When teaching math, we teach our students new skills, give them practice opportunities in class, and send them home with even more practice for homework. This makes me wonder….”Why don’t we do the same for writing?” This idea motivated me to start incorporating Weekly Paragraph Writing Homework into my classroom. This same system can also be used for Morning Work, Centers, Interactive Notebooks, or anytime you want to give your students some quality paragraph writing practice.
Paragraph writing is a critical foundational skill for becoming a good writer, and Paragraph of the Week is the perfect way to get your students to write well-organized paragraphs in a fun and enjoyable way! Here is how it works…
How I Use Paragraph of the Week
Each week, either as homework or as a weekly writing center, my students get a writing prompt based on the genre we are currently working on in class (Narrative, Informational, or Opinion). With this writing prompt, my students are expected to brainstorm ideas, write the first draft, revise and edit their work, and rewrite a final copy. Here is an example timeline…
- Monday: Students brainstorm ideas for their writing.
- Tuesday: Students write their first draft.
- Wednesday: Students revise and edit their paragraph.
- Thursday: Students rewrite their final draft.
- Friday: I like to collect the paragraph writing activities and allow students to share their work.
The Key Components of Paragraph of the Week
My Paragraph of the Week activities must have a few key components.
- A Writing Prompt – Writing prompts give students direction on where to go with their writing. I don’t like writing prompts that are just one or two sentences long. The prompts I give my students are high-interest and really get them thinking about the topic. A MUST!
- Brainstorming – It’s only a paragraph, so I don’t require a huge planning sheet. However, I DO want my students to collect ideas on a topic before writing.
- Reminders – If I want to reinforce what I am teaching in class, I must have a place that reminds my students what they should be working towards as they write.
Beyond the items I mentioned above, I also like to have some options for my struggling writers. In the picture above, you can see a 1st draft page with a checklist and spaces for the different parts of a paragraph. This is a handy tool for my strugglers, or for when students are still new to paragraph writing.
As I teach my students different writing strategies in class, I expect them to incorporate these into their Paragraph of the Week assignment. If your students are still learning how to put a paragraph together, start with my post on how to teach paragraph writing.
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The Benefits of Paragraph of the Week
After using this resource for a few weeks, I began to see my students’ quality of writing improve. They were now getting more opportunities to use the strategies I taught them in class, and they were benefiting from the weekly feedback they were getting from me. I found it much easier to provide individual feedback on a paragraph, rather than a long paper.
Another benefit of this homework was parental involvement. For the first time in my classroom, parents were seeing their child’s writing progress on a weekly basis. Typically I shared student writing a few times a year, or at the end of a unit. Now parents were able to get a “true” idea of how their child was doing throughout the entire year.
After using Paragraph of the Week in my own classroom, and seeing the benefits, I decided to put it all together and offer it to other teachers. You can now get an ENTIRE year’s worth of Paragraph of the Week activities!!!
What’s Included
My Paragraph of the Week resource requires almost NO prep! Simply cut the sheets in half and you are done! Each genre is color-coded to help students know what they are writing. Also, ALL pages are completely EDITABLE. That means you can change ANY text you want. Plus, use the included template to make your own cards. ๐
- 60 EDITABLE writing prompt cards: 20 Narrative, 20 Informational, and 20 Opinion. Each card comes with a high-interest writing prompt, room for brainstorming, a reminder checklist, and a final drafting space.
- A DIGITAL version created in Google Slides, so students can type on the slides, and it can easily be assigned in Google Classroom.
- A PRINTABLE version created in PowerPoint.
- Optional drafting pages for students to use when writing their 1st and 2nd drafts (3 variations to choose from).
- A revising and editing checklist.
- A rubric to help you quickly grade your students’ writing when necessary.
Go 100% Digital!
Guess What?! You can now go 100% DIGITAL with Paragraph of the Week! The digital version is in Google Slides, so students type right on the slides, and you can assign it in Google Classroom.
What Teachers Are Saying
“Thank you for such a great resource! It provides that extra writing practice that students need but in a fun way! I’m a student teacher and I believe this will make a great writing activity in my future classroom!” ~ Stacie S.
“I really love this!! I modeled it in class a few times, and we did some together. Now I use it for weekly homework for practice. It is great, and I use it as a weekly writing grade.” ~ Valerie L.
“I am in LOVE with the ease of this resource. I am using the Google Slides version and assigning it in Google classroom. My students love working through the writing process and are so proud of their final creations. Thanks for making writing fun!” ~ Lee R.
“The kids LOVED these! I sent them home for homework on Monday and the kids had until Friday to write the final draft. When I skipped a week, they were begging for more! The parents also loved the idea of incorporating more writing into homework. Excellent product! Thank you!” ~ Rebecca F.
LEARN MORE HERE! (Click the Pic Below)
Check out my Writing Pinterest Board for even more ideas!
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