Unit 2 Focus: Informational Writing/Research Paper
In Washington County, we are using the Lucy Calkins writing program. Our 2nd unit focuses on research writing and is called "The Lens of History". The outline below shows the steps we took to complete our first informational writing piece about European explorers.
Bend One
Topic: European Explorers
I. Organizing
A. Think about your knowledge of European explorers
B. Brainstorm subtopics
C. Record those subtopics on post-it notes
D. Write your knowledge on post-it notes and then sort them into categories based on the subtopics
E. "See" which categories are lacking information (this will be your focus for research)
II. Preparing Information for Drafting
A. Taking more notes on post-its for drafting stage
B. Tips on Note-Taking
1. Read a section of text, pause to think about what is important, and then write your notes.
2. Consider the main ideas and supporting details as you read. A structure like boxes and bullets can help you organize your notes.
3. Instead of copying from the text, put the information in your own words. If this is hard, don't look at the original text when recording notes.
4. Keep track of your source so you can return later to confirm or get more information.
III. Writing Flash Drafts
A. Review what good informational writers do when they write
1. Teach other people
2. Show what the past was like
3. Group the information
4. Use quotes
5. Write introductions and conclusions
B. Look over post-it notes (your plan)
C. Write, write, write
1. This "flash draft" is meant for students to get their ideas out on the paper - to think with their pen. I want them to write!
IV. Note-Taking and Idea-Making for Revision
A. One sub-topic on each page, then collect related notes on that page
B. Refer to "Tips on Note-Taking" (above)
1. Remember that note-taking isn't just about copying facts. Writers need to write your own thoughts while note-taking.
2. Are there surprises, patterns, questions that you have about what you are reading?
3. Continue to take notes and reflect on what you are reading; extend your thoughts.
C. Information Writers
1. Think about the topic-and the parts of the topic-to write about.
2. Plan how the writing might go.
3. Research, taking notes.
4. Draft.
5. Revise with various lenses: growing ideas, looking for patterns, and asking questions.
V. Writers of history pay attention to geography
A. Historians think it's important to include details about the places (geography) where things occurred. Geography will always have an impact on what occurs. (Keep a map close by to help you explain about the geography)
B. Reread your writing with the lens of geography - think about how the geography of the place impacted how the events unfolded
C. Possible geographic revisions
1. Where was the route?
2. Where did important events occur?
3. Which area was settled with which peoples?
4. Which physical features had an impact? (rivers, mountains, lakes, deserts, ...)
5. What did the location mean for the climate and weather?
6. What distances were involved?
VI. Writing to Think
A. When you are researching something, you need to not just move facts from someone else's book to your page. You also need to THINK, to come up with your own ideas. Do this by asking questions and then find your own answers - even if your answers are tentative - Maybe it's because...I think it's because...I wonder if perhaps...
B. Writing to Think
1. "This makes me think..."
2. "I'm realizing..."
3. "This might be important because..."
4. "I wonder if..."
5. "Could it be that..."
6. "Probably they..."
7. "It must have been..."
8. "For example..."
9. "Probably after a while..."
C. Go from recording facts to growing ideas
1. What are the surprising parts about this?
2. So what? What might these facts have meant to people? Why might this fact have been important to people? What difference would this have made?
3. How does this connect with other things I know?
4. Think about how the timeline of history impacted how the events unfolded.
Students are drafting and revising constantly throughout this process! After we completed our flash drafts in our writing journal, we re-drafted and revised typing our work into a word document. That made revisions easier, as we could cut and paste, move things around, and add things more easily.
VII. Ways to Make Writing More Formal
A. Avoid contractions. Instead of didn't or weren't, try did not or were not.
B. Use expert language from your research.
C. Use fancy transition words like therefore, additionally, in other words, on the other hand.
Topic: European Explorers
I. Organizing
A. Think about your knowledge of European explorers
B. Brainstorm subtopics
C. Record those subtopics on post-it notes
D. Write your knowledge on post-it notes and then sort them into categories based on the subtopics
E. "See" which categories are lacking information (this will be your focus for research)
II. Preparing Information for Drafting
A. Taking more notes on post-its for drafting stage
B. Tips on Note-Taking
1. Read a section of text, pause to think about what is important, and then write your notes.
2. Consider the main ideas and supporting details as you read. A structure like boxes and bullets can help you organize your notes.
