Incorporate writing instruction in your classroom as an essential element of literacy development while implementing best practices. Simplify the planning of writing instruction and become familiar with the Common Core State Standards of Writing.

Inspire students to develop as writers in the sixth grade classroom with these engaging and creative writing lessons. This classroom-tested resource shows positive results in students' writing and simplifies the planning of writing instruction. It contains detailed information on how to establish and manage daily Writer's Workshop and includes consistent, structured instruction to encourage students to actively participate in the writing process. Specific lessons to help students develop the traits of quality writing are also included.

Inspire students to develop as writers in the sixth grade classroom with these engaging and creative writing lessons. This classroom-tested resource shows positive results in students' writing and simplifies the planning of writing instruction. It contains detailed information on how to establish and manage daily Writer's Workshop and includes consistent, structured instruction to encourage students to actively participate in the writing process. Specific lessons to help students develop the traits of quality writing are also included. This resource develops college and career readiness skills and is aligned to today's standards.

As Gertrude Stein might have put it, a cento is a collage is a mix tape is a video montage. This hypothetical description is fitting in a number of ways. Although the cento form is ancient--in existence since at least the days of Virgil and Homer--it was also used to striking effect in the Modern era: consider, for example, T. S. EliotÆs The Waste Land and Ezra PoundÆs Cantos. More recent centos include John AshberyÆs “The Dong with the Luminous Nose, ” Peter GizziÆs “Ode: Salute to The New York School 1950-1970” (a libretto), Connie HersheyÆs “Ecstatic Permutations, ” and the “Split This Rock Poetry Festival--Cento, March 23, 2008” (a collaborative protest poem delivered in front of the White House). The Cento: A Collection of Collage Poems, edited by Theresa Malphrus Welford and with an introduction by David Lehman, features an extensive sampling of centos, collage poems, and patchwork poems written by Nicole Andonov, Lorna Blake, Alex Cigale, Allan Douglass Coleman, Philip Dacey, Sharon Dolin, Annie Finch, Jack Foley, Kate Gale, Dana Gioia, Sam Gwynn, H. L. Hix, David Lehman, Eric Nelson, Catherine Tufariello, and many others.

From cold-nose wake-up to bedtime with a Little Dog-shaped lump under the covers, a day that a little girl spends with her Little Dog is recounted in thirty short, playful poems and enchanting watercolor illustrations. Little Dog protects the little girl from vacuum cleaners and beetles, chases cats, digs up flowers, and waits hopefully as kitchen preparations take place and as popcorn is eaten. The little girl, who loves Little Dog enough to "bake / birthday cookies with / liver powder," retrieves tennis balls, brings home a present from the pet store, and observes how little a wet Little Dog becomes at bath time. A perfect introduction to the pleasures of poetry, this beguiling volume belongs on every young dog lover's bookshelf.

This is an utterly original and completely beguiling prose novel about a boy who has to write a poem, and then another, and then even more. Soon the little boy is writing about all sorts of things he has not really come to terms with, and astounding things start to happen.