Me Too! and The Escape of Marvin the Ape Writing Lessons

These lessons are exactly like my No David Writing Lesson that I wrote about early.  Both Me Too! by Mercer Mayer and The Escape of Marvin the Ape by Caralyn and Mark Buehner are cute picture books that contain a lot of little events but very little detail about each event.  


After reading either book, you could ask children to choose one event from either story and then revise what was in the book by adding more detail.  Students could explode the moments, add dialogue, or add thought shots.  (I wish I could give proper credit for those revision ideas but I don't remember which teaching book I read them in.  I would guess Ralph Fletcher.  He's awesome!)


This kind of activity makes for a nice prompt write because it provides students with a variety of main ideas to choose from instead of just one topic.  Also, students don't have to come up with the seed idea (Lucy Calkins), they just need to fill in all the details. 


There are a ton of books that can be used in this manner.  All of the No, David books are possibilities and a lot of Mercer Meyer's Little Critter books would work too.

"Getting Ready For Bed Directions" - Organization Lesson

Organization Writing Lesson
   - Getting Ready for Bed Directions


My class has been working on organization for the last week.  We've talked about and practiced bold beginnings and catchy endings but I'm still concerned about students putting things in order.  This lesson is to help students practice putting steps in order.

First, I'll ask my students to think about what they do to get ready for bed.  We'll take a minute or two to share.

Second, I'll read at least one of the following three picture books. None of the books are great upper elementary picture books but they apply to the topic in a fun way and get students thinking.


     1.  How Do Dinosaurs Say Good Night? by Jane Yolen and Mark Teague
          -  This book explains how dinosaurs say good night using two parts.  The first part details what    

             dinosaurs do not do.  The second part explains what dinosaurs do to get ready for bed.

  

     2.  Cornelius P. Mud, Are You Ready For Bed? by Barney Saltzburg

          -  An adorable pig does his bedtime routine, but the illustrations show that he is being extremely silly.  

             Finally, after going through six steps, he tells his mom that he forgot one thing.

     3.   Good Night, Monkey Boy by Jarrett J. Krosoczka

         - A young boy in monkey pajamas acts like a monkey while he gets ready for bed.

Third, we'll discuss what the characters did to get ready for bed.

Finally, I will ask the students to write.  Each student will imagine they are a parent writing a list of directions that tell the step by step how a baby sitter would put their six year old to bed.   Each student will be asked to write at least 10 directions in a logical order.

I did this assignment last year and allowed the students to be creative in choosing the 10 steps.  They came up with some very interesting writing.  This year I'm going to require them to use realistic bedtime activities.

No, David! Writing Lesson

No, David!

by David Shannon

I was in Borders Books in downtown Ann Arbor the first time I saw No, David!  I picked it up, skimmed through it, gazing at the pictures and not reading the words, and thought, "This book sucks."

  

A year or two later, I saw it again, picked it up, read the words, and fell in love.  I've now read this book to 13 straight classes ranging from Kindergarten to Fifth Grade.  It is a wonderful book that shows that people can be forgiven even if they do a bunch of dumb stuff.  

I just discovered that this book is great for teaching students how to revise for ideas too.  If you haven't read No, David! before, David gets yelled at by his mother for a variety of infractions. Each infraction is shown with a two page picture spread and David's mom's words.  Nothing else, so it is great for adding to.

I started my lesson by telling the students that they would be revising part of a story for ideas.  We then discussed possible techniques to use for revision of ideas, such as thought shots, adding dialogue, and exploding the moment.  

Next I read them No, David!  After that I told them to listen to the story again and choose one moment to revise.  Upon completion of the second read, I asked students to write down three word description of what moment they had decided to revise.  

We reviewed the possible revision techniques and students then began to write.  I circled around the room, reading over student shoulders, praising and encouraging different revisions.  

After 10 minutes of writing, students shared with their partners, and then I drew sticks for three students to share with the class.  

We repeated the lesson the next day, and students were begging to do it a third time but I had a different lesson planned using a benchmark text from Using Benchmark Papers to Teach Writing With the Traits. My guess is that we will come back to No, David! in the future.

Published: 1998

Locations: My Library, School Library, Public Library, and Amazon