Illustration Study Celebration

 We wrapped up our Illustration Study recently. Each student chose a book in which he/she had used interesting illustration techniques. We made covers for the books out of construction paper. Then on Wednesday each had a turn to sit on the bench and share from the book. Afterwords we toasted their efforts with ice water accompanied by cookies.

Here is the chart we put together as we studied illustration strategies in Writing Workshop. We recorded our "noticings" about the illustration strategies we studied and made note of which of the students had tried those strategies.

Since the celebration we have worked on a Halloween Big Book together. We have also had a couple of Nuts and Bolts mini-lessons to look at important writing habits. This coming week we will begin a new Unit of Study on ways to structure text.

Illustration Study

We began Writing Workshop as a whole class during the first couple of weeks of school. In those sessions we worked on the basic idea of writing workshop and the kind of work we would do at this time. We covered what conferences are, talked some about how to get ideas for our writing, and looked at ways to stretch our ideas and add details. Then the workshop moved into our language group time.


For the first week in language group I have focused on some of the "nuts and bolts" of the workshop (drawing on a title from Lucy Calkin's Units of Study for Primary Writing.) For example, we had a lesson on stretching out words and recording the sounds we hear to generate spellings for words we do not know how to spell conventionally. (For more on this see an earlier post on generated spelling.)

Now we have begun focusing on an illustration study, looking at the illustration decisions that different authors and illustrators make and how those decisions can enhance the writing in the books. This study was inspired by Katie Wood Ray’s book, In Pictures and In Words: Teaching the Qualities of Good Writing Through Illustration Study. We have begun a chart of our "noticings" as we study different books. I love how the children often point out things that I had not noticed. They are sharp observers!

 

Catching Up

It's been a while since I've blogged here, so I wanted to go over recent Units of Study that we have done. In November we looked at the questions of how authors and illustrators use pictures to support and enhance their texts. This study was inspired by Katie Wood Ray’s  book, In Pictures and In Words: Teaching the Qualities of Good Writing Through Illustration Study. The students were great "noticers" as we studied books. Then they worked to include some of the techniques we explored in their own books.

In December we studied  “Small Moments."  We looked at how authors zoomed in on particular moments in time. Then students choose their moments to zoom in on and worked to remember details to include in their books. Students wrote about moments such as losing a tooth, scary happenings on Halloween, touching a python, and a Thanksgiving party.

Illustrations that Enhance Our Writing

Our latest Unit of Study has been focused on the question: What smart illustration decisions do author/illustrators make in their books? This study was inspired by Katie Wood Ray’s latest book, In Pictures and In Words: Teaching the Qualities of Good Writing Through Illustration Study. The children have been wonderful at looking at books and noticing the smart things being done in the illustrations to communicate information, feelings, character, storyline, mood, point of view, passage of time, and more. I have recorded a lot of their “noticings” on a chart. We are also using the chart to note when one of us tries something we’ve seen in the books. We keep the books we are using for the study in a basket where students can refer to them as needed. After Thanksgiving break, students will be asked to choose books they have written to publish. Each choice should be a book that can go into the basket with our study books, because of interesting illustration choices.