Story Starters for Kids

Domo Animate - Make your own Domo Animations and Slideshows with GoAnimate's super easy to use tools. Animation Allen Hoe served as a combat medic during the Vietnam War, and his two sons continued his legacy of service. His oldest son, Nainoa, eventually became a first lieutenant infantry officer with the Army's 3rd Battalion. In January 2005, while leading his men through Mosul, Iraq, Nainoa was killed by sniper fire. StoryCorps is proud to present "The Last Viewing” alongside “1st Squad, 3rd Platoon" and "The Nature of War" to honor Veterans Day 2014. Funding Provided By In Partnership With 31 Online Resources for Better Writing Here are 31 online resources to help you improve your writing and become a better writer. No matter what kind of writing you are doing, whether you are a journalist or an entertainment blogger, a student who has to write an essay or someone who wants to become a screenwriter, there are sites on the Internet that can help you out with your writing. Here we have compiled a list of great sites that will help you with your writing, whether it is your career or you are just doing it for fun. Organize Your Writing 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Writing Aids 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. Grammar 16. 17. 18. 19. Dictionaries 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27. Social Networking 28. 29. 30. 31. Guest author Janice Blythe is a regular writer for Cometdocs, a free online document conversion service. This is a guest article and represents opinions of the guest author

Story Starters: Creative Writing Prompts for Kids If you’re looking to inspire your students’ writing and creativity, turn to these fun and exciting writing prompts. Perfect for overcoming writer’s block or even starting a brand-new short story in a different narrative, creative writing prompts can help students begin a new piece with confidence. Plus, these story starters can also encourage students to explore different genres while honing their writing skills. There are a lot of ways you can use writing prompts in your classroom. Try: Reading a book in a genre, then having students use a story starter in that same genre. Take inspiration from classics like Treasure Island and newer popular series like The Bad Guys to explore how to write thrilling adventure stories. You’re part of a pirate crew in search of a long-lost storied treasure trove. Get students excited about adventure stories with these great books: If you’re looking to inspire your students’ writing and creativity, turn to these fun and exciting writing prompts.

Educational Videos and Games for Kids about Science, Math, Social Studies and English digitalstorytelling4everyone - home iPads can’t improve learning without good teaching Pt 2 – Writing Used with permission from Debbie Ridpath Ohi at Inkygirl.com ( ) Writing and technology has been a controversial subject for many traditionalists in education. “Spell check stops children from learning to spell”. “All students do today is copy and paste from Wikipedia and Google searched articles.” ” Children need to handwrite all their drafts”. “William Shakespeare didn’t have a laptop” ( OK, i just threw that in for fun!) At the same time, of course, as a teacher I have been subjected to countless reports and stories typed in ridiculous unreadable coloured fonts, decorated with superfluous clip art and WordArt headings and thousands of “death by Powerpoints” unnecessarily printed out to hand up to me. 20 years of computers as a publishing tool has not necessarily improved the standard of students’ writing skills. The key words in that last sentence are of course publishing and writing. What is writing? Now originally, communication was verbal.

My StoryMaker : Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh my Storymaker® was named one of the Best Websites for Teaching and Learning by the American Association of School Librarians, a division of the American Library Association. People worldwide enjoy my StoryMaker®. Find out what all the fun is about! You have the power to decide -- choosing characters, taking them on adventures and creating your very own story along the way. my StoryMaker® lets you control characters and objects -- and it creates sentences for you! Or, you can enter your own words. Once you are done with your story, you can print it out. > Play my StoryMaker® Click here for HELP writing, printing and sharing stories.

Publishing Learners' Writing Light summer dresses beckon behind the door as the sun finds its path through slanted shades. Memories of green, playgrounds and crystal clear seas entice my mind. However, being an educator, summer is a time when I catch up on professional training, academic studies and research. With the regular bandwagon terminology regarding E-learning, learning, ways of learning is often on my mind. Whether through games and gaming, virtual worlds or tools which challenge one's creativity and organisational skills, there is something for everyone. One motivational approach is to have learners publish their own work, whether class work, a project or a topic they are interested in and may share with others. Writing is a challenge for most learners, regardless of age or whether studying a second language. With interactive prompts, students are guided to answer questions which will help reinforce how descriptive writing flows with adjectives and adverbs. What do you want your learners to say?

Little Bird Tales - Home Quality Student Blogs Part One – Posts As I have written about before, I have a system in my classroom where students can earn their own blog. Adapted from Linda Yollis’ idea, I have found the system to work well in both my grade two and grade four classes. Recently, six 4KM and 4KJ students were the first to earn their own blogs for 2012. They join a couple of student bloggers in our class who were in 2KM or 2KJ in 2010. Teaching about and encouraging quality comments is a big part of our classroom blogging program. Teaching students about creating quality blogs and writing quality blog posts is another area that needs explicit teaching and ongoing feedback. Over a series of blog posts, I will look at aspects of quality student blogging. What makes a quality student blog post? Over the years, I have discovered my own definition of quality by working with my student bloggers. Left to their own devices, I have seen many students create posts like this. Overuse of glitter text – very tempting for young bloggers! Jarrod has

Protagonize: collaborative story & creative fiction writing community Quality Student Blogs Part Two – Post Topics Posted by Mrs Kathleen Morris on Tuesday, June 19th 2012 Last week I wrote about how students with their own blogs can be guided to create quality posts. After I published my post, I showed my class the less ideal post example I used about dogs. When students in my class earn their own blog, I generally have a chat to them about the sort of posts they’d like to write about. A common pattern Without guidance or discussion, I have found that students can get into the habit of writing blog posts such as My familyMy petsMy friendsMy favourite sportsMy favourite animalsMy favourite booksMy favourite foods…. The “My Favourite…” theme can go on and on! I saw this pattern emerge many times before realising the students could be encourage to “think outside the square”. Be observant Linda Yollis recently gave one of my new student bloggers some excellent advice, “You mentioned that you are thinking about future topics…. I think writing about what you observe is a wonderful tip for student bloggers.