Motivating Students to Write

Happy Wednesday!  I cannot believe today is only Wednesday...I was hoping it was at least Thursday! Today, we went on a fabulous field trip to the Newark Museum.  They place was so well organized and the students had a blast!  I will share more on our experience another day.  

Today, I am linking up with Ideas by Jivey for her Wednesday Workshop. Today's topic: Motivating Students Write!  I am not teaching writing this year, so once again I am pulling from what I did when I taught third grade last year! 

Last year, I got the idea of a class mascot.  I had a stuffed animal that as a class we named, Ducky Mo Mo.  Ducky Mo Mo would go home with a different student each week.  They would play with it, take it on adventures, it even traveled to California and Portugal with different students.  The students were always excited to take Ducky Mo Mo home with them.  Part of their responsibility of having Ducky Mo Mo, was to fill out an adventure page on what they did with Ducky Mo Mo.  They would tell the class what they fed Ducky Mo Mo, what they did with it, I even had a student measure Ducky Mo Mo.  They loved it and they did not mind writing this journal entry.  If they did not complete the adventure page, they would lose a turn of having Ducky Mo Mo.

Most of my students did not mind the writing part of this activity because having Ducky Mo Mo was special to them and they did not feel the pressure of making it perfect.  I would not grade their journals.  I used this as more of away for them to just write.  Ducky Mo Mo had his own backpack that would go home with the child each week.  I included Ducky Mo Mo and a binder.  In the binder was a direction sheet and all of the adventure pages.  I have given you a copy of my direction sheet and my adventure pages.  Students would read their adventure story to the class during our morning meeting.

Adventures of Ducky Mo Mo

Well, that is all folks!  I hope you have a great rest of your night! 

Rosie