creative writing workshop lesson plan

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5 Writing Workshop Mini Lessons That Shouldn’t Be Skipped

January 12, 2022 | Leave a Comment

No matter what time of the year writing workshop starts, these are 5 writing workshop mini lessons that shouldn’t be skipped! I find that doing these lessons will start my workshop on the right foot and help students know all about my expectations.

Writing Workshop Mini Lesson #1: The Components of Writer’s Workshop

Before introducing the writer’s workshop model, plan out the pieces you’ll be using in your workshop. I modified my workshop slightly from the traditional model so that it skips the daily check in. 

Each day I cover a mini whole class lesson, independent writing time, and share time. My first mini lesson when I am starting writer’s workshop is to teach my class about each component. Sometimes it may be necessary to break it apart in several lessons (especially if you want to really focus on the dos and don’ts of each section).

I like to take my time and explicitly teach the roles of a student and the teacher (like in the Daily 5 process ). Going over exactly what I want it to look like helps minimize off task behaviors at the start.  Likewise, it’s important not to skip the step of what it shouldn’t look like. Not only do students find it pretty funny when they see off task behaviors modeled, but it really sticks in their memories.

Writing Workshop Mini Lesson #2: Writer’s Workshop Materials

The next important writing workshop mini lesson is teaching about the writer’s workshop materials and their appropriate uses. In my class we call these writing tools. This may feel like a silly lesson to teach but it’s important to teach expectations for using their supplies.

Things to consider when planning this lesson:

• Will students be allowed to color pictures heavily during each writing block?
• Will students be using pencils or pens for their writing?
• Will students use notebooks or folders to store their pieces?
• Where will they keep their daily materials?
• Where will they keep their revising and editing pens?
• Will they need highlighters?
• Will they be using loose leaf paper or a notebook? Spiral or composition?

My Writing Tools Set Up

Each answer to these questions will help you plan what to say during your lesson. For example, in my class students are only allowed to color pictures during the publishing phase. I chose this rule because we only have 45 minutes and it’s more important for them to be writing than working on coloring. This year I have chosen to use pencils for daily writing but most years I use pen. Writing in pen keeps students from agonizing over writing and erasing the same words.

Notebooks or Folders?

Students are provided a blue three-prong plastic folders with several page protectors. Inside the page protectors they are given an alphabet chart, blends and digraphs, and common rimes chart. I left one blank page protector that gets filled with their writing goals tracker once goals are created. They are also given a very slender bound notebook that we use for planning out our writing. This notebook is thin enough to be kept inside their folder along with any loose leaf writing papers.

Writing Tools Storage

Just like with the first mini lesson we are discussing dos and don’ts of handling the workshop materials and where they should be stored. This year with social distancing guidelines each student keeps their own folder in their desk. In prior years students turned in their folders at the end of each writing block and one student passed out their group’s folders.

I have a series of three metal bins (meant to be flower pots) that keep my black, blue, and red writing pens. Even though I have black pens I don’t often have students use them to write this year. Having them write in pen saves me from sharpening a ton of pencils each day. Since editing (red pens) and revising (blue pens) only happen every few weeks, I prefer to keep the pens out of their desks and on my writing center table. Unfortunately this year the table is not used except to hold my writing center cards and letter templates as well as my pen selection.

Writing Workshop Mini Lesson #3: Building Writing Stamina

My students now know what writer’s workshop should look like and how to use the tools appropriately. This means it is time for them to practice building up their writing stamina. Although this isn’t going to be a one and done type of writing mini lesson, it is an important one.

Just as readers need to build up their reading stamina, I feel the same is true for writers. My class seems to do really well with writing the whole time during independent practice, but if you are lucky enough to have a nice long writing block you will want to make sure you build up their practice time. 

Many years ago I used to have a good hour for my writer’s workshop. During those days I would have a second mini-lesson in the middle of our writing time. This way I could address immediate things I was seeing about sentence structure or punctuation. It was also another way to address what was going well with students applying the day’s lesson. Don’t be afraid to break up your writing block like this if you notice students getting squirrely halfway through.

When students work with a writing partner, they can also increase their stamina. It naturally takes longer to work on a writing piece when both partners need to share and work together. This brings me to the next mini lesson.

Writing Workshop Mini Lesson #4: Working with a Partner

I like to establish my writer’s workshop routines before I have students begin working with a partner. Once routines have been established then I’ll add writing partners into the mix. If I do it too early I might have some classroom management issues .

When planning your writing mini lesson, establish what you want partners to do. Will students have partners during independent writing time? Will students only be using partners when revising and editing?

Plan to provide several mini lessons on how to work with a partner. Now that students have had a lot of schooling impacted by Covid, it’s important to teach them the basics of how to work appropriately with each other. This might include things like sentence stems for questions to ask and how to respond, what help looks like (i.e. not doing everything for their partner but guiding them), and how to be a good listener.

Writing Workshop Mini Lesson #5: Compliments and Questions for Share Time

Share time is the last component of writer’s workshop and it’s the one I feel is the most important. Students get to see and hear examples of their peers’ writing. Many teachers use an author’s chair specifically for the purpose of this daily share time. I do not have space in my classroom so I just have students stand at the front of the room.

These one or two mini lessons should cover very similar topics as having a writing partner. In fact, many of the expectations for partners crossover to share time which makes it a perfect place to review and reinforce what students should do.

My share time is usually about 5 minutes tops since I only have a total of 45 minutes. If you have a little longer, pick mini lessons to teach about how to choose which partner goes first and how to offer specific feedback. I like to think of writing partners like mini coaches. They should be giving their partner suggestions for improvement but also a positive comment.

What are your go-to mini lessons when establishing your writer’s workshop?

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10 Essential Lessons You’ll Learn in a Creative Writing Workshop

by Melissa Donovan | Jul 11, 2023 | Creative Writing | 9 comments

What can you learn in a creative writing workshop?

When I look back over all my years of formal education, from preschool through college, only a few classes stand out as truly educational in a life-changing way.

In sixth grade, we did a section on space, which fascinated me. I retained a lot of what I learned. Later, I took astronomy and learned even more about the universe. A class on women writers exposed me to a whole world of literature I didn’t know existed. And two writing workshops (poetry and creative writing) put me on the path to becoming a professional writer.

The main difference between a regular class and a workshop is that a workshop is interactive. You work together with your fellow students, critiquing each other’s work, asking questions, and exchanging insights. Whatever you can learn from a single instructor is multiplied by all the knowledge and wisdom you gain by sharing ideas with a roomful of your peers.

What You Can Learn from a Creative Writing Workshop

2. Find out what your writing strengths are. The best part about receiving critiques from your peers is that they tell you what you’re doing right, which is reassuring. When you know that your writing skills have a solid foundation, it’s easier to accept that you still have work to do.

3. Accept the weaknesses in your writing. No matter how good your writing is now, there are things you can do to improve it. When ten of your classmates agree that certain elements in your prose need touching up or that you need to hit the grammar books, all you can do is accept it and dig your heels in.

4. Learn to handle critiques of your work. The first few critiques might be a bit rough, but once you see how all the suggestions make your writing better, you’ll start looking forward to them. You’ll learn how to separate yourself from your work, and you’ll be able to not only handle but actually embrace (and look forward to) critiques. This will also prepare you for real-world critics and their reviews.

5. Help others improve their work. When other writers put your suggestions into action or express appreciation for your recommendations and then tell you that your feedback helped them improve their writing, it feels good, especially when the arrangement is reciprocal.

6. Meet people who share your passion. There’s nothing like sitting in a room surrounded by people who are just as excited about writing as you are. It’s not only inspiring, it’s comforting. Plus, it’s a great opportunity to meet like-minded people, some of whom may become lifelong friends, writing partners, or your future writing group.

7. Improve your writing. This, of course, is the main reason most people take a creative writing workshop. The ultimate goal is to become a better writer , and a workshop will definitely do the trick. You’ll also put a lot more effort into everything you write because you know it will be scrutinized, and this builds excellent writing habits .

8. Adopt new writing techniques. Between the instructor and your peers, you’ll discover all kinds of interesting new writing tools and techniques, often simply through the course of discussion as well as through observing everyone’s work.

9. Get access to a mentor. The person running the workshop should be knowledgeable and experienced in the world of writing. Maybe the instructor is a published author, or maybe it’s someone who’s worked as an agent, editor, or publisher. This access to a mentor is priceless. Take advantage of it!

10. Gain experience and get a lot of creative writing practice. This is one of the most valuable benefits of a creative writing workshop. When writers work on their own, they tend to procrastinate, get distracted, and generally don’t finish most of the projects they start. But in a workshop, you’re forced to get it done. This gives you lots of great experience and practice, and it also builds good writing habits.

Thinking About Taking a Creative Writing Workshop?

I definitely recommend taking a creative writing workshop if you can find a good one that suits your schedule, budget, and writing needs. If you’ve already taken a creative writing workshop or class, share your experiences by leaving a comment. Did you learn or gain anything? Would you do it again?

You have spoken along these lines before, Melissa, and this entry is, as all your posts, fascinating and carries a great deal of sense. However, and I know I am repeating myself, I am quite unable to allow others to trample over my work, however poor it is and however noble their (expressed) motives.

I cannot help but think of the vast number of ‘real’ writers, men and women who would not have entertained the thought that writing could be learned, like arithmetic, in a classroom.

I am a poor writer and have come to accept the fact I shall always be a poor writer; it is my belief that some things – like arithmetic – can be ‘brought to heel’ by sheer hatd work, while others, like music, painting and writing, will remain ever beyond the reach of some.

Further, I have seen very promising young tennis players taken up by organisations such as the LTA and coached, every shred of flair and originality brutally ‘ironed out’ of them, and my fear is that, for many of us, attending a writer’s workshop would be a similarly dulling experience.

I also realise, however, that there are those of a temperament to survive – and evn thrive in such conditions. Sadly, I am not one of them.

Again, my thanks for a fascinating and informative blog and may it go on to even greater success, but I think you should make it clear that not everyone who has pretensions of being a writer will see their dream come true.

I believe anyone can become a writer. It starts with believing in yourself. I would add that successful authors demonstrate a range of writing skills. Even a “poor writer” (which you are not) can eke out a career in writing. I’ve seen it done. The only way to be sure you will never succeed is to never try.

Writing can be intended for a wide audience but it’s reason for being is that the writer cannot bear not to write. Whether you are a Eudora Welty, basking in prayers se or an Ethel Jackson whose writing fills notebooks only she has seen, your work has much value

Our local university has leisure learning classes that are workshops. We not only get feedback on our work, but we also learn how to workshop a piece, looking parts of the writing process with a discerning eye. The instructors keep the focus on the work, not the author. It’s so helpful for all the reasons you mentioned, but also to learn how to look constructively at my own work before anyone else ever reads it. Being inspired by fellow writers talking about writing is my favorite part. I’m sorry that opsimath feels that way. Whose to say what’s poor writing or good writing? Of course, some is obvious, and the above comment isn’t bad writing. I found it to be well-crafted and conveyed what the author intended. Not everybody is Stephen King or F.Scott Fitzgerald, and there are some who would argue even they aren’t good writers. I had the fear that I would lose myself in critique, but even in that it’s a good exercise. One of my best lessons is that no matter what others said, it’s still my writing. I can choose to take their advice or not. Workshops are only helpful when the focus is on the work, though. It’s a criitique, not a criticism. I’ve been in bad ones and they can hurt more than help. I got out of them quick.

