Picture Writing

Activities

Activity One: An Introduction to Ancient Writing

Objective: Students will make a connection between their developmentally appropriate stage in the writing process—drawing pictures—and how humans originally communicated through writing—drawing pictures.

Focus: Students will observe early examples of writing (Egyptian hieroglyphics), discuss what they may have symbolized, and create their own cartouches using hieroglyphic stamps.

Materials: I want to provide the students with a wide range of hieroglyphic images to view and discuss. I will have an assortment of books on Egypt to share with class, including Fun With Hieroglyphics by Catherine Roehrig and Hieroglyphs by Joyce Milton and Charles Micucci. I will also use the Apple ipad that is available for use with permission from the principal. I will be able to do a simple search on any web browser and share the images with my students using the iPad and the projector. To make the cartouches, I will use small pieces of cardboard cut into ovals and covered with a thin layer of play dough or clay, hieroglyphic stamps, permanent ink-pads in assorted colors, and small lunch trays to hold the supplies at each table.

Procedure:

-Gather on the carpet in front of the projector screen. Share with children the fact that they are in Kindergarten to learn to do many things and that they will grow a lot during the course of the year. But they may not know that they are already writers, even as they sit on the rug in front of me, even if they do not know how to spell their names, even if they have never written a single letter in their life!

-Show images of ancient hieroglyphics (be sure to use several images of cartouches) and ask students to share their ideas about what they think the images are, where they are, and what might they be for (allow students to share out ideas, prompting with questions if needed: What does that look like to you [pointing to a specific symbol]? Have you ever seen a picture that looks similar? Where do you think these pictures are? In a building, outside on a tree, where might they be?)

-Reveal to the students that these symbols and images are from the first ever ABC's—hieroglyphics! Explain how the images are read, left to right and right to left. Share with students how the symbols translate to the English alphabet (translation tables can be found online at www.chamois.k12.mo.us or in the Catherine Roehrig book).

-Model for students the procedure of creating a cartouche. Talk them through the process, step-by-step.

-Send students to their tables, passing out a cartouche to each. At each table, in the center, is a tray with five to six of the hieroglyphic stamps, and three to four stamp pads.

-Once students are done, bring their cartouches outside and place in the sun to dry.

Closing:

-Call students back to the carpet to share with their elbow partner which symbols they used to make their cartouche.

-Use the translation chart to translate a word from our daily schedule to hieroglyphics (recess, lunch, writing, etc.).

Activity Two: Introducing Kinder-Writing Workshop

Objective: Students will be introduced to the procedures and routines of our writer's workshop. Students will also have the chance to be a writer, after watching the teacher model developmentally appropriate writing practices.

Focus: Students will participate in their first mini-lesson that is designed to demonstrate that they are full of writing ideas. They will watch as I model how to brainstorm writing ideas, choose a focus idea, and then draw a picture to show my idea. They will share aloud their ideas and then return to their tables to create their first kinder-writer's workshop paper.

Materials: Large pad of chart paper or two large sheets of white butcher paper—one sheet is designed as a replica of the student's writing paper—whichever style works best for your students, countless printable resources can be found online (I like the writing paper found on Teachers Pay Teacher under "Mrs. I's Class"), markers, students sheets of writing paper, supply baskets at each table (each basket containing several pencils, crayon boxes, marker sets, and erasers).

Procedure:

-Gather with students on the carpet, in front of easel board with blank chart paper and markers.

-Remind the students from previous lessons that they are writers right now; they are all ready to write as soon as they choose an idea.

-Guide them through the process of thinking about a topic by thinking about what they know. Make a list of things that I like, eventually focusing on places where I like to go.

-Make a list of places that the students like to go.

-Model how to draw a picture of me at the beach (a place that I like to go).

-Model how to add simple details and colors to writing.

-Review the list of places the students helped to create on the chart paper.

-Students tell their elbow partner a place they like to go that they will write about at their seats.

-Send students to their tables; on their way they take a sheet of writing paper to their seats.

-Remind students of workshop rules and timing.

-Walk around and conference with students as needed (as this is our first time writing at our tables, conferencing time will be minimal).

