Getting Students to Expand their Writing when Responding to Literature

Academic Talk

Today’s Focus: Expanding your Writing when responding to literature

Today’s blog is strictly about how we can get our students to expand their writing when responding to literature. I will not be discussing how I set up writing in my classroom (I like the workshop model) until later on.

Think back to elementary school. Think about all of those times when you were given a blank sheet of lined paper at your desk and were asked to respond to a question on the board that connects to a story that was just read aloud.

Some of you may have looked like this:

But…for others, you may have looked like this:

We, as teachers, can never lose sight of meeting the needs of all of our students. We can’t expect all of the students in our classroom to meet our expectations right off the bat. You need to have a back up plan for those who need additional instruction.

I taught 5^th grade, and in the beginning of the year we read Wonder by RJ Palacio. Let’s pretend this was the question written on the front board:

While August’s mom was reading The Hobbit out loud to him, August began to cry. Why do you think August started to cry?

If a student is only given a lined piece of paper to respond to this question, then most of their thinking will take place in their head. For a few, this might work for them. But, in my experience, most of my students needed to set up a plan before they began writing their answer.

I am a firm believer of explicit teaching. How can you expect students to master a skill/strategy/task when you’ve provided very little insight on your expectations? Don’t tell the students what you expect...SHOW the students what you expect. 

When my students responded to literature, we used the ESSC format. This was what the 5^th grade team launched before I began teaching there. Once I learned more about it, I fell in complete love with the format because of its lucidness. 

E = Echo (Restate/Answer)

You want to restate the question and provide your answer, which should be an inference.

S = Support #1

Provide your first piece of evidence from the text that corresponds with the question.

S = Support #2

Provide your second piece of evidence from the text that corresponds with the question.

C = Concluding Sentence

This should connect to your echo (hence why it’s the same color). It should sum up everything stated above.

Once I launched the ESSC format with my kids this year, I realized the first issue…the students were just stating the evidence and then moving on. What was missing? The EXPANSION of their details. My students were not explaining WHY the details they included were meaningful to what the question was asking.

This was not taught and therefore, as a teacher, I can’t just expect my students to know how to expand their writing. Furthermore, I had to provide another lesson that showed the ESSC format with its new addition. Once this happened, students worked on expanding their responses to be as complete as possible. I always tell them to pretend I didn’t read the story.

Below you will see the graphic organizer I created to follow the ESSC format with the explanation piece included J

Ok so here’s what I would do…

1.      Launch the ESSC graphic organizer.

Click here to download this graphic organizer, for free!!

2.     Model an ESSC response using the organizer

a.     I will create a different question from the same book and model my expectations.

b.     I will color-code

3.     Review the expectations of an ESSC response

4.     Partner Work: Create another question that students work with partners on to continue getting used to this format.

5.     Independent Work: Students are given a question to answer on their own (of course, I will work with a small group if necessary)

Not all of my students will use this graphic organizer permanently. Some can use it to see what I expect in a response and almost turn it into their own checklist to make sure they included an echo, support #1 w/ explanation, support #2 w/ explanation, and concluding sentence.

Some students used the graphic organizer all year because of it’s directness and effectiveness. Students can even create this graphic organizer on the “Planning Page” of their state tests (if they take those). It’s something they can utilize no matter what their doing!

As a side note, I LOVE graphic organizers because not only do they help students with structure and organization, but they also allow the students to just transfer their writing onto the lined sheet of paper. It eliminates a lot of the anxiety that might come into play if you were given a blank lined sheet of paper right out of the gate.

I hope this blog was helpful for someone out there. My writing may be all over the place, but the point is we want all students to feel successful. You can’t push students to master one way of doing something. Be ready to show them multiple ways in order for them to find the method that best suits them as a learner.

PLEASE NOTE: In my original plan, I said I would be focusing on specific strategy, but instead I am going to discuss something relating to ELA, Math, Social Studies, or Science and see where it takes me.