Mini-Lesson Plan Form

Mini-Lesson Title: Showing after Telling.

Grade Level: 4th

Adaptations: None.

Materials Needed for the Lesson: Laptop, sample writing, picture book: A Sick Day for Amos McGee

Prior Knowledge and Skills Needed: Knowledge of the 6 Traits; ability to reread a piece and revise

Key/New Vocabulary: Show after telling

IRA/NCTE Standards:Standard 5: Students use a wide range of strategies as they write and use different writing process elements appropriately to communicate with different audiences for a variety of purposes.

Iowa Core Curriculum:3.b. Use dialogue and description to develop experiences and events or show the responses of characters to situations.

3.d. Use concrete words and phrases and sensory details to convey experiences and events precisely.

Learning Targets (I can): I can choose words to help my reader understand or picture things in my story.

Lessons Procedures

Teacher Actions Time

Student Learning ActionsWhat will the students do that will help them

develop strategies, concepts, or skills?

AssessmentHow will you

check for understanding?

Introduce the LessonWhat will you say to open the mini-lesson, create interest, and build connections?

Your stories are great so far and I’m hooked as a reader.

Strong leads that draw me into the story. The words you use to describe your characters,

settings, and situations make it easy and enjoyable to imagine them.

I have noticed that you just tell the reader about a character or action

What writers try to do is show, not just tell because it makes it more interesting for the reader to read your story

Important to use words to create images and emotions in addition to telling the story

2 mins

Students listen to the introduction of the lesson, the introduction includes connections to their current writing project and identification of the new application of the strategy.

Eye contact and body basics to signal their attention is focused on the lesson.

Discuss the ProcessWhat will you say and demonstrate to help develop the strategies, concepts, or skills with the students?

Writers show rather than tell the readers about something.

Let me show you how one writer, Philip Stead, does this is A Sick Day for Amos McGee

Provide a summary and read sections of the text to the student(s)

What the writer does – and what you can do – is to show after telling by adding another sentence or two.

Read and stop to talk:o Instead of saying “He got out of bed and got

dressed,” the writer said “Every morning when the alarm clock clanged, he swung his legs out of bed and swapped his pajamas for a fresh-pressed uniform.”

o Instead of saying “He woke up one day with a bad cold,” the writer said “One day Amos awoke with sniffles, and the sneezes, and the chills. He swung his achy legs out of bed, curled them back again and said, ‘Ugh. I don’t think I’ll be going to work today.’”

Find a place in my own story where I show rather than tell.

Have them imagine their favorite place in the world and write what they feel, hear, see, etc. when they’re there. That will help with showing over telling the reader.

5 mins

Turn and Talk

What will you say to set a purpose when you have them turn and talk to a partner?

Find a place in your own writing where you could show after you tell.

Think about why you chose that place in your writing and what you might say.

Tell me what you will do to show after you tell to help your reader feel and imagine that part of your story.

5 mins

The student(s) will reread their pieces and identify a place where they can show after they tell.

Students reread their pieces; identify where they can show after telling; will share what their thinking with me.

Closing and ReviewWhat will you say and do to close, review or summarize the mini-lesson with the students?

When you are writing today, think about where you can show rather than tell your reader about something in your story.

After you tell, you can add more to show.

2 mins

Anticipated Responses and Outcomes:How will you determine if the students have reached the outcomes?

If the student can write down a few different sensory things about their favorite place and then connect that to some place in their story during the turn and talk time, they will have grasped the basics of showing rather than telling.