Explore epic writing games tailored for kids! Dive into interactive challenges that spark creativity and boost literacy skills
This guide gives you some tips on dropping hints of romance without explicitly stating it, or having your characters shout it from the rooftops.
Are you ready to create a life that makes more room for what you love? Check out these tips on how to live like a writer.
The Sentence Game Let’s face it, writing is hard. It takes lots and lots of practice to master the many skills a writer needs. But practice can be boring. Not now! I’ve created a sentence writing game your kids will love. With this game they’ll write sentence after sentence without complaining, because it’s a game. It’s very simple, but practices very essential skills- capitalization, punctuation, grammar, and spelling. The game can be played with 2 or more players. There’s even a way to play it with your whole class. Each student needs a word grid and a sentence/scoring sheet. Each set of players will also need one die and a scoring guide. Here's how it's played: v Each player rolls the die. The players then circle that number of words on their word grid. They circle the words down the first column, in order. Words cannot be skipped. v Now each player writes one sentence, using as many of the circled words as they can. If two sentences are written, only the first sentence will be scored. All of the circled words do not need to be used, but players earn one point for each grid word in their sentence. The words from the word grid cannot be changed. (ie. quickly cannot be changed to quick.) Important: After writing the sentence, players underline the grid words they used. This makes it easier for the checker to check the grid words. v Once all sentences are written, players pass their sentence/scoring sheet to the right. These players score the sentence and write the score in the box on the right. To play with your whole class, simply roll the dice once. Every student in class will use that number to circle the words on their grid. Once all the sentences are written, students can exchange their sheet with a partner for the scoring. After your students understand how to play you can play a round anytime you need a time filler. Students can keep their word grid and sentence/score sheet in a folder or their binder so it’s always handy. This game also works very well in a literacy center. Click on this image to download The Sentence Game. Happy writing!
Apple Pre-Writing Tracing is great for toddlers and preschoolers who are just learning how to use crayons. Using crayons or whipping creams, let your kids
Add some extra texture to your characters.
This week’s Homeschool Help topic is “Help! My child hates writing!” My suggestion whenever a child hates anything is to take a complete break from the current routine and have so…
Whether you are trying to write a novel, pen an epic poem, or maintain a blog about this or that, it’s inevitable that you will at some point experience one of the following: lack of inspiration decrease in motivation general malaise writing burnout general I-don’t-give-a-shit Some people refer to these symptoms as “writer’s block,” but I … Continue reading What to Write About When You Have Nothing to Write About
We loved making this brain hat (UPDATE: if that link won't work for you, try this : Go to the link here: https://ellenjmchenry.com/ and...
A clever classroom trick to help children learning to write inside lines
Here are five daily creative writing exercises that you likely won't see repeated across the internet. Try them and soak up the inspiration.
Are you interested in learning to become a freelance writer? These tips will help you on your path to success.
Do you want your students to love writing? Get tips on how to create a classroom writing center that your students will WANT to go to!
Comparing The Seven Basic Plots by Christopher Booker to Dramatica Story Theory
These all about me, back to school art activities for kids are engaging icebreakers. Encourage creativity and build community during the first week back
Are you a singer wanting to venture into songwriting? Or, you're already a songwriter, but you've been feeling like your process has just been uninspired lately. Maybe you're someone just looking for a new hobby?! Learn one of my favorite ways of writing a song! Learn how to write a song.
