Quick Writing Strategies

Free Response

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Free response works great as an active strategy during a read aloud or as a way to process a video, infographic or other visible content.

During a read aloud or when watching a video, identify where you are going to stop and have students respond. Students will need paper/writing utensil or a tech tools (Google Docs) to record their thoughts.

Provide them with a few sentence starters they can use to begin their response such as:

• I wonder
• This reminds me of
• I was surprised
• I think
• I feel

Stop at your predetermined points and tell students, "Please respond." Allow 1-2 minutes for students to jot down their thoughts then move on to the next stop. Students should create a number or bullet for each response.

After reading, have students "Hands-Up/Match-Up" to find their first partner. Allow them to share their thoughts for each of the stops then come back for a whole group debriefing.