3. Instead of copying from the text, put the information in your own words. If this is hard, don't look at the original text when recording notes.
4. Keep track of your source so you can return later to confirm or get more information.
III. Writing Flash Drafts
A. Review what good informational writers do when they write
1. Teach other people
2. Show what the past was like
3. Group the information
4. Use quotes
5. Write introductions and conclusions
B. Look over post-it notes (your plan)
C. Write, write, write
1. This "flash draft" is meant for students to get their ideas out on the paper - to think with their pen. I want them to write!
IV. Note-Taking and Idea-Making for Revision
A. One sub-topic on each page, then collect related notes on that page
B. Refer to "Tips on Note-Taking" (above)
1. Remember that note-taking isn't just about copying facts. Writers need to write your own thoughts while note-taking.
2. Are there surprises, patterns, questions that you have about what you are reading?
3. Continue to take notes and reflect on what you are reading; extend your thoughts.
C. Information Writers
1. Think about the topic-and the parts of the topic-to write about.
2. Plan how the writing might go.
3. Research, taking notes.
4. Draft.
5. Revise with various lenses: growing ideas, looking for patterns, and asking questions.
V. Writers of history pay attention to geography
A. Historians think it's important to include details about the places (geography) where things occurred. Geography will always have an impact on what occurs. (Keep a map close by to help you explain about the geography)
B. Reread your writing with the lens of geography - think about how the geography of the place impacted how the events unfolded
C. Possible geographic revisions
1. Where was the route?
2. Where did important events occur?
3. Which area was settled with which peoples?
4. Which physical features had an impact? (rivers, mountains, lakes, deserts, ...)
5. What did the location mean for the climate and weather?
6. What distances were involved?
VI. Writing to Think
A. When you are researching something, you need to not just move facts from someone else's book to your page. You also need to THINK, to come up with your own ideas. Do this by asking questions and then find your own answers - even if your answers are tentative - Maybe it's because...I think it's because...I wonder if perhaps...
B. Writing to Think
1. "This makes me think..."
2. "I'm realizing..."
3. "This might be important because..."
4. "I wonder if..."
5. "Could it be that..."
6. "Probably they..."
7. "It must have been..."
8. "For example..."
9. "Probably after a while..."
C. Go from recording facts to growing ideas
1. What are the surprising parts about this?
2. So what? What might these facts have meant to people? Why might this fact have been important to people? What difference would this have made?
3. How does this connect with other things I know?
4. Think about how the timeline of history impacted how the events unfolded.
Students are drafting and revising constantly throughout this process! After we completed our flash drafts in our writing journal, we re-drafted and revised typing our work into a word document. That made revisions easier, as we could cut and paste, move things around, and add things more easily.
VII. Ways to Make Writing More Formal
A. Avoid contractions. Instead of didn't or weren't, try did not or were not.
B. Use expert language from your research.
C. Use fancy transition words like therefore, additionally, in other words, on the other hand.
Bend Two
Drawing Inspiration from Mentor Texts - we sort of plowed through our first bend of writing like a snowplow - straight and to the point, no frills, just getting the basics down. This time we are going to really try to put everything we know about good writing into our research piece. Our first day, we discussed what we would like to do with our new research project - (1) study beautiful writing; (2) choose a more focused topic; (3) make decisions-even creative ones- about how our writing will go; (4) work on qualities of good writing (show, don't tell).
We watched a short piece of a video about the Transcontinental Railroad in order to discuss what makes powerful informational writing (viewing). Here is the list we generated after watching the video:
1. Lists reasons why the event was important and intense.
2. Uses dramatic language.
3. Starts by telling a bit about the whole event, then goes back to inch through the story more slowly.
4. Brings out the action-filled, emotion-filled parts.
5. Creates scenes that capture life then.
6. Uses quotations from lots of people, including colorful language.
7. Tells history like it is a story (quirky characters with big dreams faced with troubles, one after another).
We reviewed the information from our chart, reminding us of what made powerful informational writing. We spent some time talking about possible topics - from a list Mrs. Nallo generated. Then we really discussed note-taking and citing sources. We have a resource in our classroom that shows us how to cite text and videos. An online resource students can use at home is http://www.citationmachine.com/
The last thing we did on day 2 was to choose our topic. Students are working in groups of 2 or 3 on the same topic in order to divide up the research work.