Yes! Everything you said is spot-on. Your experiences in workshop give all of us reason to feel optimistic about finding good writing workshops and the benefits that we’ll gain from them. Thanks so much for sharing your experience. I hope it inspires others to take the plunge and try workshopping for themselves.

You have talked thusly some time recently, Melissa, and this section is, as every one of your posts, interesting and conveys a lot of sense. On the other hand, and I know I am rehashing myself, I am very not able to permit others to trample over my work, however poor it is and however honorable their (communicated) thought processes.

I really want to think about the incomprehensible number of “genuine” essayists, men and ladies who might not have entertained the prospect that written work could be learned, similar to math, in a classroom.

I am a poor essayist and now acknowledge the actuality I should dependably be a poor author; it is my conviction that a few things – like math – can be ‘conveyed to heel’ by sheer hatd work, while others, similar to music, painting and composing, will remain ever past the compass of some.

Further, I have seen extremely encouraging youthful tennis players taken up by associations, for example, the LTA and instructed, each shred of energy and innovation mercilessly ‘resolved’ of them, and my trepidation is that, for a significant number of us, going to an author’s workshop would be an also dulling knowle

Hi Shamit. Receiving feedback and critiques is not the same as people trampling all over your work. A good critique is designed to make your writing better. If you want to be a better writer, you can certainly work toward that. It’s your choice. There are people who have a natural talent for writing. However, great writing requires a lot of different skills (grammar, storytelling, word-craft, etc.). Even the most talented writers will find some area of the craft where they need to learn skills they don’t possess. The idea that writing can’t be learned is simply not true, as evidenced by thousands upon thousands of people who worked hard to learn the craft and then became successful. The myth that talent is a requirement is an unfortunate one.

A writer is someone who writes. However, the object of writing is not necessarily to get published or make a living by writing. Read, for example, the notebooks of Thomas Edison. One of the best writers I knew was my grandmother, who maintained weekly correspondence with seven high school girlfriends for over 50 years.

That’s true, Ann. People write for many reasons and not only for professional purposes.

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Writer’s Workshop Middle School: The Ultimate Guide

Feb 23, 2021

Writer’s Workshop Middle School: The Ultimate Guide defines the writer’s workshop model, its essential components, pros and cons, step-by-step set-up, and further resources.

What is the writer’s workshop model?

Writer’s workshop is a method of teaching writing developed by Donald Graves and Donald Murray , amongst other teacher-researchers.

The writer’s workshop provides a student-centered environment where students are given time, choice, and voice in their learning. The teacher nurtures the class by creating and mentoring a community of writers.

So, why does the writer’s workshop in middle school matter?

Students learn more during the writer’s workshop because you can mentor them toward what they need to know and practice, and they have lots of time to write and read in order to improve at their own pace (to an extent). 

For example, if the skill I need to teach is how authors use mood and tone to create meaning , then I would use a mentor text to teach that concept. However, after reading, the focus will not be on answering questions about the text in written form. Instead, I demonstrate how writers choose particular words and the arrangement of those words to create a mood and tone. 

Students then try creating mood and tone with their own pieces of writing. Only after students have practiced their own creations, do I then circle back around to other literature for students to practice literary analysis of mood and tone and its effect on meaning.

Why I focus on writing in the ELA classroom?

I’ve found students are more likely to read assigned texts if I’ve given them a reason to use those texts. That reason? To apply what they learn from mentor texts to their choice writing. Middle school students love to express themselves in creative ways, and by giving students this choice, you build engagement and motivation to continue learning.

The essential components of the writer’s workshop in middle school are:

• Time to write daily 
• Student choice 
• Exploring the writer’s voice
• Building a community of writers
• Mentor teaching 

1. Time to Write Daily

Students need a chance to write daily. Various ways you can do this are through Bell Ringers at the beginning of the class, writing during the mini-lesson, and writing projects during workshop time. My students use writing journals because they need a space to think before they face a blank computer screen.

Students do read in my classes. However, their purpose for reading is to become better writers. This reading is either assigned, student choice, or a choice between the assigned reading and student choice, depending on the skill or concept I’m targeting that week. 

This is how I break up our daily writing:

• Write Now (bell ringer) 
• Mini-lesson and sharing 
• Writing/Reading Workshop while I confer with writers 
• Short turn and talk, log off computers and pack up 

Below is an example of my story writer’s workshop time transformation. This is what I use when we are writing narratives. I’m using a fantasy magic theme here:

2. Student Choice

To keep students motivated to write, you want to build in student choice whenever and wherever possible. Just to clarify, you don’t have to give them choices for everything they do. 

For one thing, that would be as overwhelming as shopping on the cereal aisle at your local grocery store. Just too many choices. 

When I introduce a concept, I may give them a few choices on how students can practice that concept. If I give them a writing assignment, I often allow them ONE choice in topic, genre, audience, or mode of writing. 

If you need students to complete an assignment/activity within a certain time period, tell them ahead of time. Let them know they can turn in an excerpt if they want to write something longer than you expect. 

Of course, this is not always possible. They need to learn how to write within certain time parameters. So, let them practice this through timed writings or word sprints .

One way to help students with choice is to have them do listing activities frequently. They could even have a section in their writing notebooks just for lists of ideas.  

3. Exploring the writer’s voice

Writer’s voice – that elusive term that most writers have no idea how to achieve until they’ve written for a while, and then finally realize they have it. The ultimate goal for me as a writing teacher is to help my students to find their voice.

I want students to be able to explore what is important to them personally and to explore how they can share this with others. From encouraging students to participate in small group sharing to author’s celebrations, students need the opportunity to see their writing voice matters.

There are so many different ways for kids to publish safely online – Edublogs, Adobe Spark, Google Sites, FlipGrid, etc. 

4. Building a community of writers in your writer’s workshop for middle school

Middle school students are very social, but even the quiet writers need to socialize often with other writers. This component of the writer’s workshop for middle school is what makes this model an actual workshop.

Students share their writing with each other. Usually, I allow for natural partnerships and groups to form. However, at the beginning of the year, I often pair up students for short activities. This helps everyone feel more comfortable with each other.   

One way I build a community of writers is to play the name game at the beginning of the year. We all stand in a circle and we toss a ball to each other and say our name and all the people who have had the ball tossed to them. It gets fun when students start to forget names. They all start out being self-conscious but end up laughing and smiling.  

Another way to build a community is during share time. I have students write in their notebooks as soon as they come into the classroom as a warm-up, starter activity that I call Write Nows. These Write Nows are projected up on the screen, and students write for 2-5 minutes. After this, I ask students to turn and talk to a neighbor about what they wrote. 

Sometimes this writing is a review of the previous day or another activity that goes along with the skill we are learning. Other times it is a prewriting activity that helps break writer’s block .

Write a Letter to your Students

To help students get to know me as a community member, I write a letter to them and they write back to me. This starts the relationship-building between my students and me within the first week, and I conference with the students about their letters. This also gets them into the swing of a writer’s workshop.

My students love this letter-writing activity that I’ve done every year for the past 24 years. It’s a hit every year and establishes the tone and mood of our workshop.

5. Teacher as Writing Mentor

One of the most important components of the writer’s workshop in middle school is you – the writing teacher.

To teach writing well, you should write along with your students. Over the years, I’ve written on transparencies, used a document camera, and filmed myself writing. All of these methods work. Generally, I write along with students during the bell-ringer activity, which I call Write Now, but sometimes I’ve prewritten the Write Now.

Additionally, I show students my various writing projects, both published and unpublished, during daily lessons.

My students have seen this blog, heard my podcasts , listened to me read aloud from stories I’ve written and/or published. My students are the ones who pushed me to publish my first YA books . You’ll be amazed at what you come up with and how this creates a bond with your students that lasts a lifetime.

Also, by completing the writing assignments you assign, you’ll be able to empathize with and anticipate the writer’s struggle with each assignment.

Terms to Know for Writing Workshop

This is not an exhaustive list, but one that will be added to as I find more terms that should be added here.

Activity:   the practice of a skill or process, especially when gaining new knowledge

Assignment: a product created by the student after practicing a skill or process that may be revised up until a particular due date

Bell ringer: a beginning of the period activity (I call these Write Nows in my class)

Blended learning environment: in-person LIVE teaching and learning or digital learning with recorded lessons

Conference: a meeting between teacher and student about their writing

Journal write:  handwriting in a journal for ideas, bell ringers, collecting information, etc.

Mini-lesson: a short 5-10 minute lesson that teaches either a whole or partial skill or process

Mastery Learning: quizzing students on their conceptual knowledge, giving them different activities based on the results of their quizzes – either reteach or extend – and quizzing again. Revisions can also be mastery-learning pieces. 

Mentor texts: well-written, multicultural texts used to demonstrate a literary concept or style

Rubric: a breakdown of the skill into levels of learning – students revise to earn a higher level

Writing Workshop Middle School Pros and Cons

• Builds student relationships with you and each other – lots of SEL
• Easier to differentiate for students than the traditional classroom model
• Grading can be accomplished during conferences
• Students are more engaged and begin to enjoy writing
• They might even enjoy reading more, too
• Mini-lessons are short, sweet and to the point, less prep time for presentations 
• Breaking through writer’s block
• Teaching students how to use the technology 
• Helping students revise if they don’t have access to technology
• Adapting to technology challenges that arise (switch to writing journals or change Internet browsers) 
• Deadlines can be difficult to manage sometimes

As far as time management is concerned – one of the things I am going to stress to my students is the need for getting assignments turned in, even if it’s not perfect. I need to be able to keep them to deadlines. So, this year, I’m going to teach my student’s Parkinson’s Law :

How to start a writer’s workshop for middle school

These are the steps I’m taking this year to start my writer’s workshop, and I’ve used these for quite a few years now. Some steps may be done simultaneously on the same day. There will be future blog posts about each of these steps.

• Create a welcoming classroom space.
• Decide what technology you will be using – hardware and software. If you need help with Canvas LMS, click here .
• Send out your course syllabus with materials students will need for your course.
• Create a course outline based on your school’s curriculum guides or state standards. 
• Plan and post your first 2 weeks of lessons and assignments into your online course (if you are using technology in your course).
• Establish classroom expectations and routines.
• Build a classroom community of writers.
• Show students how to navigate your course online.
• Write a letter to your students and have them write back to you as their first assignment.
• Confer with your writers as they are writing their letters and make a list for yourself of things students need to work on with their writing.
• Set up writing journals and begin writing workshop routines.
• During mini-lessons, teach the 5 tricks that break writer’s block .
• Students write in journals to gather ideas and begin writing pieces.
• Assign a short writing piece and confer with writers during workshop time. 
• Teach ONE revision strategy during a mini-lesson, depending on your curriculum.
• Teach ONE editing strategy during a mini-lesson, depending on your curriculum.
• Allow writers to revise and edit before turning in their first short writing assignment.
• Celebrate your writers with the Author’s Chair presentations.
• Continue writer’s workshop by using daily bell ringers, mini-lessons about writing and reading, sharing, writing/reading workshop, conferencing, and turn and talk.
• Breakaway from the writer’s workshop routine every once in a while to play – escape rooms, read-arounds, watch a movie, celebrate authors, group brainstorm, catching up on overdue assignments.

References for Writing Workshop in Middle School

Atwell, Nancie. In the Middle: A Lifetime of Learning about Writing, Reading, and Adolescence. Heinemann, 2014.

Graves, Donald H. “All Children Can Write.” http://www.ldonline.org/article/6204/  

Lane, Barry. After The End: Teaching and Learning Creative Revision. Heinemann, 2015.  

