Teaching Line of Reasoning with Children's Stories

As ELA teachers, one of the things we are tasked to do is to get our students to create clear lines of reasoning in their writing.

But how and the world do we do that?

If only we could bust open the lids of their brains and pour in a healthy dose of logic and reasoning.

Well, I have created a strategy to crack the line of reasoning conundrum.

The other day, I was reading P.D. Eastman's "Are You My Mother?" to my grandson.

And I had a ginormous epiphany …

I said to myself … holy cow …

This entire book is written syllogistically.

And as you know, the template I use to get my students to sustain their line of reasoning in their body paragraphs is rooted in the Aristotelian heuristic of the syllogistic method.

Bingo!

Man oh man … it worked!

Things clicked for a ton of students ... especially right before state exam season.

In today's video, I walk you through a writing workshop (which also features one of my alternative grading methods) whereby students are forthrightly engaged in crafting clear lines of reasoning in their synthesis and literary analyses papers.

In looking at each student's syllogistic body paragraph, the class has to decide if the 1st premise is the mother to the baby bird (2nd premise), or if the whole thing is a snort?

Tons of fun ... super high engagement ... and majorly edifying!

Click Here!

If you would like to take a deeper dive into how I get students to sustain super tight lines of reasoning with the aid of a slew of other children's stories, edible templates/graphic organizers, and through gamification strategies, then you might be interested in knowing that on December 10th at 11 a.m. EST, the National Writing Project and I are teaming up to offer my Teaching Line of Reasoning 2-Hour Intensive live in Zoom.

Replays will be available ... and NWP will be awarding PD completion badges.

Hope to see you there!

Happy teaching and happy writing!!