Visual/Author's Organization

Title: Sequential Order

Write each of the sentences from a paragraph on a small, separate piece of paper in mixed-up order. Ask the students to arrange these sentences in a logical sequences to form a paragraph that makes sense. Another activity you could do is cut up comic strips or pictures of sequential events and have students assemble them in the correct order.

Resource:

"Locating and Correcting Reading Difficulties, 8th Edition" James L. Shanker and Eldon E. Ekwall

bulletContributor: Amanda Bloemendaal
bulletMail: bloemena_pluto.dsu.edu

Title: Cartoon Sequencing

First, the teacher needs to clip the strips from a cartoon that focuses on the same topic for several clips. Next, the teacher will cut apart the strips and tape them to a note card and randomly number each (the teacher should make records of what order the cartoon should be put together in). Give the notecards to groups of students and have the students put them back into the correct order. The teacher could make several copies of the cartoon in order to have more than one group. This activity will help the students work on the organization that an author goes through when writing something in chronological order.

Resource:

http://www.angelfire.com/ks/teachme/orgcartoon.html

bulletContributor: Kory Scholten
bulletMail: scholtek@pluto.dsu.edu

Title: Recognizing Organization Techniques


Idea: This is an activity to use after the students have already been introduced to the different ways writing can be organized. First, the teacher should put together or find sample writings, each having a different organizational pattern. Then, assign students to read through each section of text and decide which organizational pattern the author is using - chronological, cause & effect, etc. and explain why the writing represents that form of organization. To add to the lesson, or as a variation, the students can also be given one reading, separated into sections and the teacher can assign to put each sentence into place so that it would fit a particular order (so that the writing would represent cause and effect, chronological, etc.).
Resource: http://www.kimskorner4teachertalk.com/writing/sixtrait/organization/patterns.html

bulletContributor: Katie Schultz
bulletEmail: klschultz611@pluto.dsu.edu

 Title: Plots Go!

Idea: The teacher hands out three train cars to each student. (These can be real toy train cars or pictures of them.) Each student will have an engine, freight car, and caboose. The students will arrange the train cars in the correct order of a train. Then, the teacher hands out three note cards to each student. One note card will have the beginning of a story, one will have the middle of a story, and the other note card will have the ending of a story. The students have to decipher which is which. Then, the students place the note cards in the correct order on the correct order of the train cars. The teacher will explain that the plot and order of a story is what makes it "go" similar to a train.

Resource: "Scholastic Instructor" Make More Time for Writing By Hannah Trierweiler Hudson

bullet

Contributor: Kylie Terca

bullet

Email: krterca@pluto.dsu.edu