Writing Offices for Elementary Students

Our district is {finally} adopting the Common Core next year, so I’ve spent a lot of time this year preparing for it!

One thing that is changing are our writing assessments.  Students will write on the three different types of writing over a period of a couple days (a day to pre-write, a day to draft, a day to publish).  And, the best part: they can use resources and tools that they use everyday in the classroom.  It’s no longer a “cold” write, but a “use what you know and can figure out” type of writing.

As a result, I’ve been taking a look at how to to give students as many aids as possible without being too overwhelming.

I created this writing office that has checklists for each type of writing (where the parts of the standard are bulleted out), a list of temporal and linking words, checklists for editing and revising, and a list of ways to start and end their stories.  These are tied to the second grade Common Core standards, but I hope to be coming out with a third grade version soon!  The editing checklist has the common core language conventions up through second grade.  I expect students to be responsible for applying the K-2 conventions.

To create the office, I glued together two file folders and pasted down the different pieces in a logical order.  I intend to laminate them so students can use their whiteboard markers to check off or circle different parts of their folders.  I also left the back blank.  After laminating, I’ll add a page protector to insert various lists of words or other helpful tools that I might not have thought of yet!

These writing offices are available in my TpT store.