Teacher Resources for Instructional Planning


Grade 12, Language Arts Std # 5–1: Determine logical progression and completeness of paragraphs Introductory sentences Concluding sentences Sequence of events or details Transitional words Irrelevant and/or redundant sentences

Lesson Plans: Picking Up the Pieces In this lesson students examine how a breaking news story is constructed, first by predicting what facts and details must appear in what order, and then by assembling the story from cut-up pieces. They then practice writing their own 'breaking news' lead paragraphs. Analyzing Author Style Using Sentence Combining Students will combine three sets of kernel sentences. They will then combine their sentences with sentences from an essay and discuss what sentence combining strategy or strategies they used and observe how to vary their sentences. Focus in Writing This brief lesson will help students recognize when a paragraph loses focus and will help them understand the concept of focus.

Resources: PowerPoint Presentations Sentence clarity and combining presentation Paragraphing (length consistency) This page provides students with information about the consistency of paragraph length. The Paragraph This page provides writing students with information about the paragraph, including unity and coherency. Organizing Your Argument This PowerPoint presentation reviews the elements of an organized essay, including the introduction, the thesis, body paragraphs, topic sentences, counterarguments and the conclusion. OWL Online Writing Lab Lesson on Transitional Devices Suggestions for English Language Learners: ESL Ideas (B=Beginning, I=Intermediate, T=Transitional) (B) Using a list provided by the teacher, students highlight transitional words in a newspaper article or other writing. (I, T) Students identify orally or in writing the beginning, middle, and end of a story they have read or written. (I, T) Students use pictures to create a story sequence of events. Students can draw the pictures or the teacher can cut out pictures and have the students place the pictures in order. (I, T) Students list the steps in a procedure or science demonstration. Transitional students can also make sentences or paragraphs about the procedure or demonstration. (I, T) Students locate comic strips (preferably from the Sunday paper) and cut them into separate frames. Students exchange groups of comic strip frames and place them in the correct sequential order. Students then read the newly sequenced comic strip to the class to check for correct order.
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