NaNoWriMo :)

I had a breakthrough last Friday with my 6th grade Language Arts class!

They loved Friday's journal prompt so much that they asked if they could turn them into short stories or novels. I had planned to have students choose a journal entry to develop into a larger writing piece later on in the school year. However, their enthusiasm convinced me to embark on the adventure now!

The biggest question was how to structure novel writing for my 6th grade students whom I only see for 45 minutes a day?

During the launch of my own novel writing adventure this summer, I discovered NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). It's a great website designed to get you writing and keep you motivated. I remembered that November is NaNoWriMo (the timing couldn't be more perfect)! I checked out their site and found that they have a Young Writers Program geared towards educators and classrooms.

Best of all... they have FREE workbooks you can download for your students! Click on the logo to the right to visit their site and check out their free resources for educators. I will be binding workbooks together for my students tomorrow morning :)

I used NaNoWriMo's middle school workbook to plan out the remaining weeks till writing begins in November. The workbook includes everything students will need to plan their stories, including content vocabulary definitions. I'm going to try to FLIP my classroom, having students complete the lessons and do most of the reading at home so we can focus on writing in the classroom. Here's my rough outline:

Check out NaNoWriMo's free notebooks {HERE}. They have one for elementary, middle, and secondary grade levels! It is an amazing resource. I can't believe it's FREE!!

I can't wait to set out on this adventure with my class! I think we are going to learn a lot from each other! I will post updates along the way :)