Murray, Donald. “The Listening Eye: Reflections on the Writing Conference”  https://secure.ncte.org/library/NCTEFiles/Resources/Journals/CE/1979/0411-sep1979/CE0411Listening.pdf

Learning materials for Writing Workshop for Middle School

Writing Literary & Informative Analysis Paragraphs

Students struggle with writing a literary analysis , especially in middle school as the text grows more rigorous, and the standards become more demanding. This resource is to help you scaffold your students through the process of writing literary analysis paragraphs for CCSS ELA-Literacy RL.6.1-10 for Reading Literature and RI.6.1-10 Reading Information. These paragraphs can be later grouped together into writing analytical essays.

PEEL, RACE, ACE, and all the other strategies did not work for all of my students all of the time, so that’s why I created these standards-based resources.

These standards-based writing activities for all Common Core Reading Literature and Informational standards help scaffold students through practice and repetition since these activities can be used over and over again with ANY literary reading materials.

Included in these resources:

• step-by-step lesson plans
• poster for literary skills taught in this resource
• rubrics for assessments standards-based
• vocabulary activities and notes standard-based
• graphic organizers that incorporate analysis of the literature and information standard-based
• paragraph frames for students who need extra scaffolding standard-based
• sentence stems to get students started sentence-by-sentence until they master how to write for each standard
• digital version that is Google SlidesTM compatible with all student worksheets

List Making: This resource helps students make 27 different lists of topics they could write about.

Sensory Details:  This resource will help you to teach your students to SHOW, not tell. Descriptive writing with a sensory details flipbook and engaging activities that will get your students thinking creatively and writing with style.

Included in this resource are 2 digital files:

• Lesson Plans PDF that includes step-by-step lesson plans, a grading rubric to make grading faster and easier, along with suggestions for what to do after mind mapping.
• Google SlidesTM version of the Student Digital Writer’s Notebook allows students endless amounts of writing simply by duplicating a slide.

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Teaching with Jennifer Findley

Upper Elementary Teaching Blog

Types of Writing Lessons (Writing Workshop Ideas)

I recently spoke with a teacher who asked me what writing program I use to teach writing. When I told her I didn’t use a program, she was a little shocked and wanted to know how I knew what to teach.

As I explained to her how I generate my lesson topics, I realized this might be something useful to share on my blog. Keep reading for three types of writing lessons, how I generate those lessons, and tips for how you can do the same.

Management Writing Mini-Lessons:

Management writing lessons are basically the procedures and expectations you want the students to follow during writing time. I teach the bulk of these lessons in the first month of school and then revisit them (or new ones) as needed based on my students’ writing behaviors.

Here are some examples of management writing lessons:

• Materials and how to use them
• Using writing forms
• Using the computer to publish
• Expectations during independent writing
• Expectations for self evaluation of writing
• Peer conference procedures and expectations
• Procedures for editing and the different ways to edit (partner, self, teacher)
• Using editing and revising checklists
• Procedures for requesting a conference
• Ways to publish drafts
• Any other areas of concern based on your students’ writing behaviors

Here is an example of my writing expectations for independent writing time. For the lesson, I have this particular anchor chart prepared ahead of time. The students and I go over each expectation, discuss why it is important, and how we can ensure we meet those expectations.

Where do I get more ideas for management writing mini-lessons?

To get more ideas for management writing lessons, I observe my students during writing time and look for behaviors that need to be stopped or procedures that need to be put in place. Here are some ideas:

• Do your students constantly ask you how to spell words? Teach a mini-lesson on spelling strategies for unknown words.
• Do your students get off-task frequently? Teach a mini-lessons showing them how to stay on-task during writing time.
• Do your students not know what to do when they finish a writing draft? Teach a mini-lesson of the necessary procedures for when students finish a draft.

Craft Mini-Lessons:

The craft mini-lessons are the lessons aligned to my standards. These lessons are how I actually explicitly teach my students genres of writings and the craft of writing in each genre.

Here are some craft mini-lesson ideas that I do in the first month to generate ideas for writing:

• What do I write about?
• Using seed notebook for ideas (Click here to read about how we use writing lists to help generate writing topics)
• Updating seed notebook
• Pulling from personal experiences for writing
• How do writers choose topics?
• Why do writers write?
• Expanding ideas from seed journal

Here are some craft mini-lessons that I do throughout the year for the genres I teach:

• Writing for specific audiences
• Writing from specific points of view
• Writing for specific purposes
• Small moments
• Adding details
• Sequencing ideas
• Leads and conclusions
• “Show, Not Tell”
• Transitions
• Developing characters
• Adding voice
• Strong descriptions
• Word choice
• Adding figurative language
• Adding sound devices
• Research skills
• Adding research into writing
• Writing in different genres

Where do I get more ideas for craft writing mini-lessons?

One strategy that I use to come up with craft mini-lessons is to analyze released writing samples from my state assessment. As I analyze the writing samples, I take note of what the students did well in the samples that my students are not doing well.

Another strategy is to use your student writing to reflect on what the students need to include in their writing to advance their writing to the next level. For example, one year I had students who were constantly making lists in their writing. After noticing this, I taught the students a mini-lesson on how to avoid making lists and instead expand on the details (or leave them out if they are not relevant to advancing the plot).

Conventions Mini-Lessons:

Convention mini-lessons are just what they seem: lessons you teach your students to improve their writing conventions, such as:

• Spelling Patterns
• Paragraphing
• Grammar Rules
• Punctuation
• Capitalization

For a more detailed list of ideas for convention mini-lessons, click here to grab the checklist of ideas shown below.

Where do I get more ideas for conventions writing mini-lessons?

To get ideas for my convention lessons I use my students’ writing to guide me and my language/writing standards. As you are reading/grading your students’ writing, look for patterns in their errors. If you see something that the majority of your students are doing incorrectly or not even doing at all, jot down a note and add that to your mini-lessons for the next week.

While I am reading my students’ essays, I use this printable to help me jot down ideas for convention lessons. Click here to grab a copy.

Do you use a writing workshop model to teach writing? Do you have other strategies for generating writing lesson ideas than the ones I use? Let me know in the comments!

Share the Knowledge!

Reader interactions.

December 31, 2016 at 5:08 am

Thank you so much for all the wonderful ideas. There is always so much to teach and do, it is awesome to have organized way of teaching like yours that will definitely help me and I am sure many orhers too.

December 31, 2016 at 11:36 am

Hi Nagihan, Thank you for your comment! I am so glad this will help you! It really helped streamline my writing instruction for sure.

August 27, 2017 at 8:13 pm

I was wondering if you had the lesson plans and printables for all your lessons. I would like to purchase.

September 2, 2017 at 4:35 pm

Thank you so much! I’m teaching writing for the first time to and I’ve loved all of your posts! They are so detailed and specific, when you spoke on a previous post about the specificities of your 9 week units I got a much better sense of what to do, making planning so much easier! I was hoping I could see more about how you ask students to organize their mini lesson section in their notebooks, mine always seem so messy and hard to find. Do you use a table of contents? Thank you again for everything!

September 18, 2017 at 9:22 pm

This is my first year ever teaching ELA (5th Grade) and this blog is saving my life!

October 24, 2017 at 7:40 am

thanks for the information is very helpful to be read and known

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Welcome Friends!

I’m Jennifer Findley: a teacher, mother, and avid reader. I believe that with the right resources, mindset, and strategies, all students can achieve at high levels and learn to love learning. My goal is to provide resources and strategies to inspire you and help make this belief a reality for your students.

How to Plan Your Writing Workshop

Planning your Writing Workshop is no easy feat.  With a limited amount of time and a wide range of moving parts, having a great game plan is essential to teach writing well.  In the past two weeks of the Summer Writing Workshop Series , we have covered how to keep your students engaged and tackled the issue of time  in Writing Workshop .

Okay, so you’ve got engagement strategies up your sleeve and you are not going to let time get in your way.  So what’s next? What are you teaching? How are you teaching it? When are you teaching it?

Today, we are diving into 5 strategies to plan for Writing workshop.  These strategies are the overarching elements that drive everything you do in Writing Workshop. If you are looking for the specifics of each writing unit, including teaching points aligned to the standards, that would be in each of  my writing units .  

Let’s get started, shall we?

1// Identify your Core Beliefs and Values as a Writing Teacher.

A few years ago, I attended a 3 day summer workshop at the Poynter Institute for Media Studies and Journalism in St. Petersburg, Florida .  This workshop was ran by Roy Peter Clark and the amazing ELA department in our school district.  The purpose of this institute was to help us implement new-to-us Common Core standards (now Florida standards) without losing all that we already KNOW about teaching Reading and Writing.  At the very beginning of this workshop, we collectively created a list of what we knew needed to be happening in our classrooms to teach writing.  I am sharing this list with you below because standards may change, assessments may change, administration may change, curriculum may change, and ,of course, our students may change.  However, it is essential that we have sound and steadfast philosophies about teaching writing. When we are faced with any of these changes, we can always make decisions based on our core beliefs about teaching writing.  Therefore, we can always do what is best for our students.

Core Beliefs & Values

These core beliefs are the foundation of my classroom and basis for every writing unit.

• Students should read & write everyday.
• Students should see you writing.
• Drafting & revising helps us grow.
• We talk about our writing.
• Writing is connected to reading.
• We help students recognize the value of their own experiences. (reading is a source, their life experiences are a source for writing)
• Read like a writer. How does the author do what they do?
• We should know our audience and purpose for writing.
• Keep students OFF teacher welfare. (Donald Graves)
• Help students see the world as a storehouse for writing ideas.
• Share writing with peers and other audiences- PUBLISH the work of every student writer.
• Students should know what they are doing well.
• Students need to see us get excited!
• Conferring/Talking about reading and writing one-on-one or in a small group.

Why does this matter?

I think it is really important that we identify our core values and beliefs as teachers .  We need to know what we stand for and value in our teaching.  We have to remember that WE are teaching our students. Not anything or anyone else.  I invite you to be empowered by that and remember how much power you do have in your classroom.  When we identify our core values and beliefs, we can use this to guide our instruction and daily decision-making.

2//  Identify Writing Goals for Your Students

Before setting out to think about how you plan your year in writing (OR maybe your district tells you exactly what you are going to do), think about what goals you want for your students by the end of the year. What matters most to you? What results do you think are really important in terms of your students’ writing?

For me, it has never been based on numbers.  Sure, I want my students to write well and achieve a fantastic score on our state assessment.  But that number is NOT going to drive my passion and enthusiasm during my daily writing lessons.  Moreover, I cannot let that number determine my worth as a writing teacher or my students as writers.  We are more than a number.

So when I ask, “What goals do you want for your students?”- I don’t mean just numbers.  I mean how do you want them to feel about writing? Personally, this is what matters most.  I want my students to feel confident about writing, to enjoy the process, and eager to learn new things about writing.  

Of course I know that we also need to be setting tangible goals based on specific skills.  You know the deficits that come into your classroom every year that make teaching writing difficult for your particular grade level.  Let’s identify what goals YOU have for YOUR classroom. I could write all day about what I think is important, but this isn’t about me, it’s about YOU and YOUR students.

Let’s try this out by answering the questions below.

• List 3 (or more) Core Beliefs you have about writing. You can also choose your top 3 from my list.
• What do you want your students to feel, think, or believe about writing?
• Do you think you have achieved this goal in the past?  
• What writing skills do you think are the most important for your grade level?
• Based on classroom, district, or state assessments, what goals do you have for your students?
• What type of mindset do most of your writing students have? (i.e. enthusiastic about writing, lack confidence in their writing, indifferent about writing, do not seem to enjoy writing)
• What prerequisite writing skills seem to be lacking when students get to your grade level?