What are Scrambled Paragraphs? Scrambled paragraphs are sentences taken from a complete paragraph for your students to rearrange. They are like puzzles your students will put back together using what they know about text structure. Teachers
I can't believe this school year is almost over! I have only 5 days of school left, Friday is our last day. I will miss my kiddos dearly but am super excited to start my summer vacation. Next school year will bring so many changes for me~~new partner teacher (SUPER excited!!), best friend coming back to teach at my school (YAHOO!!), my baby girl is starting 8th grade at another school (BOO HOO!), and 3rd grade will switch classes next year (SCARED!!)!! I will need the summer to get ready for my 27+ new students next year. I love planning over the summer and will need this summer to prepare for switching classes. Switching won't be so bad, I will teach religion to 2 classes. I am really happy about not teaching science and social studies too!! I always have a hard time fitting these 2 subjects in on a daily basis. My students have been really busy these last 2 weeks doing my favorite all-time writing assignment~~~My Favorite Summer Vacation! I just love this writing and really LOVE how the finished essays turn out. Check them out below. You can click (HERE) to download the sunglasses template. You need to make 2 copies and tape them together. See below!! This year I decided to give out Candy Awards. I literally ran all over town looking for each type of candy. I even had my honey helping me (He was so cute going from store to store!)! I had the hardest time finding Lifesavers (Who would believe that?!). You can download your own set of Candy Awards from Tunstall's Teaching Tidbits. I found these awards during the summer and have been saving them all year. Check them out below! I can't wait to share them with my students tomorrow!!! Here is just a taste of what the awards look like! They are precious!!!! Here is a fun project I did with my class last week. I found this idea on Pinterest and just HAD to try it with my class! Look at the pictures below and try to see the shape! I am in LOVE with this!!
These all about me, back to school art activities for kids are engaging icebreakers. Encourage creativity and build community during the first week back
What is blackout poetry? Poetry writing that all students can feel successful with. Here's how to teach it. Freebie included!
David Sax on analog ideas and products, such as Moleskine notebooks, that remain viable and popular despite advances in digital technology.
I am beyond passionate about writing. I truly believe that writing is the corner stone to all thinking. Through writing children gain higher level thinking, use their creative talents, strengthen their reading and speaking abilities, and so on! Writing is POWERFUL! I have one rule in my classroom (okay well maybe more than one) but ... Read More about Writing with Mentor Texts
It's the end of the year and amazing things are happening in kindergarten! This week we completed our animal research projects. These kiddos blew me away! I wrote a blog post all about writing animal research papers in kindergarten HERE if you would like to see how I get this started. Today I will share an update on how our research papers went this year and a little freebie at the end to get you started. I used a class set of books we received from the Kiwanis earlier in the year. They are from Scholastic and come in sets of 5. Each book has lots of pictures of different kinds of animals so students have choices regardless of the book they pick. Once students picked their book they went to do a little reading on their own. They picked an animal from the book and started writing. I encouraged them to draw a picture first to really get to know their animal before they decided what facts they were going to share. I didn't expect them to jump "write in" and start writing but they did! The class was silent as they went to work writing about their animal. Some sat around the floor to find a quiet area for their research and some build little privacy areas around themselves so they wouldn't be bothered. A little privacy with folders and her book so she can get to work! A quiet spot on the floor was all this one needed to get focused. The thing that always amazes me about these research projects is that students that rarely write a full sentence suddenly are writing pages because they are writing about something that INTERESTS them! That's what we want right? Don't get me wrong, we always have choice in our classroom when it comes to writing but this project just really inspires students to do more. I had to have this one read to me first but once she read it I got it! ANTS! This sweetie spoke very little English when she came to school and now she is writing her very own research papers on her own. What an accomplishment! "Ants is bug are red" Remember what I said about kiddos that don't write very much. They write "I like..." and are done with it on a daily basis? Well this kiddo gives me that a lot but today was totally different. Notice the phonetic spelling....no copying out of the book here! He did his research and wrote what he wanted to write about his creature. Check out those finger spaces too! Ok, now for the FREEBIE! If you would like this ALL ABOUT page just click HERE. It also includes an All About Beavers page that I use the week prior during our Reading Street Building Beavers unit. I blogged about that HERE. It's a great way to do a group research project first before sending your kiddos out on their own. Thanks for stopping by today! It's been a little while since I have blogged about ANYTHING and it feels good to share a little fun we've had in the classroom! We only have a few weeks left....I don't know exactly and I refuse to countdown. (#takedownthecountdown) I am enjoying every last second with my kiddos! Save this post for later!
Teaching narrative writing can be easy, effective while consuming little time. This model is simple to implelment and promotes student love for writing!
Learn how to use picture writing prompts to keep elementary students engaged, writing, and having fun with the great ideas and suggestions here.
