This Lesson's Title:

Serendipitous Fairy Tale Tabloids

imitating a newspaper's voice with a funny and original idea

This lesson was created by NNWP Teacher Consultant Corbett Harrison. Check out all of Corbett's on-line lessons by clicking here.

The ideal "mentor text" that can be used when teaching this on-line lesson is the picture book Fairytale News by Colin and Jacqui Hawkins. Before writing, students should listen to and discuss the writing style of this book's authors.

Click here to view this book at Amazon.com.

If you are a Washoe County teacher, click here to search for this book at the county library.

Three-Sentence Overview of this Lesson:

After enjoying Colin and Jaqui Hawkins' story of Fairytale Land's newspaper, pose this question to students: "If they have a newspaper, do you think they have a tabloid newspaper too?" After examining articles from tabloid newspapers, students create crazy, tabloid-worthy headline for Fairytale Land. Using the style of a tabloid's articles, students will create an entire article that might run in the Fairytale Enquirer. Teachers: Click here to see the entire lesson plan.

6-Trait Overview for this Lesson:

The focus trait in this writing assignment is voice; the writer's goal is to authentically imitate the style (and voice) of a real type of writing that can be found in the world.  The support trait in this assignment is idea development ; students should be encouraged to be as original as possible (no Shrek rip-offs!) as they write this assignment.