KINDERGARTEN OPINION, NARRATIVE, AND INFORMATIVE WRITING CURRICULUM WITH PROMPTS

Are you ready to get stellar results through explicit and systematic writing instruction? If so, this completely done-for-you writing curriculum includes a year's worth of structured kindergarten writing lessons, prompts, and activities for teaching opinion writing, informational writing, personal narrative writing, and beginning-of-the-year writing skills in kindergarten.

With this curriculum, we literally take your hand and walk you through, step-by-step, teaching writing every day of the year.

Teaching writing will seriously become the easiest, and most joyful, part of your day.

So say goodbye to teacher overwhelm and hello to your newfound confidence as an amazing teacher of writing.

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This yearlong writing curriculum includes 178 digital step-by-step lesson plans, all the blackline masters you'll need, colorful posters, experiences for students to write about, ebooks, and daily step-by-step directions to make your teacher's life as stress-free as possible.

We are talking NO PREP for opinion, informative, and beginning-of-the-year writing units and minimal prep for personal narrative writing. Each unit will take no more than 5 minutes of planning each day! It's true!

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This Standards Aligned resource sets ALL learners up to become confident beginning writers. It's written in an organized, systematic format that helps students gradually learn how to write using a combination of drawing, dictating, and writing.

The beginning of the year unit focuses on drawing and orally sharing their work. It also intentionally teaches the formation of each letter of the alphabet with emphasis on letter/sound relationships. Students use that knowledge to label pictures.

The personal narrative, opinion, and informative units are structured similarly to one another, allowing you to teach them in any order. They each progress through orally sharing, drawing, adding words, adding details, writing sentences, and writing more than one sentence. You will LOVE how easy it is to implement each unit.

A unique feature of this writing curriculum is that it includes eBooks and common experiences for background building so all students have something to write about. We are thrilled to say, ALL the resources you need are included in this unit (except for a few supplies needed for the personal narrative unit)!

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WHAT DOES THE RESEARCH SAY ABOUT TEACHING WRITING?

While there is a massive amount of research on best practice in reading, that is not the case with writing.

A few books we recommend you read if you want to learn more about best practice in writing instruction using evidence-based strategies are:

• The Writing Revolution by Judith C. Hochman and Natalie Wexler
• The Writing Rope by Joan Sedita
• Best Practices in Writing Instruction by Steve Graham, Charles A MacArthur, and Michael Hebert

What we do know is that writing is an extremely complex skill that requires time and solid instruction. (Graham et al., 2012)

Additionally...

• Writing should be taught systematically and explicitly
• Writing instruction should be carefully scaffolded

Our curriculums provide teachers with DAILY scripted lessons that are explicit, systematic, and scaffolded. Students are so successful because of the gradual release of responsibility, explicit instruction, and daily writing practice where they implement the use of skills taught.

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WHAT’S INCLUDED IN THIS RESOURCE?

178 DIGITAL LESSON PLANS – No need to search for your lesson plans or spend an enormous amount of time reading them each day. We have them right on the slides - making your teaching life stress-free.

Digital Lessons Include:

· “I Will” Statements – To keep students laser-focused on the objective of the day. We use “I will” statements instead of “I can” statements as they hold the students more accountable

· Writing Chats – To introduce topics and build background information and vocabulary

· Watch Me Slides – For the teacher to show the objective through thinking aloud and modeling. This is oftentimes interactive to keep student engagement high.

· Our Turn Slides – For students to practice the new skill with you.

· Your Turn Slides – For students to independently practice the skill learned.

PRINTABLE PAGES – After each writing skill has been explicitly taught and practiced, students are held responsible for their learning by engaging in a writing assignment aligned to the day's learning target. Extra generic, printable pages are included in the Opinion, Informative, and Personal Narrative units to offer you quick and easy resources to differentiate assignments for your students.

