By Dr. Cindy Gause-Vega, Elementary Principal
Writers take great pains to engage their readers by using clear, precise language to paint a picture of where a story takes place – the setting. Drawing on the students’ curiosity about the forest, one Grade 3 teacher capitalised on this curiosity to help children develop their skills as writers. The children learned how to write rich descriptions of a setting through close observation, writing about what they saw and heard, and creating water colors of their observations. They then thought further about precise words they could use in a piece of writing to depict the settings they had observed and painted. Finally, they wrote descriptions of the forest setting they had observed and painted.
Finally, the children write descriptions of the forest setting.
“Tweet tweet tweet” the sound of the birds
is like a song made just for you. Its splashed
with a little dot of orange, yellow or a bit of red.
Theres a smell of the earthy ground with a tiny
spice. The forest is filled with creatures
and songs.
The forests have the colorful and beautiful birds singing very peacefully and happily. The trees with yellow, orange, green, red leaves which make me think of an artist dropping paint from the sky. The smooth rocks, the colorful leaves and the fresh air make me very calm. I really love the beautiful and peaceful forest.