To make this even more fun and interactive, I’ve created a Google form for these questions.  Don’t worry, I am the only one that will see your responses. What you share will only be used to create more content and resources to meet your needs.  

Answer using a Google Form: 

https://goo.gl/forms/KzzUBxeBUiog4Ucw2

Now, you might be thinking, “Whoa, Jessica! That’s way too personal.”  I feel you. I am a pretty private introvert myself. Just get out a notebook and your favorite Flair pen to jot down your responses to the questions.    

Either way, just take the time to think about what is most important to you and your students when it comes to writing.

3// Begin with End in Mind

This is one of my favorites habits from Stephen Covey in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People .

Anytime we are trying to make a plan to do something, we can begin with the end in mind.  So what does that look like in writing?

If we consider our core values/beliefs and writing goals, then we can use this to guide our planning throughout the year.  Your core values and beliefs guide your day-to-day lessons and conversations with your students. It’s like your moral compass when teaching writing.

What does that look like for each unit? Think about what end goal you have for your students at the end of each unit.  What is the endgame? Most likely, it is some form of published writing. Maybe it’s an opinion essay, a personal narrative story, or an informational article.  Whatever type of writing that you want your students to do, provide a model at the beginning of the unit to study the structure and characteristics of that type of writing.  

This is where mentor texts come in.  Nothing gets students more excited about a certain type of writing than by sharing a picture book as a mentor text.   To do this, choose a mentor text that is an exemplar of the type of writing you will teach. This text will be used throughout the unit to teach specific writing skills.  

For example, when I am teaching Opinion Writing, I use A Pig Parade is a Terrible Idea by Michael Ian Black .  Not only is it hilarious, but it is a perfect model of the opinion essay structure. He gives his opinion and supports it with reasons and evidence.

Studying  a mentor text is typically the first lesson in the unit.  Below I have identified the steps I use when introducing a mentor text.

Reading a Mentor Text Steps:

1// Read once for the gist.  (Let students simply enjoy the book, but tell them this is a specific example of the type of writing they will do.)

2// Read a second time with purpose. Before reading, tell your students that they will be reading the text a second time to look specifically for characteristics of [insert genre].

3// Create a Chart.  You can create this chart as you have students take notes in their notebook, or use a pre-made chart. (see below)

Opinion Writing (Grades 3-5)

Narrative Nonfiction (3rd Grade)

Personal Narrative Writing Unit

This chart was created after a discussion to highlight the certain skills.  We had to move VERY quickly through this unit, so I made a chart specific to the needs of my classroom.  This went along with the text Those Shoes by Maribeth Boelts.

4//  Yearly Planning

This next section truly depends on where you teach.  I’ve taught in some places where the teacher has a lot of control and flexibility over the yearly scope and sequence of their writing.  I’ve taught in other places where you are expected to follow the district scope and sequence. So, I am going to address this area of planning your Writing Workshop by what I would do in an ideal world.  

Begin with Personal Narrative

Ideally, you want to start off with Personal Narrative.

Narration is the art of storytelling.  Besides the fact that half our Reading Standards are based on literature (STORIES) , storytelling is part of the human experience.  The art of storytelling is found in social, academic, and career situations.  I’ve got a whole blog post planned and entitled The Importance of Teaching Narrative .  I feel compelled to share these thoughts and points because I teach 4th Grade in Florida.  This is the first year students take the Writing Florida State Assessment.

It’s a big deal.  

However, the Informational and Opinion Writing Standards are the only standards assessed.  So, guess what is all too often not taught? You guessed it- Narrative.

Personal narrative is a way to not only build community, but it gets students engaged and excited about writing right from the start.  They care about what they are writing because it is about them .  

It is a natural human instinct to want to be heard, to share your story.  Look at the world of social media.  People are all over Instagram stories, IGTV, Facebook stories, and YouTube. No matter where our technology goes, most developments are made to deepen the human experience.  People want to share their stories. You know who else wants to share their stories? Your students. (Whether they know it or not.)

The first unit of the year would be Launching Writing Workshop. (coming soon to a shop near you!)  The purpose of this short, 10 day unit is to establish routines, procedures, and build community.  Throughout this unit, students will complete their first personal narrative so that they can get the overall writing process and understand how writing workshop goes.  As the teacher, you can also see what students are able to produce. This will also help you go deeper with craft in the second unit: Personal Narrative.   (NOTE: This unit is being updated on August 1st.)

While teaching Narrative, I also like to align the writing standards to the reading standards.  This helps to make connections across Reading and Writing. It doesn’t always fit perfectly, but when I can make it work, I go for it!  Below you can see two examples of how you might plan out your year trying as best as possible to align the Reading and Writing standards.

5// Step by Step

Last week we learned a writing lesson from Ant-Man.  This week our writing teacher comes from New Kids on the Block.

http://https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ay6GjmiJTPM

This song always gets in my head when I teach my students this lesson.  As writers, we go STEP by STEP in the process. No matter what genre of writing I am teaching, we follow the same process.

STEP by STEP

• Get Ideas/Unpack a Prompt/Set a Purpose (if writing in response to text)  
• Make a Plan
• Write a Lead/Introduction
• Draft (Use Transition Words, Craft Moves, Organized into Paragraphs)
• Write an Ending
• Revise (Does my writing make sense? Is this my best work?)
• Edit (Spelling, Punctuation, Capitalization)

For each of these parts, I would absolutely have different teaching points on the genre and we go into depth on how to use various writing techniques. However, this is the very basic process we follow in writing.  Having a clear vision and structure helps students see the parts of their writing and make decisions about their next steps.

( Sidebar: Last year, I played the beginning of this song for my class to teach this lesson.  One of my girls knew exactly who this was.  Other guesses included Michael Jackson, Justin Timberlake, and the Beatles.)

6//  Your Writing Notebook

Setting up YOUR model notebook before you begin any writing unit will help you establish clarity and confidence in your own teaching, which will lead to your students’ success.  In reality, you might not have time to set the whole unit up at once inside your notebook. Honestly, I don’t have that much creative brain capacity to sit and do it all at once.  Plus, I find things along the way that I want to add in, change or make even better. Instead, I sit down a few times throughout the unit to reflect on what I’ve taught, the students sitting in front of me, and where I need to go next.  A huge benefit of setting up your notebook with examples of your own writing is that you can continue to use the notebook year after year. Sure you may have multiple notebooks with new writing, but that just means more material to teach from! 🙂

Using your Notebook as a Mentor Text

One of the best ways that I learned how to teach writing was by going through the process myself.  If there was something I was having specific difficulty with teaching, I knew I needed to go through that process so that I could understand the struggles my student would go through, but also how to push through the struggle.  

We don’t have to be the most amazing expert writers in the world.  We just have to be a step ahead of our students. In fact, the struggles we go through make us better teachers.  They need to see us make mistakes, play with words, and the thought struggle that goes with creating quality writing.  That’s part of the process and they need to see it. Be okay with not knowing answers. Your writing doesn’t need to be perfect.  In fact, it shouldn’t be. What a great way to model revision work!

To help myself (and my students) stay organized, I try to title what I am teaching on a specific page or on the page to the left so that I can go back to that again and again.

I hope you have found some great value in these planning strategies for Writing Workshop.  At the very least, I hope you enjoyed listening to some NKOTB!

If you are looking for more specific support in teaching writing, be sure to get on the waitlist for our Writing Membership site coming August 2018.

I’ll see you next week when we dive into one of my FAVORITE topics: How to Integrate Writing into Content Areas

Until then, you can find me on Instagram and Facebook. 

You’ve already signed up for the Free Resource Library , right? 😉

If not, be sure to sign up HERE!

Let me know in the comments:

What other planning obstacles get in your way?

• How to write a story
• How to write a novel
• How to write poetry
• Dramatic writing
• How to write a memoir
• How to write a mystery
• Creative journaling
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• For teachers

How to Teach Writing - Resources for Creative Writing Teachers

Fiction writing course syllabus with lesson plans, fiction writing exercises and worksheets, resources for teaching introductory poetry writing, resources for teaching children.

How to teach writing - general thoughts

• help students to understand the elements of craft (e.g., story structure, poetic meter, etc.) so that they can recognize them in their reading and consciously experiment with them in their writing.
• open students' eyes to the options available to them when they write a story or poem (e.g., "showing" instead of "telling", using different kinds of narrators and narrative viewpoints, using different poetic forms).
• encourage students to become close observers of the world around them and to find creative material in their environments.
• teach students the value of specificity, of using all five senses to discover details that may not be obvious to the casual observer.
• help students to separate the processes of writing and editing, to avoid self-criticism while writing their rough drafts to allow ideas to flow freely (for this to work, their teachers also have to avoid criticizing rough drafts!). Teach students to treat self-editing as a separate stage in the writing process.
• get students reading in the genre they'll be writing; e.g., if they're writing poetry, encourage them to read a lot of poems.
• help students learn to trust their own perspectives and observations, to believe that they have something interesting to say.
• teach students not to wait for inspiration, that they can write even when not inspired.
• get students excited about writing!

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Creative Writing in the Natural World: A Framing

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To promote development, detail, and focus of ideas in students' writing, it sometimes helps to start with a fun, creative writing activity that encourages what you want to see in all of their writing. In this minilesson, students practice writing detailed, sensory-rich descriptions by framing a small piece of nature and freewriting about it. From this, students can develop a variety of types of writing including poetry, short stories, science writing, reflections, and other academic genres.

Featured Resources

• Literal vs. Figurative Language Guide
• Internet access and the Flip Book Interactive

From Theory to Practice

This lesson explores figurative language comparisons formally known as simile and metaphor; however, the focus of the lesson is on students' use of their their imaginations to describe their observations in writing rather than on the official terminology for language use. In Wondrous Words: Writers and Writing in the Elementary Classroom , author Katie Wood Ray advises, "Give it [the craft element you identify in a text] a name so you can refer to it easily in the future as you study craft and as you writing your own texts"; yet the name that students use need not be the formal, "correct" name (42). The formal name of the element simply detracts from the ways that writers work. As Ray explains, "What's important is that, in seeing it and naming it for yourself, you have a new vision of what's possible when you try to write well" (42). When we do use formal names for craft elements, best practice pairs such words with students' definitions of the elements. Ray and Lisa Cleaveland say, "We are careful to use the words most writers in the world use for the important concepts of writing . . . if we embed kid-friendly explanations of what they mean...we need not shy away from the words themselves" (98). Further Reading

Common Core Standards

This resource has been aligned to the Common Core State Standards for states in which they have been adopted. If a state does not appear in the drop-down, CCSS alignments are forthcoming.

State Standards

This lesson has been aligned to standards in the following states. If a state does not appear in the drop-down, standard alignments are not currently available for that state.

NCTE/IRA National Standards for the English Language Arts

• 5. Students employ a wide range of strategies as they write and use different writing process elements appropriately to communicate with different audiences for a variety of purposes.
• 6. Students apply knowledge of language structure, language conventions (e.g., spelling and punctuation), media techniques, figurative language, and genre to create, critique, and discuss print and nonprint texts.
• 8. Students use a variety of technological and information resources (e.g., libraries, databases, computer networks, video) to gather and synthesize information and to create and communicate knowledge.
• 11. Students participate as knowledgeable, reflective, creative, and critical members of a variety of literacy communities.
• 12. Students use spoken, written, and visual language to accomplish their own purposes (e.g., for learning, enjoyment, persuasion, and the exchange of information).

