Creating Strong Kids Through Writing

30-Minute Lessons That Build Empathy, Self-Awareness, and Social-Emotional Understanding in Grades 4-8

Deborah S. Delisle, James Delisle

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN:
  9781032141688
• eBook ISBN:
  9781000491364
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Teachers are always looking for activities that not only enhance the mechanics of writing—grammar, spelling, and syntax—but also allow students to express themselves in creative and personal ways. Creating Strong Kids Through Writing is the perfect resource for teachers seeking quick, ready-to-use writing lessons that encourage social and emotional growth, personal development, introspection, and innovative thinking in students. Each of the 20 lessons has been classroom-tested with students of all ability levels in grades 4-8, and each lesson contains one or more samples of student work to help guide and inspire student writers. Creating Strong Kids Through Writing is a resource teachers will turn to again and again when they seek writing lessons that, although short in duration, are lasting in their personal impact on student growth.

Grades 4-8

PART I
LESSONS FOR THE BEGINNING OF THE YEAR

DOI: 10.4324/9781003233893-2

LESSON 1
GETTING TO KNOW STUDENTS FROM THE INSIDE OUT

OBJECTIVE

DOI: 10.4324/9781003233893-3

In this lesson, you will gather some interesting facts about your students and give them the opportunity to share information about themselves and the lives they lead.

RESOURCES AND MATERIALS

• Handout 1.1: Getting to Know You Better
• Handout 1.2: Sample Response
• Handout 1.3: Lesson Extension Sample Responses

CONTEXT

There is no better way to learn interesting things about your students than to ask them questions about their sometimes serious, sometimes funny, and sometimes confusing lives. This lesson helps you to get to know your students from the inside out, as they reveal in single words, phrases, or sentences those elements of themselves that make them unique or original. We’ve used this lesson as a stand-alone to help us get to know our students. We’ve also used it twice in the same year: once at the beginning of the school year and again at the end of the school year, when the students complete the lesson handout a second time without having access to their previous answers. Only after they complete the activity a second time should you return the responses they gave at the school year’s start. Watching them compare their two sets of answers often reveals how much a person can change in a few short months—or, conversely, how some things about people stay the same, no matter how much time passes by.

SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL CONNECTIONS

We enjoy teaching this lesson at the start of the school year because many of the following lessons will ask students to be reflective and introspective at an in-depth level. By having them complete this short-answer exercise first, you can open the door to self-expression that can be either humorous or deeply moving. By sharing the sample student response written by an actual seventh grader (see Handout 1.2), you can provide some guidance on how the answers to these questions can be both funny and personally revealing. If you prefer not to share the sample response, that’s fine, too. We have found that seeing what another student wrote sometimes gives needed direction to kids who are unsure about what types of things they might write.

THE HOOK

Keeping a straight face, and with no introduction at all, ask random students some direct, yet quirky, questions:

• What’s your favorite/least favorite sound?
• What’s your favorite/least favorite word?

Some students are likely to say, “I don’t have a favorite word,” to which you can respond, “Oh yes you do—everyone does. Mine is hypoallergenic. Want to know why?” At this point, some students will snicker a bit, while others will wonder where their once-normal teacher went. Gather a few more responses from students, asking for elaboration.

INVITING STUDENTS TO RESPOND

1. Distribute Handout 1.1: Getting to Know You Better. Allow students no more than 10–15 minutes to complete the questions.
2. Once your students have completed their responses, invite them to share in one of two ways: either by randomly selecting questions and asking for individual responses, or by placing students in small groups and having them share any of the answers they wish to reveal. (Note. In these lessons, sharing is never required, just encouraged.)
3. Afterward, collect students’ respones. If you plan to revisit this lesson at the school year’s end, hold on to these papers so that you can redistribute them to your students after they complete the activity a second time.

