Fantastic Storytellers Series Launch!

We've got a new release in a new series of workbooks that encourage writing and literature skills, the Fantastic Storytellers series.

How to Tell Fantastic Stories: A Fantastic Storytellers Activity Book, the first in the Fantastic Storytellers series.

Nourish your child’s creativity with Narrator’s upbeat help. Narrator will show students the parts of a story and give students the framework needed to develop creative writing skills. Students fill in blanks, answer review questions, and fill out brainstorming sheets similar to those used by adult writers. Includes silly black-and-white illustrations to color. Ages 6-9.

Available in handbound paperback ($11, includes shipping) and in printable PDF.

For Fantastic Stories in handbound paperback, use Paypal's "Note" to let me know where to ship it and to whom to sign it. You can also pre-order "Visual Writing Prompts," for $1 off the release price, coming out soon.

Coming soon...

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Lesson Plan: Simple Machines

Last month I taught an awesome group of first and second graders about simple machines at one of our co-ops. After an introduction on simple machines, we split into groups and designed and built simple machines of our own using common craft materials and everyday objects. The kids loved working with their hands to put their newfound knowledge to immediate use.

It was a lot of fun researching (and drawing!) simple machines and making up a story to inspire our students to design their own machines. I've made my lesson plan available on TeacherPayTeacher:

Sally's Simple Machines

by Michelle Ristuccia

Another member of the co-op had this wonderful book which we read to introduce simple machines:

How Do You Lift A Lion? by Robert E. Wells

This gave me some time to (ahem) finish drawing and crossing all my T's in my new lesson plan. My lesson explains each of the 6 simple machines, but this book would still be a great supplement.

I've added this and other worksheets on a new collaborative Pinterest Board:

https://www.pinterest.com/mrsmica/elementary-printables-and-workbooks/

If you want me to add you to the board, send me a message.

Enjoy!

Story Elements Classes

Earlier this month I had a great time running a class at the Lillington library for our homeschool group. We used fairy tales to discover the different elements of a story, and then we made our own as a class. Everyone had a blast!

This is our class story. If you can make my drawings out, I'll be impressed.

Then this week I took part of that lesson and used the same story-telling method to introduce our co-op class to elements of a story. They'll be using these new vocabulary words to play an awesome game, Create-a-Story, that the co-op has. As you play the game, players gather cards like "character" and on the other side of the card is a description of a character. You gather several of each type of card and once you reach the end of the board game, it's time to pick your favorite cards and write your story using an outline provided with the game. For the co-op, we divided the students into groups and each group is creating their own story. My group drew cards about pirates, treasure, and tornadoes... So much fun!

Earlier this year I also taught a class about the three-act story structure to middle and highschoolers at the Erwin library. I find the three-act structure helpful for understanding the "problem," "solution," and tension of a story on a deeper level, even when that story doesn't follow the model precisely. My favorite part during all of these classes is being privileged to talk with enthusiastic students who are very creative and excited to learn more. I'll also be doing a presentation on NaNoWriMo and encouraged my older students to look into that.

I'll be teaching more of these classes in the future. You can read about my classes here and connect with me through email or facebook.

PS. Another good tool for story telling are cubes like the Rory's Story Cubes