Teaching Grammar in Writing Workshop
Agenda
• What is grammar? Why teach it in context?
• Routines for Teaching Grammar using Mentor Sentences
• Types of Sentences– Simple– Compound– Complex
Objectives
• Explain why teaching grammar in context is more effective.
• Discuss a procedure and process for teaching grammar in context using mentor sentences.
• Name the different types of mentor sentences.
Grammar vs. Mechanics
• Grammar includes principles that guide the structure of sentences and paragraphs.
He likes to eat pizza, but I like spaghetti.
Grammar vs. Mechanics
• Mechanics is how we punctuate to achieve meaning (punctuation, capitalization, paragraphing, formatting).
“Let’s eat Grandma.”
“Let’s eat, Grandma.”
Why Teach Grammar and Mechanics?
• Grammar and mechanics shape meaning.• Allow writer’s words to be understood by the
reader.
“I say we spray!”, shouted Dad taking aim with a squirt.
“Yes! Spray! Spray!” cried out Mom and Emily.
“So spray already!” sputtered Oliver.So they spritzed him and sprayed him. And they gooped, glopped, and moussed him. They even hair-pinned him flat in five places for good measure.
“Aaah,” they said, sighing a confident, job-well-done sigh.Oliver’s bedhead was now one slick gelhead.And then…
Margie Palatini, Bedhead
How do we teach it?• Studies show that teaching
grammar in isolation is not the most effective teaching strategy.
• Teach grammar in context.
• Apply grammar/mechanics to students’ writing.
Teach Grammar and Mechanics
• As principles to be studied, explored, examined, and practiced rather than rules
• Tools to serve a writer in creating text reader will understand
Focus on Craft instead of Correctness
• Students need grammar and mechanics tools so they have choices and can make decisions about crafting their writing
• Make editing and revising activities as regular as breathing.
They can’t even…• What are they using correctly?• What are they attempting to do?• Make a list of grammar and mechanics
errors you notice over and over in students’ writing
Hair- Is the writer able to arrange words, sentences, and paragraphs to convey meaning?
- Does the writer understand the sentence as a unit, even if the punctuation isn’t correct?
-Does the writer understand verb tense?
--What grammatical understandings is this student approximating?
-- Does the writer understand simple conventions such as contractions, indenting, use of punctuation, subject-verb agreement?
Spending hours correcting grammar and punctuation?
• Hours of work…tons of hope… little result
• “Marking every error does as much good as yelling down a hole.” Nancie Atwell
What do I teach?
• Base your teaching on the errors they make. Base your teaching on the strategies they need.
• 20 Most Frequent Errors
20 Most Frequent Errors1. No comma after introductory element
2. Vague pronoun reference
3. No comma in compound sentence
4. Wrong word
5. No comma in nonrestrictive element
6. Wrong/missing inflected endings
7. Wrong or missing prepositions
8. Comma splice
9. Possessive apostrophe error
10. Tense shift
11. Unnecessary shift in person
12. Sentence fragments
13. Wrong tense or verb form
14. Subject-verb agreement
15. Lack of comma in a series
16. Pronoun agreement error
17. Unnecessary comma with restrictive element
18. Run-on or fused sentence
19. Dangling or misplaced modifier
20. It’s versus its error
Argument: Daily Oral Language vs. Mentor Texts
• DOL helps with editing…sometimes.• More than one concept• Visually absorbing incorrect writing
MENTOR SENTENCES
What is a mentor text?• Any text or piece of text that can
teach a writer about an aspect of writer’s craft, from sentence structure to quotation marks to “show don’t tell”.
• Sentence Stalking
• His room smelled of cooked grease, Lysol, and age.
-Maya Angelou, Why the Caged Bird Sings
• Matilda’s wonderfully subtle mind was already at work devising yet another suitable punishment for a poisonous parent.
