Writing Lesson Planning Template (Adapted from Tompkins, 2013, p.

22)

Grade level:​ 1st Grade

CCSS:
● CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.1.2​ Write informative/explanatory texts in which they name a
topic, supply some facts about the topic, and provide some sense of closure.
● CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.1.5​ With guidance and support from adults, focus on a topic,
respond to questions and suggestions from peers, and add details to strengthen writing as
needed.

Objective(s):
● Students will be able to use revising strategies to edit their writing in order to make their
ideas more clear to the audience.

Materials (including mentor texts):

● D.A.R.E. Anchor Chart
● D.A.R.E. Sticky Note Anchor Chart for Writing Resource Folder
● Mentor text:
● Teacher writing piece
● Student writing folders
● Hooray for Diffendoofer Day!

Academic Language (vocabulary and/or other language objectives):

● Draft
● Revise
● Delete
● Add
● Rearrange
● Exchange

Procedure

Introduce the topic:

● “Today Writers, we are going to learn about what famous authors and authors like
yourself do when they are finishing a piece of writing. Authors revise their draft to make
it the best that it can be before publishing. This means they want to make sure their ideas
are as clear as possible for their audience.”
 ● Teacher will prompt students to turn and talk to restate what they will be learning about
today in writing (based on previous introduction).
● “Revision is about making the message clear and knowing how to move the piece of
writing forward towards publishing. (Culham, 2018, pg. 101) When we look at the word
revision ‘re’ means again and vision means ‘to see.’ Therefore, revision means to see
something again. Like we have talked about when learning how to strengthen our writing,
writers are never done. We are always adding more to our pieces of writing, but today we
will discuss ways to make our thoughts and stories more clear to our audience or people
who are reading our stories.”

Share examples/model:
● The teacher will begin by showing showing students the book ​Hooray for Diffendoofer
Day!
● The teacher will introduce the book by telling students that this book was written by
multiple authors. Dr. Seuss started the book, however, Jack Prelutsky finished it.
● The teacher will explain that this book is based on illustrations and ideas that Dr. Seuss
had began before he passed away.
● The teacher will show students these pictures and ideas that Dr. Seuss created and will
explain that Jack Prelutsky revised Dr. Seuss’ ideas to make the book more clear for the
reader to understand.
● The teacher will read the ideas that Dr. Seuss wrote and then ask students what they
understood.
● The teacher will then read what Jack Prelutsky wrote and will ask students what they
understood.
● The teacher will scaffold students through a conversation to compare which author’s
words are more clear and less confusing.

Provide information:
● The teacher will say, “Just like the authors, Dr. Seuss and Jack Prelutsky, as well as
others that write books that we have in our library, we are going to learn how to make our
ideas more clear to others. This is one of the many traits that
we use during the writing process as we prepare our writing to
be published and shared with our classmates.”
● The teacher will introduce the “D.A.R.E.” anchor chart to
students. (to the right).
● The teacher will explain what the words delete (take out), add
(put in), rearrange (move around), and exchange (trade).
● Students will turn and talk about what each letter of D.A.R.E.
stands for.
 ● Teacher will call students back together and have them share what each letter stands for
and what that means.
● The teacher will then ask students again what it means to revise their writing (to make
their ideas more clear for the reader to understand).
● The teacher will model looking at the writing pieces in her folder to decide which piece
she can make more clear. (Teacher should verbally explain her thoughts for students to
hear.)
● The teacher will use a colored pencil to make corrections to her writing by beginning to
focusing on deleting unnecessary information.
○ In the lessons to follow, the teacher will then model adding more important words
and transition words. The teacher will continue to model rearranging sentences or
exchanging words to make them more clear.
● Students will help the teacher revise her writing by deleting confusing parts of her story
or what may not be needed.
○ In the lessons to follow, the students may also help the teacher coming up with
words/sentences to add, rearrange, and exchange.
● The teacher will then read her writing with the revision changes to show how now the
movie being made in her mind is even more clear, with more details.

Guide practice:
● Students will get their writing folder and will read over
their writing to choose which piece needs to be made
more clear.
● The teacher will give students a sticky note that reflects
the anchor chart that was created for them to keep. (to
the right)
● All students will write what the letter D stands for
(Delete) on their sticky note anchor chart to keep in their
writing folders for reference.
● The teacher will lead students in partner talking about
ideas for the revision process, focusing on deleting
unnecessary information.
● Prompting partner talking:
○ One student will begin by reading their piece to their partner.
○ The partner that is listening will then tell the writer which part was confusing or
didn’t make sense.
○ The writer will draw a line through the part in which they should take out of their
writing.
 ● Students will switch roles and teacher will prompt students to do the same steps, with the
opposite partner. The writer will draw a line through the part in which they should take
out of their writing.
● **The teacher will continue to conduct this procedure with each part of D.A.R.E.
Depending on how students do with this, they may continue to do the same procedure
with add, rearrange, and exchange on the same day or stretched out over a week (or
longer). The teacher may use their own judgement depending on the time allowed for
writer’s workshop and how students are responding. The teacher may repeat parts of the
revision acronym if students do not grasp the concept clearly.

Independent Practice:
● Students will practice deleting unnecessary information from other pieces of their writing
if time allows. After each part of the acronym is taught, students will practice with pieces
of writing other than what was used during guided
practice. Depending on the working level of students, the
teacher may pull small groups to guide during this time,
focusing on this concept.

Assess learning ​(include specific rubrics, checklists, or other

tools you will use to assess student learning)​:

● The teacher will use the checklist found on page 217 (to
the right) to score their clarity of ideas.
● The teacher should use the checklist (below) assess how
the student revised their writing. Students should use 2-3
parts of the acronym to revise their writing.

I can use the revision process to make my writing more clear.

Demonstrated Not Demonstrated

Delete unnecessary information

Add more important details & transition

words

Rearrange text to be logical & effective in

order to stick to the topic

Exchange words for clearer & stronger

words
​Next Steps:
● To provide a clear and concrete understanding of the difference of revision and editing,
the teacher will follow the revision lessons with editing lessons. This shows students that
revising our work is working with the words, rather than mechanics, which is the editing
stage. (Culham, 2018, pg. 101)
● After students are done making revisions to their writing, they will be introduced to
“Editing Visors.” Students will be able to put on their editing visor to show that they are
fixing mechanics in their writing (punctuation, capitalization, etc.). Students will be given
the opportunity to use their editing visors to show the teacher what stage of the writing
process they are working on.
 Resources

Culham, R. (2018). ​Teach writing well: How to assess writing, invigorate instruction and rethink

revision.​ Portsmouth, NH: Stenhouse.

Olivieri, P. (n.d.). Retrieved from

https://rockinresources.com/2015/06/writing-mini-lesson-23-revising.html

The book ​Teach Writing Well​ was used to help prepare this lesson focusing on the Revision trait
of the Writing Process. The teacher/creator of this lesson used Chapter 5: Rethinking Revision:
The Real Work of Writing to strengthen her knowledge of teaching revision in the classroom.
Vocabulary, concepts, ideas, and activities may be found in this text. The scoring guide found at
the end of this lesson plan was also borrowed from the text.

The blog post written by Pam Olivieri was used to aid the teaching instruction in this lesson.
From her blog post, I found the anchor chart that I will be using during instruction. This anchor
chart is what sparked my thoughts in the creation of the sticky note anchor chart that students
will be keeping as a resource in their writing folders.