This week in Reading and Writing Workshop

Last week we have launched our new unit on nonfiction reading and writing. We read aloud a variety of nonfiction books: How to Lose All Your Friends, Milk to Ice Cream, The Bubbly Drop, The Watcher, and Butterflies. Through careful noticing and thinking about the ideas and topics behind these books, we understood that there are four main types of nonfiction: all-about books (information books), how-to books (procedural books), narrative nonfiction, and biography. We have had many hot discussions this week when we were reading The Bubbly Drop (a narrative nonfiction story told by a made-up character/narrator, Bubble, about his water cycle adventure as a water droplet). After reading the story, some kids said that it is a realistic fiction, while some kids said it's a little bit of both, and some kids said it is a nonfiction text. Many of them had great reasons to back up their argument.

"It's realistic fiction because the water cycle is real, but in real life, water droplets don't talk -Bubble is a made-up character." - Mia

"It's a little bit of both fiction and nonfiction because there are facts about the water cycle and rainbow colors, but water droplets don't ever talk." - Adessa

"I think this is nonfiction because this is all about the water cycle. It's teaching you about evaporation, condensation, precipitation." - Yaseen

After a long debate, we came to a conclusion that this is a narrative nonfiction story, where a character/narrator tells a story of a topic that is fact-based. When asked why authors write narrative nonfiction, other than just all-about (information) books, a student said,

"The narrator and characters in the books make learning more fun!" - Danielle

In writing, we have begun drafting our "how-to" procedural books. Our writers have been envisioning and acting out the steps to help recount and write out the steps of their "how-tos". They have also been using transition words like, first, then, next, and then... finally to link the steps in order.

Today we did a class how-to book together. We learned how to make orange popsicles! We first gathered all of our materials/ingredients, and we followed the procedure in order. We had a fun time making and enjoying our popsicles. Ask your child this weekend how to make popsicles and see if he/she is able to recall the materials needed and retell the steps in order. Have fun trying it out at home!