Workshop Wednesday and a Giveaway!

Yay for hump day!  For today's Workshop Wednesday with Ideas by Jivey, the topic is sharing how we get students to WRITE (especially the more reluctant writers!). 

Keep reading to the end of this post to enter an amazing giveaway!!

I have shared some strategies in past posts that I use during my Daily 5 work on writing (I use Daily 4, leaving out the Listening).  Especially at the beginning of the year, I just want my students to WRITE!  We work on building our stamina and writing about topics that are easy to write about.  If students see that they can actually write for an extended period of time, they will start to believe in their writing abilities.  I have seen it happen time and time again.  My students do not complain when they are assigned "work on writing" (I have not been giving them free choice of which center to go to but they do have their choice of which activity to choose at work on writing).  They really do enjoy going to their work on writing center because the choices appeal to their interests and are at a low frustration level for my students.

One of my students' favorite work on writing activities are the shared writing journals.  You can read more about them here.  I keep four journals at a time in one of my drawers.  

 Here are two entries from the "Bandaids and Boo Boos" journal from two of my developing students:

 Here is another entry in the "Bandaids and Boo Boos" journal from possibly my lowest writer.  He worked on this independently, with no prompting from me.  What student couldn't write about injury?  We know they have stories to tell!  Why do students always feel the need to write, "The End"?  

Here is one more entry from one of my average students.

 Another great activity for getting students to write are story starters.  You can read more about the story starters I use here.  These are the winter story starters that I just added to my bins this week (we have already had snow and temps feel like winter here even though it is not "technically" winter yet!).  You can download these story starters from my TpT store for free here.

Here is a picture of one of most reluctant writer's journal entry from a fall story starter!  He was so proud of himself when he was finished!

Here is a journal entry for a story starter from one of my highest writers:

I am always looking for fresh ideas to motivate my writers and I can't wait to check out the other linkups at Ideas by Jivey!  Don't forget to check out the giveaway below!

A bunch of bloggers have joined up to say THANK YOU.  Thank you for following us.  Thank you for your support, encouragement, and friendship.  We have learned so much from you.  

So, we wanted to say thank you with a Gift Card Giveaway.  

Simply fill in the rafflecopter below and you have a chance to win one of 3 prizes. 

(You can fill in the rafflecopter on any of our blogs, it's all the same one.) 

3 lucky winners will win a $25 gift card to TPT!!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Good luck!