[ACENetwork-Instruction] Teacher ListServ Posting

[David Collings]

This is my first message posted to the Teacher ListServ.  I am pleased
that Delaware has a teacher listserv to exchange information and for me
to post messages directly to you.

I would like to address an important aspect of our work, writing
development leading to the CEA 1, 2, and 3.  I had the opportunity to
read about 50 CEAs over the last month.  There were several
well-developed paragraphs, but I also read some very disappointing
paragraphs.  I realize that writing is not always easy for our students,
but the good news is that it is a process that can be developed with
explicit instruction.

The critical elements of a topic sentence, supporting detail, and
concluding sentence (for stand alone paragraphs and transitional
sentence for longer papers) is not difficult for our students to
understand.  I suggest using a graphic organizer to help students grasp
the concept of choosing details to support their topic sentence.  By
webbing their ideas graphically, it drives home the connection between
the topic sentence and the details.  The concluding sentence is the
summation of the topic sentence without adding new information.

I would very much like to hear about your experiences (especially your
successful strategies) in teaching paragraph development at any level of
writing (e.g., CEA1, 2, or 3).

Dr. Fran Tracy-Mumford
State Director of Adult Education