some thoughts to share, pt 4

Sentence fluency and syntax exercise: Place the word "even" in different positions of the following sentence. Then, discuss the merits, liabilities and the altered nuance caused by the various placements:

--even-- This is better than it was yesterday.
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I've found I need to be careful about re-stating students' verbal responses to my questions. Putting their words into my own can, in their eyes, completely nullify their input, and disarm their pride of participation. Instead, I'm trying to--
1. leave room for silence. Let the student's response sit with the class for a while...longer, usually, than I am comfortable with! Hopefully, this will generate some questions or further thoughts from others.
2. ask another student to 're-state' what they heard their peer say. It seems this could be a great way to keep students interested...fear of the exposure of being lost. 'Probaly need to be gentle with this strategy, though.
3. give the students a quickwrite over the student's statement/response.
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Words That Work 3 Ways
Once we've got the 8 parts of speech down, it's fun to find words that serve as multiple parts of speech, like "land", "sting", "plant", and "lock". I find that there are many words that can function as either a noun, adjective, or verb, depending on the placement in the sentence. The kids enjoy the hunt.