4. Play the game for more than
you can afford to lose... only
then will you learn the game.
Winston Churchill
What types of games are there in life?
What characteristics do gamers have
in common?
7. Play with the order of your notecards
◦ Rearrange, omit, add, combine
Where does the “so what?” fit best?
Can you add a thread or structure so that
they all flow and make sense together?
8. Monday—What do we notice about ideas?
Tuesday—What do we notice about
organization and structure?
Wednesday—What do we notice about
sentences?
Thursday—What do we notice about word
choice?
Friday— “Publish”
9. To encourage students to think and
respond like writers, they need to be
provided with great pieces of literature
to read, time to reflect, and models
that teach habits of collection and
creation.
Heather Lattimer (2003)
Thinking Through Genre
10. These questions work when we help
students “inquire” about . . .
What a “text” means
How I respond to what I see, read, hear
What “good” readers do
What an author might mean
How an author achieves certain effects
Hamlet’s mental health
The causes of homelessness
10 minutes
One minute quick write—List people, examples, details, events, stories
Three minutes—Choose one thing from the list to explain, analyze, describe, compare,
Next note card, three minutes—choose another thing from the list to explain, analyze, describe, compare, etc.
So What?—So what do you believe is true about gamers based on your quick writes so far—one-two sentences
10 minutes
What sticks with you? How does this piece make you feel? Why? What is one take-away you have after reading this text?
10 minutes
So what does this mean?
Deconstruct author’s use of examples, coherence, and structure in relation to the controlling idea.
5 minutes
Tape onto white paper to make notes in between cards about possible transitions, etc.
