Expert+Texts

= Launching the Expert Text Unit =
 * Lesson Plan from Liz Hale's Unit
 * Exposure Day
 * Generating Expert Topics

= Lessons Generated After Reading Student Work =

Lessons Taken From Teacher's Guide for Write Traits

ORGANIZATION
Organization is about staying on track, sharing details in an order that is easy to follow, and beginning and ending a piece effectively. Ideas & Organization are closely connected.
 * putting details in an order that makes sense
 * writing a lead that gets a paper off to a strong start
 * telling one story at a time
 * finishing a paper with a strong conclusion

DAY 1
__MATERIALS__ small puzzle Copy Trait Book (page 18) Copy Trait Book (pages 19-20) Posters from Trait Kit Elmo

__LESSON__ Show students page 18

Show students a piece of a jigsaw puzzle and explain that one piece does not tell you much about the picture but that when it all comes together it does show you the whole piece. Writing is like a puzzle - all the pieces need to fit.

Go through pages 19 - 20 with students.

Remind them that today as they do their writing they need to make sure that their writing is organized.

**DAY 2**

 * Framing Sentences Properly**


 * Materials**

Strips of paper cut White erase boards with markers


 * Plan**

Do an Interactive Writing about framing sentences properly. Have students write a piece about the birthday stone and imbed ideas about organization in the writing. Also talk about planning sentences out with lines so that students can write them out.

**** Bold Beginnings **** taken from Katie Wood Ray

__Learning Target:__ I can brainstorm strong leads so that a reader will want to read my whole story.

__Materials:__
 * 30 to 40 Index Cards
 * A binder ring
 * a poster of techniques and examples on how to start interesting leads
 * anchor chart/poster of types of leads: [|Non-fiction Bold Beginnings.doc]
 * elmo

__Prep:__
 * Put a pile of index cards in each table group's area
 * Groups should be about 4 people, heterogeneous mixings

__Connect:__ In writing we have been talking about organization. Well today we are going to talk about how important it is to start off with a bang in the beginning of your story. You want a strong beginning, a lead that pulls your reader into your writing. You want your reader to keep on reading. Before we can begin writing though we are going to do a little activity to help you think more about writing bold leads. Leads are how you start your story. You want the first lines of your story to be interesting so the reader feels like reading your story... you want them to want to read on until the end. There are lots of different kinds of leads and today we are going to show you what they are and then you all are going to practice writing them.

__Guided Practice/__Teach: First off - you need to chose one person in your group to be the recorder.

I am going to introduce a lead to you and on the index card you are going to try and write a lead for the story. If you need to add an illustrations to your index card - you may. But you are going to brainstorm some ideas for strong leads with your partners.

Introduce each type of lead. Give student five minutes to write. Share out. Do the next type of lead.

==** Bold Beginnings Day 2 ** ==

__Learning Target:__ I can go back to a story I have started and change the beginning so that it has a bold lead.

__Prep:__
 * Anchor charts from last lesson are hung
 * Index cards with certain kinds of leads are punched and on binder rings so students can look back at them.

__Connect:__ Yesterday we brainstormed all kinds of leads. Today you are going to have a chance to actually use one of these leads in your writing so that readers want to continue to read your story.

__Guided Practice:__ Let's look at some of the types of leads we brainstormed yesterday.

Share out.

__Teach__: Now you are going to go off to a story you have already started and you are going to try and change a lead of one of your stories to make it more interesting. That is what you must do right now.

Off you go!

__Share/Debrief:__ Share students who created interesting leads in their stories.


 * On the second day encourage students to go back and add bold beginnings to another story they have written.