Teaching Blog Addict: Using photos for writing

Every year I try to improve on what I've done the previous year. Last year with writing I tried to use creative writing prompts as often as I could. To be honest, I just didn't see the kind of creativity or application of the skills we had learned as much as I wanted. This year I've been using photos from the National Geographic website.

If you click on the link above it will bring you to their photography home page. You can search through photos of landscapes, animals, photos of the month, travel, etc. These have led to great discussions in my class about our senses. We used a photo of a national park waterfall and discussed what the water would sound like, what would we smell, we saw that leaves were turning yellow and orange and knew it was autumn so it was probably cool out. My kids have just blossomed using these! One of my kids wrote about his photo like it was the view from his deck! Today I showed this photo:

Isn't it awesome?! One of my kids wrote a continuation of the Lion and the Mouse fable. He wrote that the lion ate the mouse and it tasted terrible! Be sure to check out the incredible photos and pick which ones you would like to use!

Jennifer

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