Let's Brainstorm

 One of the biggest challenges my students face when it comes to writing is always that initial idea. I always hear the "I don't know what to write about" or "I can't think of anything to say." To avoid this and set my students up for success, we used cooperative learning and thinking maps to help get their creative juices going. 

We are starting our new unit in writing which is opinion. To get them started, I have them think about what they are passionate about. Specifically, what they are passionate about changing in our world. The experience and the way that my fourth graders see the world lends themselves perfectly to opinion writing. The simple question of what do you want to see changed in the world sparked so many new thoughts and ideas. 

We started off with jot thoughts. One minute was not enough for them, they needed more time. All the students were engaged and thinking about what truly mattered to them. There were ideas about the price of food to protecting the environment. Once they shared their ideas we put all of our ideas onto one large class circle map. Where we could admire all of our brilliant opinions about what we want to see changed in our world to make it a better place. 

Their thinking did not stop there. Once they picked one idea the real work began. They created a tree map where they dived deeper into their topic. They truly thought about why their idea mattered and the reasons they could use to persuade others to do better. Not only was their writing more detailed but it was also meaningful and important.