These all about me, back to school art activities for kids are engaging icebreakers. Encourage creativity and build community during the first week back
Writing instruction often fits into a small corner of the day. This makes it so challenging to find time to teach grammar, spelling, punctuation, and all the other foundational skills students need to be more effective writers. While working through the writing process is an important piece of writing instruction, many
Okay... I've mentioned before that I'm super uncomfortable writing a blog post that is all about one of my TpT products. But, with that said, welcome to a blog post all about one of my TpT products! And, I'm okay with it. Because, for real, this product ROCKS! If I do say so myself :) So, argument writing is hard stuff. I love teaching it. And eventually, I think the kids like knowing how to do it. But, it's hard. SO.HARD. Especially in the beginning. I was looking for a cool way to ease us into it. A way to slide in so that it didn't seem so intimidating. An approach that made it seem exciting, even a little bit FUN! But, I couldn't find anything! And so, like anytime Google lets me down, I got creating and this little gem is the fruit of my labor! The Debating Game is fun. My kids LOVED it! So much so that they asked to play it every day for almost a week during free write time. And while playing, they are practicing supporting claims with reasoning and evidence... exactly the skill necessary for opinion/persuasive/argument writing! It's a total win-win. Fun and learning! You should know, this product does take some time to put together, so please don't buy it if you need to use it exactly five minutes later. There is laminating and cutting and organizing involved in putting these together. I made six total games for my classroom (I stored each complete game in a pencil case). I also went to the dollar store and bought one-minute sand timers and golf pencils to put in the case along with the game pieces for easy playing (though they are totally not necessary!). And you'll see I used a standard die, but there is a template for making your own dice to use when playing, so it is not necessary to have your own. It took me about an hour to print, laminate, cut, and organize all 6 games. But, now that they are together they are ready-to-go anytime we need them. I definitely see myself putting these in a writing center, using them for an anchor activity for early finishers, and leaving them in my sub plans. The kids enjoyed playing far too much to put them into storage until next year! So, if you teach opinion/persuasion/argument writing and you are looking for a fun way to practice the skills necessary for this, The Debating Game might be for you! My own students loved it and if you try it out, please let me know what yours think about it! Happy Teaching!!
Use sensory bags in your classroom for mess-free learning and fun. Your kids will love learning and playing with hands-on sensory bags!
Writing Station Suitcase is a year long writing center all-in-one solution. Keep students excited and learning at the writing center.
One of my favorite things about back to school, is knowing that I get to meet and love on a brand new bunch of kids for the school year. I’m sure you feel the same way, and have your lesson planner packed to the max with different “get-to-know-you activities.” I want to share with you […]
Class books are a wonderful writing activity for preschool and kindergarten students! This post has tons of great class book ideas to use with your students. These class-created books cover the beginning of the year, Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. Valentine's Day, Easter, and more! Students will love writing and illustrating their own books to be enjoyed by the class!
Inspire your second writers with this list of journal ideas and 2nd grade writing prompts shared by one of our Journal Buddies readers!
Let's talk about teaching adjectives. Specifically, how you can build interest and engagement by incorporating art and poetry into your lesson.
In a right-handed world.
Our comprehensive list of 61 unique and captivating journal ideas for teens is perfect for middle and high school students! Let's get writing!
The six word memoir is a quick and creative way to get students thinking and writing about their own lives. Whether you use it for an icebreaker (which makes a great display!) at the start of school or as part of an identity or personal narrative unit, this engaging activity pulls together reflection, writing and visuals to produce a memorable moment of connection with your student writers. This curriculum set now comes with a Google drive link to an editable version of the student instructions and handouts. I hope that's helpful! From the Reviews: "I'll be using this during the first week of school with my sophomores. I've done six-word memoirs with my students before, but I love that you have added an artistic element. I also appreciate the short reflection assignment, as reflection is a very important part of my classroom culture. Thanks!" "Great activity to use during the first week. Will be using as a lead in to a 5 paragraph essay. Thanks!" "Easy to use. Open-ended enough to allow creativity." Here's what's inside: Clear project instructions Two template options to help students combine their words and imagery An optional reflection to extend the writing process once the six word memoirs are complete Please check out the preview to see the handouts in detail. Looking for more creative ideas for your English classroom? Check out The Spark Creativity Teacher Podcast! Did you enjoy this activity? Please share your thoughts by leaving a review! You'll get free credits towards your next purchase, and think of the karma. Love combining visuals with ideas in class? Check out these popular one-pager activities.
