Four Simple Steps to Small-Group Guided Writing

Materials and Technology

Printouts

Websites

Teacher Resources

Preparation

 

MATERIALS AND TECHNOLOGY

• Bat Loves the Night by Nicola Davies (Candlewick Press, 2001)
  
  
• Small-group writing table with room for you and a small group of students
  
  
• Computers with Internet access
  
  
• Writing paper or journal for each student

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PRINTOUTS

• Keep Writing!
  
  
• Write a Title!
  
  
• Write Lots of Details!

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WEBSITES

• National Geographic Kids: Amazing Bats of Bracken Cave
• Naturesongs: Other Animal Sounds
• California Underground: Bat Echolocation Station

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TEACHER RESOURCES

Analytic Assessment

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PREPARATION

1.	Identify a group of two to six students in your class who are in need of additional support. For the sessions described here, choose students who are not writing enthusiastically about topics they are interested in during whole-class writing activities. You might, for example, choose students who write very little text on a daily basis or who write repetitive texts that lack interesting details.
2.	Collect an initial, independent writing sample for each student.
3.	Locate and preview a copy of Bat Loves the Night by Nicola Davies. Take note of the wide range of information about bats that Davies has included within the story and the ways in which the illustrations (by Sarah Fox-Davies) support students' natural inquiry. Notice how different fonts used in the book provide different types of information.
4.	Review the websites listed in the Web Resources. For the National Geographic Kids: Amazing Bats of Bracken Cave website, review the description of the bats of Bracken Cave in Texas. Pick a few of the Fast Facts that might be of interest to your students. For your review of the Naturesongs: Other Animal Sounds website, click on This is what we hear (about half-way down the page) for the Mexican Free-Tailed Bat (and then the slower version of the same sounds from Here is an MP3). For the California Underground: Bat Echolocation Station website, click on Cave Life Gallery and explore the animals found at the Entrance, Twilight, and Dark Zones. Also review the Bat Echolocation Station and different types of bats. Bookmark these websites on your computer so that they are easily accessible for students during Sessions 1, 2, and 3. If you do not have a classroom computer with Internet access, reserve sessions in your school's computer lab.
5.	Create your own one- or two-sentence story about bats to use as a model in Session 3.
6.	Make photocopies for each student of the Keep Writing! (Session 1), Write a Title! (Session 2), and Write Lots of Details! (Session 3) strategy charts. Also make one copy of the Analytic Assessment form for each session.

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