Last week, mid-Week 4 – our 1st grade team launched Writer’s Workshop. I am SO excited because all 5 of us are committed to using a Workshop model this year, saturated with lots and lots of mentor texts, the bulk of our time spent writing, and assessment guided by Lucy Calkins’ Writing Pathways. Today I wanted to share with you our 1st day of writer’s workshop!
Now many classrooms and teachers jump right into Writing Workshop and that works for them. If you are one of those amazing teachers, go you! For my 1st grade friends, I actually hold off a few weeks. We spend the first few weeks of school building writing stamina, doing oral writing (through Whole Brain Teaching), and setting expectations for our Writing Journals. You can read all about these procedures here.
Structuring Our Writer’s Workshop Time
To jump-start our conversation, we talked about how we would spend our time in writer’s workshop. Currently, I only have 30 minutes on the schedule for writing. I need a little longer than that and am dipping into theme time to get an extra 10-15 minutes. On days that it is not possible to take more than 30 minutes, I alternate days we do mini-lessons and share. Cutting out writing time is a non-negotiable for me. On days that we only share, I will make sure I am very intentional about picking students to share, based on skills and ideas I want to highlight in their writing.
Generating Writing Ideas
Our first writing unit is Narrative Writing and our first mini-lesson was all about “What do I write about?” I was introduced to Ralph Tells a Story through Instagram and will forever use it. Ralph is an adorable little boy who has zero writing ideas and he does all kinds of things to avoid writing – breaking pencils, using the bathroom, helping friends, getting drinks of water, etc. Then, with the help of his friends and a push from his teacher, Ralph learns that stories have been all around him the whole time! It’s precious, hilarious, and hit home for so many of my littles. (Note – I read Ralph during morning snack, so our mini-lesson would indeed stay mini.)
After brainstorming ideas, we entered into our ‘Work/Write Time’ where I play some type of classical music (currently we are listening to Yo-Yo Ma), students are writing/illustrating, and I am conferencing with students.
I love how this friend alternates text and pictures because “That’s how real books do it, Ms. W and pretty soon this will be a book about my life.” 
Accommodating All Writers
Although I do have some fabulous writers, I am a normal classroom with normal students – I promise! I have one friend that is not writing independently, yet. He struggles with motor and OT issues, reading issues, attention issues, and at the beginning of the year absolutely refused to pick up a pencil. In 5 weeks, we have come LIGHTYEARS! Even though he struggles, I still expect this friend to participate. He dictates his stories (obviously we need to review what a narrative is) to me and I write them on his table with a dry-erase marker. Then, as this friend writes each word, he erases them from the table using his finger. It is a HUGE motivator for him to write because he loves erasing the words. Then, he adds pictures to explain his ideas.
Sharing Our Writing
Learn more about writing in my 1st and 2nd grade classroom in these posts and resources:
FREE Work on Writing Papers
Hi! Thanks for sharing your wonderful ideas. Your writing workshop looks very similar to mine! (smiley face) I would like to know what resource you use to plan your lessons? I can't seem to find one consistent book, resource, etc. to use. This makes weekly planning difficult and uses time I don't have! Any suggestions are appreciated!
Hi Janet! Honestly, our school has a 'writing plan' called the 1.3, 2.6, and 3.8 paragraph writing. It is geared toward on-demand/paragraph writing and less toward creative writing with mentor texts. I definitely use this plan and integrate it into our writing block, but other than that our team uses Common Core and Luck Calkins to help us plan! We also love using a lot of mentor texts to guide our students.
Thanks so much Catherine! I also love the writing on the desks idea
for those that have to have their work scribed! Quick, easy, and it's so handy! I love your blog and all of your first grade ideas!
I love your idea of writing what he says on the desk and then he can erase them!!! BRILLIANT!
Love your ideas! I have a question. Do you have 2 writing times, writers' workshop and Daily 5 writing time? How are they different?
Hi Sherry! This early in the year, I haven't been brave enough to introduce Work on Writing. I know the Sisters say to introduce it 2nd but I always introduce it last. Once it is introduced, students do have 2 blocks of time for writing. Most of our paragraph and prompt writing is done during Daily 5 and creative writing is done during writer's workshop. Students will also do a lot of book response, letter writing, and typing of writing during our Daily 5 block, too!
Hi Sherry,
In my 2nd grade classroom, our Daily 5 "Work on Writing" time is when students implement what they are doing in Writers Workshop. Some days we'll spend more time with the Writers Workshop model and then during the afternoon Daily 5, students are continuing what was started in the morning or the day before. There are times when students are working in response journals et al which is separate from the WW and D5. This seems to work well for my students and they are more focused during the Daily 5 writing time because they are already prepared for what to do.
I got so many ideas from this post. Thank you! I have to tell you that my favorite idea will be used with a little autistic boy in my first grade classroom. Writing is really a struggle for him. I have tried many things, but with little success. I'm thinking that your idea of writing right in the table will be fun and motivating. Yahoo! Thanks for sharing!!!
This is fantastic! I've been planning a total revamping of my writer's workshop for my first graders and this got me even more motivated! I can't wait to come back and hear how your little ones are doing!
I ordered "Ralph Tells A Story" and it just came today! I can't wait to read it to my second graders tomorrow, they will love it and will be able to TOTALLY relate to Ralph! Thanks for the great recommendation Catherine.
Read Ralph Tells a story! Such a great anchor text. Thanks for all the great ideas and lessons. Question, what does your work on writing time look like during daily 5? Thanks I would love to find out. Loving your blog- Emily
Hi Emily! I've shared about our Work on Writing time here – http://thebrownbagteacher.blogspot.com/2016/01/work-on-writing-ideas.html
Hi, great post, thank you. I'm not quite sure I understand the difference between D5 'work on writing' and writer's workshop. Is D5 more 'open' to what they wish to write and writer's workshop more 'guided' on format? Please clarify. Thank you. Once you launch Work on Writing, do you have two separate instances for writing? or do you mesh them together?
Hi Barbara! Great questions. You'll definitely want to check out these two posts about Work on Writing and Writer's Workshop!
Writer's Workshop: http://thebrownbagteacher.blogspot.com/2015/09/launching-writers-workshop-our-1st-day.html
Work on Writing: http://thebrownbagteacher.blogspot.com/2016/01/work-on-writing-ideas.html