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| I found some cute pointers for half off today at the teacher’s store. |
I like to let the kids use pointers for “read and write the room” activity when they are at centers. I have a box with 4 clipboards in it with A to Z lined writing papers clipped on. The kids LOVE to do this writing activity. Maybe because when they are done with all 26 words they can go get a sticker. It seems to be very motivating. 🙂
Another fun motivator is my writing workshop bulletin board. My kids move their own little icon with their name on it (and velcro on the back) up and down the board as they go through the writing process.
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| The whole thing is surrounded by a “roadway” for their “animal cars” to move on. I got the roadway and the animal cars just from 2 different borders I cut up and put velcro on the back. The topics are all from 1 original poster $1.99 from the teachers supply store. |
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| They go through brainstorm, prewrite (usually one of those we do on the board together) sloppy copy, teacher editing….the whole works….. |
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| Then after a final copy and illustration, they can sign up to share in the Author’s Chair. |
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| We did some writing about summer….an acrostic poem…. |
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| I think it is also motivating to have creative papers for them to print on and then decorate. Here they did summer beach scenes using stickers. |
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| Here is their own versions of The Little Red Hen…..some of them were so funny! |
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| We also do non-fiction writing….here we were learning about famous presidents for Presidents Day. They liked learning about Lincoln and Washington. And notice the cute paper? I think it helps motivate them to finish the writing so they can color the pictures. |
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| My oldest granddaughter just graduated from an excellent preschool where writing skills begin. She is barely 4 and writes her own name perfectly. She’s got a good teacher who helped her learn her ABCs and she’s actually reading 3 letter words now. Here she is getting cold feet just before going up to get her “graduation certificate”. My daughter had to “talk her down”. 😀 |

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| It is rewarding to me to be that good teacher in a child’s life. And to get to daily celebrate all of their learning. I hope writing is as big a part of your classroom as it is mine. Especially in this age of texting, kids need to learn how to write the “right way”. We write at least 45 minutes uninterupted every single day. I rate it tops on my list of skills to teach. |

