If you teach in a Common Core (or fake CC state like I do) then you are very familiar with the idea of “responding to text” and “close reads”. These ideas seem to be fixtures on my lesson plans and although we’ve been slowly working on a routine with these two practices, we really didn’t hit a breakthrough with text marking until we started BOOGIEING through it…
You heard me right… BOOGIE… and not the dance kind either!
As in the gross green stuff that comes out of your nose.
As in the stuff you’re constantly telling your kiddos NOT pick…
… and eat (UGH!) #teacherproblems #really
Now, don’t get me wrong, we were doing very well with our close read, but annotating text independently was a struggle. It seemed my kiddos constantly needed me there to “suggest” what was noteworthy. But SNOTS changed all that! Like seriously… Like a slimy green light bulb went off in their heads! Who knew green colored pencils would be such a game changer?
What are SNOTS?
“SNOTS” stand for: Small Notes On The Sides. They are exactly what they say they are… little annotations in the margins of papers of what we, the readers, think, feel, or wonder. Now, I’ve extended SNOTS to include circles of important words and diagrams as well as a way to “zero” in on key terms when answering questions.
I introduced my class to SNOTS after reading a nonfiction article about how plants have spread all over the Earth (Oh yes, Spring has sprung in the Applicious Classroom! More on that later this week!) After reading the article, I had my kiddos write a responding to text question in their RRJs. Then, I pass out our magic pencils and we got to boogieing up our question and then our text!
Persuasive Writing Using SNOTS
I was REALLY impressed with how easily they were able to pull evidence from the text to support their position on video games! I mean seriously… it’s just a green pencil, folks! #magicpowers #funintheclassroom
Do you use SNOTS? Tell me more about how they look in your room below! Or what are some tricks you use to get your students more involved in their learning?
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