Directions for Parents About the Cut-Up Journal Sentence
Many parents are interested in incorporating cut-up journal sentences into children's at-home writing routines. As a way to motivate youth and give direction, parents can create and provide daily sentence starters that help children form journal entries around the initial writing prompt. The perfect sentence starters will vary from child to child, which is something parents should take into account when developing cut-up sentences for their kids.
Things You'll Need
- Paper
- Pen
- Scissors
- Glue or tape
- Journal
Instructions
Gather necessary supplies for the project. Parents will need a pen and paper for writing sentence starters, and children will each need a journal along with scissors and glue or tape. Consider letting each child pick out a bound notebook that can be solely dedicated to the activity at hand, choosing a pattern or design that she loves. Create journal sentence starters. With each child's particular needs and abilities in mind, draft writing prompts. "Today, I am grateful for . . ."; "This weekend, I plan on . . ."; "I love my family because . . . ." Print each sentence on its own line, skipping lines in between sentences to give young children enough room to cut around each entry. Give each child a page of sentence starters, letting him choose which starter to cut out and write about today. Young children may benefit from cutting out each word in the journal sentence, having to reproduce the sentence itself when they go to attach the starter in their journals, and others may find that simply attaching the journal starter as one piece works best for them. Instruct the children to complete their journal entries based on the prompt. Give them specific instructions such as "write for ten minutes" or "produce five sentences." For additional practice, invite the children to read their entries aloud after they have finished penning them.