Closing:

-Call students to the carpet with their writing and allow any students who wants to share to stand on the "writer's stage" (a stool placed in front of the carpet) and share their writing.

Assessment:

-Collect students' writing to do a quick check and evaluation (I like to save their first writing of the year and send it home on the last day of school, so the students and their parents can see how far their writing has come in the school year).

Extensions:

-If you have noticed that your group of students contains enough children who are ready to write letter-strings or letters, the next day you can begin with a mini-lesson on the topic or call those specific students to the carpet for a conferencing session on writing letters or symbols for each sound they hear.

Activity Three: How to Write a Three-Part Story (A two-part lesson)

Objective: Students will participate in a writer's workshop mini-lesson that pushes them to stretch their one-page writings into a three-page story. They will read a story (taken from the Treasures curriculum) as displayed in three sequence cards and observe how a story can be told in three parts, beginning, middle, and end.

Focus: They will see this process in reverse as I share a story with them, taken from the Treasure's curriculum sequencing cards. After "reading" the story in the three images representing beginning, middle, and end, students will brainstorm activities we've done at school, breaking each of them down into three steps. We will then work as a whole group to choose a significant event that has occurred in school thus far, to break it into three parts, and to draw each part (teacher modeling the writing).

Materials: Large pad of chart paper, or four large sheets of plain, white butcher paper, markers, students sheets of writing paper (three pages stapled together like a book for each child), supply baskets at each table (pencils, crayons, markers and erasers), Apple Farmer Annie by Monica Wellington sequencing cards from Treasures curriculum (choosing the best three to tell the story and stapled together, out of the six cards provided), a teacher-written book in the same writer's workshop format that the students will use in Day 2 of the lesson.

Procedure (Day 1):

-Gather students on the carpet in the kinder-writing workshop area in front of the easel board and tell them that you want to begin the workshop by telling them a story.

-Share the "story" Apple Farmer Annie with the students by looking at each page, discussing what is happening, and describing the scenario in each picture.

-After discussing each page of the book, begin to formulate a story that links the pages together as a story (keeping it as simple as possible, based on the class' skill level).

-Show students the teacher written three-part book (this should be a book that you have already created in the writer's workshop format: a simple beginning, middle, and end story with a simple plot and illustrations).

-Ask questions to guide the students' thinking and get them ready for the next day's lesson: Where can you get ideas for your story? Can you think about something exciting that happened to you since you've been in Kindergarten? Maybe you went on a special trip last summer and want to make that into your story.

-Record students' ideas on the chart paper, with their names next to their idea and save for tomorrow.

Closing:

-Have students turn to a partner and share other ideas for a story.

Procedure(Day 2):

-Gather on the carpet for writer's workshop, in front of the easel board with chart paper and yesterday's list of student ideas for story writing.

-Review story of Apple Farmer Annie as well as the teacher-written book you shared with the students on the previous day. Be sure to use keywords: beginning, middle, end, sequencing.

-Share with students a day that you can remember as special since the school year began, recalling three major events that day.

-With students, repeat the three events and count them out numerous times.

-Model making your story into a book by writing it in front of the students, with their guidance and assistance (What was the middle part? What could I draw to show that? Are there any details I can add to make this page more interesting?)

-Review the students' list of story ideas from yesterday and ask if there are any more ideas they would like to add today, recording their responses on the chart paper.

-Have students stand and mingle-mingle on the carpet (walk around the carpet area, finding a new spot once the music has stopped), then share their story idea with their elbow partner. (If time permits, I might put them in quick groups of four and have each small group share—four ideas is better than two!)

-Send students to their seats, stopping at the writer's station to get their "books" (three regular workshop writing papers stapled to look like a book).

-Allow students time to think at their seats and write.

-Circulate, prompting with story ideas or sequencing tips when needed. I like to encourage the students to first ask their tablemates for help.

Closing:

-Call students back to the carpet after ten to fifteen minutes, leaving their books on their tables to be collected.

-Choose two to three students to share their books with the class (I choose students who have a firm grasp of the concept or who are headed in the right direction. I might also choose students who have effective details or have tried to add letters; just to give the class a variety of examples to look at).