Materials and Technology

• A piece of loose paper, paper to take notes on, and a writing utensil (pen or pencil)

Preparation

• Scout out a good spot to take students outdoors on the school grounds, a place that preferably has grass or that feels somewhat “natural.” If such an area isn’t available, it is okay to do this activity on constructed spaces such as sidewalks, playgrounds, and even inside the classroom if absolutely necessary, but it’s best done outdoors.
• Prepare the Literal vs. Figurative Language Guide by making it into a transparency or making copies for each student.
• Test out the Flip Book Student Interactive .

Student Objectives

Students will:

• freewrite about a specific place that is framed by their piece of paper using imaginative and literal observations.
• identify nouns in their writing that they would like to focus on and develop further.
• write using specific sensory imagery and figurative language in order to accurately describe their framed “worlds.”

Session One

• Ask students to get out a loose piece of paper.
• Have them fold it in half at least once and tear or cut out the center. (Some students may want to fold it more than once in order to create an unusual shape. That’s okay.) The goal is to be left with a piece of paper with a hole in the middle of it like a frame. The frame can be of any shape or size.
• Explain that you will be taking the class outdoors and that each student will find a spot to place his or her frame. Also explain that students will pretend that what is inside the frame is the entire world, the only thing students will focus on. In their notebooks, students will freewrite about what they find in their frames. Encourage students to use their imaginations. Perhaps they’ll find a bug and write about it as a giant dinosaur or a talking creature. However they proceed, students should write as freely as possible to get as much detailed information down about their framed “worlds” as they can.
• Once students have found a place outdoors for their frames, give them ten to fifteen minutes to freewrite.
• Back inside the classroom, ask students to remind you what a noun is. Ask them why nouns are important in writing. How do they function in a sentence, for example? (One answer is that nouns help us know who or what a sentence is about. They are they focus, and they help us visualize ideas as we talk or write about them in any genre.)
• Have them read over their freewriting and underline three to five nouns that they would like to focus on.
• Collect students' freewriting to be returned in the next session.

Session Two

• Return students' freewriting from the previous session where they had finished by underlining three to five nouns to focus on.
• Ask students to list their five senses. Ask for a volunteer or two to provide one of their nouns. Use these to practice developing these nouns into fully described sensory experiences. Help students describe them using all five senses. Encourage imaginative leaps so students understand that their descriptions don’t have to be literal.
• At this point, discuss the difference between literal and figurative language, and explain that the goal is for students to describe their nouns using sensory detail and figurative language. Show students the Literal vs. Figurative Language Guide overhead or give them the handout. If the students were to write literal descriptions of their framed “worlds,” for example, they will simply write exactly what is in their frames (Grass looks green; sand feels rough; grasshoppers make a high pitched noise, etc.), but if they write figuratively, they will use their imaginations to describe their observations. This might include using similes, metaphors, hyperbole, and personification. For example, the grass looks like spiky green hair; sand is solid water; grasshoppers are fiddlers who play their legs, etc.
• Using the Flip Book Student Interactive , have students create a page for each of the three to five nouns they underlined. (Each student should complete at least three pages.) On each page, they will develop these nouns by adding sensory-rich, figurative descriptions of them in paragraph or poetry form. The goal is to describe each noun using as many of the five senses and as much figurative language as possible. Encourage students to be imaginative for this process. What might an ant sound like? How might a rock smell?
• Students may need to finish their Flip Books outside of class, or you might reserve some class time tomorrow to finish these up.
• Give students the opportunity to share their finished pieces with the class.
• Encourage students to develop their flip book pages further by illustrating them.
• Students might also use an additional page in their flip books to create a piece of writing such as a short story, poem, or reflection about the natural world. Encourage them to find connections between the nouns in their list. How might that list become one piece of writing instead of three to five separate pieces?
• Discuss ways students can use these writing techniques to improve other writing that they are doing. You might ask students to review one of their past writing assignments and underline places where they might add detail or figurative language in order to develop their ideas.

Student Assessment / Reflections

As long as students participate fully in the freewriting activity and complete at least three pages on their Flip Books, they should receive full credit for this activity. If you would like to turn the Flip Book into a graded assignment, you might require that each page include at least three sensory images and one instance of figurative language. Students might also earn credit by reading one of their pages aloud in front of the class.

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Planning a Dynamic Writing Workshop

Planning for and Implementing a Dynamic Writing Workshop:

How to create and implement a writing workshop that adapts to your writers’ needs.

This is a free Writing Workshop plan for your classroom created by The Curriculum Corner.

We have been thinking a lot about Writer’s Workshop and its flow in the classroom.  We are often asked about the best way to make all the pieces fit together while still providing the fluidity and individual instruction that needs to occur for writing in a classroom full of diverse needs.

In the summer of 2018 we had the opportunity to present our ideas for creating a dynamic writing workshop at NAESP in Orlando. Below we are sharing the resources we created along with other relevant materials.

It All Centers Around Conferencing

Conferencing is at the heart of a workshop approach and is what provides you with the vital information for your instruction.  The knowledge you gain from conferring with each of your students independently is the basis for the decisions you make for upcoming mini-lessons, small group instruction and even future one-on-one conferencing.   It is this same information that changes so often as children grow and develop as writers at various paces.

The following flow chart is something we came up with to help new teachers (or those new to Writer’s Workshop) think about the process and flow of Writer’s Workshop as they start to plan and work through what this will look like within their classrooms.

Conferencing is the center of everything you do in workshop.  It not only affects your future instruction, but is what you analyze and reflect upon as you make daily decisions about your students and create action plans to meet the needs of the writers in your classroom.

As a workshop teacher, your goal is to keep your planning and instruction dynamic. This will allow you to provide continuously for your individually changing student needs. Below you will find our resources to assist you in this.

Implementing Your Writer’s Workshop

These resources might be useful to you if you’re wanting to start your journey with writer’s workshop or even if you have been doing workshop, but wanting to restructure things a bit.

Writing Conference Guide (click title to access resource)

If you (or even your student teachers) are new to conferencing and need a little guidance during your conferencing we have JUST what you need.  This resource contains guiding questions for the six traits of writing to help you get the most out of your one-on-one time with students.

Writing Management Binder   (click title to find resource)

 There is much information to record and so much data you may need to keep to track your students’ progress.  This collection of resources may help in that process.

Writing Continuums (click title to find resource)

Use these as a way to determine where your writers fall in their writing.

Writing Strategy Menus (click title to find resource)

This collection of strategy menus is designed to help you assist your students when you find needs either during conferencing or whole group instruction.

Launching Writer’s Workshop   (click title to find resource)

Some of you may need a way to start the next school year of writing instruction in a different way.  This full set of launching lessons may help you to establish procedures and get your writers started in a structured way so that your workshop is successful.

Setting Expectations

Keep in mind that the time you spend at the beginning of the year preparing your students and communicating your expectations will pay off. Making sure your students know procedures will save you valuable time as you are doing the important work of conferencing with your students.  It is well worth the time it takes at the beginning of a school year.

Resources for Training

If you are new to writing workshop and looking to learn along with your staff, we have created a PowerPoint and accompanying resources to help you work through the process. These materials are ones we shared at NAESP during our session on writing workshop.

Here you will find our PowerPoint that contains the key points: Presentation

Resources we have created for planning and record keeping: Resources

Student writing samples for teacher practice: Samples

Interested in having us guide your teachers through this process? We are available for school trainings! Please contact us at [email protected] to learn more.

Writing Workshop Units of Study

After launching your workshop and getting your students into the day to day understanding of how workshop works, you may want to have some ideas for writing lessons and meeting standards.  While we know that these lessons will most likely NEVER be followed exactly in the order they are written, they may provide you with some ideas and planning for your dynamic workshop.

It is suggested that you think about the standards you are required to teach along with your specific learners to choose lessons from these units as you teach these different types of writing.

You will also want to do as much collaborating as possible with grade level team members to get great ideas for addressing other standards or to help your students understand an important writing concept of skill as the need arises.  Your team’s PLC is the best time to look at data and information about students collectively and make decisions for your own classroom based on the team’s brainstorming and problem solving efforts.

Below you will find links to the writing units of study we have created over the years for various grade levels.  Each unit will contain lesson ideas and the resources needed to carry out the unit in your classroom. All of the units of study are free.

Units of Study for Writing Workshop

• Writing Personal Narratives
• Informational Text Writing
• How-To Writing Unit of Study
• Writing Like a Scientist
• Animal Research
• Punctuation
• Fantasy Writing
• Persuasive Writing
• “All About” Books (Informational text for younger authors)
• How-To Writing for Young Authors
• Opinion Writing for Intermediate Grades
• Writing Research Papers

Author Units of Study

A wonderful way to teach students about a particular type of writing is to immerse them into a particular author’s style of writing.  If you are looking to stand on the shoulders of famous writers, you might like the following units of study:

• Gail Gibbons

Other Useful Resources for Implementing Your Writing Workshop

In primary classrooms we always gave students the opportunity to write on different types of papers.  For our youngest writers, pre-made books is a great way to get them engaged, help them stay organized and provide for some structure as they are learning to write.  You can use the pages linked below to stand alone as options for your writers or you might choose formats that work best for your students and staple pages together to create those pre-made books.

• Lined Papers
• Lined Papers for Info Text
• Portable Word Walls

Getting Started with Writing Workshop & Word Study

Friday 6th of August 2021

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Launching Your Writer's Workshop **Updated** - The Curriculum Corner 123

Wednesday 10th of July 2019

[…] Planning a Dynamic Writing Workshop […]

Unit of Study: Personal Narratives - The Curriculum Corner 123

Tuesday 9th of July 2019

[…] If you are new to writing workshop, start here: Planning a Dynamic Writing Workshop […]

Back to School Lined Papers - The Curriculum Corner 123

Friday 21st of June 2019

[…] New to writing workshop? Start here: Planning a Dynamic Writing Workshop […]

Back to School Writing Interventions - The Curriculum Corner 123

[…] New to Writing Workshop? Start here: Planning a Dynamic Writing Workshop […]

Six Writing Mini-Lessons for Secondary Students

Writing mini-lessons? Today, I’m reflecting on the larger writing process that I teach with freshmen and sophomores. I’ve realized that within my writing units, I primarily teach six writing mini-lessons.

I teach writing throughout the entire semester with various projects after reading or an important discussion. Sure, we complete formal, researched papers. I do front-load information and provide expectations ahead of assignments. Still, as I encourage my writers, I’ve realized that I use min-writing lessons at different times throughout the semester.

I don’t present these lessons in a particular order, but by the end of the semester, we’ve worked through these smaller lessons. With high school writing lesson plans, flexibility is key.

My writing bundle contains various mini-writing lessons. Below, I’ve detailed my ideas so that you can make them your own. Writing mini-lessons (for high school students) can work in most writing curriculums, with writing workshop, and alongside mentor texts.

Not only do the writing mini-lessons boost student understanding allow me to differentiate, but they also ease my grading. Classes experience targeted practice and therefore, polished products. My grading is easier especially when we move to larger papers.

Overall, these writing mini-lessons benefit everyone.

How do you structure a successful writing mini lesson?

A successful writing mini-lesson should follow a clear structure: start with a hook to engage students, introduce the writing concept or skill, provide examples and explanations, allow for guided practice and independent writing time, and end with a wrap-up and reflection on what was learned.

Here are six.

Writing Process Mini-lessons

Cover expectations, definitions , and the writing process with a presentation and digital note sheets. Show characteristics of effective writing.

