Explore the Deck - Manual

Written by two teachers from New Canaan, CT, Betty Parker and Jill Campbell, Explore The Deck, a teacher’s resource book for primary teachers at grade levels 1 and 2, is divided into two sections. Section one includes nine units that provide a complete understanding of writing as a process. Section two includes over eighty pages of blackline masters for all activities students will practice throughout the year.

Key Features of Section One:

1. Guides for establishing a warm, trusting, child-centered classroom
2. Suggestions for oral sharing on the first day of school
3. Strategies for shifting from oral shares to daily writing
4. Setting up a writing center
5. Components of the writing process: time, ownership, and response
6. Procedure for setting up a writing classroom
7. Rules for effective classroom management
8. Practical strategies for teaching daily writing
9. Mini-lesson models for teaching individual skills
10. Numerous publishing activities
11. Step-by-step procedure for whole class writing activities: card-making, poetry, alliteration books, Then and Now Books, memory book, ABC Research

Key Features of Section Two:

1. Teacher language observation and conference
2. Record sheets for record keeping
3. Forty shape patterns – four for each month of the school year
4. Mini-lesson practice pages
5. Twenty-six handwriting pages
6. Alliteration pages
7. Card-making pages
8. ABC Research pages
9. Sample letters for staff and parents

**Special mini-lessons insert for teaching sentence writing skills and establishing a simple writer’s vocabulary

Scope and Sequence

Oral Language:
Oral sharing the first day of school
(Share Chair = Author’s Chair)
Recognizing letters and sounds
Shared writing experience
Oral sharing – talking to a friend – prewriting strategy
Reading aloud – all stages of the writing process

Sentence Combining – Sentence Fluency:
**Mini-lession using:
There is a puppy.
The puppy is small.
There is a pond.
The puppy fell.
- exercise from Herb Hrebic
Establish Writer’s Vocabulary
Special Handout

The Writing Process:
Writer’s Workshop
Card Writing
Poetry
Alliteration Book
Then and Now Book
Memory Book
I-Search Alphabet
ABC Research
**Seasonal Assignments