– Ronald Dahl, Matilda
We Know We Need to Teach Grammar in Context…
• Context is about meaning.• The key is meaning, not length.• Use mentor sentences to teach
grammar and mechanics principles.
Teaching Grammar• Teach one thing at a time• Apply it to daily writing• Use the shortest mentor text possible• Give students time to work with the
principle• Scaffold for maximum success• Display visuals for constant
reinforcement
At first they may…
• Copy directly• Overuse concept• Attach meaning to the
wrong things
And you…• Keep teaching, re-teaching,
repeating, mentioning, thinking aloud, noticing, encouraging
• Writing is recursive• Students may need WEEKS to
master one principle
If struggling readers need to see a word forty times to learn it (Beers 2002), then I’ll make a leap and say students need to see grammar and mechanics rules highlighted in different contexts at least as many times
to own them.- Jeff Anderson
Mini Lessons on Grammar and Mechanics
• Short! 5 Minutes!• Best taught at the beginning of Writing
Workshop• Display and read mentor text
– Make observations– Play around with punctuation, etc.– Make more observations
• Discuss rule or principle
TYPES OF SENTENCES
Various Sentence Structures are Used
• Simple sentences• Complex sentences• Compound sentences• Sentence variety ., !, ?
Assumption
A sentence has a subject and verb. It must make sense and stand on its own.
His mother yelled, “Be careful crossing the street.”The boy raced across the street.
+
Sentsentence
Subject(who or what did something)
Verb(what did they do?)
stands on its own
What makes a sentence?
Cows moo.
Cows moo?
Cows moo!
Sentence Fluency begins in the ear.
A fragment is missing a subject or verb and/or doesn’t make sense.
A car came zoomingbig and bold
when I was little
Kids need to be able to identify and fix fragments. In order to do this, they must understand the simple sentence. Everything builds
on this understanding – from compound to complex.
The ability to pare down a sentence to its essential core is the first tool students need in
order to uncover the craft of all sentences.
Jeff Anderson, Mechanically Inclined
Sentence Smack Down
SENTENCE SENTENCE SENTENCE SENTENCE
SMACKDOWN!SMACKDOWN!SMACKDOWN!SMACKDOWN!• Jobs
– 2 sentence readers
– 2 writers
– 2 smackers
• Analyze the two sentences assigned to your group.
• Focus on WHO or WHAT did something (subject) and WHAT they did (verb).
*It is helpful to find the verb (usually action) first.
Sentence Choices:1. “Our knees and elbows rose and fell together.” (Fogelin, Crossing Jordan, p.
18)
2. “For some reason, my temper was hardwired to my tear ducts.” (Meyer, Twilight, p. 25)
3. “My name is Inigo Montoya.” (Goldman, The Princess Bride, several pages)
4. “A mischievous grin rearranged his features.” (Meyer, New Moon, p. 240)
5. “You killed my father.” (Goldman, The Princess Bride, several pages)
6. “At first, Zinkoff shades his eyes.” (Spinelli, Loser, p. 3)
7. “Two vampires edged slowly into the small opening of our camp.” (Meyer, Eclipse, p. 541)
8. “In rainy weather, the streets turned to red slop.” (Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird, p. 5)
9. “Prepare to die.” (Goldman, The Princess Bride, several pages) [This one is a little
tricky!]
10.“In the same second, he shoved the needle straight into her heart.” (Meyer, Breaking Dawn, p. 354)
11.“With the shoe factor on our side, we’d win this thing for sure.” (Fogelin, Crossing Jordan, p. 121)
12.“The lights cluster brilliantly up the street at Claudia’s house.” (Spinelli, Loser, p. 174)
When I was five. I had a Chuckie doll. I would scare everybody with Chuckie. Chuckie was about two feet, had orange hair, little red and white shoes, overalls, and plastic knife. To make Chuckie look more like the real thing. From the kitchen drawer. Like a mini-butcher knife. I super glued it into Chuckie’s hand.
Sound familiar?
