Writing Opinions

Yesterday I was at a workshop with our Instructional Literacy Team and I started to think about persuasive writing. In kindergarten it starts with writing opinions.  Do kindergartners have opinions?  Oh,  YES!

I started this morning with this chart.

This is an ugly chart... I admit it.  My cat looks a LOT like a pregnant kangaroo...I know!

I then began to tell my kids that sometimes we feel a certain way about something and we HAVE to tell people why.  So, now that we had committed to our opinions, we had to explain why we felt the way we did.       

Like everything we write, we started by talking about it.   I called on a few kids and they gave me their explanation.   I played dumb (an easy role for me),  "You like dogs?   But why?... But why? ... But why?"

After a few students spoke, they got the idea.  We noticed that we used the word because a LOT, so I wrote it down for them.  Then, I sent them on their way.

Here is what they came up with.  You can get a better view of their writing sample if you click on the image.

 After discussing this, he explained that the cat will chase the string and flip around trying to catch it... don't worry.

She used a caret to add text... no prompting on my part... Yay!

 Good if you are a dog... bad if you are a cat.

I think this one is so sweet... and YES, she is that sweet of a girl!

Let me explain...our school is very rural.  This student's brother has a cow that is so tame that she can ride on it.

 Um...  And we are in Missouri... enough said!

You want to get a copy and give it a whirl?

This was not our writer's workshop, but a quick little activity. I think if we continue to try opinion writing once a week we will get really good.

Will you let me know if you give this a try?   I would love to hear how it goes!