Show Not Tell!

 What began as a warm-up exercise for my 5th grade class turned into sentences so fantastic that I had to put them on the blog!  The lesson was writing in a style called "show not tell."  The idea is to take a simple sentence or scenario, and make it so the reader can see and hear a fantastic picture in their minds of what the author was trying to convey.  Adjectives, adverbs, strong verbs, similes and metaphors, and onomatopoiea can all be used to achieve this challenging-yet-rewarding style of writing!

The students were presented with the following simple scenarios involving personifying a piece of paper, and their job was to improve them with show-not-tell styles of writing.  I hope you enjoy this "warm up" activity as much as I did!

Scenario 1: The paper is getting written on.

Max: I feel like I'm being pushed, the hard lead tip smashing through my skin.  The sharp graphite is putting colors on me, and the pain is coming at me like a bullet train.

Zivah: The sharp pencil piereces my thin skin.  The bold graphite stains me.  It hurts me so badly, but nobody can hear me cry.

Scenario 2: The paper is getting cut by scissors.

Sara: The unforgiving, ruthless points cut right through my life.  I am speechless, and only the pure thought of despair can bring me away from the violent rip.

Mabel: Snip, snip.  "Ouch!" I yell.  I feel the scissors cutting me into thousands of pieces, and the sharp pain makes my paper eyes water.  I am ripped into jagged pieces, falling to the floor.

Leo: The unforgiving, cold metal scissors cleave through my unfortunately thin, delicate skin, and I hear the screech of the multiple blades ripping me apart.

Scenario 3: The paper gets thrown away.

Aria: After the aimless marks stop, I am suddenly being gripped by a pair of giant hands.  My feet touch my nose, and my mouth touches my elbow as they crumple me.  Suddenly, I am being whisked away, soaring high-- "I am flying!" I thought.  I land in a musty gray bin.

Grayson: I am lifeless as I feel myself turn into a ball with many holes.  I hear the crackle as I fall into the "basketball hoop."

Adelynn: Crumple, crumple, crumple.  I feel the cold strong hands shrivel me up into a worthless ball.  They throw me into the pit of darkness where all the useless things go.  I have no more purpose anymore.  I feel myself being sucked into the half-drunk soda, which makes me soggy.... or is it just my own tears?

Kaia: I feel the pain as two big hands squash me into a small, wrinkly ball.  I start to fall and soon I am drowning in tears as I have been thrown into the dark, unforgiving, inescapable hole.  A trash can.  The place for unwanted things; disappointments.

Backwards Land Paragraphs and Postcards

 Our second and third assignments blended beautifully together.  Assignment #2 was Paragraph Writing.  The students spelled various places forward and backwards to create a new imaginative land.  They then constructed five unique sentences, to give their paragraphs a nice flow and to avoid sounding "boring" by using the same formats.

Assignemtn #3 took the students on an adventure to their backwards land.  They wrote a 1st person story with a clear beginning, middle, and end about their journey to their imaginative place.  I have included both the paragraphs and the postcards, so you can see how nicely the students used what they had written in Assignment #2 to make Assignment #3 beautifully connect.

Can you read backwards and figure out what these places were originally?  And would you like to vacation here yourself?  Enjoy!

Aidni, by Vivia (4th grade)

Rendrag, by Leo (5th grade)

Super Sentence Writing!

 My budding and awesome authors classes started the session off with a very important lesson in grammar, and how we can use the various parts of speech to make our writing more interesting to read.  Through adjectives, adverbs, clauses, and phrases, we can paint the perfect picture in our readers' minds of exactly what we want them to see.  And that is what good writers do!

We started off with learning that a sentence just needs 5 things to be a sentence:

1. A capital at the beginning

2. A mark of punctuation at the end

3. A noun

4. A verb

5. A complete thought

Once we learned that, we looked at this boring sentence:

The puppy licks.

It's a sentence, but it's boring!  It lacks detail.  So we added a direct object, two adjectives, an adverb, a "where" phrase, and a "when" clause or phrase.   Look at the improvements across the grades!

by Cora (3rd grade)

by Bella (3rd grade)

by Marlo (4th grade)

by Mabel (5th grade)

New Olympic Sports!

 Since the Olympic Games will be coming up this summer 2024, I decided to do this project that I usually save for my summer sessions.  In order to teach persuasive writing, my students were given the assignment to create a new Olympic sport by combining two real sports into one.  This new sport would of course be a bit crazy, silly, or even dangerous, making it even more difficult to persuade our imaginary "Olympic Board of Commissioners" to adopt it in the next Olympic games.  Our goal was to write a letter that was so persuasive, that anyone could picture it in their minds and of course, say "yes" to our proposal!

Our outline went as follows:

Paragraph 1: A really pleasant and compliment-filled introduction to butter them up (it's much easier to persuade people when you start off being super nice!!)

Paragraph 2: A brief introduction to the new sport

Paragraph 3: Great detail, including rules, scoring, uniforms, etc.

Paragraph 4: All the benefits to adding this new sport.  Think money, opportunities, and a bunch of pathos!

Paragraph 5: A conclusion with a "sell-it" sentence so convincing, the reader would of course say "YES!"