I demonstrated the need for a thesis/mission statement in order to focus our research. I used the Transcontinental Railroad topic as an example and came up with the thesis/mission statement: It's amazing that this railroad was actually made at all! I then modeled how to listen/read for facts that will support my statement. Students then met in their groups to come up with their thesis/mission statement and a possible table of contents. The groups were then allowed to conduct a small amount of research in order to really "nail down" their table of contents.
Primary Source Documents: we discussed the difference between a primary source and a secondary source. We discussed the importance of using primary source documents in our research - get a "first hand" account of what happened! I gave the students a list of web resources that contain primary source documents. That list is included below:
http://www.sfmuseum.org/hist6/grush.html
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/photo-gallery/tcrr-gallery
http://commons.wikimedia.org (site for shared media of all types)
http://www.pbs.org
http://www.archives.gov/education/
I modeled and we worked together how important it is to read super closely (more than one time) when reading primary source documents. We need to be detectives to figure out information from these types of documents.
1. Who is writing it?
2. Who is being written to or about?
3. What's going on?
4. What is the importance of it? What does it mean?
5. Where does it come from?
6. Why was it made?
7. What's missing? What is being hinted at without actually saying it?
8. What are the circumstances around the artifact?
9. What details does it have about life back then?
10. Are there any quotations that support my focus?
These types of documents can be great sources of information to help us understand what life was like then, as well as gather quotes for our writing piece.
Primary Source Images: we practiced looking at photographs in order to gain knowledge about our topic. We were able to focus on one section of the photograph at a time; we wrote down what we saw in a list; we categorized the things we saw; then we made notes about what we thought was happening. See specific questions below:
1. What is in the background?
2. What is in the foreground?
3. Where are they? What's the setting?
4. Who do you see? Who do you NOT see?
5. What are they doing?
6. What are they wearing?
7. Look closely at the facial expressions and body language.
8. What objects, tools, or instruments do you see?
9. What do you make of all this? What questions do you have?
10. What surprises you?
11. What patterns do you notice?
Finding a structure to let writing grow - TEXT STRUCTURE: we reviewed what a structure is (the bones/the building blocks) and then we reviewed what we remembered about text structure from back in August - compare/contrast; question/answer; descriptive; problem/solution; chronological/sequential; main idea/details. Then we looked at a few examples of nonfiction text that stuck with a specific structure. Then we chose a specific structure for our writing piece to help us keep our "building" straight and tall - not lopsided and falling over.
Formats to Let Information Writing Grow:
1. Quizzes with answers (question/answer)
2. Cause/effect
3. You might think...but the truth is...because...
4. Interesting facts; before, during, after; or other subsections in every section
5. Labeled sketches
6. Different perspectives
Finding Multiple Points of View: Eleanor Roosevelt once said, "The world cannot be understood from a single perspective." We started our lesson with this quote and a discussion about what it means. We linked it to times when we had a fight with a friend or sibling and how our stories are somewhat different, depending on the shoes you are in at the time. We talked about how the American Revolution would look from the British point of view; the building of the Transcontinental Railroad from the Native American point of view; or the Civil War from the slave's point of view; or World War II from the Jewish perspective....so many times it's difficult to put ourselves into someone else's shoes, but in order to write good informational text, it's something we have to try to do! We looked back at primary sources and other sources to see if there was a different perspective about our topic and then tried to incorporate that into our writing. To do this, we asked these questions:
1. What is the obvious story? (the story we most often hear)
2. What are some other sides of the story?
3. What are sides that are not often heard?
It's important for students to understand why certain points of view might be silenced. It's also important for them to know and understand that this wasn't just something that happened long ago, but that it still occurs today!
Drawing Inspiration from Mentor Texts - we sort of plowed through our first bend of writing like a snowplow - straight and to the point, no frills, just getting the basics down. This time we are going to really try to put everything we know about good writing into our research piece. Our first day, we discussed what we would like to do with our new research project - (1) study beautiful writing; (2) choose a more focused topic; (3) make decisions-even creative ones- about how our writing will go; (4) work on qualities of good writing (show, don't tell).
