Mindy Passe, Fifth Grade, Barringer Academic Center
Synopsis
This unit will help 5th grade students develop their writing skills as they read, analyze and discuss a variety of memoir styles. Using mentor texts to develop an understanding of memoirs, students will also learn about and begin to analyze the craft and structure of texts. Growth Mindset will play a key role as students go through the writing process to create their own memoir in a style and structure of their choice, which will be published in a classroom book of memoirs. Typically, 5th grade students have little interest in revising, editing and improving their writing. Peer editing is particularly challenging, not only due to the lack of skill in analyzing and critiquing writing but the reticence students feel about making corrections or suggestions about a peer’s work. Having a classroom with a Growth Mindset will provide a framework and structure that will enable students to give, receive and value feedback as within a culture in which the students expect and accept that their writing is a work in progress and will take time, effort and often humility to go beyond their current knowledge and skills in order to improve as a writer.
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