Enjoy theses samples.  Could YOU picture these sports really happening?  Would you give them a try?!

To the Olympic Board of Commissioners:                                        

First of all, I want to mention that you are the best Olympic Board of Commissioners there ever was! Also, congrats on  another successful Olympic games. The 2022 Olympics were awesome! You brought pride, accomplishments, and awesome opportunities to the world!

I am writing to you in the hope that you will consider adding a new sport into the 2024 Winter Olympics. It is called “Figure Soccer.” It will combine Figure Skating and Soccer. Even though  Soccer is a Summer Olympics event, I think it would be a great idea to combine winter and summer sports! 

Let me explain how this sport is played. It would have the same aspects as soccer, only it would be played on an ice rink. This sport is both for women and men, but it’s only allowed for people ages 16 and up to participate. Each team will have eleven people, including the goalie. The athletes try to kick the ball into the goal. However, they have to do a trick while kicking the ball. If the athlete does a very hard trick, (for example a spin with one leg off the ground for 10 seconds) their team gets five points. If they do an easy trick, (for example stand on one leg for 2 seconds, which is easy for figure skaters), their team gets one point.  If an athlete forgets, or doesn't want to do a trick, they either get a penalty, or the referee takes 2  points from that team, because the athlete didn't want to do the trick or forgot to do it. Also, while the athletes are performing a trick before kicking, no one is allowed to steal the ball. The opponent gets a penalty if they do that.

Uniforms will be normal ice skating clothes. For practices, athletes can wear any kind of flexible clothing. For performances or competitions, women have to wear special ice-skating skirts and a t-shirt on top. Under that, women will wear tights and a  white long sleeve shirt. The ice skates will be shaped and will look like cleats. For men, they have to wear shorts and also, a t-shirt on top. They will also wear tights and a white long sleeve shirt. They also have ice skates that are shaped like cleats. However, you might be thinking, “How will we tell the teams apart?”For that, you don’t have to worry. Each team will have a different color t-shirt, skirts, and shorts. The ice skates shaped like cleats will also be a different color.

Imagine the possibilities! Ice skaters on a soccer field covered in ice. The tickets will sell faster than any other event! This could lead to greater money given back to the city, and more jobs resulting from referees needed. Countries around the world would start playing this sport too, and it would become more popular! Jobs, such as Referees, judges, janitors, ticket sellers, food court helpers, will all be filled because this is a very good sport, and lots of people will be willing to help out.

I hope you will consider “Figure Soccer” to become one of the most popular sports. If you accept this idea, thousands of people will be inspired.

Best Regards, 

Acey (4th grade)

WARNING: THIS SPORT CONTAINS VIOLENT ACTIONS AND CAN CAUSE SERIOUS HARM TO FANS WHO ARE OUT IN THE OPEN-ONLY EXPERIENCED PLAYERS ARE ALLOWED TO PLAY

To the Olympic Board of Commissioners:

To kick things off, I just want to facilitate your 2022 Summer Olympics! Your outstanding games really left the fans bursting for you to host another round of competitions. And for the 2024 Olympics, I have a sport that will stun the crowd furthermore than they already are!

First off, my sport is called Cricker. It consists of two popular sports: soccer and cricket. These are the most well-known sports around the globe, having billions of supporters for their teams.  As you can already tell, combining these two will create an eye-popping sport that all people can enjoy.

My description of my sport is precise, but accurate. The first part of the game is like cricket: you hit a baseball-like ball with a stick, then proceed to run to a soccer goal. After hitting the ball, you will anticipate a soccer ball being hurled at you, thrown from the sideline. Defenders will attempt to stop you and your four other teammates that appear. The rules are simple. You correctly hit the cricket ball, and you get three points. A hit leading up to a goal is 5 points. Going onto equipment descriptions, both the cricket bat and ball are VERY hard, and you will suffer a severe injury if hit by it. The soccer ball has a panel (nobody knows which one, as it changes) that ejects a strong wind that pushes it in every direction (including up and down) that the panel is facing. 

The number of players on the field resembles both soccer and cricket quite a bit. There will be one hitter for each team, one goalie, seven players playing outfield and pitcher, and four defenders for the goal, so fourteen players for each team. The team will have to wear a tank-topped shirt and shorts, any color that they choose, and in the winter or when it’s cold, an undershirt will appear under the tank top.  There will also be shin guards and cleats. Of course, stadiums will have to be constructed for this sport.. Cricker is played on a baseball field, except instead of a full diamond, there will be a cut at the top point, as the goal will go there. The field is surrounded by spikes that point inward to the field. For professional athletes, family members will have box seats and will be protected from harm.

Although playing this sport will be beneficial to everyone’s happiness, it also exploits the economy. When fans spend money to go to the host’s city for competitions, fans will improve businesses by going to restaurants and by staying in hotels, ultimately making money to support the economy.  Additionally, importing a new sport will create more economical opportunities for people, some examples being referees, security guards and announcers. And most importantly, it will benefit all the athletes who have dreams of becoming professional sports players, and the kids who desire to play both sports.

In conclusion, this sport, when you put it next to some of the greatest sports in Olympic history, will change the foundation of the Olympic Games, and improve the lives of many people to come!

Sincerely, Cho (6th grade)