We have been working through the writing process, using seeds we’ve put in our Writers’ Notebooks.

Once we got to the end (which took WAY longer than I remembered it would!), we were ready to CELEBRATE with our friends!  The best part about what we did was that we did it with more than one class!  Mrs. Appelbaum’s class was finished with their pieces, too, so we got together.

As with many things, the way Mrs. Appelbaum did her writing celebration was a little different from me, so she taught me something new and it was super!!  First, she shared with Rm. 202 kiddos the directions her class had come up with to share their work with a partner:

There was also a comment sheet she had come up with, where readers would give the writer feedback based on these starters: “Something I liked about your writing was…”; “Something I learned was…” and “Something I wonder now is….”  I’ve done compliment sheets before, but they’ve always been completely open-ended.  The structure of her sheet was helpful for those that needed ideas, but was also still open-ended enough for kids to make choices on how they’d respond.

From within minutes of when we started, the room was “a-buzz” with that fabulous sound of excitement, learning, and laughing as kiddos proudly shared the work they had done to create meaningful writing pieces.

This is a short video, but here’s what it sounded like:

While you can’t really get the same experience from seeing pictures of it as if you were there, I do think you can imagine the experience.  Sometimes just seeing the pride and happiness on their faces is story enough!

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Ok, these next few will look really similar, but they’re from the 2nd go-round, where Mrs. Appelbaum’s friends came to hear our writing.  We were excited to try out her “rules” and the compliment sheet on our work!

Jamiir leaves a compliment for Ja’Mia.

Thomas was excited about hearing Millie’s piece about the olden days.

Mrs. Appelbaum even joined in and listened to Jacob read his story called Mr. Zap.

Amber shared her non-fiction writing with Solis.

Tre’ listened to Baron read his non-fiction writing about his trip to Alaska.

Emily shared her story with Noah.

Khalani read his piece about a trip to Branson to Thomas.

Jamiir writes a thoughtful comment for Sara as she waits patiently.

Evan and J.D. discuss writing.

JKB shares his writing.

Mya and Ella Marie listen to EM’s story about Zelda and witch school.

Landen shared his story about “Landen and the Monkey” with Alex

Ava and Antoine work together.

Alexander comments on Nate’s writing piece about when Pacifique and Tresor came to visit Robinson.

Tyrin and Anthony listen respectfully.

Kaden comments on Amelia’s writing piece about her friend.

I don’t have pictures of the last share we did, but after we had practiced with the Appelbaum team, we invited our friends from Ms. Turken’s class (they’re first graders) to listen to our writing, too.  This was the first time they had been to a writing celebration and we were hoping to teach them well about how it was supposed to work.  You’d never have known they were newbies–they were writing rockstars and worked really hard to give us meaningful comments on our work!  Hopefully we can share with them again when they’re finished their own writing pieces.

Whew! What an exciting day of celebrating our hard work, our meaningful writing ideas and our using grit and perseverance to share great stories!  Way to go, Rm. 202 kids!