Using children's picture books, Deborah Dean provided frameworks for student research papers that avoided the pitfalls leading to voiceless and encyclopedic writing. Research guide sheets; class analysis of text organization, sentence variety, stylistic choices; and peer review all contribute to interesting final papers.

"Framing Texts: New Strategies for Student Writers"

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Beyond Voices of Readers: Students on School's Effects on Reading
8 - 12
Professional Library
| Journal
This article summarizes and explicates research on 272 twelfth-grade students' reading autobiographies. Cope quotes from some noteworthy comments and makes some suggestions on how teachers and schools might do a better job of teaching literature.

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Be Fabulous: The Reading Teacher's Guide to Reclaiming Your Happiness in the Classroom
K - 12
Professional Library
| Book
Scoggin merges her straight-talking blogger persona, Mrs. Mimi, with her years of research to help you rediscover who you are and redefine the type of literacy teacher you want to become. At the heart of this book is teacher happiness and empowerment—reconnect with your inner fabulous to give the best possible literacy instruction to your students.

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Book Clubs: Reading for Fun
3 - 5
Lesson Plan
| Recurring Lesson
This lesson describes how small groups of students can plan meetings to discuss what they've read in a "just for fun" book club they've organizedand that they control.

Grades
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Daily Book Boosts
3 - 5
Lesson Plan
| Recurring Lesson
Book Boostsone-minute raves at the end of independent reading timeare easy ways to suggest new titles to students, and they act as a way for students to have something to think about as they read.

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Native Americans Today
3 - 5
Lesson Plan
| Standard Lesson
This lesson challenges students' views of Native Americans as a vanished people by asking them to compare their prior knowledge with information they gather while reading about contemporary Native Americans.

Grades
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Using Children's Natural Curiosity to Lead to Descriptive Writing
K - 2
Lesson Plan
| Minilesson
Inspired by the book It Begins with an A, kindergarten students are invited to turn their curiosity and guesswork into a class book, complete with illustrated objects and descriptive language

Grades
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Composing Cinquain Poems: A Quick-Writing Activity
1 - 2
Lesson Plan
| Minilesson
Students use themed graphic organizers to compose cinquain poems on topics common in the early elementary classroom.

Grades
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Story Character Homepage
6 - 8
Lesson Plan
| Unit
Students analyze personal homepages, as well as a character in a book they have read, and then create a homepage for the character.

Grades
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Poetry from Prose
3 - 5
Lesson Plan
| Standard Lesson
Working in small groups, students compose found and parallel poems based on a descriptive passage they have chosen from a piece of literature they are reading.

Grades
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Shared Spelling Strategies
6 - 8
Lesson Plan
| Recurring Lesson
Students increase their spelling accuracy and retention, while preserving fluency, by using sound, sight recall, and analyzing strategies instead of memorizing words, as they deal with spelling during drafting.

Grades
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Learning to Learn with Miss Alaineus: A Vocabulary Disaster
3 - 5
Lesson Plan
| Standard Lesson
Modeled on the activities in Miss Alaineus: A Vocabulary Disaster, a picture book, students combine vocabulary exploration with word play by planning their own vocabulary parade.

Grades
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Get the Reel Scoop: Comparing Books to Movies
3 - 5
Lesson Plan
Students compare a book to its film adaptation, and then perform readers theater of a scene from the book that they feel was not well represented in the movie version.

Grades
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Draw a Story: Stepping from Pictures to Writing
K - 1
Lesson Plan
| Standard Lesson
Students draw a series of pictures that tell a story, including character action, problem and solution. They ‘read' their story to others, transcribe it into writing, and create an accordion book.

Grades
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Literature Circles with Primary Students Using Self-Selected Reading
K - 2
Lesson Plan
| Recurring Lesson
Students respond to self-selected books in journals, and talk about their books daily in small groups. The teacher guides students by offering suggestions and writing with them in dialogue journals.

Grades
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Composing Cinquain Poems with Basic Parts of Speech
3 - 5
Lesson Plan
| Standard Lesson
Reinforce student understanding of parts of speech through the analysis of sample cinquain poems followed by the creation of original cinquains.

Grades
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Fairy Tales from Life
3 - 5
Lesson Plan
| Unit
Picture books provide the basis for an analysis of fairy tale elements before students write their own original tales.

Grades
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Expository Escapade—Detective's Handbook
6 - 8
Lesson Plan
| Unit
Students create a Detective's Handbook based on a detective mystery they have read. The handbooks include expository and descriptive writing, as well as a letter.

Grades
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Seasonal Haiku: Writing Poems to Celebrate Any Season
3 - 5
Lesson Plan
| Standard Lesson
After listening to haiku poetry, students use seasonal descriptive words to write their own haiku, following the traditional format. They then publish their poems by mounting them on illustrated backgrounds.

Grades
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Have Journal...Will Travel: Promoting Family Involvement in Literacy
K - 2
Lesson Plan
| Recurring Lesson
Students build positive memories of literacy activities when they take turns taking home a book bag stuffed with items to encourage literacy interactions with their families.