Saturday, February 15, 2014

Spark Student Motivation: Writing Bracelets

Happy Saturday Friends! Time to get motivated by each other! :)
I know some of you only went to school one day this week, but you can link up an idea you plan to use next week to get them motivated to be back at school!
 
I wanted ALL of my students to include more descriptive words/phrases in their writing, so we brainstormed a list together. We were working on a piece about our favorite food, so I asked them for words that would describe foods (using their five senses) and spelling words that may be difficult. After generating the list, I told them we were going to use them as writing bracelets {insert squeals!}.  
Sometimes we give our students resources and they don't use them, which is very frustrating for us! This is why I had them do most of the brainstorming, giving them more ownership of the list and more probability they would use it. So... it was very exciting to see them referring to their bracelet while they were writing. EVERY student included words from our bracelets!!! :)
 
I wanted to point out words they may want spelled because some of my students are reluctant to use better vocabulary in fear of misspelling those words. They stick with safe or common words that aren't necessarily to their full vocabulary potential.

Want to know how I'm POSITIVE these bracelets MOTIVATED them to write? They asked me the following day if they could use them again! (Which at first made me nervous because we weren't writing about food, but they explained several of the words/phrases would fit into other writing pieces. Phew!)
I don't use this every year, depends on my group of course, but I want to stress it shouldn't be done all the time because they'll become too dependent on a word list. I introduced this brainstorming strategy so my students would think about their own words while writing.
 
I hope you had a wonderful week! Please link up any lessons, ideas, tips, tricks, incentives, ANYTHING you do get your students motivated or excited!
Don't forget to grab my button and link back to this post!
Check out all the wonderful ideas from my friends who link up and don't forget to leave some love by commenting....we LOVE comments!
***Please include the topic in the link up with your blog name.

Since I couldn't have a SNOW day sale like my buddies, I decided to have a SUN DAY SALE!!
Entire store is 20% off today and tomorrow! Click here to start shopping!
Thank you Jivey for making my adorable button!!!
 

13 comments:

  1. Fun writing idea! When we do our upcoming pioneer unit/simulation I could really use it! Thanks for sharing!!!
    Ana
    Mrs. Bentin's Blackboard

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  2. What a cute idea! Anything to help them write! Of course...love how easy to implement!! You are the bomb dot com!
    Rachel
    A Tall Drink of Water

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  3. This is a great idea, Joanne! I love how it is responsive to your students' needs. You really get to know your students and what will work for them. Thanks for sharing!

    Jennifer
    Mrs. Laffin's Laughings

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  4. Genius! How perfect would this be if they were allowed to wear one for FCAT writing? 5th grade gets a math reference sheet. I think 4th grade should get to have a writing braclet! Of course it's not going to happen, but it was a happy thought. Of course the food bracelet would be my FAVORITE! Hope you're having a blast with Holly! XOXOX
    Alison
    Rockin' and Lovin' Learnin'

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  5. what a super idea!

    You are awesome!

    Elizabeth
    Hodges Herald

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  6. That's cute, sometimes it bugs me when ALL the kids are up looking at our synonym wall at the same time...this would solve that problem!

    Jessica
    Literacy Spark

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  7. What a great idea to make writing fun and resources convenient. Thank you so much for sharing this! Enjoy the rest of the weekend!

    Mary
    http://fittobefourth.blogspot.com/2014/02/spark-student-motivation-saturday.html

    ReplyDelete
  8. Cool idea! Maybe I could refer to them as superhero armbands to get my "tough guys" into it... :)

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