Revising our Reports

A few weeks ago I wrote about how my students were starting to research a notable person in history. The unit was kicked off  with a biography genre book talk in which the various categories of notable people we would be researching was introduced, such as artists and composers, politicians, athletes, etc. After a few busy weeks of research my class is ready to start revising our drafts Monday. As my students worked to prepare their draft paragraphs, I was so impressed at the voice that came shining through in their writing. We worked so hard on turning notes that we took from our nonfiction sources into our own words and it really payed off! With all drafts, there is still much work to be done to fine tune our reports so they are ready for final publication.

When I was in college, checklists worked wonders for me. I had one for each class to ensure that I turned in all of my projects on time and that I covered all of the content that the professor required. While I was blog hopping, I saw a checklist that a teacher had created for similar purposes. I can't recall who it was but I believe it was available for public use.  I revised it and tweaked it just a tad to fit my students needs. I'm going to model using the checklist as I revise my draft report-the one I created while modeling paragraph format, etc. Then I'll have my students peer edit with the checklists prior to their final edit with me.

Here is a copy of the checklist I am using. I think it is pretty versatile for most intermediate classrooms. If you are currently writing content reports or paragraphs, this may be a useful tool for your students as they continue to rework their writing.







Have a great start to you week!