• I went to Disney it was awesome and we took my friend Sam and then we went to the Frontier for lunch and we had barbeque and then we went swimming at the pool it was so much fun!
The classic run-on!
Compound SubjectMy mother looked at the map. My sister looked at the map.
My mother and my sister looked at the map.
Compound PredicateThe leaves fall on the ground. The leaves cover the ground.
The leaves fall and cover the ground.This is easy!
ROUTINE FOR MENTOR SENTENCES
Invitation
• Invitation to Notice• Invitation to Imitate• Invitation to
Celebrate• Invitation to Write
• Invitation to Revise• Invitation to
Combine• Invitation to Edit
Invitation to Notice
Prompt: What do you notice?Probing beyond “What do you notice?”Craft:• What’s working with the text? • What’s effective?• Where’s the good writing? What’s the
effect? Where’s the craft?• What else?
Invitation to Notice
Punctuation• What’s the punctuation doing?• What effect does the punctuation have
on my reading aloud?• What changes if we remove it? Use
something else?• What is the writer accomplishing with
his or her choice?• What else?
Invitation to Notice
Invitation to Notice
Invitation to Imitate
• Deconstruct the sentence for its prominent features.
• Show an imitation of your own (model) or a student’s (model) and connect back to the prominent features.
• Show students how to insert their ideas and experiences and still imitate the structure or pattern.
Invitation to Collect
• Collect sentences from student’s own writing and other text that follow the patterns introduced.
Invitation to Edit
• After seeing the correct sentence, students identify what has changed as each sentence is uncovered separately. We are open to changes from sentence to sentence so that the activity continues to be generative.
Invitation to Edit
• When the web is finished, the spider waits for insects to fly into its web.
-Seymour Simon, Spiders (2003)
Invitation to Edit
• When the web is finished, the spider waits for insects to fly into it’s web.
• When the web is finish, the spider waits for insects to fly into its web.
• When the web is finished, the spider wait for insects to fly into its web.
• When the web is finished the spider wait for insects to fly into its web.
Let’s Try It
• Dad dished up three plates, side by side, with big pieces of pie and giant scoops of ice cream.
Enemy Pie
TYPES OF SENTENCES: COMPOUND SENTENCES
What do you notice?
Every day was a happy day, and every night was peaceful.
-E.B. White, Charlotte’s Web
Nick Allen had plenty of ideas, and he knew what to do with them.
-Andrew Clements, Frindle
I want to buy a new car, so I have to save some money.
I want to take a cruise to Hawaii, but I don’t have enough time.
What do you notice?
Every day was a happy day, and every night was peaceful.
Every night was peaceful, and every day was a happy day.
Every day was a happy day and every night was peaceful
Every day was a happy day every night was peaceful.
Probing Questions
-What do you notice?-What else?-What’s the punctuation doing?-How does it sound as we read it?-What would change if we removed this or that?-Which do you prefer? Why?
Building the Compound Sentence Pattern
Sentence
forand *norbut *or *yetso
sentence, .
I want to go, but I have to clean my room.
I want to go, but I have to clean my room.
A compound sentence contains two subjects and two predicates. A conjunction is used to combine the two sentences.
F - forA - andN - norB - butO - orY - yetS - so
Compound Sentences
Notice, Notice, Notice
I hit a double, and then everything changed.
He forgot his lunch money, so he had to eat a peanut butter sandwich.
I thought I lost my homework, but it was under my bed.
Build Grammar Section of Writer’s Notebook
• Explain principle• Students cut and paste principle and mentor
sentence in writer’s notebook.
Subsequent days…• Students imitate sentence and/or pattern• Leave room below -- encourage students to find
more sentences from their reading to add
Let’s Give it a Try• Invitation to imitate
I sat near the back with Stephen, and he kept pestering me.
Stephen is my best friend, but I’m not sure he would admit it.
There was only about a block to go before our bus stop, but I couldn’t stand Stephen’s whining.
