Writing, labels, and freebies - Oh my!!

Whoop whoop. I'm back folks.....2 days in a row! Today, I'm posting about what's been going on in Writer's Workshop. I began with labeling and my explorers are doing so well with it! I loved Julie Lee's idea on labeling the teacher and Cara Carroll's idea of making an anchor chart to hold the labels...so I went for it. And oh.my.word, my students loved everything about it. Brilliant.

Here is the after math of it all. ha And I'm not sure what is up with my outfit. Well, I do know. I was running late and went down to my garage to leave...in just my shirt and shoes....hoping my black pants were clean and hanging in the laundry room.....and, well, I was wrong. ha And I didn't have time to go back upstairs and change my shirt...so I grabbed the first pair of pants I could find. Wardrobe fail. They did NOT match. heh Good thing I'm with 5 and 6 year olds all day....

It is important to remember, that when teaching Writer's Workshop, (you match your clothes) AND you generate ideas for writing with your students. ha ha Providing "live" demonstrations, while showing the students how to write the same type of text they will, is so important! You should provide interactive writing opportunities where you "share the pen." When you do this, you're inviting the students to record some parts of the shared text. Here is my classroom example of pen sharing:

And for those of you not familiar, this is a labeling chart on our sweet and precious Gertrude. You can read more about our classroom pet here. We discussed how a label gives the reader more information and how we needed to educate others on our guinea pig. ;-) Afterwards, students labeled their own guinea pig.

If you're interested in a Gertrude labeling page, you can grab it by clicking the image below. Also, check out Katie Mense's most recent post on labeling and the great freebie she included. So smart! 

I also wanted to share with you a great sheet I put together based on the teachings from Dr. Deborah Rowe from Vanderbilt University. There are many conditions that support young children's writing and we must remember that students learn write best when the learning instructional environment provides: 

1. A purpose for writing and a real audience

2. Immersion

3. Demonstrations

4. Collaboration

5. Response from Others

6. Engagement

7. Responsibility

8. Expectation

9. Approximation

These are great to remember when carrying out your Writing lessons and conference times. This reminder sheet is tucked away in my plan book and I refer to it when planning. I sure hope you've found some helpful tips. Happy Writing!