Writing Activities!
The beauty of this clock, as well as the fascinating history should
provide the motivation for any number of writing assignments. No matter
what grade level or subject you teach, there are ways to use Josephine's treasured
clock and troubled times to help students with your writing assignments.
Listed below are some
suggested writing activities with lesson plans or links to go along.
Hopefully you will
notice that most of the sites have a "back" button to take you to other places on their
web sites.
This way you can build up your bookmarks with good lesson plan web sites.
 Biography Maker.
Have your students write another biography of this interesting Empress! A *VERY* good comprehensive site to help
students write a biography. Even includes 6 traits of effective writing!
Planning a Trip.
Have your students create an itinerary or brochure for an imaginary trip to France using
this web site.
Basic Guide to Essay Writing.
Do your students have an opinion about Josephine, her times or the clock? Use this format to help
them write a paper which argues their point!
Paradigm Onine Writing Assistant.
Another wonderful lesson idea on writing essays. Covers four types of essays: informational,
thesis, argumentative, and exploratory.
Only a Matter of Opinion?
A ThinkQuest web site by high school students, this page offers guides for AP/IB writing
on the subject of opinion. It has sections speaking specifically to teachers of journalism,
english, composition, history and art. The period of French history from 1790 to 1820 is
rich for this subject.
Point of View.
This lesson plan involves creating a situation viewed from the point of view of 5 different
characters. Use 5 different citizens living in France during the Revolution or Napoleon's
invasion of most of Europe.
Create a Newspaper.
Are your students studying the terrifying events of the French Revolution? If so, use
this web site to have them create a newspaper in time.
New Writing.
Another great lesson plan for writing news stories.
Creative Writing.
This lesson plan uses photographs as a prompt for creative writing. Use the photo of
the clock!
Haiku poetry.
There are many natural symbols on the clock that can be used in this inspiritional lesson.
Odes. This
type of writing can be funny, but it doesn't have to. If Josephine could have written an ode to her clock,
what would she have written?
Adding Critical Thinking to your lesson plans.
Are you planning on creating your own lesson plans for a writing activity? Here are some tips
on how to include Bloom's Taxonomy or the multiple intelligences.
OFCN's Academy Curricular Exchange.
Writing successful paragraphs. (Same lesson plan found here, http://ericir.syr.edu/Virtual/Lessons/Lang_arts/Writing_comp/WCP0035.html
in case the link goes bad.)
This short writing exercise involves creating a list of student wishes. This list can
easily be related to the world that Josephines clock came from.
Rubric for evaluating
paragraphs.
PIZZAZ..Story Box.
This writing activity for ESOL students involves pictoral prompts. Use the clock!
The Hamburger Homepage.
Use this method to teach your students a complete research and writing guide.
APlus Research & Writing for High School. Here
is another VERY extensive site which gives a step by step instruction for research papers.
Principles of Composition. This site provides information on teaching the writing process.
Clustering.
This lesson plan uses pictures to connect to a state of mind, and then to words. Pictures
from France during these tumultuous times would be fascinating.
WAC Writing Assignments.
Stands for Writing accross the curriculum. This site shows how to integrate writing with
a lot of different topics.
Outta Ray's Head site has a
VERY LARGE group of suggestions for writing activities. Includes biographies,
daily writing programs, writing folder checklists, opinions, paragraphs, reviews, story writing,
turning photographs into writing, pen pals, mythological character research, etc.
Most appear to be middle or secondary school level.
AskERIC Lesson Plans: Language Arts.
A very large listing of all language arts lesson plans on file.
Writing Plans from the Teacher's Desk.
A lot of interesting ideas here!
Educate the Children.
A Brittish twist on language arts. Click on any of the choices to get a variety of writing and
reading lesson plans in PDF format. This site also has worksheets to print out.
W.R.I.T.E.
These letters stand for write, revise, inform, think, and edit. This article on Education World
has links to numerous language arts sites.
Writing Resources.
This site has lots for middle school teachers.
Instructional Materials in Writing.
This has a number of interesting ideas.
Yahoo! search results
for "Writing Lesson Plans". For those of you who haven't yet mastered the art of using
search engines. A lot of links here.
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