-Andrew Clements, The Report Card
Let’s Give it a Try• Invitation to imitate
I sat near the back with Stephen, and he kept pestering me.
I sat on the floor with Harry, and he kept licking me.
-Andrew Clements, The Report Card
Collecting Sentences
Next Steps• Add compound sentence(s) to daily writing• Collect sentences• Practice combining
I tried calling her as soon as I got home from school.Her line was busy.
Celebrating Grammar• For homework have children, “Shop the
World” looking for sentences that follow the pattern (or have them write one)
• Share the sentences aloud• Celebrate, reread, compare, contrast,
enjoy, and review the craft of grammar• Display sentences all over the room• Empower kids -- “I can do that, too!”
If struggling readers need to see a word forty times to learn it (Beers 2002), then I’ll make a leap and say students need to see grammar and mechanics rules highlighted in different contexts at least as many times
to own them.- Jeff Anderson
Principles We’ve Learned• Construction of a Simple Sentence
Subject + Verb + stands on its own
• Construction of a Compound SentenceSentence, + Conjunction +
sentence.
Moving on…Complex Sentences
COMPLEX SENTENCES
Dependent
Vs.
Independent
If independence means to stand on your own, what does dependencemean?
What did you notice in those lyrics?
• Now, it's your turn to write some lyrics. Write 10 of your own "If I had a million dollars," lyrics.
• Make sure to follow it with a comma!
Comma after the clause!
AAAWWUBBIS !!! ...the most used subordinating
conjunctions• After, Although, As• When, While• Until• Because, Before• If• Since
Invitation to Notice
They are shouting your name, asking if dinner is ready yet.-Jim Grisley, Winter Birds
Abraham was growing fast, shooting up like a sunflower.-Russell Freedman, Lincoln: A Photobiography
Furlough found his brother in the library, standing on the top of the great open book.
-Kate DiCamillo, The Tale of Despereaux
Sentence closer, .
Independent clause(Simple sentence)
Subject Verb
An Independent Clause
•Is a sentence•Stands on its own•Is perfectly fine as it is
But sometimes we want more
� Pictures or images� Information� Specifics� Description
So how do we add information to our sentences without making run-on or incorrect sentences?
We can write complex sentences.
Not all of our sentences have to be short; We need long and short sentences.
What you add to the sentence
• Can’t be a whole new sentence• Can’t stand on its own— it must be…
Independent
This has a noun and a verbDoes it stand on its own?Does it express a complete thought?
It’s Dependent
independent clause (sentence)
must lean on an
Let’s Give it a Try
The dog approached me.
There are three basic complex sentence patterns
• Add information at the beginning of a sentence
• Add information in the middle of a sentence
• Add information at the end of a sentence
, closing .
Beginning ,
, interrupting ,
Complex SentencesThe three basic patterns…
Where should we add the dependent?
At the Beginning?, Middle?, End?
• Which one sounds the best?• Does it add detail to the sentence?
Flapping its wings, the duck flew.
The duck , flapping its wings, flew.
The duck flew, flapping its wings.
Which do you like better?
You are the artist you get to decide which is best.
Dependents can be many things, but they will always:
> Begin> Interrupt> Close> Add detail to an independent clause
Express Lane Edits
• Support students in integrating the grammar skills they have learned into their writing.
• Ask students to edit for one grammar skill that you have taught.
• Students record the “item to check out” or skill they edit for. Students record the “receipt” or changes they have made.
When I was five, I remember riding around in my dads taxi. He was proud of his taxi. He kept it’s interior spotless. Hed spend one day a week cleaning every spot on the car. My sister and I loved to run around the car, playing tag and listening to the music from the radio. It seemed when we drove in it we werent allowed to breathe or touch anything.
We need to teach students that sentencesare as much fun to
build – and play around with as Lego castles.
You build them, stand back to check them out, break them up and build them another way.
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