Extension Week: Writing a Research Report

This week, the grade 2 classes are learning how to research and write an informational text about a main idea. This will be the culmination of a variety of skills the students have been practicing all semester. The most basic of these is paragraph construction. Using topic sentences and supporting sentences to communicate information about a topic. We practice this skill during our pen pal letter extension, but now students are taking that skill to the next level by writing a research report about an animal.

An informational text has many paragraphs all about a single main idea, or big topic. Each paragraph gives supporting facts in greater detail about the big topic. Learning to organize and write information in this way is a new skill for our students. For this reason we are spending the rest of this week on this assignment to make sure students have enough time to master the skill.

Next week, students will be taking their research reports through the entire writing process. They are beginning by organizing their topics and researching details about their animals. Below you can see the assignment and prewrite sheets the kids will be using to plan their writing. They will write two drafts and revise their work twice before completing the final draft. I know you all will be very impressed with their work.