Writing Lesson Plan: Thanksgiving

Name: Beverly Cortez Grade: 2

nd

Date: November 14-15 Content Area: Writing
Duration: 45 minutes/day
Materials needed:
Read aloud book: Thanksgiving by Amanda Doering
Pencils
Papers
Chart Paper
Crayons
Post-its
Opinion writing criteria chart from MT
Reasons and Details Chart
Final product sheet




Guiding Questions:
Does anyone know what Holiday is coming up?
Why do we celebrate Thanksgiving?
What are you thankful for?
Enduring understanding:
Students learn to express an opinion and present evidence to support their
beliefs.

Purpose of lesson:
The purpose of this lesson is for students to establish a better understanding of
stating an opinion and providing information from the text to support it.
What component/s will be the lesson
focus?
Use of productive language writing to
present information and opinion and
demonstrate understanding of the
literary text.
Writing process
Strategy or skill emphasis
Pre-writing
Drafting
Revising
Editing
Publishing
Language modalities to be used in this lesson:
Listening
Writing
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Speaking
Critical Thinking Skills
ACEI 3.3-Critical thinking, problem solving
and performance skills.
Remembering
Understanding
Applying
Students will use critical thinking skills by
remembering parts of the story to use as
evidence to support their opinion.
Student Engagement Techniques and
Grouping
ACEI 3.4-Active Engagement in Learning

Students will work with their side-
by-side partners during building
background class discussion and
before independent work.
Students will work with their behind-
you-partner during focus/mini
lesson.


DIFFERENTIATION PLAN

ACEI 3.2 Adaptation to diverse students.
Identify type of
learner
(ELL, SPED,
Accelerated
Learners, Striving
learners, 504
students, reading)
List type of
differentiation
(learning environment,
content, process,
product, performance
task)
Instructional approach
(Write the instructional
approach/accommodations that will be
used for these learners)
Non-writers, ELL Process I will need to repeat instructions for these
types of learners to help them register
what they need to do. Also, give them
more time to work on their writing
because they tend to be slower.
Advanced
Learners
Process/Product These students will be allowed to move
on to the next step when they are done.
They tend to be faster than others so I
want them to be doing something. When
they are done with everything, depending
on what they included, I will ask them to
use more details if they can and also
make sure to have punctuation and
capital letters where its appropriate.
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1. Standards/Benchmarks/GLOs
ACEI 2.1-2.4 Content Area Knowledge. List CCSS, HCPS III, HELDS, GLOs
Common Core Standard:
Writing: Text Types and Purposes 2.W.1: Write opinion pieces in which they
introduce the topic or book they are writing about, state an opinion, supply
reasons that support the opinion, use linking words (e.g., because, and also) to
connect opinion and reasons, and provide a concluding statement or section.
o I can write an opinion piece that includes an introduction, my opinion, my
reasons, details from the book that support my reason and a conclusion.
Writing: Production and Distribution of Writing 2.W.5 With guidance and
support from adults and peers, focus on a topic and strengthen writing as needed
by revising and editing.
o With the help from adults, I can improve my writing by rereading my work
and making changes.

2. Assessment Task
(ACEI 4-Informal and formal assessment. Candidate plans appropriate formative and
summative assessments to guide and assess student learning, including criteria). Write
the teacher assessment tool for each stage of the writing process. Include copies at the
end of the document.
Activities:
Students will create a writing piece that comprise of introduction, body and conclusion.
The introduction should include their opinion statement while the body contains reasons
and details to support their opinion and restating their opinion statement for their
conclusion. Students will be using the writing process to create their opinion writing. A
rubric and checklist will be used as a teacher tool. (see pages 11, 12 and 13)

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3. Activities/Instructional Strategies
ACEI 3.1: Knowledge of students and community; integration of knowledge for instruction;
ACEI 3.3: Critical thinking, problem solving and performance skills; ACEI 3.4: Active
engagement in learning; ACEI 3.5: Communication to foster learning
(List how you plan to build background knowledge and the sequence of teaching students
how to apply the writing process.)
1. Introduction (2 min)
a. Gather students to the carpet area and inform students to bring a pencil and
writers folder.
b. Greet and explain todays lesson. (Today, Im going to do a read aloud and then
were going to answer the opinion question and make a chart with our reasons
and details as a class. After we have made our chart, we will create an
introduction where we can incorporate a hook, a question or introduce the book,
body where you write your reasons with details and conclusion where you
restate your opinion).
c. Explain what standard we are working on:
i. I can write an opinion piece that includes an introduction, my opinion, my
reasons, details from the book that support my reason and a conclusion.
ii. With the help from adults, I can improve my writing by rereading my
work and making changes.