Boring? Nope: when I cover basics, I emphasize with students that I want us all to know expectations. Students arrive in my classroom with different experiences and domain-specific vocabulary. Instead of assuming that classes know my expectations, I clarify ideas with a quick presentation that outlines the basis of the writing curriculum.

After reviewing the writing process, implement paragraph writing to familiarize your classes with your expectations and manner of feedback. Plus, short assignments are a great way to implement the writing process quickly.

“One” Focus

Writing can overwhelm students, and one of my mini writing lessons is a focus on “one” idea students can accomplish. Since I provide feedback ahead of the final draft, I take into consideration the “overwhelm” that some writers can face. Since writing is a personal endeavor, students can easily become defensive about corrections. I feel that one of my jobs is to support the writer while showing the writer ways to improve the message.

With the “one” focus, everyone can easily tackle one area for improvement, see success, get excited, and move to working on more areas. As I work with a anyone, I give one piece of feedback and ask the student to return. You can read more ideas about feedback , but basically, I ask students to look at one area for improvement. For instance:

• Sentence variety.
• Transition words.
• Topic sentences.
• Integration of sources.
• Word choice.

And on! If I feel that a students is particularly overwhelmed, I will focus that student on one sentence. I keep the power of one in mind, and when students sense accomplishment, they almost always begin working on other areas. My conference cards align with the goal of one, and allow for private feedback.

Verb Focus, Grammar

Another writing mini-lesson focuses on verbs. With rough drafts, classes typically fill their papers with linking verbs and basic verbs (have, does). A rough draft shouldn’t be perfect, so I always emphasize that these verbs are perfect for the rough draft. After students work through their papers a few times, focus on verbs.

Teach young writers to leverage the power of verbs. Verbs drive a sentence, and verbs can provide an image that adjectives and adverbs can’t. Start by showing students linking verbs . (Sometimes, they don’t realize all of the linking verbs.) Then, we look at predicate adjectives and decide if there is a verb form. Finally, we dive deep into the sentence and find the meaning. Together, we find a verb that portrays the message of the sentence.

Students might not be aware that linking verbs actually lead to simple sentences such as subject, linking verb, predicate adjective. Lightbulbs normally go off when they realize that the predicate adjective often has a verb form (vocabulary lesson!) that can easily improve the sentence.

Another approach for improving verbs is simpler: ask classes to highlight every verb in the paper. Force them to resist plugging the verbs into the thesaurus and replacing the verb. Encourage everyone to brainstorm and work; they can recall verbs that will fit appropriately into their papers. When we work on verbs this way, I typically create a large web and encourage students to add to it.

After we improve verbs, we move to sentence structure.

Sentence Structure Focus

Connecting grammar and writing may take different forms, but sentence structure absolutely connects the two ideas. Sentence structure and all that it encompasses (punctuation, clauses, conjunctions) can overwhelm students. When I begin these writing mini-lessons, I have provided direct instruction over simple, compound, complex, and compound-complex sentences.

When we directly connect this grammar concept to writing, I review different sentence types and then ask writers to look at one paragraph of their paper. I’ve found that looking at the entire paper overwhelms them. When we look at one paragraph, students find success, and then they are able to transfer the idea to the rest of their paper.

Often, simple and compound sentences fill the paragraph. Would the addition of a conjunctive adverb or subordinating conjunction show more meaning, and in the process, provide a natural transition? Sometimes, combining sentences can add emphasis to a simple but little-known fact. Other times, using certain types of sentences can convey a larger meaning.

A simple exercise to illustrate the power of connecting grammar to writing is to ask students to provide you with a simple sentence. Model the different approaches students can take with such a sentence. For example: Plastics are harmful to the ocean.

That is a simple sentence, and it is a complete sentence! As a simple sentence, could you change it? The linking verb “are” could become “harm.” Plastics harm the ocean. Then, model how to turn the sentence into other types of sentences:

Compound: Plastics harm the ocean, and the public must become aware of the sad situation.

Complex: Although the situation is dire, humans must combat the harm of plastics in the ocean. 

Compound-complex: Plastics harm the ocean; however, when the public reuses containers and bags, people produce less plastic waste.

Playing with types of sentences is a powerful grammar and writing lesson. There is no correct answer, but many correct answers. Showing students sentence structures and their possibilities empowers young writers.

Overused Words Focus

Things, stuff, a lot, many: vague words can ruin a paper.

Again, I start by recognizing that overused words are common in a rough draft, but these words rarely poitively add to a paper. I complete a vocabulary lesson to support students and provide examples. Often, classes possess words that will improve their papers, but they need help drawing out those words.

The vocabulary lesson can be anything, really. . . but most often, I use a list of words associated with their papers. For instance, if students are writing about teenagers and sleep, we might look into words that they already know and branch from there. Students can brainstorm: naps, bedtime, exhaustion, focus, deprivation, chronic, difficulty, tiredness, fatigue, and moods.

That’s ten words, and everyone can use those words in a variety of forms. So, empower students by tapping into their prior knowledge. Then, show students how to branch those words into other ideas. Is a lack of sleep harmful? Do teenagers resist bedtime? Can sleepiness contribute to chronic conditions?

Create an anchor chart with classes based on the assignment. Another option is to brainstorm words that will help students cite information and incorporate it seamlessly into their papers. “The author said. . . ” Start a list with students, and show what they already know. What did the author do? Illustrated, demonstrated, proved, expounded, outlined, showcased, clarified: Teenagers know those words, and they can choose which verb best fits into their paper.

With a bit of help and brainstorming, you can eliminate overused words from student papers. Working on overused words and building vocabulary through modeling proper thesaurus use and activating prior knowledge are great mini-writing lessons.

Organization Focus

Focus in a paper begins before students write their first draft . Students might have dozens of ideas about a topic! They get excited and want to put all of those ideas in a paper, or they might not realize that numerous ideas won’t work in a paper.

Pre-Writing

Help writers focus by working with them before they write. Narrowing a focus before writing alleviates many focus problems before they even exist.

Students and I use a graphic organizer for mapping out their ideas. Allow individuals to choose the graphic organizer that makes sense to them. With graphic organizers, I provide images to utilize the benefits of metaphors from brain-based learning. To emphasize the meaning, I carry those metaphors into conferencing sessions. (Student conferences are also mini-writing lessons.)

For instance, if students look at their creation process as a road, I will tell them that I need more directions, that I need a yield sign or green light. Sometimes when I ask students to add transitions, they simply stick standard transitions into sentences. Instead, I want them to give me alerts ahead of the half-mile turn; I want to know in advance where their point is turning.

Drafting & Organizing

Other students might need a more abstract graphic organizer that prompts them to consider the color of their message or the graduation song for their conclusion. (I really will do anything to help students analyze their papers!) These silly techniques get students talking and brainstorming, and when we are finalizing papers, I am sure to return to the graphic organizer that shaped their organization at the beginning of the process. Using a metaphor, goofy and different ways, a bigger picture that students already understand, provides a starting point with students for focus.

As you conference and work with students, you will develop your own method of talking about papers. I am comfortable with using a road or a song as a talking point, but I’m confident you’ll develop an idea that works for you and your students.

Referencing the graphic organizer that meant something to them at the start of the writing process helps with organization throughout the paper. Plus, students can think of every idea for that paper at the start of the process. They can look back and realize why they eliminated certain points when they ultimately narrowed their focus.

High school English mini-lessons often support writing, and such activities are easy to connect to other lessons. My writing bundle contains various lessons with ample tools to support student writers. That bundle carries over the messages that I wrote in this post concerning mini-lessons.

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Are you interested in more mini writing lessons? My Pinterest board for writing contains ideas for m ini lessons for writing from around the web.

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Poetry Center

Five Creative Writing Lesson Plans for Middle & High School Students

A Poem About Joy:

In this lesson plan, inspired by Ross Gay's "Sorrow Is Not My Name," Teré Fowler-Chapman asks young poets to come up with a list of things that bring them joy and then write a poem inspired by one of the items on that list. The writing exercise, which is a fantastic way to bring social-emotional learning into the classroom, is preceded by a conversation on Gay's poetics and on how joy can exist even in times of sorrow.

Personal Migrations:

Saraiya Kanning, inspired by Wang Ping's "Things We Carry on the Sea," asks young writers to, "contemplate how migration has played out in their own lives, including the lives of their families." This multi-part lesson plan includes a word association game, a discussion of Ping's poem, and a group poem in which students answer the question, "What sort of things have been carried across land, sea, or even across time?" collaboratively. After this, they write their own individual poems, using a series of questions to jump start their creativity, and then craft art pieces using popsicle sticks, pipe cleaners and/or puff paint to trace paths across the surface of their chosen canvas (Kanning used cake board!). This lesson can be shortened or spread out over class periods as part of a unit on immigration and migration.

Rare Bird Erasure:

"Erasure poems use words from another source to create a new poem," Saraiya Kanning writes in this lesson plan, which uses the field guide Rare and Elusive Birds of North America as a source text from which young writers create their own pieces (although you're welcome to use any book you'd like!). Each student receives a photocopied page from the book and goes on a "treasure hunt," selecting 5-10 words that in some way connect to one another. After creating their erasure poem, students can decorate the page with art materials to "create images, patterns, or designs around the words." This lesson plan includes a note on modifications for student with visual impairments.

Titles: Art on their Own:

So often in creative writing, the titling process is overlooked but important: as Sophie Daws says, "Writing a title can feel like putting the cherry on top of your great poem or it can feel like walking on eggshells, where the wrong title could ruin the whole poem and you just can’t come up with the right one!" This lesson plan, drawn from her high school zine residency, uses six prompts to offer a guided approach to coming up with a title for a finished project, from one that asks students to write down their favorite line to another that encourages them to think of how a title can add another tone or angle to their work.

Found Art Handmade Books:

Taylor Johnson bridges creative writing and visual art in this lesson plan, which focuses on crafting handmade books from recycled materials. Johnson suggests using everything from old postcards to yarn to insect wings to create a publication that's truly one of a kind. As far as words go, students can either add something they've previously written to their books whole cloth or cut up bits of their old writing and "remix" it. After the books are done, Johnson suggests creating a classroom library or exhibit for students to browse one another's books.

Image from the Boston Public Library.

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Poetry Out Loud

Lesson plans.

Poetry Out Loud is not intended to replace classroom activities like creative writing. In fact, the two naturally complement each other. For that reason, we have created a number of optional writing activities and lesson plans for teachers.

Do you have some great Poetry Out Loud lesson plans? Email us at [email protected] to share your ideas!

For further ideas on poetry instruction, visit the  Poetry Foundation’s Learning section.

 “My English class would practice with each other every week, getting tips and tricks from our teacher before the class competition. My main focus was always ensuring that I had a deep understanding of the author’s intended tone and purpose.” Ella Weinmann, 2023 New Hampshire Champion

Downloadable PDF Lesson Plans

Poems Put to Use  (PDF) Students write about poems being put to use and, in the process, imagine the practical advantages of poem memorization and recitation.

The Tabloid Ballad  (PDF) This lesson teaches students about the typical metrical forms and narrative structure of the ballad by having them write ballads based on comic, even outrageous source material.

The Tone Map  (PDF) As students learn to name the tones of voice that the poem moves through, they learn to describe mixed emotions and to distinguish subtle shifts in tone and mood. 

Poetry, Celebrity, and the Power of Connotation  (PDF) Students learn to recognize some of the most common strategies that poets use when writing about historical figures. With these in mind, students then hunt up and present other poems about historical figures.

Golden Shovel   (PDF) Students learn to read and write poems through a new form.

