Real Life Writing-Yum!

I love to do interactive writing that has a real life purpose.  This engages students as well as creates motivation and meaning for the writing.

Here is a great activity for expository writing using recipes!

We did a shared writing activity as we made peanut butter and jam sandwiches.

                                Each step was told verbally first.
                                We followed the verbal step physically.
                                We wrote a sentence describing the step we took.

The concrete sandwich making created an accessible reference point or reminder when writing.  We worked on sounding out words as we wrote.  We also looked for word clues to spell new words.  For example- peanut was referenced on the peanut butter jar.  These clues created independence when writing.  She even thought of a 'hint' for making her sandwich.  Recipes also require or introduce sequencing of events.

Good recipes to write include: familiar foods, short processes, child-appropriate accessible ingredients

exs. sandwiches

ants on a log

pizza

tostadas

salad

nachos