down again, I didn’t just crash. I slid. I skid. I skimmed across the road. When I came to a stop, my elbows and knees were bleeding. My hands hurt.

Consider the above to be the “middle” of a piece of writing. Use this same “middle” over and over, while orally reciting several different beginning/ending combinations. Some examples might include:

1. Intense Action

Beginning: I was pedaling fast down Hicker Hill on my brand new bike. My legs were going around and around. I remember picking up speed with every rotation.

Middle: Reference the crash.

Ending: It took a long time to hobble back up the hill, hauling my bike parts. There was a throbbing pain in my palms. They were scraped and raw, with speckles of gravel buried in them. Man, did they burn!

2. Sensory Description

Beginning: My new bike reflected the sunshine; it bounced off the shiny chrome trim. There was a white, plastic basket with seven, dainty purple flowers on the front. I swung my leg over it and began my first ride.

Middle: Reference the crash.

Ending: But, no matter how banged up I was, you should have seen my not-so-new bike. The chrome was dented. The paint was chipped. The basket was dangling from the handlebars, with only one purple flower remaining.

3. Intriguing Question

Beginning: Did you ever feel like you were flying? I have — the day I zoomed down Hicker Hill on my brand new bike.

Middle: Reference the crash.

Ending: Well, all I can say is you’ve seen a bird fly and crash into a window before, haven’t you?

4. Mood-Setting Emotion

Beginning: What a great day for bike riding! The sun was shining. The air was crisp. I was ready to hit the road, just me and my new bike.

Middle: Reference the crash.

Ending: It all went wrong, terribly wrong. All I want to do now is dump this bike in the garage and forget this day forever.

5. Sound Effect/Onomatopoeia

Beginning: WHIZ! The trees were behind me. WHIZ! I zoomed past a parked car. WHIZ! WHIZ! WHIZ! I passed mailboxes one by one. No one could catch me on my brand new bike.

Middle: Reference the crash.

Ending: CLINK! CLANK! CLUNK! The chain from my bike rhythmically banged against the bent fender, as I hauled my once-new bike back to the house.

The greatest advantage to such a technique is that students are immediately thinking of their ending before they even write the beginning. They know where their pieces are going. Producing a “meaningful whole” with a beginning, middle, and end is essential for on-demand writing.

This can be incorporated into primary-grade writing, too. This concept of tying the beginning and ending together is applicable even for young writers. Although it may not be a multi-sentence beginning with a multi-sentence ending, a single sentence is definitely doable. 

Titles

Different kinds:

• Character Title – Wilfrid Gordon McDonald Partridge, Fancy Nancy, The Recess Queen
• Repeat a specific line from the story — If You Give a Mouse a Cookie, Click, Clack, Moo: Cows That Type, Hey, Little Ant, Harriet, You’ll Drive Me Wild!
• One Word Title — Chrysanthemum, Oink, Scranimals, Fireflies!
• Identify a key object or thing — The Magic Hat, Piggie Pie, Lilly’s Purple Plastic Purse

Writing endings

The sign of a strong ending or conclusion is not necessarily one that fits a 3-5 sentence recipe. We’ve all read great endings that were one sentence long and great endings that were five sentences long. We’ve all read wretched endings that were one sentence long and wretched endings that were five sentences long. A great ending has nothing to do with how long the ending is but rather how satisfied it leaves the reader. 

Many teachers have students challenge students to write summary endings such as: Review the three main points outlined within the body of the writing. Here’s my problem with the summary ending--it’s so predictable! Everyone’s sounds the same. And more importantly, the piece isn’t usually long enough for me to have forgotten the main points anyway. So what’s better than a simple summary ending? How about an ending where the writer concludes with a more insightful and big picture approach? To produce such an ending, the writer needs to turn away from the piece and answer questions like What do you want to leave the reader with? So what? So what’s the big deal? Who should care? So what’s your point? What I like about these endings is that they are more global. They get the students to step back from the writing and not just restate their ideas. Rather, they truly conclude. When having students write conclusions, partner them up and have them literally ask each other these questions. Have the writers answer them orally for their partners. And those are the words and ideas the writer should then use in his final concluding sentences. 

Ways to Combine Sentences

Take two sentences and make a compound sentence

Example: Water at Big Bear Lake is cold, and swimming is discouraged.

Insert modifiers, adjectives or adverbs, to combine sentences

Example: Swimming in the cold water is discouraged

Use a prepositional phrase to combine sentences

Example: Near Los Angeles, San Diego, and Las Vegas, Big Bear, California is easily accessible.

List items in a series to combine sentences

Example: Park rangers encourage boating, fishing, and kayaking

Use a subordinating conjunction to combine sentences:

Example: Unless you want to sleep at a rest stop using railroad ties as firewood, plan ahead.

Use a dependent clause beginning with a relative pronoun (which, that, whom, whose, or who):

Example: Big Bear Lake, which sits 7,000 feet above sea level, is home to great fishing, kayaking, and boating.

