Writing Paper

I've mentioned before that I use Lucy Calkin's Units of Study for Writing. Today I want to share the handwriting paper I use with my students to help them organize their Writing.

I want to start by saying this was not my idea, I just made it cuter. When we being the year my students start with a one page sheet. This has one box, for a picture and 2 to 3 lines below for a sentence or two about their picture.The Kindergarten and First grade look different so I will show you both. I will also show you my Second graders writing papers. (Some of you may not know I see 4 second graders for 30 minutes everyday to work on Writing.)

Kindergarten

 You'll notice that Kindergarten only has 1 line. This is because at the start of Kindergarten, as many of you already know, most children only manage to get one or two words on paper. As the year progresses more lines are added.

First Grade

Why lines for 1st Grade and not Kindergarten? In Kinder we concentrate on the context of the text and not the actual handwriting. Don't misunderstand, they do receive handwriting instruction daily, we just don't want them to get hung up on it during their story telling writing time. While in 1st grade they have already had a whole year of handwriting and we want the students to apply what they have learned. 

Second Grade

This is front & back and they can use as many as they need to complete the story. It usually ends up being 1. :(

Halfway through the year my 1st graders are writing in 5 page books. It is just 5 pages stapled together. This helps them to stretch out their stories. If you use Units of Study you know exactly what I am talking about. However, my students struggled with remembering what to put on each page.

One morning when a teacher friend showed me how she had added some picture visuals to her students writing papers to help them I love this idea. (Thank you Miss. H) I had just downloaded some new fonts from Kevin and Amanda.com and it just so happened that some were Doodles. I knew exactly how I would use them. So I went about adding them to my 1st graders writing sheets. Here is what they look like.

Let me move on now. By the middle of the school year my Kindergarten students move to what we call 3 page books. We've taught the trait of Organization and they know that their story must have a beginning, middle & end. We teach the Organization trait with the "O Train". This is a clip art poster that has a train with 3 parts. At this point we introduce using 3 sheets of paper stapled together. My ELL students had a hard time making the connection. My 1st graders were so successful with their sheets I thought I would do the same with the K paper. I took trains from their planning sheet and put them straight on to their picture box. Here is what it looks like.

Here is the Planning sheet:

This is the revamped writing pages:

I am not sure why they were scanned crooked but my students don't seem to mind so I left them. As you can see I also added letters and numbers to the trains to help them remember. With my ELL kids I do EVERYTHING I can to aid them and help them be successful.

At this time I thought it would be a good idea to add words to my 2nd graders writing sheets. Here is what those look like.

I decided I would give them 3 sheets instead of letting them choose how long their story would be.

I cant being to tell you how much this has helped my students. I didn't even realize what an impact it had made when I heard one of my 1st graders today reading the titles to see what went on that page. :)

Now it is time to share.
Do you want these writing sheets to use with your students? Feel free to grab any or all of them and use them with your students. The only think I ask is that you leave a comment because I like to feel loved. :) Enjoy!

K Planning Sheet
K 3 pg bk
1st Grade 5 Pg Story
2nd Grade Writing

The second grade paper is meant to print front and back.

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