In Another’s Voice  (PDF) This lesson focuses on poems that enter into a voice other than the poet’s, perhaps not even a human voice, so that students can explore the dramatic possibilities within a poem.

Keeping Score  (PDF) In this lesson, students practice close readings of poems by analyzing the style—what musicians call the “dynamics” —of the poem: its volume, speed, language, syntax, lineation, and punctuation.

Poetry As Ceremony   (PDF) This lesson focuses on poems that have the sound of ritual, often with an incantatory rhythm that can guide students in memorization and performance.

Visualizing Voice  (PDF) In this lesson, students will practice close reading by deciding points of emphasis within a poem.

Line Dancing  (PDF) This exercise will help students become more comfortable with line breaks, to think about the ways in which they can inform not only the meaning of a poem on the page, but also how understanding line breaks may aid in the performance of poetry out loud as well.

Lesson Plans by Eileen Murphy that complement Poetry Out Loud

Sonic Patterns: Exploring Poetic Techniques Through Close Reading Students use the idea of a composed memory and their knowledge of sonic patterns to draft, revise, and share their own original text.

Speaking Poetry: Exploring Sonic Patterns Through Performance Students engage in a variety of vocal activities and performance techniques based on word sounds and then prepare a recitation for small group performances and compare their interpretative choices as part of the reflection process.

Creative Writing Lesson Plans: From Paragraphs to Narratives

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Creative Writing Workshop

This creative writing workshop activity also includes:.

• Teacher Reference
• Join to access all included materials

Looking for suggestions on how to organize a creating writing workshop? For topic suggestions appropriate for various grade levels? Check out a resource packet, designed for English language arts instructors, that is packed with ideas that may be incorporated into a course, a unit plan, or for a fun break from routine.

Additional Tags

Instructional ideas.

• Use as the basis of a summer writing seminar
• Incorporate these types of assignments in every instructional unit

Classroom Considerations

• Divided into sections, the packet includes materials for elementary, middle, and high school classes and general information on how to teach creative writing
• While all instructors can find some fresh ideas, the packet is most appropriate for those new to teaching creative writing
• Suggests using the six traits of writing as the basis of assessment
• The 35-page packet includes suggestions for how to teach creative writing to elementary, middle, and high school writers
• Topics appropriate for the various grade levels are included
• Contains few student examples
• While activities are suggested, no specific writing prompts are included
• No rubrics are provided
• Does not emphasize the writing process

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Creative Writing Lesson Plans

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Roald Dahl in the Classroom

Bring the magic of Roald Dahl stories to life in your classroom with our YPO-sponsored lesson plans, spanning the full curriculum!

Created to align with Key Stage 1 and 2 learning objectives, our free lesson plans are designed to add a touch of Roald Dahl magic to the curriculum, from English, Maths and STEM to Art, PSHE and Geography.

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

Step into Willy Wonka's factory with your class and discover a world of imagination and invention. With Literacy and PSHE objectives, these lesson plans explore themes including identity and understanding others' experiences.

• Build creative characters with descriptive language
• Debate the pros and cons of television
• Explore PSHE inspired by events in the chocolate factory

Inspire your class with our favourite brave and brilliant heroine. These lesson plans span several subjects; try moving things with your mind in STEM, or overcoming Matilda's challenges in PSHE.

• Take on a newt-based Geography challenge
• Explore forces and motion in Matilda's Science class
• Discover a Maths lesson for brilliant bookworms

Discover buckets of whoppsy-whiffling words to gobblefunk around with. These Literacy and PSHE plans explore themes including friendship, dreams and believing.

• Experiment with creative language and gobblefunk
• Devise an exciting plot
• Understand human rights by studying the Giants

Introduce your class to the most disgusterous duo we know and discover nasty tricks and sticky situations in these Literacy and PSHE lesson plans.

• Create your own mischievous trick
• Write Roly-Poly rhymes
• Learn how to use dialogue in creative writing

James and the Giant Peach

Take your class around the world with the help of some rather peculiar insects. With Literacy and Science objectives, these lesson plan explore themes incluidng invention and being champions for good.

• Learn about gathering data by holding a fruit Olympics
• Join James on a Geography adventure
• Become a minibeast detective and create fact files

Early Years Lesson Plans

Who said primary school pupils get to have all the fun? We've created an extra-special set of six lesson plans perfect for titchy toddlers, with a little help from the Enormous Crocodile!

• Get crafty with Croc
• Practise numeracy by counting Croc's teeth
• Rescue the alphabet from getting gobbled up

Fantastic Mr Fox

These lessons might just be fantastic. Join our foxy hero on an exploration through English, Drama, Design, Technology, Art and more.

• Plan and write your own playscript
• Create original animal characters
• Design and make your very own digging machine

The Witches

The Witches is a splendidly spooky way to bring some adventure into your lessons. Use the story of the Grand High Witch to explore Maths, English, PSHE, Computing, Art and Design.

• Create your own Witch awareness videos
• Collage the fearsome face of the Grand High Witch
• Explore maths challenges with the recipe of Formula 86

George's Marvellous Medicine

George's mischievous adventures are perfect to explore themes of invention, feelings and the power of words. Lead creative writing challenges and PSHE conversations guided by George's story.

• Write poetry inspired by George's spells
• Use dramatic techniques to bring the story to life
• Understand and evaluate George's mixed feelings

Danny the Champion of the World

Danny's dad teaches him many things about the world; let his wisdom inspire in your class with these inventive lesson plans exploring Computing, Design, Literacy, PSHE and more.

• Design and make your very own kites
• Learn debate skills inspired by Danny
• Create atmosphere in a creative writing workshop

Billy and the Minpins

The Minpins may be small, but they have some big lessons to teach. Join Billy and his crew for a series of lessons on Literacy and Art. 

• Learn how to listen to others with different opinions to yours
• Design your own Minpin party poster
• Use colour, shape and space in your writing

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The Write Stuff Teaching

Helping Teachers Inspire Learners

Writer’s Workshop in 2nd & 3rd Grade

Writer’s Workshop is a fantastic structure that you can put in place in your 2nd or 3rd-grade classroom to help you teach writing and to help students learn how to write. While it’s important that your students be taught explicit writing skills in order to move them forward in their writing development, It is equally important to create an environment to help them LOVE writing! Using a step-by-step writing unit will help your students scaffold learning to become confident writers.

Warming Up to Writing

Starting a writer’s workshop without front-loading a bit of curiosity-provoking and wonder may interest many of your students, however, it may not grab them all. We have all seen the students that we might refer to as “reluctant writers”. Those students can be tough to read. Why don’t they like writing? Another common sight is the students that plow through their writing and are either very proud of their work or ask you “Is this good enough?” (My most dreaded question.) Sometimes the kids that are proud of their work just need a little support with revision or editing, other times, there is so much writing but not a lot of thought was put into the process.

2nd and 3rd-grade writers need a strong introduction to writing before they can dive deep into the lessons, therefore, the first step in setting up your writer’s workshop lessons should be to find out who your writers are and what they like or don’t like about writing. I created an entire writing unit curriculum that begins right there. (If you would like to go straight to the resource, click here. )

Skill-based and Joyful

This writing unit curriculum aims to hook your writers from day one. It is aligned to CCSS and the Write Traits. You will find that it aligns with many state and province curricula as well due to the wide range of concepts and skills covered.

In order to help you determine your students’ thoughts and mindset around writing, you can begin with a survey on writing that is included in Unit 1 Beginning a Writing Program unit. This survey and an accompanying writing sample that is included in the set will help you to determine your class of writers and their needs.

Using these mentor texts and the lessons for each book will help your students learn that writing is personal and that everyone can write! Sometimes, writing is all about drawing and sharing the story behind the pictures.

Setting Up Writer’s Workshop

• Library Mouse by Daniel Kirk
• Ralph Tells a Story by Abby Hanlon
• The Best Story by Eileen Spinelli
• Chester’s Masterpiece by Melanie Watts

It’s really not as difficult to set up a writer’s workshop as you may think.

I have created a FREE Launching Writer’s Workshop resource to help you do just that! There are teacher notes on the process and a PowerPoint for you to use to introduce Writer’s Workshop to your class and also includes some blackline masters for student use.

Once it is set up and the framework is understood, teaching the lessons that are already written in a step-by-step format in the Writers Workshop Year Long Curriculum is a breeze. Just bring your enthusiasm!

Sentence Writing

Your second and third graders will learn what a sentence is and how to write a great sentence with the Unit 2 Sentence Building unit. Keep in mind that all units can be used as stand-alone units. If you have already taught sentence writing, you can move on to the next unit in the series. You can also use a unit to enhance what you are already doing or to give your students a boost. If you use the whole set, one unit after the other, the learning is scaffolded in a very organized fashion.

Write Trait focus: IDEAS

For unit 1, you will use the following mentor texts:

•   Rocket Writes a Story  by Tad Hills
• Nothing Ever Happens on 90th Street  by Roni Schotter
• Punctuation Takes a Vacation  by Robin Pulver
• Little Red Writing  by Joan Holub

What Teachers are Saying

The following is just a sample of the feedback that this unit and the other units have received.

This resource promised to engage reluctant writers and it did just that. Also, I LOVE the mentor texts! This bundle is like taking a master class in teaching writing!

This is a really comprehensive product! I love how you added mentor texts, which will help my students make strong connections. Thank you!

My students are loving this unit. I bought this on Sunday and started to teach with it Monday. It is all ready to go. I even found the books at my local library as e-books and am projecting them on the Smartboard for all to see. Great resource!

This was such a great resource! The lessons are engaging and follow a really clear path to a finished product. I love these writing units- they’re age-appropriate and are written in a way where skills are broken down so that kids aren’t overwhelmed. Thank you!!

It’s important to teach your students both fiction and non-fiction writing throughout the year and not as a separate full unit. I used to start with story writing at the beginning of the year thinking it was easier. It was easier for some kids but to others, it wasn’t. Then I decided to switch it up and teach non-fiction first so that I could focus on having students make more real connections to their own lives and also give them a choice about what they wanted to write about. Students varied in who found which kind of writing was “easier” or more pleasant to write. The real “AH-HA” was when I intertwined the writing and taught fiction and non-fiction together, off and on, throughout the whole year. I was able to interest and engage the whole class in one way or another!

Organizing Writing

Whether you are writing fiction or non-fiction, students need to understand how to organize their writing so that it makes sense to the reader. The Unit 3 Research unit helps you to teach for the organization. Students will be writing small research reports and also some fiction.

The unit starts with looking at what organization is in the real world: ie. a clean kitchen, or a clean room with real photos, and then connects this to the organization in writing. (We always want real-world connections, don’t we?)

Write Trait focus: Organization

Skill Focus: Elements of Good Writing: Beginning, middle end, Introduction, Body, Conclusion

The mentor texts used in this used are:

•   Roberto the Insect Architect  by Nina Laden
•   Cats vs Dogs  by Elizabeth Carney (National Geographic)
•   Dog vs Cat  by Chris Gall
•   Stellaluna  by Janell Cannon

Students will have fun comparing cats and dogs and looking at fiction and non-fiction on the very same topics. As with many of my other teaching resources, there is always an element of social and emotional learning (SEL), and the reason I choose certain books. Stellaluna and Roberto the Insect Architect were chosen for those reasons.

The Unit 4 topic for writing is narratives. Students will look at memoirs and stories based on personal experiences like Chris Hatfield’s The Darkest Dark and develop their own understanding of writing narratives.

