Once Upon A Time....Kinder Writing

Let me start this post by getting a little something off of my chest.  Today it was wonderfully humid, yes that is laced with sarcasm, and by the end of the day, that humidity got the best of me.  I hit that point where frustration and uncomfortable meet and I yelled at one of my little owls.  I am telling all you because I'm hoping that you can relate and to allow myself to admit that I made a mistake. 

Anywho.....

To go along with our fairy tale readings, I added a little fairy tale into our writing (ELA) block.  I found this fabulous book on Amazon when I was searching for fairy tales.

(Click on the picture to check it out.)

 

 

We started this writing project last week on Friday by just brainstorming characters and villians.  I wanted to stick with a three little pigs feel, so we tossed around ideas like three little dragons and a big bad cat, three little sharks and a big bad starfish, and three little owls and big bad ghost.  The owls had some of the silliest ideas for characters.  We giggled a whole lot during our brainstorming.  Each owl picked a set of three littles and a villian and drew a picture of them.

 

Tuesday and Wednesday of this week, involved reading a few pages each day from the book above.  We did not use the whole book because I didn't want to overwhelm my owls.  Some are still hiding in their little writing shells, so I wanted to let them work at a level that was comfortable. 

 

Tuesday, we talked about characters again, creating a setting, and beginning a plot.  Wednesday, we added dialouge, a warning, and a bit of magic.  (The characters talking was the magic for them!)

 

Here are a few finished pieces. 

 

 

"Once upon a time there were 3 little kittens and a rabbit.  The rabbit said, "One day I'll get the kittens and eat them."

Watch out for the big bad rabbit!  "Ok," said the kitten.  The rabbit was next door.  He never got the kittens.

 

This owl is one of more advanced writers, so I let her go a little further with her story.

 

 

 

Once upon a time 3 little flowers lived in the garden.  Mom flower said, "Go get something to eat but watch out for the octopus."  :)

 

This little owl came to me knowing only 9 letters and no letter sounds.  I am beyond proud of his accomplishments this year.

 

 

We are down to our last 9 days!  I'm looking forward to this summer break more than ever right now.  :)

 

~Erin