High-Interest Writing Task Cards and Activities

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Review writing skills with these 22 fun and high-interest writing prompts. Directions, templates, and product examples are also included.

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Students create zines, pop-up books, traditional essays and more with these task cards.  Even better, there are templates, examples, and detailed directions to help students make fun zines, mini graphic novels and more using information that they have learned while reading fiction and nonfiction texts.

These high-interest writing activities are versatile, so they can be used with upper elementary students and middle school students.

This is a fun way to incorporate zines into elementary and middle school writing lessons.  A zine is a small booklet that is handmade.  It includes explanations and illustrations.  Zines can be created for any topic.  They are a fun way for students to practice writing without feeling as though they are writing.  This is just one of many of the fun activities that is included with this resource.

Zines and Ways to Make Writing Fun

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I think I have a new love.  I absolutely LOVE zines.  A zine is a tiny booklet that provides information.  It is a handmade booklet that can be created to describe, persuade, or inform about any topic.

Using Zines in the Classroom

Finding writing center activities that appeal to upper elementary, middle school, and high school students can be challenging.  The goals are to have students practice writing and want to do it.  This is where zines come in to help.  Since zines look like tiny booklets, students do not feel as though they are writing an essay.  Plus, zines enable students to get creative.  They can add artwork,illustrations, plus graphs and charts to their texts.

A few days ago, I stayed up into the wee hours in the morning making math zines.  I needed to review geometry with a student.  Then the idea came to me, create zines!  (Come back to my blog and I will show you the inside of the zines.)

The zines also inspired me to create my latest task cards.  This is an image from inside of the page of my task cards.  Access them here.

The writing task cards contain helpful tips and templates for creating zines too.

The upper elementary students that I worked with one period really made me smile.  I introduced them to the idea of making zines and they LOVED it.  The students did not want to move on to the next activity.  We explored how we could create zines as an alternative to flashcards in order to review concepts in all subjects.

This is an example of my primary writing paper.  It is wonderful for primary students, but it something different is needed for older students.  

Check back soon.  I will share more images.

Free Groundhog Day Writing

Can you believe that it is almost February? Do you know what that means?  It is almost Groundhog Day.  I have a Groundhog Day freebie to share.  It has Groundhog Day writing prompts and two types of writing paper.

Click Here To Access It

Free Writing Prompt of the Week #2

Greetings everyone!  I am back with the second free writing prompt of the week.  Enjoy.

Click here to access the printable version of the writing prompt

Click Here To Access Grade 3

Click Here To Access Grade 4

Click Here To Access Grade 5

Click Here To Access Grade 6

Click Here To Access Grade 7

Click Here To Access Grade 8

Free Writing Prompt of the Week

Some time ago, I released a freebie called the Free Close Reading Passage of the Week.Click Here To Access It.  Inspired by Janice Malone, I wanted to create free writing prompts that inspire creative writing.  As a result, I am doing this short series that includes fun writing prompts.

Click Here for the printable version of the writing prompt.

Additional Resources

Click Here for the Passages

Click Here for the Task Cards

Free Sentence Starters--Helping Students Interpret What They Read

If you are looking for a way to help students interpret and explain what they read, this free resource will help.  I love to use sentence starters with students.  After a short time, students are able to write without any support.

Why is this important?  There is a greater push to encourage students to go beyond summarizing.  Being able to interpret what is read sets a strong foundation for later grade levels and helps students comprehend what they read.Click Here to Access It

For additional writing resources, access a link below.

Click Here for Argument Writing Exit Slips

Click Here for Narrative Writing Exit Slips

Improve Student Writing With Mentor Text Journals

If you are looking for a way to help students take their writing to the next level, consider using mentor text journals.

What is a mentor text journal? It is a journal that students keep to record examples of creative word and language use. My students really enjoy keeping this type of journal. How does it work?

Each student gets a blank journal.  A notebook can also be used.  The top of the journal is labeled.  Headings include things such as:  vivid verbs, metaphors and similes, characterization, etc.  As a student reads books and magazines, they record words or sentence structures that they like.  When students create their own narrative stories or informative essays, they insert some of the words from their journals in their own writing. Students eventually move on from emulating the techniques of professional writers to thinking of their own ways to write creatively.

Mentor text journals are a great tool to use when interpreting text.  During this lesson, we reviewed figurative language.  After learning what similes, metaphors, hyperboles, etc. are, we evaluated how authors use language to convey ideas.

This also works well for learning about characterization.  As students read, they can record how authors let a reader know about characters.  This could include indirect characterization techniques such as through a character's actions, dialogue, etc.

With mentor text journals, students have a reference book at their fingertips that they can use to improve their own writing.  It is an effective tool and a great way to get students to pay close attention to what they read.

Click Here For Differentiated Writing Lessons

Click Here For Argument Writing Exit Slips

Argument Writing

Recently, I began argument writing with the middle school students that I work with and have started opinion writing with my elementary students.

Above is an example of the poster that I developed for our lessons.  My first goal was to make sure that students know the parts of an argumentative essay.  

As I presented the poster, the students helped to generate ideas about how each part of an argumentative essay should be presented.  We spent some time talking about writing good evidence.  This is a great distinction.  Providing evidence is not enough. It is important to provide really good evidence that can make the claim of the essay convincing.  The text support should also be able to stand up against the counterclaim.

Stop back by to look at examples as we progress through these lessons.

Click Here For Argument Essay Exit Slips

Vary Sentence Structure

When students write, they must pay attention to several aspects of writing as they read. One of those aspects is sentence structure. Using a variety of sentence structures adds flow and makes writing more appealing. 

This blog post includes free task cards to help students remember to use sentence variety.

Free Varying Sentence Structure Task Cards

The Case for Using Sentence Variety
Why should students be concerned about sentence variety?  Writing clear and cohesive sentences are not only focus points of the new Common Core Standards, it is also a valuable tip that will help students score higher on ACT and SAT exams. Understanding how and when to use different sentence structures not only improves writing, it also helps students understand how authors develop and convey ideas to their readers.

How Authors Use Different Sentence Structures
Varying sentence structures can heighten the tone in an action story.  In informational text, it draws a reader's attention to specific ideas.

In addition to experimenting with different sentence structures, students should analyze the writing structures that authors use.  They can ask questions like:

• How does the author convey tone in the text?
• How does the use of this sentence structure (in paragraph 10) help the speaker be more convincing to listeners?

The Common Core Connection

The Common Core English Standards lead students into deeper levels of analysis as they progress into higher grade levels.  While words such as analyze, think about, and compare are used at the lower and middle grade levels, terms such as diction and syntax are directly used at the high school grade levels to address this deeper level of analysis.
View additional posts on Classroom Freebies

To access close reading task cards from my TpT store, Click Here