• The following mentor texts are used throughout the unit:
• Memoirs of a Hamster  by Devin Scillion
•   Our Tree Named Steve  by Alan Zweibel
• A Bear in War  by Stephanie Innes
• The Darkest Dark  by Chris Hadfield

Write Trait focus: Sentence Fluency

These are perfect books to not only help students understand narratives but also to showcase the power of writing a variety of different kinds of sentences. Sometimes short sentences are impactful. Other times, longer sentences are necessary.

The Unit 5 unit is all about procedural writing. Students will learn to write “how-to” pieces. While this seems like an easy thing to do, it really needs to be modeled and broken down into steps. The lessons in this unit show you how to do this quite easily.

Skill Focus: paragraph writing

You will be using the following mentor texts:

• The Plot Chickens  by Mary Jane and Herm Auch
• Meanwhile  by Jules Feiffer
• Once Upon a Cool Motorcycle Dude  by Devin Scillion
• The Christmas Wish  by Lori Evert

These books go deeper into different writing styles and strategies as well as choosing different words for effect. Students are taken step by step into a simple paragraph writing lesson. Second grade can be young for paragraph writing but in my experience, many are beginning to learn this as they get more and more experience with daily writing through the use of this curriculum. By 3rd grade, students are feeling much more comfortable with learning to develop a paragraph. Part of the reason why is due to the incremental focus on skills from the beginning of the year onwards.

Author Studies

Any good writing program must include the use of quality children’s literature (mentor texts). This is how children learn about what it is about writing or a book or text that they find interesting. There are many different kinds of texts that students should be reading and writing but for this unit, let us just look at the power of Author Studies . That is the topic of the unit 6 set of this writing unit.

You might be wondering why I haven’t mentioned grammar skills or conventions. These are very important aspects of learning to write, however, it is much more effective to include these things as part of your teaching rather than as isolated lessons. Jeff Anderson (the original mentor sentences author) has stated that teaching students grammar starts with these mentor texts. Let’s have students look at the positive aspects of writing and then emulate them in their own writing.

• 50 Below Zero  by Robert Munsch
•   Scaredy Squirrel  by Melanie Watt
•   Lilly’s Purple Plastic Purse  by Kevin Henkes
• Mr. Putter & Tabby Write the Book  by Cynthia Rylant

This is where author studies come in. This unit focuses on 4 authors and looks at their biography and their books. Students get to learn about who the authors are and what stands out in their writing. Students can identify what trait they think each author is strong in.

Write Trait focus: Word Choice (Students are also introduced to “voice” in writing and what it is.)

Narrative Writing: The Writing Process

Unit 7 is all about the writing process! Students will be putting everything they know about story elements, word choice, and writing sentences and paragraphs to practice. Students will learn to write great hooks, rich middles, and powerful endings. They will put it all together and then take a look at their writing with a revising eye.

It is my belief that students need not all be in the same place of the writing cycle at the same time. Some students may still be writing while others are editing with a peer. The whole point is that it is a process and the focus is on that: process . Throughout most of the year, the final product is not the destination.

You will need:

• I n My Heart  by Jo Witek
• The Story of Diva and Flea  by Mo Willems
• Mad Scientist Academy: The Weather Disaster  by Matthew McElligott
• The Lion Inside  by Rachel McBright

You will love these books! The Story of Diva and Flea is priceless. It is a short novel perfect for 2nd and 3rd graders.

Write trait focus: Voice (Students will use what they learned to add voice to their work. If you don’t have the previous unit, this one will fill in the gaps by using voice.)

Opinion Writing

In Unit 8 , (or any other time you need this), students will learn about opinion writing. It will be important to practice voice as that is what comes out when you are sharing your opinion. Students can learn that voice in opinion writing doesn’t mean raising their voice (!) but that how they choose words and expressions to write influences the reader or listener more than a raise in actual voice.

• Hey Little Ant  by Phillip Hoose
• The Perfect Pet  by Margie Pilantini
• The Night Gardener  by the Fan Brothers
• Henry & Leo  by Pamela Zagarenski

Write Trait focus: conventions, editing and revising

Students will engage with the books (that also have an SEL theme) and practice different opinion writing tasks. Students will give their opinion on the Perfect Pet and then conduct surveys throughout the class.

These writers’ workshop units are active. Students are encouraged to talk, move around and engage with the teacher and others in order to learn and grow their ideas and their own writing skills. Books are purposely chosen based on the time of year and/or the link to the focus skills.

While this poetry unit is part of Unit 9 of the writer’s workshop due to Poetry Month, it is my firm belief that poetry should happen all year long. Not only is poetry a powerful tool in learning to read, but kids also LOVE IT!

I am also a big believer in learning about and protecting the environment all year. April just also happens to be the month we find Earth Day . In order to be able to have a rich learning experience, I often integrate subjects. This month, students will be learning about poetry writing and the overriding theme of the unit is the environment. How great that students can be putting their heart, soul, and passion into writing and learning poetry through the thoughtful lens of protecting the Earth. Talk about working smarter, not harder and having a big impact!

You will need access to these fantastic books:

• The Adventures of a Plastic Bottle  by Alison Inches
• Our Big Home  by Linda Glaser
• Human Footprint  by Helen Kirk (National Geographic)
• Compost Stew  by Mary McKenna Siddals

Skill focus: oral language

Your students will enjoy learning all about different kinds of poetry. They will also follow the journey of the plastic bottle as it gets recycled. A human footprint is an important concept in the environment and students will learn what it is and write about their own footprint as it relates to the environment. As students learn about composting through the poetic verse of Mary McKenna Siddals, they will also write Haiku poems about worms!

Publishing and Presentation In Writer’s Workshop

Probably one of the most underrated aspects of learning to write is the celebrated world of presentation and publishing. You might not realize that you need this unit but wow what an impact this has on my little writers!

Whether you have used any other units in this Writing Unit set or not, you can use this unit to amplify your little writers’ voices.

We learn to write so we can communicate, express ourselves, and create. Therefore, this unit will explore all of these aspects as a way to celebrate writing. Students will learn all about different kinds of communication. They will use a maker space to create and generate writing ideas and they will write and present their final product.

Pre and post-assessments done by the student, their peers, and the teacher are included.

All Students Can Learn to Write

No matter what the challenges are, all students can learn to write. Remember, “writing” does not always involve a pencil. Adaptations can be made for students that experience the physical difficulty of writing or those that struggle with coming up with ideas or any other challenge. With the right mindset, everyone can be successful. I’ve written about this before here. If you have any questions or comments, please ask them in the comments section or feel free to email me at [email protected]

You can find the Year-long Writer’s Workshop and Writing Curriculum by clicking here.

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Walking by the Way

the road to inspired learning

Eight Free Creative Writing Lessons

February 17, 2012 by Ami 17 Comments

I know I throw around the word favorite all the time. But this is the truth: teaching creative writing lessons is my favorite. 

I have taught creative writing enrichment for summer school students. I have taught creative writing in various homeschool settings and co-ops. I have taught big students and little students. And I love it. 

Since I love to share homeschool co-op class ideas , I have compiled the creative writing lessons from a co-op class that I taught. 

Creative Writing Lessons for a Homeschool Co-op Class

First, please remember that any teacher can use these creative writing lessons. You don’t need to be teaching homeschoolers. You can be a classroom teacher or a homeschool teacher at home with one student. You can even be a librarian who needs a fun program series.

Second, I used these creative writing lesson plans with upper elementary students (with maybe a few 7th graders thrown in). However, you can adapt and use them for older students or younger students!

Creative Writing Lesson Plans

Creative writing lesson one.

The first lesson focuses on cliché and metaphor. It prompts students to consider how words matter.

Grab lesson one here .

Creative Writing Lesson Two

The second lesson teaches students about sensory details: why they are important and how to include them in their writing. Students will begin using sensory details to evoke smells and sounds and sights.

Grab lesson two here.

Creative Writing Lesson Three

The third lesson introduces showing vs. telling. Students learn how to recognize authors who utilize showing, and students are able to articulate the difference between showing and telling.

Grab lesson three here.

Creative Writing Lesson Four

The fourth lesson teaches students how to capture images. We use examples of poetry and prose to discuss this important writing skill.

Grab lesson four here.

Creative Writing Lesson Five

The fifth lesson introduces the story elements of character and conflict.

Note: You may choose to split this lesson into two lessons since it covers two big elements. I only had nine weeks with my students, so I had to jam character and conflict together.

Grab lesson five here.

Creative Writing Lesson Six

The sixth lesson introduces the students to point of view and perspective. We have fun reading poems and using pictures to write descriptions from different points of view.

Grab lesson six here.

Creative Writing Lesson Seven

The seventh lesson puts everything we’ve learned together. I read the students some fractured fairy tales, and we watch some, too. Students then use the prewriting activities and their imaginations to begin drafting their own fractured fairy tales.

Grab lesson seven here.

Creative Writing Lesson Eight

The eighth lesson focuses on revision. After a mini-lesson, students partner up for peer editing.

Grab lesson eight here .

For our final class day, students bring revised work, and I host coffee shop readings. This is a memorable experience for students (and their teacher).

Creative Writing Lessons FAQ

Since posting these creative writing lessons, I have had lots of questions. I decided to compile them here in case you have the same question.

Q: What are copywork quotes? A: Copywork quotes are simply great quotes that students copy as part of their homework assignments. You can use any quotes about writing. I’ve included my favorites throughout the printable packs.

Q: Can I use this with a younger or older student? A: Absolutely! Just adapt it to meet the needs of your student.

Q: Can I use this for my library’s programming or my homeschool co-op class? A: Yes! I just ask that it not be used for profit.

Do you have any questions about teaching creative writing? What’s your biggest hang-up when it comes to teaching creative writing? I’d love to hear from you and help you solve the issue.

January 7, 2016 at 1:57 pm

Hi Theresa,

As long as you are not profitting from using them, they are yours to use! Enjoy! Wish I could be there to help facilitate all those young writers! 

[…] Creative Writing Class […]

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Creative Writing – Lesson Plan for Young Learners

Creative Writing – Lesson Plan for Young Learners: A Comprehensive Free English Lesson Plan (Online and In-Class) with online Videos, Games and Free PDFs

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Whether you’re an educator seeking engaging materials for your online or in-class lessons, we have you covered. This free English lesson plan includes a variety of videos and games to create a fun and interactive learning experience for your students.

Young learners thrive when learning is both educational and enjoyable. That’s why this lesson plan combines language acquisition with playfulness, helping children develop their English skills . From vocabulary building to listening, speaking, reading, and writing activities, our lesson plan covers it all.

Lesson Plan Young Learners

Objective :.

By the end of this lesson, young learners will be able to:

• Understand the concept of creative writing and its role in expressing imagination and ideas.
• Explore various forms of creative writing , such as short stories, poems, and descriptive paragraphs.
• Develop their creativity and imagination through engaging writing prompts and activities.
• Share their creative works with peers, promoting confidence in self-expression.
• Receive constructive feedback on their writing and use it to further improve their creative pieces.
• Cultivate a positive attitude towards writing and view it as an enjoyable and meaningful form of self-expression.

Time: 60-120 minutes

• Digital whiteboard software: Videos and Games
• Material : PDFs

Story starters

Get students to think of a story using the interactive prompt

Pass the bomb: Word types

Writing prompts: Fill in the blanks

Horror prompts.

DOWNLOAD THE PDF FOR FREE

Story generator.

What is Going to Happen?

Creative writing prompts, all downloads are in pdf format.

For additional resources on creative writing, also check out these posts

Creative Poetry

Creative fiction

Creative Non-fiction

Creative Writing Guide

Creative Writing – Thomson Writing Program

The Psychology of Creative Writing

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