This Lesson's Title:

The Important Thing about Strong Writing: Details

four memorable details create an organized paragraph

This lesson idea was proposed to WritingFix by NNWP Teacher Consultant Kim Polson.

The intended "mentor text" to be used when teaching this on-line lesson is the picture book The Important Book by Margaret Wise Brown. Before writing, students should listen to and discuss the writing style of this book's author.

Check out The Important Book at Amazon.com.

Washoe County teachers, click here to search for this book at the county library.

Three-Sentence Overview of this Lesson:

The Important Book, written by Margaret Wise Brown, provides a very specific writing pattern that even the youngest of writers can imitate.  Requiring these types of patterns for writing tasks provides safety for all students, and when students feel safe, they can explore things (like details in writing) with less anxiety.  This on-line prompt has students learn and toy with the pattern, so they can use The Important Book's simple pattern throughout a school year, applying it to things they've learned in any content area. Teachers: Click here to see the entire lesson plan.

6-Trait Overview for this Lesson:

The focus trait in this writing assignment is idea development; the writer's goal is to compose and prioritize memorable details as they write about their chosen or assigned topic.  The support trait in this assignment is organization; students create paragraphs about topics while writing to this prompt, and both linking introductions to conclusions and sequencing can be discussed to build better organizational skills.