Digging Deeper
How do we as teachers get our students to dig deeper? How do we guide them to a more specific memory or feeling to write about? Through this blog post I hope to provide some ways to help our students do this.
Giving our students a completely open ended writing assignment with no topic or guidance can be overwhelming for some students but too specific of a writing assignment can be even worse for a students creativity. There are ways to find that middle ground and it starts with mentor texts, inspiring literature, and appropriate guidance.
Two texts that provide empowering and relatable content are Happy Like Soccer by Maribeth Boelts and Mango, Abuela, and Me by Meg Medina. These stories are perfect texts to share to brainstorm some of our students own personal narratives.
Mango, Abuela, and Me is about a young girl whose grandmother moves into her home with her and her family. There is a language barrier between the girl, Mia, and her grandmother, Abuela. Mia feels disconnected and discouraged when her and her Abuela can not understand each other but she decides to take matters into her own hands. Throughout the rest of the book Abuela and Mia teach each other English and Spanish so that they can communicate better. They develop a special bond and along with their new parrot, Mango, they learn more and more from each other everyday.
Happy Like Soccer follows a young girl, Sierra, along her love and passion for soccer and the hardships that come along with it. Every Saturday Sierra puts on her flaming cleats and her white jersey and heads eagerly to her teams soccer games. But there is no one to cheer her on because her beloved auntie works on Saturdays. Finally one Saturday her auntie gets a rare day off to come watch Sierra play. When a storm cancels the game, Sierra is devastated that her aunt won't get the chance to watch her play soccer. After much convincing Sierra's coach decides to schedule a game for when her aunt can come watch and near their house. On that special Monday Sierra got to fly across the soccer field with her aunt cheering her on.
Your Turn Lesson Idea:
These texts offer a specific memory and storyline that can provide inspiration to help our students dig into their writing territories and find a specific writing topic. A Your Turn lesson provided in Chapter 3 of Mentor Texts; Teaching Writing Through Children's Literature is a great example of a lesson that allows students to dig deeper. To begin the lesson, you can read the two mentor texts, Happy Like Soccer and Mango, Abuela, and Me. After each shared reading take time to brainstorm the big ideas covered in the stories and the more specific details and storyline. To provide a visual for this thought process, you can create inverted triangles while brainstorming with both stories. (examples provided below)
After modeling with the mentor texts allow students to create their own inverted triangles with their writing territories they have previously listed (which might include hobbies, friends, family, holidays etc.) Once they have narrowed down a specific storyline from their general topic they can eventually independently write their own personal narrative.