2. Building background (8min)
a. Hand out sticky notes for each student.
b. Explain what students need to do with the sticky note. On your sticky note,
write your prediction (what you think the book will be about).
i. Show the book Thanksgiving by Amanda Doering
ii. Give students a sentence frame, This book will be about!
c. Scan to make sure each student is writing his or her prediction.
d. Allow students to share their predictions.
e. Instruct students to put their pencil and sticky note down and they will check if
their predictions were right at the end of the story.
f. Begin reading the book Thanksgiving by Amanda Doering
i. Ask students
1. What does it mean when a book has a table of contents?
2. What do you call when a word is dark and stands out? (Bold)
ii. Explain that a bold word is used to tell the reader that its a vocabulary
word that you can find in the glossary.
iii. Explain that a glossary is a mini-dictionary that tells the reader what
words are used in the book and explains their meaning. The words are
bolded and sometimes familiar or unfamiliar.
g. Ask students during read aloud:
i. Did anybody watch the Macys parade before?
h. Initiate a discussion with their side-by-side partner to share if their predictions
were right. Turn to your side by side partner and read your prediction and then
say if your prediction was correct.
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i. Select a few students to read their predictions and state if they were correct with
the rest of the class.
j. Inform students that today we will be working on pre-writing and drafting.
i. Prewriting is when we brain storm our ideas.
ii. Drafting is putting our ideas together.
Part 1: Pre-Writing/Drafting (20 min)

3. Focus/Mini lesson (I do): (10min)
a. Ask students to place down their papers and pencils.
b. Explain that students will write their own opinion writing.
i. Opinion writing is a writing piece that expresses what you think with
reasons and details to support it.
c. Explain the definition of country. Country is a place where a large group of
people are joined together by one government. So United States of America is a
country. Philippines is another example of a country.
d. Explain why America celebrate Thanksgiving.
e. Inform students: I dont want to see any hands up. I just want you to think about
this question for 10 seconds: Should every country celebrate Thanksgiving?
f. Raise your hand if you think every country should celebrate Thanksgiving.
Raise your hand if you think every country should not celebrate Thanksgiving.
g. Initiate a discussion with their behind you partner.
i. Turn to your behind you partner and tell them your opinion.
1. I think that every country should/should not celebrate
Thanksgiving because (insert your reason).
h. Call on a few students to share their opinion to create a class discussion.
i. Pass out folder paper for each student.
j. Explain that they need to write the prompt on top of the folder paper.
k. Ask students to create a T-Chart with reasons on one side and details on the
other side.
l. Show the chart with the question Should every country celebrate
Thanksgiving? This chart includes headings of reasons and details.
m. Ask what is one reason why every country should or should not celebrate
Thanksgiving.
i. Possible reasons:
1. Spend time with family
a. Details: Play games, watch sports, watch parade
2. Thankful for different things
a. Details: Delicious meal, their families, homes
3. Eat good food
a. Details: Turkey, stuffing, cranberry sauce, pumpkin pie,
potatoes, yams
n. Remind students to use facts from the non-fiction book that we just read as
details for their reasons. If necessary, review certain pages of the book to
refresh students memory and help them present details.
o. Call on students to share their answers.
p. Write students answers on the reasons column.
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q. Write students answers on details column.
r. Review students answers and elaborate or guide them if necessary to add
more information to the chart.
4. Guided practice (We do) (5 min)
a. Explain the next step: Okay now that we have come up with our reasons and
details what is the first part that we should have on our opinion writing.
b. Ask what is an introduction.
i. Ask what are ways we can create an introduction.(hook, ask a question,
introduce the book)
c. Explain that we will write the introduction together.
d. Ask what should we write for our introduction?
i. Build on students examples to model a topic sentence.
e. Guide students in creating an introduction for the opinion writing.
5. Work Time (20 min)
6. Collaborative Group work (You do it together) (5 min)
a. Review with students what comes after the introduction of an opinion writing.
i. Use the opinion writing criteria chart from MT.
b. Explain to students that we will write part of the body together (first reason with
details) so that they know what to expect for the second and third reason.
c. Ask students how should I start the body of my opinion writing?
i. Call on students to share their answers.
d. Ask students to include the reason then details.
i. Call on students to share.
7. Independent work (You do it alone) (15 min)
a. Explain that they will return to their desk and have independent work time. In
your desk, you will work on the body of your own opinion writing using the
reasons and details that we have come up with.
b. Ask what should the body of opinion writing have.
i. Call on students to share.
c. Display the class opinion-writing chart on the board. (Pre-made from MT)
d. Remind students of the pattern of the body of an opinion writing (reasons,
details, reasons, details, so on).
e. Explain to students that after they have finished the body then they can proceed
to writing their conclusion.
f. Share definition of conclusion.
i. Conclusion is the last paragraph of your writing piece where you restate
your opinion statement.
g. Ask what should the conclusion of an opinion writing have.
i. Turn to side-by-side partner and share what conclusion should have.
ii. Call on students to share.
h. Remind students to raise their hands if they need help and if you have questions
right now you may remain on the carpet.
i. Instruct students to return to their desks if they dont have any questions.
i. Dismiss students by asking, Which group believes that every country
should celebrate Thanksgiving? You may go back to your desk. Which
group believes that every country should not celebrate Thanksgiving?
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You may go back to your desk. This can be used as a formative
assessment.
j. Walk around to monitor students and ask them guiding questions if necessary.
8. Closure: (How many minutes?) (3 min)
a. Gain students attention using classroom attention getter.
b. Ask questions:
i. What did we learn about Thanksgiving?
ii. What did we learn about opinion writing?
c. Remind students about the standard they are working on for this writing piece.
i. I can write an opinion piece that includes an introduction, my opinion,
my reasons, details from the book that support my reason and a
conclusion.
ii. With the help from adults, I can improve my writing by rereading my
work and making changes.

