Today's Classroom Activities :

Sentence Structure and Punctuation

Expandable Sentences
Language Select a student to suggest a noun, then another to suggest a verb. Build a sentence together. Add a descriptive word, an article, a preposition, etc. Then do it again. And again. Maybe the expandable sentence can become an expandable story. Stress how the words work together.

Sentence Expansion/Elaboration
Students will add details to simple sentences in order to develop more complex sentences. Then students will distinguish between a descriptive and non-descriptive sentence.

Sentence Quest: Using Parts of Speech to Write Descriptive Sentences
This multi-session activity uses students' speaking vocabularies to help them learn about complete sentences. Students first participate in a whole-group activity to create lists of nouns, verbs, and adjectives. They then write selected words on color-coded index cards. They work with the word cards to learn the essential criteria for complete sentences. Using this criteria, they collaborate in groups to create, write, and share complete, descriptive sentences. Finally, they use additional descriptive words and phrases to create complex complete sentences, which are written on adding machine tape, illustrated, and shared with the class.

Perfect Punctuation
Students practice using various punctuation marks correctly, such as periods, commas, questions marks, and exclamation points. After that, students work in small groups to design a punctuation board game and create all the pieces for the game. Finally, students test their own game, make any revisions, then exchange games with classmates to play.

Pasta Punctuation
The students will demonstrate correct usage of quotation marks, commas and periods when writing dialogue. They will also be able to write sentences that show character traits.