Use participial phrases to combine sentences:

Examples: Planning ahead eliminates the need to sleep at rest stops and the need to use railroad ties as firewood.

Show, not tell

Here's an old rule in the writing business - show, don't tell. The problem with adjectives is that they don't show us anything. In other words, they rarely if ever evoke visual images in readers' minds, and are just a lazy substitute for writing good, effective description.

Look at the following two examples:

The man was fat.

The man's belly hung over his belt buckle and there was sweat on his forehead as he climbed the stairs.

See the difference? The first sentence is vague and lifeless. It doesn't really create a picture in your mind.

The second sentence, on the other hand, evokes images through just a few descriptive phrases - the belly hanging over the belt, the sweaty forehead. Notice that the word "fat" isn't used. It isn't needed. We get the picture.

Gettin’ Better Verbs

Revise the original “get/got” sentences without repeating a single verb.

1. When I went to camp, I got (caught)a head cold.
2. After dinner, my dad got ( received ) a phone call from his boss.
3. Jerry listened to the math teacher explain the lesson, but he still didn’t get (understand) it.
4. When will we get () our school pictures taken?
5. Ellen got (scored )an A- on her test.
6. When dad sold his lawn mower, he got ( made / was paid) $1500.00 for it.
7. Mom got (bought / purchased) all the items on her grocery list with a coupon.
8. My dad thought he knew the directions, but he got mixed up.
9. We got (arrived) to the theater late, and missed the opening act.
10. My sister got (received )free tickets for the concert next week.
11. During our camping trip, I got (was) bit by several nasty mosquitoes.
12. My teacher asked me how I got (received) my unusual name.
13. Dad got (was) lost when we went on vacation this summer.
14. Mom got (was) really upset with my brother.
15. Do you get (understand) that you shouldn’t use “get” as a verb?

• 1) Strong verbs show instead of tell

  Example: The tiger ate the antelope.

  The tiger devoured the antelope.

  Example: The Buffalo injured the hunter.

  The Buffalo gored the hunter.

  He hit (swatted) the ball.

  She ate (gobbled)the candy.

  They walked(trudged) up the hill.

  2) Single verbs show better than verb/adverb combinations.

  Example: He uses time wisely when writing essays.

  He maximizes time when writing essays.

  Example: The lion ferociously ate the gazelle.

  The lion gobbled the gazelle (note the serendipitous use of alliteration).

  3) Be verbs (am, is, are, was, were, be, being, been) suck the life out of your writing!

  Example: He was bludgeoned by the boxer.

  The boxer bludgeoned him.

  Example: The pedestrian was run over by the school bus.

  The school bus ran over the pedestrian.

  4) Have/has/had combined with a noun encourage readers to wedge their head in a vice.

  Example: I had an argument with the referee.

  I argued with the referee

  Example: I had dinner with the sheriff.

  I dined with the sheriff.
  
  

Common Action Verbs for Content-Areas

alternatives to "get, put, make, do, take, go." 

MATH VERBS
add  factor  represent  vary  measure  simplify  predict  operate  subtract  estimate  multiply substitute  apply  express  divide  plot  intersect  solve  arrange

LITERATURE VERBS
infer  symbolize  describe  foreshadow  represent  expose  express  contrast  relate  inform exaggerate  narrate  imply  compare  interpret  summarize  characterize  analyze

GOVERNMENT VERBS
vote  influence  advocate  restrain  elect  empower  veto  restrict  oversee  govern  defend  campaign  enforce  oppose  legislate  debate  propose  lobby

HISTORY VERBS
rule  force  reign  retreat  govern  attack  trade  affect  rule  contribute  isolate  influence  invade conflict  dominate  export  import  develop

BUSINESS VERBS
buy  exchange  save  reduce  transfer  close  sell  deduct  profit  balance  trade  advertise  invest
manufacture  borrow  bid  negotiate  collect

CHEMISTRY VERBS
separate  explode  level  cool  release  transfer  attract  liquify  implode  dissolve  contain  produce  repel  burn  heat  react  saturate  calculate  balance  remove  change  control  respond  bond  melt  affect  absorb  evaporate

EARTH SCIENCE VERBS
fill  flow  decrease  dissolve  reflect  cement  date  develop  drift  absorb  weaken  split  drop
weather  move  release  float  settle  collapse  precipitate  erode  accumulate  migrate  sink  disintegrate  increase  originate  melt

BIOLOGY VERBS
interact  produce  filter  hydrate  transport  expand  breathe  evolve  stimulate  dehydrate  flow  pump  contract  protect  digest  divide  mutate  block  nourish  reproduce  ingest  react  respond exchange  secrete  control  connect  decompose

PHYSICS VERBS
push  burn  melt  explode  vibrate  pull  force  evaporate  drive  measure  implode  collect  attract
recycle  float  sink  signal  repel  counteract  adhere  expand  bounce  ignite  rotate  contract balance  reverse  react