Teacher Instructions & Lesson Resources :
Pre-step…before sharing the published model: Talk about transition words and phrases with your students. Explain that a transition helps a reader move from one idea to another in writing. And and then are two very common transition words, but for today's writing, your students will have to use much more variety in the transition words they choose to use.
Ask, "If we were to write step-by-step instructions for how to build something--like a treehouse--,we would use a lot of transition words as we moved from step one to step twenty-five of the process. What are some transition words that we might write in between the steps?"
Start your class list with first, second, and third, and then ask your students for others that aren't numbers. Encourage them to think of phrases (like after that) as well. Brainstorm for just a few minutes, then hang the list where everyone can see it.
Step one (sharing the published model): A note from Corbett Harrison about this mentor text: "I meet a lot o f people who remember reading Homer Price and Centerburg Tales when they were younger. When I ask for specifics of what they remember, everyone always brings up the donut-machine...and very rarely anything else. McCloskey's chapter about the donut making machine just sticks in people's memory, and I love that fact. There are plenty of other Homer Price adventures in those books, but that donut machine is a part of the collective memory of anyone who ever was lucky enough to read these books. Now what I find really interesting is the amount details about the donut machine that people remember when, in fact, McCloskey doesn't give that many details in his story. He gives the basics, then he lets our imaginations take over. Don't be surprised if you pick up this book to teach this lesson, and you find your memory's version of the donut machine much better than McCloskey's. I think that speaks so positively to McCloskey's ability as a story teller!"
In Chapter three of the first Homer Price by Robert McCloskey, we find Homer helping his Uncle Ulysses in the family's lunch room found in downtown Centerburg. When his uncle leaves to go chat at the barber shop across the way, Homer watches shop. When a rich lady enters the shop and offers to whip up a batch of donut batter, Homer sees it as an opportunity to try out his uncle's homemade donut-making machine. The lady makes a bit too much batter, the machine makes a mountain of donuts, and the lady realizes she has dropped her bracelet in the batter. Deducing the bracelt must be inside one of those donuts, Homer and the lady sponsor a donut-eating contest and the braclet is--of course--found. Your kids will love hearing this wonderful story inside this novel, but you should practice reading it a few times...it has a lot of dialogue and needs some different voices. It's worth the rehearsal time!
After reading the whole chapter, ask students to work with a partner and try to remember specifics about the donut machine. How did it work? What happened first? See how well their memories work.
Share just the paragraph about the donuts being made again. It is about five pages into the text, and it starts with the words: "Homer got down from the chair and pushed a button..." If you can put this paragraph up on the overhead, it will be helpful here.
Look for the transition words: If you find after, and, and then you'll have pretty much found them all. Hand out this list of transitions to student partners and say, "I want you to change those three transition words to different words or phrases, and when you're done, the paragraph must still make sense. Choose only transition words from the list whose meaning you understand enough to subsititute for and, then, and after." Have students share their descriptions with other partners.
Explain that the donuts made by the machine are plain cake donuts. In Homer Price's day, fancy donuts were much less common. If you were to have a modern day donut-making machine, the donuts would need to come out much fancier. Brainstorm how modern day donuts are much fancier.
Now it's time to make a longer class paragraph about a fancier donut-making machine's workings. You can certainly borrow some of the basic details from the original text, but if you do, use one of your student's versions with the different transition words in place of the original ones. As your class decides to add sprinkles and/or glaze and/or strawberry filling, make each added thing a new step in the instruction. In between the new steps, negotiate a transition word or phrase.
Publish the class paragraph where everyone can see it.
Tell students they will be inventing (in their minds) a machine that makes something different than donuts, and they will write a showing paragraph that demonstrates the steps the machine goes through to make its product. Their paragraphs will need to show a variety of transitions in between the steps of the process.
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