d. Explain work for the next writing period. Next class, we will continue writing
where we left off. Some of you are at different stages (finishing body or
conclusion)
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Part 2: Revising/Editing and Publishing
1. Introduction (3 min)
a. Gather students to the carpet area.
b. Explain to students that we are continuing our opinion writing Should
every country celebrate Thanksgiving?
c. Explain standard:
i. I can write an opinion piece that includes an introduction, my
opinion, my reasons, details from the book that support my
reasons and a conclusion.
ii. With the help from adults, I can improve my writing by rereading
my work and making changes.


2. Building background (5 min)
a. Show students the chart that we worked on last class.
b. Read the opinion question: Should every country celebrate
Thanksgiving?
c. Ask the class to read the introduction that we created as a class.

3. Focus/Mini lesson (I do): ( 5 min)
a. Explain revision to students.
i. Revision is when we make changes to our writing to improve it.
b. Explain to students what we do when we revise our writing.
i. Reread their work and make sure it makes sense.
ii. Rearrange your work so that it follows the pattern:
1. Introduction
2. Body (reasons, details, reasons, details)
3. Conclusion
c. Explain editing to students.
i. Editing is when we correct our writing by looking at our mistakes
in our capital letters and punctuations.
d. Explain to students what we do when we edit our writing.
i. Look at letters that need to be capitalized.
ii. Look at the end of your sentences and make sure they have a
punctuation mark like a period.
iii. Place a space in between your words so that they are not
overlapping each other.
e. Ask students individually what stage they are going to work on before
allowing them to go back to their desk to do independent work.

4. Independent work (You do it alone)
a. Explain that they will do independent work in their desk.
b. Explain that their task is to finish their opinion writing piece.
c. Explain expectations of their writing piece. After you have finished your
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rough draft and have gone through revising and editing stage, take out
another piece of paper and rewrite it neatly. Also include your name,
date, number and a title for your writing piece.
d. Explain that if they need help, they can raise their hands.
e. Walk around to monitor students progress and guide them (if needed).
5. Closure: (5 min)
a. Gain students attention to explain their next task.
b. Ask students to share their writing piece to their side-by-side partners.
After they have shared, ask students to turn in both their draft and final
paper.

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