OBSERVATION CHECKLISTS – Great for formative assessment! As you walk around and observe students, record your findings. These easy-to-use checklists help you remember who is meeting targeted standards and who needs extra help. These checklists are helpful tools to refer to when planning for parent-teacher conferences.

WRITING RUBRICS – Each unit includes a writing rubric that is perfect for grading and discussing goals and progress with students and parents.

HANDWRITING ASSESSMENTS AND RECORDING FORMS – Easy to use to gather data on which letter formations are mastered and which need more practice.

AUTO – FILL NAME WRITING TEMPLATES – Just type each child’s first name once into a designated box and all the typed names will automatically be inserted into each of the 12 templates. Just print the ones you want. Also, there’s another file included for practicing first and last names. It is auto-fill as well but has more room to write.

POSTERS - Each unit contains a set of posters to display in your classroom for students to refer to.

HERE IS A GLIMPSE OF THE FOCUS FOR EACH UNIT included in the bundle so far:

Building the Foundation:

·  6 GET READY LESSONS:  These 6 lessons are designed to engage students in prewriting skills that will be referred to later in the unit, such as drawing lines, shapes, and simple pictures. They also are introduced to line guides and dots to help with letter formation.

· 52 ALPHABETIZED LESSONS:

There are two lessons for each letter of the alphabet. Day 1 lesson should be taught before Day 2 lesson due to more scaffolding being integrated into it.

Depending on the letter/sound scope and sequence you are using, scroll through the alphabetized lessons to find the one you need. Students will engage in letter formation practice, illustrating, adding details to illustrations, and labeling.

Personal Narrative Writing:

• WRITING FOCUS WEEK 1 – Features of a personal narrative/ Oral focus/ Optional handwriting practice

• WRITING FOCUS WEEK 2 – Draw an illustration to represent a story / Label a picture

• WRITING FOCUS WEEK 3 – Labeling an illustration / Sentence writing

• WRITING FOCUS WEEK 4 – Sentence writing / Capitalization / Punctuation (period)

• WRITING FOCUS WEEK 5 – Sentence writing / Stretch out a story with a beginning, middle, and end / Add details to pictures

• WRITING FOCUS WEEK 6 – Sentence writing / Stretch out a story with a beginning, middle, and end / Add details to pictures

• WRITING FOCUS WEEK 7 – Use pictures and writing (dictation if needed) to write a personal narrative

• WRITING FOCUS WEEK 8 – Use pictures and writing (dictation if needed) to write a personal narrative

Informative Writing:

· WRITING FOCUS WEEK 1 – Draw one fact about a topic and verbally share

· WRITING FOCUS WEEK 2 – Label using best-guess spelling

· WRITING FOCUS WEEK 3 – Write a factual sentence using a sentence starter

· WRITING FOCUS WEEK 4 – Use sentence starters to write facts about a topic

· WRITING FOCUS WEEK 5 – Make plan and write factual sentences about a topic

· WRITING FOCUS WEEK 6 – Make plan and write factual sentences about a topic

· WRITING FOCUS WEEK 7 – Make plan and write factual sentences about a topic

· WRITING FOCUS WEEK 8 – Make plan and write factual sentences about a topic

Opinion Writing:

• WRITING FOCUS WEEK 1 – State opinion / identify facts and opinions

• WRITING FOCUS WEEK 2 – Draw, label, and color a picture of an opinion

• WRITING FOCUS WEEK 3 – Sentences / Draw an opinion and write it (dictation if needed) using a sentence starter

• WRITING FOCUS WEEK 4 – Practice drawing and writing (dictation if needed) an opinion using a sentence starter

• WRITING FOCUS WEEK 5 – Write an opinion and say a reason to explain why

• WRITING FOCUS WEEK 6 – Write an opinion and write a reason to explain why (or dictate)

• WRITING FOCUS WEEK 7 – Write an opinion about a nursery rhyme and a reason for it (or dictate)

• WRITING FOCUS WEEK 8 – Write an opinion and a reason for it (or dictate)

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WHY EXPLICIT INSTRUCTION FOR WRITING?

