"good" ... BE GONE!

I began the day by greeting each child in the morning with... "It's grand to see you." It's spectacular to see you!" "It's super to see you." Etc. When writing time came, I gave each child a sticky note with one of the above words on it. I had them copy their words onto sentence strips and then I stapled them into hats. The students wore the hats and their words became their names for the rest of the day. "Spectacular Katelyn" "Grand T.J." "Lovely Campbell" and so on.You would have thought they were kings and queens! The kids LOVED this!

I gave a mini lesson about word choice, had each child bring their sticky word and place it on the board and read the following sentence.  I helped as needed.

I wrote a quick story using one of the words and we decided never to use the boring word "good" again. I then challenged students to use one of the words in their writing. Most did. It was a fun lesson and students got the point! There was much excitement in the air. A little motivation goes a lo-o-o-o-ng way! I am going to give each student a copy of the word sheet above to insert in their writing folder. Click on the picture at the top to download the word list for your students to use.