Saturday, March 7, 2015

Persuasive Writing

Last week we previewed our current unit on Persuasive Writing.  We read stories that focused on convincing people to do certain things.  These stories included:

1.  The Day the Crayons Quit, by Oliver Jeffers. (I absolutely love all stories by Oliver Jeffers.)
This story shows persuasive writing in letter form.  You can kind of work the petition angle here, too, with the protesting crayons.  After reading the book, we made a sign as a class. It said "STOP! Take Care of Your Crayons!" and listed various ways to take good care of them.  We put extra emphasis on PUT CRAYONS BACK IN YOUR PENCIL BOX since that's a huge issue we're having this year. 



2. What Pet to Get? by Emma Dodd.  We wrote a letter to the main character, Jack, telling him what pet we thought he should get.  As a class, we said he should get a German Shepherd (I think career day with the Sheriff's office heavily influenced this decision...) and listed 6 reasons why we thought a German Shepherd was the best option.  This was a great introduction to the WHY? part of persuasive writing and helped students see that the more reasons we listed, the more convincing our suggestion became.


3. Click, Clack, Moo, Cows That Type by Doreen Cronin.  This helped us revisit the power of words in letters! Students also saw how convincing a trade could be in persuading others.  (For better or worse...)



This week, to start applying what we know about persuasive writing, students identified a problem in the school and made signs to persuade others to fix the problem.  I laughed so hard at these student-identified problems....

Don't stick your tongue out! It makes people cry!

Stop don't bother the teacher when they're with a group! 
Why? Because you will fly your owl! Raise your hand please!
[SHE KNOWS WHAT'S UP.]

Stop! Don't run in the hallway!
You might break your leg or your arm!!!!!

Don't step on the iPad!! It will break!
[SERIOUSLY. I'm glad someone made this!]

And my personal favorite......

Stop! Flush the toilet! 
No one else wants to flush your stinky mess!

We also wrote letters to various Dr. Seuss characters (Sally & Nick, Cat in the Hat, Thing 1 & Thing 2) letting them know what choices they should make and why. Some of them were really convincing!! Sorry, parents, if you start getting letters from your children explaining WHAT toy they need and WHY they just have to have it.... ;).  Our next shared writing activity will be a kindergarten petition for five extra minutes on our recess time! I'll let you know how that pans out...




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