It’s simple… IT WORKS!

This curriculum uses explicit instruction. This teaching method allows teachers to scaffold learning by giving structured lessons that target specific skills. Each day targeted skills are explained and modeled by the teacher. They are then practiced with guidance. Students are held accountable for their learning by engaging in daily assignments that specifically target the focus skills. This means ALL learners are set up for success.

If you’re thinking that this doesn’t sound like Writer’s Workshop, you’re right. It’s not. Years ago, we implemented Writer’s Workshop in our classrooms, but it didn’t work for us or for our students. The biggest problems were…

•It was difficult to manage and keep students on track.

•It was a planning nightmare trying to find mini-lessons for the diverse needs of students.

•Students were expected to use invented spellings when many were unable to form letters and had not yet learned letter/sound relationships.

•Students were expected to draw, label, and write sentences, but many just stared at their papers saying, “I can’t draw. I can’t write.”

We felt as though we were “rushing” writing and, inadvertently, caused frustration and bad habits. We knew we had to do something different. We knew we needed to put structure and intentionality into our teaching. So, now, we clearly state what students will be working on, give thoughtful instruction through modeling and discussion, and provide time to practice as we observe and guide. It is simple to manage and gives students the support they need.

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WHAT ARE THE BENEFITS OF USING THIS STRUCTURED WRITING RESOURCE?

❤️ The entry point for each writing unit is accessible to all learners.

❤️ Lessons are carefully and thoughtfully scaffolded, ensuring success for all.

❤️ The Watch Me, Our Turn, Your Turn format sets your kindergarten writers up for success.

❤️ Your students will be highly engaged and motivated to write.

❤️ Experiences and background information is brought to students to ensure ALL students have something to write about.

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HERE'S WHAT TEACHERS LIKE YOU ARE SAYING:

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Oh MY goodness! What a wonderful resource for writing. A friend of mine had the 1st-grade version and LOVED it. I was SO excited when you made one for Kindergarten. Very engaging, love the visual where you can use the Smartboard all the time, as well as the prompt at the bottom of the page on the smartboard. My kids are enjoying writing and I am saving paper by printing the blank copies and putting them in clear folders to write in with a dry-erase marker. AMAZING! Thanks SO much. Such quality work. Thanks for all your hard work in creating this to help my kinders as well as make my life so much easier in addressing the standards. -MARCIA

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
This is absolutely amazing! So much learning packed into easy-to-use lessons. Everything needed is right here. The I do, we do, you do systematic approach is a game changer for writing. I had such success in first grade with that version and now kindergarten. My whole team purchased this and we are excited to see how our kinders grow. -DEB

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Fell in love with the first-grade year-long writing curriculum. Then I found out I was moving to K, and this was the first resource I searched for! I have started with the beginning lessons already with my class, and we are all loving the explicit directions and my turn, our turn, your turn! I can not wait to see how far my kinders come this year! Thank you for making this teacher's life a little bit easier. -ALLYSON

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WHO IS THE RESOURCE FOR?

• Kindergarten teachers looking for a strong, yet easy to implement, writing curriculum that is aligned to the Common Core State Standards and fun for kids.

• Special Education Teachers who need to teach students the very basics of writing using a direct instruction approach.

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FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Do students complete a writing assignment each day?

Yes, students engage in a writing activity each day. The assignments are highly engaging and help hold students accountable for their learning.

Does this follow a Writers’ Workshop model?

No. Students are explicitly taught a writing skill each day, then they practice the skill taught.

Can this be used with Google Slides?

Yes! We have included a link to a Google Slides version in this resource.

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Copyright © Primary Bliss Teaching

Permission to copy for single classroom use only.

Please purchase additional licenses if you intend to share this product.

Becky & Cindy

Team Primary Bliss Teaching