In our efforts to help middle school students better comprehend what they are reading, sometimes we forget to tie in a valuable skill that is connected to reading comprehension: writing. When a student gets involved in writing, he/she can use their new-found strategies being a writer to not only give them the tools to synthesize texts, but also motivate them to review others' written work.
Writing Fun gives tons of text organizers to assist in the writing process from informational writing to narrative to procedural to descriptions. By becoming more skilled in these areas of writing, students can be encouraged to be writing critics by reading samples of these forms of writing.
Teachers can motivate their students to look for strengths and weaknesses in texts written by different authors. Some ideas could be reading other student works, teacher works, and/or renowned literary works.
Get them writing and reading at the same time, and they may just begin comprehending even more!
I like how this site not only provides great downloads to aid your students in organizing their information prior to writing, but it also presents writing samples you can use to teach your students about specific types of writing. Very helpful tools! In addition, it is colorful and fun to view.
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