Nonfiction for Middle School: A Sentence-Composing Approach

by Donald Killgallon, Jenny Killgallon

Overview

Don and Jenny Killgallon's sentence-composing approach helps students all across America develop into more proficient and sophisticated writers. Now in this powerful worktext, the Killgallons use their highly effective method to help students become better readers and writers of nonfiction.

Nonfiction for Middle School: A Sentence Composing Approach offers varied practice in building better sentences and paragraphs by modeling the sentence structures of well-known authors, including Diane Ackerman, David McCullough, Gary Paulsen, John Krakauer, Tracy Kidder, Erik Larson, Anna Quindlen, Laura Hillenbrand, Phillip Hoose, Rebecca Skloot, and many others.

Using the activities in the worktext, students—

• learn the meanings of words in the context of nonfiction selections, promoting deep reading skills
• learn and apply valuable tools for writing—the identifier, the describer and the elaborator—for variety in sentence structure
• imitate the sentence and paragraph structure of mentor authors from a wide variety of short nonfiction pieces.

The Killgallons provide the scaffolding students need to build strong sentences and paragraphs, as well as to interpret challenging nonfiction texts.  With recognizable nonfiction authors as their mentors, students learn skills and build confidence as their reading and writing become more meaningful and masterful.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780325062891
Publisher:	Heinemann
Publication date:	03/31/2016
Edition description:	Student
Pages:	224
Product dimensions:	7.30(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.50(d)
Age Range:	11 - 13 Years

About the Author

Don Killgallon is the originator of the sentence-composing approach and author of numerous sentence-composing worktexts. He is the author or coauthor of Paragraphs for Middle School (2013), Paragraphs for High School (2012), Grammar for College Writing (2010), Story Grammar for Elementary School (2008), Grammar for High School (2007), Grammar for Middle School (2006), Sentence Composing for Elementary School (2000), Sentence Composing for High School (1998), Sentence Composing for College (1998), Sentence Composing for Middle School (1997), and Daily Sentence Composing (Great Source). He currently co-teaches with Jenny Killgallon in the Odyssey Program of Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland.

Jenny Killgallon is coauthor of Paragraphs for Middle School (2013), Paragraphs for High School (2012), Grammar for College Writing (2010), Story Grammar for Elementary School (2008), Grammar for High School (2007), Grammar for Middle School (2006), Sentence Composing for Elementary School (2000), and Daily Sentence Composing (Great Source). She currently co-teaches with Don Killgallon in the Odyssey Program of Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland.

Table of Contents

Nonfiction: Words, Sentences, Paragraphs

Quickshots: A Word about Words 1

Your Turn: Quickshot Sentences 15

Nonfiction: Words from Real Life 17

Your Turn: Summarizing 22

Reaping and Writing Nonfiction Sentences 24

Your Turn: Contrasting Writing and Speaking 26

Mirror Images: Imitating Nonfiction Sentences 28

Your Turn: Imitating Within a Paragraph 36

Sentence Tools for Nonfiction

Sentence Tools: Openers, S-V Splits, Closers 38

The Opener: Good Beginnings 48

The S-V Split: Good Middles 55

The Closer: Good Endings 62

The Mix: Sentence Salads 69

Your Turn: Personality Profile 76

Sentence Boundaries

Out of Bounds: Problem Sentences 84

Your Turn: Proofreading 98

A Sampler of Remarkable Nonfiction

Remarkable Events: Fascinating Details 101

Your Turn: Vignette 133

Remarkable Places: Strange but True 140

Your Turn: Researched Paragraph 167

Remarkable Words: Figurative Language 170

Your Turn: Explanatory Paragraph 180

Remarkable Statements: Quotable Quotes 185

Your Turn: True Story 201

Sentence Composing: Teaching to Learn 210