Shaking Up The Classroom
For the second year running, a 3rd Grade teacher at the Patricia A. DiChiaro School in Westchester, NY, used Shake-a-Phrase for a Halloween creative writing exercise in her classroom. Mrs. Colacicco, shook up a bunch of Monster-themed Story Starters, printed the individual Starter screens, and engaged her class in a collaborative writer’s workshop. Using the story prompts, the students worked together in groups of 2-3, to imagine and write their own creepy and silly story endings.
Activity goals:
- Get kids thinking creatively
- Get kids writing and/or drawing
- Reinforce writing process and habits
- Reinforce vocabulary as they work on their stories
The result: a fun, themed activity to engage kids and nurture their natural creative writing instincts.
Instructions:
Recipe to launch your own Shake-a-Phrase creative writing project in your class or at home:
- Shake up your favorite Shake-a-Phrase theme with Story Starter and get the creative juices flowing.
- Save your favorites using the Fave feature.
- Share on your class whiteboard or print out story starters for the class to choose from.
- Arm the kids with pens, keyboards, paint, paper and other instruments of creativity.
- Turn them loose.
- Add structure to taste.
The Results...
The activity stirs up students' creative juices and gets kids exercising their storytelling skills – with a spooky dash of holiday fun. The result: a fun, themed activity to engage kids and nurture their natural creative writing instincts.
Read some of the kids' stories
Spectre and Gorilla
A naughty spectre would get eaten by a gorilla if he sings like Opera and the gorilla will roast it and have a Halloween feast.
more...Boogeyman and Sandman
There was a puny bogeyman any feeble sandman camping. They were in a pit. They camped till morning and got in a fight.
more...Troll and Skeleton
Once upon a time it was a glorious troll and a curious skeleton. They were hiding from astronauts. They got so tired that they moved to Earth. They were wondering how to get to Earth.
more...Cyclops and robot
A curious robot and a fabulous cyclops were cooking in the laboratory. They found a piece of steak from another dimension.
more...Hydra and Spider
A boy came into the bathroom and saw the muddy spider and the ridiculous hydra. He knocked the spider into the tub with the hydra.
more...Poltergeist and Jack-o-lantern
One night a sneaky spirit and a big jack-o-lantern were walking into a haunted house.
more...