Writing Strategies for Fourth Grade
1. Expository Frames (Cecil, 2011):
Description: Expository frames are an effective way to introduce young students to expository writing.
Purpose: Expository frames help students understand expository structure by providing a systematic way to write about content material they have read.
Directions: Expository frames provide a scaffold for creating different ways to organize text by:
1. Write a simple paragraph about a topic that lends itself to sequential ordering, using the signal words first, next, then, and last.
2. Copy the sentences onto sentence strips.
3. Review the topic and logical sequence of events with the class.
4. Have the students arrange the sentences in correct order in a pocket chart.
5. Read the completed paragraph together.
6. Have the students reorder the paragraph on their own and paste it on construction paper in paragraph form.
7. Invite the students to illustrate the details or some important part of the paragraph.
Description: Expository frames are an effective way to introduce young students to expository writing.
Purpose: Expository frames help students understand expository structure by providing a systematic way to write about content material they have read.
Directions: Expository frames provide a scaffold for creating different ways to organize text by:
1. Write a simple paragraph about a topic that lends itself to sequential ordering, using the signal words first, next, then, and last.
2. Copy the sentences onto sentence strips.
3. Review the topic and logical sequence of events with the class.
4. Have the students arrange the sentences in correct order in a pocket chart.
5. Read the completed paragraph together.
6. Have the students reorder the paragraph on their own and paste it on construction paper in paragraph form.
7. Invite the students to illustrate the details or some important part of the paragraph.
2. Acrostic Poems:
Description: Acrostic poems are formed by writing a single word or short phrase vertically and using its letters to start the horizontal lines of the poem.
Purpose: After reading an informational text, invite students to write an acrostic poem that conveys detailed information.
Directions: Encourage students to use alliteration, assonance, and metaphors and/or to answer the five W's: Who? What? When? Why? and How?.
Here is an example of an acrostic poem on spring:
Sailing kites on a warm afternoon
Planting young flowers
Raking old, dead leaves
Irises bobbing their purple faces in the breeze
Narcissus swaying to the rhythm of the woodlands
Getting out of school for an entire week!
Description: Acrostic poems are formed by writing a single word or short phrase vertically and using its letters to start the horizontal lines of the poem.
Purpose: After reading an informational text, invite students to write an acrostic poem that conveys detailed information.
Directions: Encourage students to use alliteration, assonance, and metaphors and/or to answer the five W's: Who? What? When? Why? and How?.
Here is an example of an acrostic poem on spring:
Sailing kites on a warm afternoon
Planting young flowers
Raking old, dead leaves
Irises bobbing their purple faces in the breeze
Narcissus swaying to the rhythm of the woodlands
Getting out of school for an entire week!