New Year's Writing Project

I didn't think I would be posting again until the new year. But I had an idea for my class that I was eager to share with you.

When I start a new idea, I get a little out of control. One minute, I'm calmly drawing something up on my computer (I use a design software called Fireworks). Next thing you know, I'm printing out templates, cutting papers up, and my work area is a total mess in about 2 minutes flat! I'll deal with that later though.



I wanted a little New Year's writing project for when we go back on Monday. I was inspired by those really cool templates that teaching stores sell...you know, the ones that look like posters? I did a store-bought one that was "All About Me" with my students back in September and they loved it. I also happened upon this really great journal prompt site this morning, called Journal Buddies which got me thinking about all the different things the students could write about.

So, I made a template for a New Year's writing paper. And then I blew it up large (on Block Posters)! This image shows a size comparison of two of the papers.






The larger poster sizes print on 6 pages and require a little trimming to fit together, but it was easy to do.












I love lots of options, so I made 4 different templates in all (lines, no lines, regular-sized, poster-sized).

I know my students will want the poster size. I'm going to let them choose whether they'd like lines or not, as I have a huge range of writers in my ELL class. I think the blank template will work well for my most non-English proficient students...I will let them draw a picture as well as use a phrase in each bubble.



I really hope you can use these in your class. And I would love to hear back about how it went if you decide to try it out. I will be posting about how it went in my class on Monday or Tuesday.


1. Small paper, no lines
2. Small paper, with lines
3. Poster, no lines
4. Poster, with lines

I hope you have a very happy New Year's Eve! Off to clean up my work area...