Mentor Texts Provide Input


	Mentor Texts The suggested mentor texts, listed in each grade level’s Curriculum Guide, provide writing and plot models and enhance the lessons. Some of the books set the topic of the personal narrative or the genre of the week. Others model a certain plot and still others model rich content vocabulary or style. Several model forms of figurative language. Once you get comfortable with the scope and sequence of skills and genres, you may substitute other books with the same theme, content, style or plot. Your school may have most of these books in the Media Center. If not, you may order them through Amazon.com. Used library books are durable and inexpensive. A detailed list with authors is available in each Curriculum Guide and in the Administrative Support. Why Mentor Texts? Students learn to write by reading models, mentor texts and receiving explicit skill instruction. Not only does reading supply the information that writers need, but reading also develops awareness of what writing is supposed to look like. Writing style is a special kind of language. Unlike speech, writing involves conventions such as spelling, punctuation, the creation of complete sentences, sentence variation and certain expressions and sentence structures heard rarely in speech but seen often in written text (Benjamin, Hugelmeyer 92). Readers may become better readers by reading more, but writers do not become better writers by writing alone. Since language is acquired “from input, not output, from comprehension, not production” (Krashen136), the reason we cannot learn writing by simply writing more makes sense. In order for students to be successful, confident writers, they must read mentor texts, view writing models and receive explicit instruction in sentence building and writer’s craft. Writing Alive provides these.
	KINDERGARTEN The Kissing Hand The Little Engine That Could Big Pumpkin The Legend of Spookly the Square Pumpkin Circle: The Story of a Garden The Runaway Pumpkin A Plump and Perky Turkey Thanks for Thanksgiving or Thanksgiving is for Giving Thanks or The Night Before Thanksgiving Froggy Eats Out The Shopping Expedition Corduroy Lost! I Lost My Bear! The Wild Toboggan Ride Marco Flamingo Martin Luther King books The Three Little Pigs Three Little Fish & Big Bad Shark Alaska’s Three Little Pigs Three Hawaiian Pigs & Big Bad Shark Red, Red, Red The Three Bears Clouds Down Comes the Rain The Puddle The Cat in the Hat Rainy, Rainy Saturday Poetry Flash, Crash, Rumble and Roll The Tiny Seed The Mother’s Day Mice Leo the Late Bloomer GRADE 1 The Wolf’s Chicken Stew My Big Dog Animal Babies I See Animals Hiding, Brown Bear, Brown Bear, Who do You See? Animals Should Definitely Not Wear Clothing The Hungry Caterpillar Recess Mess; Roawr! Arthur’s Halloween Costume That’s What Friends Are For They Thought They Saw Him How to Hide an Octopus What is Camouflage? Animals in Disguise How the Guinea Fowl Got Her Spots Little Bunny’s Sleepless Night Henny Penny, Chicken Little Slow Days, Fast Friends The Perfect Nest Feliz Cumpleanos, Gus I Want Two Birthdays Snowmen at Night Roses are Pink, Your Feet Really Stink When Dinosaurs Came with Everything; Abe Lincoln’s Hat Abe’s Honest Words Abe Lincoln, Boy Who Loved Books If You Take a Mouse to School My Tooth is About to Fall Out Sleepover at Grandma’s Froggy’s Sleepover (Spanish) The Mother’s Day Mice Flash, Crash, Rumble, Roll The Jolly Postman GRADE 2 Finklehopper Frog Belly Button Boy Ghost’s Hour, Spook’s Hour Feliz Cumpleanos, Gus (Spanish) Whose Birthday is it? Froggy’s Sleepover (English and Spanish) Days with Frog and Toad, “The Kite” Flip, Float, Fly Seeds on the Move Seeds Fruit is a Suitcase for Seeds Honk! The Secret Shortcut Officer Buckle and Gloria Random House Book of Poetry When I Was Little The Snow Speaks The Dog Who Cried Wolf Walk with a Wolf Read and Wonder Nutik, the Wolf Pup Look to the North - A Wolf Pup Diary Wolves for Kids Wolves Wolf Pack - Tracking Wolves in the Wild If You Take a Mouse to School Days with Frog and Toad, “The Hat” That’s What Friends Are For And To Think That We Thought We Would Never Be Friends Smart About: George W. Carver-Peanut Wizard Great African Americans: George W. Carver Peanut Scientist: George Washington Carver How to Draw Cats The Life Cycle of a Frog - El Ciclo De Vida De La Rana Little Red Riding Hood (Spanish) Sleeping Beauty, Sleeping Ugly Help Me, Mr. Mutt!			GRADE 3 The Gigantic Turnip A. Tolstoy The Enormous Potato A. Davis Big Pumpkin Erica Silverman The Giant Carrot Jan Peck The Giant Cabbage Cheri B. Stihler Smile John A. Rowe The Big Orange Splot M. Pinkwater Gilberto and the Wind Marie Ets I Love the Rain Penguins! Wayne Lynch Endangered Penguins Penguin Chick Who Has Seen the Wind? Star in the Forest The Stories Julian Tells String Bean’s Trip to the Shining Sea A Wish for Wings that Work So you want to be an inventor… The Courage of Sarah Nobel Ruby Bridges: Through My Eyes Charlotte’s Web E.B. White GRADE 4 The Three Billy Goats Gruff P. Galdone The Three Billy Goats Gruff/Just a Plain Old Troll - Another Point of View (Flipbook) Alvin Granowsky The Mean Calypso Joe C. Youngquist The Three Billy Goats Gruff, A Norwegian Folktale Ellen Appleby Los Tres Chivitos Carol Ottolenghi The Great Fuzz Frenzy J. Stevens The Little Red Hen Paul Galdone Cook-A-Doodle-Doo Janet Stevens Flora & Ulysses: The illuminated Adventures Kate ViCamallio Voices in the Park Anthony Browne Poetry: If You Want To Find Golden Eileen Spinelli Teammates Peter Golenbock The Talking Egg Robert San Souci GRADE 5 Ordinary Mary’s Extraordinary Deeds Won Ton: A Cat Tale Told in Haiku Somebody Loves You, Mr. Hatch The Heart, Our Circulatory System The Amazing Circulatory System The Three Little Pigs (5-8 of each The 3 Little Pigs, The Three Little Pigs, The Three Little Aliens and the Big Bad Robot The Three Little Wolves and the Big Bad Pig The True Story of the 3 Llittle Pigs Colonial Relutionary Wartime: Historical Fiction and Non-fiction MIDDLE SHOOL CURRICULUM 1 Feathers and Fools The Tale of the Mandarin Ducks Maniac McGee Swine Lake Swan Lake Wrong Number Script Where the Sidewalk Ends But That's Another Story [Articles and editorials are included in the curriculum guides.]