Full Description
This volume of Ready-to-Use Writing Proficiency Lessons & Activities gives classroom teachers and language arts specialists a powerful and effective tool for addressing curriculum standards and competencies at the eighth-grade level and preparing their students for comprehensive assessment testing. Writing Proficiency Lessons & Activities books are also available from Jossey-Bass at the fourth-grade level and the tenth-grade level.
Included are a variety of easy-to-use, reproducible activity sheets that provide application and review the basic language skills as well as extensive practice in producing the types of writing called for in standardized tests.
For easy use, the 240-plus student activity sheets are printed in a big 8-1/2" x 11" format that lays flat for photocopying. The activities are organized into nine sections. Here is just a sample of the topics covered in Sections 1-5:
CHOOSING THE RIGHT WORD: words often confused, prefixes, suffixes, synonyms, antonyms, homonyms, adverbs vs. adjectives, sensory words, similes, metaphors, and double negatives
MAKING MECHANICS AND USAGE WORK FOR YOU: apostrophes, hyphens, end marks, commas, semicolons, colons, quotation marks, titles, and misplaced modifiers.
WRITING SENTENCES: subjects and predicates, subject-verb agreement, simple and compound sentences, complex sentences, sentence fragments, run-on sentences, and sentence types
WRITING PARAGRAPHS: writing a topic sentence, writing a concluding sentence, developing the topic, using tense consistently, using transitional words, and staying on the topic
ESSAY-WRITING TECHNIQUES: brainstorming, clustering, outlining, writing an introductory paragraph with a question or a surprising statement, developing the topic using examples, avoiding irrelevant details, writing a concluding paragraph, proofreading, and writing a five-paragraph essay.
Contents
About This Writing TestPrep Teaching Resource iv
Section 1: Choosing the Right Word 1
Teacher Preparation and Lessons 1
Answer Key 6
Review Test: Choosing the Right Word 26
Section 2: Making Mechanics and Usage Work for You 61
Teacher Preparation and Lessons 61
Answer Key 65
Review Test: Mechanics and Usage 104
Section 3: Writing Sentences 109
Teacher Preparation and Lessons 109
Answer Key 113
Review Test: Writing Sentences 141
Section 4: Writing Paragraphs 147
Teacher Preparation and Lessons 147
Answer Key 152
Practice test: Writing Paragraphs 182
Section 5: Essay-Writing Techniques 189
Standardized Testing Information 189
Teacher Preparation and Lessons 190
Answer Key 195
Practice Test: Essay-Writing Techniques 225
Section 6: Writing Informative Essays 231
Standardized Testing Information 231
Teacher Preparation and Lessons 233
Practice Test: Writing Informative Essays 260
Section 7: Writing Persuasive Essays 265
Standardized Testing Information 265
Teacher Preparation and Lessons 267
Practice Test: Writing Persuasive Essays 293
Section 8: Narrative Writing 299
Standardized Testing Information 299
Teacher Preparation and Lessons 301
Practice Test: Narrative Writing 329
Section 9: Writing Letters 333
Standardized Testing Information 333
Teacher Preparation and Lessons 334
Practice Test: Writing Letters 355
Proofreading Symbols 360
Appendix: Preparing Your Students for Standardized Proficiency Tests 361