TIPS TO ENHANCE OR EXTEND THIS LESSON

• If you have access to your class list prior to the school year’s beginning and would like your students to complete Handout 1.1: Getting to Know You Better before or on the first day, then you can simply review their responses early in the school year.
• Have students answer the questions on Handout 1.1 in the way a main character from literature (e.g., Pony Boy from The Outsiders) might answer them, or, if you teach science, how a particular scientist (e.g., Albert Einstein) would respond. Teaching history? How would Rosa Parks complete her responses? See Handout 1.3: Lesson Extension Sample Responses for examples.
• If you are going to ask your students to reveal their thoughts and feelings to you as the school year begins, you need to do the same. Teaching is the most human of professions, so any linkage we can make between our students and ourselves helps to build the yearlong bond that unites us with our students. So, we invite you to complete Handout 1.1 yourself, sharing your responses with your class.
• If you revisit this lesson at the end of the school year, provide time for your students to compare their two sets of answers completed months apart. Then, open a discussion on what students found most revealing or interesting about the similarities and differences in the responses they gave at these two different times of their lives.

HANDOUT 1.1 GETTING TO KNOW YOU BETTER

Directions: Respond to the following questions using words, phrases, or sentences. Consider which responses you might be comfortable sharing with your classmates and teacher to help them get to know you better.

1. What is your favorite word?
   ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
2. What is your least favorite word?
   __________________________________________________________________________
3. What is your favorite sound?
   __________________________________________________________________________
4. What is your least favorite sound?
   __________________________________________________________________________
5. What would make you as happy as possible?
   __________________________________________________________________________
   __________________________________________________________________________
6. What trait or behavior of yours do you most dislike?
   __________________________________________________________________________
   __________________________________________________________________________
7. What trait or behavior do you most dislike in others?
   __________________________________________________________________________
   __________________________________________________________________________
8. What is your greatest regret?
   __________________________________________________________________________
   __________________________________________________________________________
9. What is your most cherished possession?
   __________________________________________________________________________
   __________________________________________________________________________
10. What is your greatest fear?
    __________________________________________________________________________
    __________________________________________________________________________
11. If you could live anywhere, where would it be?
    __________________________________________________________________________
    __________________________________________________________________________
12. What do you value the most in your friends?
    __________________________________________________________________________
    __________________________________________________________________________
13. Whom do you most admire?
    __________________________________________________________________________
    __________________________________________________________________________
14. What is it that you most dislike?
    __________________________________________________________________________
    __________________________________________________________________________
15. What is your favorite smell?
    __________________________________________________________________________
    __________________________________________________________________________

HANDOUT 1.2 SAMPLE RESPONSE

Pav, Grade 7

1. What is your favorite word?
   Blabber
2. What is your least favorite word?
   "often" with the 't' sounded out
3. What is your favorite sound?
   That satisfying click that you get sometimes when two things fit perfectly together
4. What is your least favorite sound?
   The slurping of soup
5. What would make you as happy as possible?
   Feeling that whatever happens doesn't matter Because I have everything OK in my life
6. What trait or behavior of yours do you most dislike?
   I am shy around other people who I know don't think much of me
7. What trait or behavior do you most dislike in others?
   Continuous talking
8. What is your greatest regret?
   Not going to India when my grandfather died
9. What is your most cherished possession?
   My talent for writing
10. What is your greatest fear?
    Being kidnapped
11. If you could live anywhere, where would it be?
    India
12. What do you value the most in your friends?
    Trustworthiness and loyalty
13. Whom do you most admire?
    Jackie Robinson and Doctors Without Borders
14. What is it that you most dislike?
    Mayonnaise and clowns
15. What is your favorite smell?
    Garlic

HANDOUT 1.3 LESSON EXTENSION SAMPLE RESPONSES

Possible Answers From Rosa Parks

• 1 What is your favorite word?
  Courage
• 9 What is your most cherished possession?
  The knowledge that my actions gave others strength to stand up for their beliefs
• 10 What is your greatest ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• TABLE OF CONTENTS
• Introduction
• Part I: Lessons for the Beginning of the Year
• Part II: Lessons for Any Time of the Year
• Part III: Lessons for the End of the Year
• References
• About the Authors