We watched a short piece of a video about the Transcontinental Railroad in order to discuss what makes powerful informational writing (viewing). Here is the list we generated after watching the video:
1. Lists reasons why the event was important and intense.
2. Uses dramatic language.
3. Starts by telling a bit about the whole event, then goes back to inch through the story more slowly.
4. Brings out the action-filled, emotion-filled parts.
5. Creates scenes that capture life then.
6. Uses quotations from lots of people, including colorful language.
7. Tells history like it is a story (quirky characters with big dreams faced with troubles, one after another).
We reviewed the information from our chart, reminding us of what made powerful informational writing. We spent some time talking about possible topics - from a list Mrs. Nallo generated. Then we really discussed note-taking and citing sources. We have a resource in our classroom that shows us how to cite text and videos. An online resource students can use at home is http://www.citationmachine.com/
The last thing we did on day 2 was to choose our topic. Students are working in groups of 2 or 3 on the same topic in order to divide up the research work.
I demonstrated the need for a thesis/mission statement in order to focus our research. I used the Transcontinental Railroad topic as an example and came up with the thesis/mission statement: It's amazing that this railroad was actually made at all! I then modeled how to listen/read for facts that will support my statement. Students then met in their groups to come up with their thesis/mission statement and a possible table of contents. The groups were then allowed to conduct a small amount of research in order to really "nail down" their table of contents.
Primary Source Documents: we discussed the difference between a primary source and a secondary source. We discussed the importance of using primary source documents in our research - get a "first hand" account of what happened! I gave the students a list of web resources that contain primary source documents. That list is included below:
http://www.sfmuseum.org/hist6/grush.html
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/photo-gallery/tcrr-gallery
http://commons.wikimedia.org (site for shared media of all types)
http://www.pbs.org
http://www.archives.gov/education/
I modeled and we worked together how important it is to read super closely (more than one time) when reading primary source documents. We need to be detectives to figure out information from these types of documents.
1. Who is writing it?
2. Who is being written to or about?
3. What's going on?
4. What is the importance of it? What does it mean?
5. Where does it come from?
6. Why was it made?
7. What's missing? What is being hinted at without actually saying it?
8. What are the circumstances around the artifact?
9. What details does it have about life back then?
10. Are there any quotations that support my focus?
These types of documents can be great sources of information to help us understand what life was like then, as well as gather quotes for our writing piece.
Primary Source Images: we practiced looking at photographs in order to gain knowledge about our topic. We were able to focus on one section of the photograph at a time; we wrote down what we saw in a list; we categorized the things we saw; then we made notes about what we thought was happening. See specific questions below:
1. What is in the background?
2. What is in the foreground?
3. Where are they? What's the setting?
4. Who do you see? Who do you NOT see?
5. What are they doing?
6. What are they wearing?
7. Look closely at the facial expressions and body language.
8. What objects, tools, or instruments do you see?
9. What do you make of all this? What questions do you have?
10. What surprises you?
11. What patterns do you notice?
Finding a structure to let writing grow - TEXT STRUCTURE: we reviewed what a structure is (the bones/the building blocks) and then we reviewed what we remembered about text structure from back in August - compare/contrast; question/answer; descriptive; problem/solution; chronological/sequential; main idea/details. Then we looked at a few examples of nonfiction text that stuck with a specific structure. Then we chose a specific structure for our writing piece to help us keep our "building" straight and tall - not lopsided and falling over.
Formats to Let Information Writing Grow:
1. Quizzes with answers (question/answer)
2. Cause/effect
3. You might think...but the truth is...because...
4. Interesting facts; before, during, after; or other subsections in every section
5. Labeled sketches
6. Different perspectives
Finding Multiple Points of View: Eleanor Roosevelt once said, "The world cannot be understood from a single perspective." We started our lesson with this quote and a discussion about what it means. We linked it to times when we had a fight with a friend or sibling and how our stories are somewhat different, depending on the shoes you are in at the time. We talked about how the American Revolution would look from the British point of view; the building of the Transcontinental Railroad from the Native American point of view; or the Civil War from the slave's point of view; or World War II from the Jewish perspective....so many times it's difficult to put ourselves into someone else's shoes, but in order to write good informational text, it's something we have to try to do! We looked back at primary sources and other sources to see if there was a different perspective about our topic and then tried to incorporate that into our writing. To do this, we asked these questions:
1. What is the obvious story? (the story we most often hear)
2. What are some other sides of the story?
3. What are sides that are not often heard?
It's important for students to understand why certain points of view might be silenced. It's also important for them to know and understand that this wasn't just something that happened long ago, but that it still occurs today!