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Language Arts - Elementary Curriculum English Language Arts Grade 1
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Writing Standard 7

Participate in shared research and writing projects (e.g., explore a number of "how-to" books on a given topic and use them to write a sequence of instructions).
  • A Journal for Corduroy: Responding to Literature
    This lesson from ReadWriteThink leads first-grade students to reflect on and respond to literature through journal writing. Students read books in the Corduroy series and interact with a stuffed bear to personalize their experiences. They also record their own adventures with Corduroy, share their stories with the class, and create a class book using the computer.
  • Adventures in Nonfiction: A Guided Inquiry Journey
    This lesson acquaints students with multiple nonfiction resources and helps them to think about what they want to learn during research.
  • All Together Now: Collaborations in Poetry Writing
    This set of 3 lesson plans from EDSITEment makes poetry exciting for students as they listen to, write, and recite poems that are sure to please. By the end of these lessons, students should be able to create lines of poetry in response to poems read aloud, identify musical elements of literary language, and recite short poems or excerpts.
  • Collaborative Stories 2: Revising
    Using a story which has been written collaboratively, students engage in a whole-group revising process by having each student add a sentence at a time. The teacher leads this shared-revising activity to help students consider story content. Students begin by reading their collaborative story and then discuss ways of making changes. Then, after revisions have been made, they reread the story as a group. Finally, students come to a consensus on a title for their story.
  • Draw a Story: Stepping From Pictures to Writing
    In this ReadWriteThink lesson, students draw a series of pictures that tell a simple story that includes character action, problem and solution. They 'read' their story to others, transcribe it into writing, and create an accordion book with the drawings and writing. The activity supports the transition from oral to written storytelling.
  • Egyptian Symbols and Figures: Hieroglyphs
    This lesson plan from EDSITEment introduces students to the writing, art, and religious beliefs of ancient Egypt through hieroglyphs, one of the oldest writing systems in the world, and through tomb paintings. The lesson plan is in two parts. In this first lesson, the class creates a pictorial alphabet of its own and then learns and uses the symbols of the Egyptian hieroglyphic alphabet. In the second lesson, Egyptian Symbols and Figures: Scroll Painting, students identify and represent in their own drawings figures from the Book of the Dead, a funeral text written on papyrus and carved on the walls of tombs to help guide the deceased through the afterlife.
  • Egyptian Symbols and Figures: Scroll Paintings
    This lesson plan from EDSITEment introduces students to the writing, art, and religious beliefs of ancient Egypt through hieroglyphs, one of the oldest writing systems in the world, and through tomb paintings. The lesson plan is in two parts. In this second lesson, students identify and represent in their own drawings figures from the Book of the Dead, a funeral text written on papyrus and carved on the walls of tombs to help guide the deceased through the afterlife. In the first lesson, Egyptian Symbols and Figures: Hieroglyphs, the class creates a pictorial alphabet of its own and then learns and uses the symbols of the Egyptian hieroglyphic alphabet.
  • If You Were a Pioneer on the Oregon Trail
    In this lesson from EDSITEment, students compare imagined travel experiences of their own with the actual experiences of 19th-century pioneers. After creating, as a class, oral stories about contemporary cross-country journeys, students learn about the experiences of the emigrants who traveled on the Oregon Trail. They then create works of historical fiction in the form of picture books, drawing upon the information they have learned.
  • Sentence Quest
    In this lesson from ReadWriteThink, students learn the criteria for a sentence by manipulating word cards, then collaborate to write and illustrate complete, descriptive sentences. Finally, students work in groups using descriptive words and phrases to try to create the longest sentence they can.
  • Shape Poems
    A shape poem is a poem about an object or thing. It is written in the shape of the object. Make a poem in the shape of a star, a leaf, heart, fish or other shape.


UEN logo http://www.uen.org - in partnership with Utah State Board of Education (USBE) and Utah System of Higher Education (USHE).  Send questions or comments to USBE Specialist - Sara  Wiebke and see the Language Arts - Elementary website. For general questions about Utah's Core Standards contact the Director - Jennifer  Throndsen.

These materials have been produced by and for the teachers of the State of Utah. Copies of these materials may be freely reproduced for teacher and classroom use. When distributing these materials, credit should be given to Utah State Board of Education. These materials may not be published, in whole or part, or in any other format, without the written permission of the Utah State Board of Education, 250 East 500 South, PO Box 144200, Salt Lake City, Utah 84114-4200.