My Dog is as Smelly as Dirty Socks

Wow, two blog posts in one night!

Today I reminded the students that we are working on writing that invites our readers to make connections.  Our writing topic last week and this week has been "Connecting to a Special Grown-up".

Last week we shared a number of anchor books related to our topic. We also discussed how the use of adjectives and similes can make our writing more interesting and different from anyone else's. One of my favourite books to introduce our writing topic and the concept of similes is My Dog Is  As Smelly As  Dirty Socks by Hanoch Piven.

You can watch an online video version of the book if you click HERE. After discussing the similes that were introduced in the book, we brain stormed a few of our own using our wonderful public librarian as inspiration. Here are just a few that we came up with:

 

Ms. Judy is as sweet as sugar and as smart as Albert Einstein.

She is as beautiful as a rose and as bright as the sun.

 

Afterwards, we made her a giant poster with our similes and presented it to her after our Thursday book club talks. I think she loved it!

 

On Monday, we completed a planning sheet and chose another special grown-up to write about. Many students chose their parents, aunts and uncles, or a family friend. We brainstormed memories, adjectives, similes and information for our special grown-up. After viewing a variety of writing samples, the students then wrote their own stories about the special grown-ups in their lives.  Here is one example from one of the grade one students:

 

My favourite part : "My mommy can cook really fast. She cooks like a wolf and she likes to take naps on Saturdays".

 

Wow! That must be some fast cooking. I  am sure anybody would need a nap on Saturday if they cooked like that all week longt! Too cute!

 

Next we'll be editing our writing for errors in spelling, punctuation and missing words. Then we'll begin publishing our stories by adding illustrations to our written work. Phewwww! It is a long process and a lot of hard work but I can already see so many improvements in our writing skills.

- Mrs. Singh