This week, I had to come up with an independent activity that kids could do while I did a speaking test. I decided to take the idea of embedded reading and twist it so that students were doing an embedded writing instead. I gave the students three sentences and then asked them to double that "story" by adding details. I really had to model this a LOT for my kids because they could not understand what I meant. It helped to say "Imagine cutting and pasting the text and then adding details or sentences between those words or sentences."
Once they had doubled the initial story, I had them give their paper to another student and double someone else's story. Then, if there was time, they did it one last time.
As I read over what they came up with, I was pretty impressed. Of course, some students still didn't understand the concept and changed the story or started writing their own...but, for the most part, the students did a great job of using vocabulary from waaaay back and synthesizing French.
I will definitely do this activity again and I'll be interested to see how this activity impacts their next round of free-writes. I'm hoping they'll be longer and more detailed.
I love that you tried this!!!! The more that students read Embedded Readings, the more comfortable they are...actually it comes naturally to write that way!! In fact, that is how our Intro teacher approaches writing!! They always start with a very short "base" story and go from there. It is a great combination of input and output!!!!
ReplyDeletewith love,
Laurie
Yes! I've tried this as well with several different ways, but I haven't done anything with it in quite awhile. I think I'll have them work on one throughout next week so that they can type it and add it to their final portfolio on finals day!! Here are some posts about it... http://martinabex.com/2011/10/25/expanding-a-writing-piece/ http://martinabex.com/2011/11/18/embedded-free-writes/
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