Delicious

I created a language arts unit for a second grade classroom. Since my major is language arts and my field placement is currently in a second grade classroom, I thought that I could really benefit from using the social network del.icio.us. My unit specifically deals with writing in the language arts curriculum, focusing on personal narratives. Here are the standards and GLCES that I thought would be most appropriate for my unit. Here are the GLCES specifically for writing: one from the Writing Genre section, W.GN.02.01 write a narrative piece such as realistic fiction, fantasy, or personal narrative depicting major story events, using illustrations to match mood, and containing setting, problem/solution, and sequenced events, another from Grammar & Usage W.GR.02.01 in the context of writing, correctly use more complex complete sentences, nouns and verbs, commas (in a series, in a letter, and with dates), contractions, colons to denote time, and capitalization of proper nouns, and lastly, Spelling W.SP.02.01 in the context of writing, correctly spell frequently encountered words (e.g., two-syllable words including common prefixes and suffixes); for less frequently encountered words use structural cues (e.g., letter/sound, rimes) and environmental sources (e.g., word walls, word lists). From the METS, I expect second graders to: proofread and edit their writing using appropriate resources including dictionaries and a class developed checklist both individually and as a group, as well as use various age-appropriate technologies for gathering information (e.g., dictionaries, encyclopedias, audio/video players,phones, web resources.

The tag I used to identify the 6 websites I bookmarked on my delicious account was writing, since all of the sites deal with writing in some way.

Here is the weekly agenda for the personal narrative unit:

Monday: We will start the unit by developing the students' stories through writing workshop and they will write their first personal narrative drafts. Students will use their writer’s notebooks to think and write about their favorite moment so far as a second grader. The writer's workshop website I found is a very useful website for both teachers and parents. It gives you an idea about how the writer's workshop works. Students will be encouraged to think back to their moments and have a vision about how this experience was for them using their senses. Tell them to use their senses, such as their emotions and how they felt, what they saw, heard, felt, etc. Their ideas can be in a list form, and then they should make a draft of their story with pictures.

On Tuesday, students will be revising their work. Revising is the process of working to clarify meaning and add details to a piece of writing. Students will reread their drafts to see if their stories make sense, and then share it with a partner and have them help them with their mistakes or add other ideas.

On Wednesday, students will be editing their stories and finishing the final draft. Editing is the process of attending to the conventions of writing, such as, spelling, capitalization, and punctuation. They will use a checklist and guideline to help them. Students should also use dictionaries and thesauruses as sources to improve their writing. The 2nd grade writing rubic/narrative writing that is posted on my delicious account, offers some great guidelines for teachers, students, and parents alike to use throughout the writing process to help with the personal narrative stories.

On Thursday, we will be publishing the students work by showing off everyone's personal stories. This will be a day to celebrate all of the students hard work by sharing every story with the rest of the class. The article, "Inviting Personal Narratives Into the Classroom," is a great article for students, teachers, and parents to use. It helps all of them understand the importance of personal narratives in their lives by: 1. Connect their home lives to their school lives, blurring the distinction between home and school, and affirm the value and importance that the individual child had in the classroom, 2. Find ways of getting to know each other and build their community, and 3. Offer ideas for the reading and writing they did in the classroom. Since personal narratives are more like personal storytelling, this will help children see their own experiences and stories as valuable work, and can help build students' confidence and competence. Not only in writing, but also in reading and thinking as well, and these are all needed in order to be successful with the higher level literacy skills.

On Friday, students will be reflecting about the stories they've created. "A Students Perspective" is a great article for students to help them understand how they can reflect on what they learned throughout the writing process, as well as what they learned about themselves as learners. This websites gives real life examples that students gave about how to become better organizers as writers. One of the students used a hamburger as an example of how to organize information that is going into the writing: the topping on the hamburger is the introduction, topic sentence, or introductory paragraph, the filling of the hamburger represents the details and supportive ideas, and the bottom bun represents the ending or the conclusion or summary in a story. I think students really need to think critically about the work they've created, and look at their accomplished, but also find ways in which they can improve on as well.

Lastly, I used a sixth article called "Help Your Child With Writing," that can provide parents some great suggestion on how to engage their child in the writing process. Even though this is not part of my lesson plan, I want to make sure that students are still getting the necessary education outside of school and into their homes.