The Writing Teacher's Book Of Lists: With Ready-to-Use Activities and Worksheets (J-B Ed: Book of Lists) [Paperback]

Gary Robert Muschla (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 29, 1991 | ISBN-10: 0139711694 | ISBN-13: 978-0139711695 | Edition: 1

The Writing Teacher's Book of Lists provides over 70 useful lists for developing instructional materials and planning lessons for elementary and secondary students, plus 89 innovative activities and reproducible worksheets that motivate students to simultaneously improve writing skills, word usage, and vocabulary.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

This unique information source and time-saver for English and language arts teachers provides over 70 useful lists for developing instructional materials and planning lessons for elementary and secondary students.

In addition, it includes 89 innovative activities and reproducible line master worksheets that motivate students to simultaneously improve writing skills, word usage, and vocabulary.

For quick access and easy use, all of these lists and activities are organized into six sections and individually printed in a format that can be photocopied as many times as required for individual or group instruction.

• SPECIAL WORDS & WORD GROUPS?Section 1 contains lists and activities such as Synonyms and Antonyms (?Synonym and Antonym Word Find?) ... Hard-to-Spell Words (?Spelling Bee with a Twist?) ... Compound Words (?How Many Can You Find??) ... and Easily Confused Words (?Spaceman in the Backyard?).
• NONFICTION WRITING?Section 2 presents lists an dactivities for nonfiction writing, such as Ecology Words (?Changing Places?) ... Education Words (?If I Were Teacher?) ... Government and Politics Words (?Student Bill of Rights?) ... and Sports Words (?Be a Sports Writer?).
• FICTION WRITING?Among the lists and activities in Section 3 are Adventure and Romance Words (?The Complete Character?) ... Folklore Words (?Invent a Folklore?) ... Words of Mythology (?Modern Myths?) ... and Western Words (?Going Backward in Time?).
• WRITING STYLE?The lists and activities in Section 4 include Analogies (?Check the Relationship?) ... Clich?s (?The Major Mix-up?) ... Redundant Phrases (?The Big Test?) ... and Transitional Words and Phrases (?Why Students Succeed or Fail?).
• CHECKLISTS?Section 5 offers a variety of helpful writer?s checklists and related activities, including Prewriting Checklist (?It?s Your Pick?) ... Target Audience Checklist (?Persuading Your Peers?) ... Revision Checklist (?Self-Editing?) and Proofreading Checklist (?Proofreading Practice?).
• REFERENCE LISTS?The last section includes 29 valuable writer?s reference lists, including an Annotated List of Library References ... Bibliography and Footnote Formats ... Books About Writers and Writing for Students ... Common Foreign Words and Phrases ... Common Initializations ... Tips for Answering Essay Tests ... Proofreading Marks ... Markets for Student Writing ... and more.

The Writing Teacher?s Book of Lists places in your hands a ready store of good examples, key words, teachable content, and teaching ideas and activities that might otherwise take years and much effort to compile.

About the Author

Gary Robert Muschla received his B.A. and M.A.T. from Trenton State College in New Jersey. For the past fifteen years, he has taught at Appleby School in the Spotswood, New Jersey School District, where he has developed a practical approach to the teaching of writing, conducted writing workshops for teachers and students, and edited magazines of students? writing. In addition to his teaching experiences, Mr. Muschla has been a successful freelance writer, editor, and ghostwriter. He is the author of the Writing Resource Activities Kit: Ready-to-Use Worksheets and Enrichment Lessons for Grades 4-9 (The Center for Applied Research in Education, 1989).

Product Details

• Paperback: 285 pages
• Publisher: Jossey-Bass; 1 edition (March 29, 1991)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0139711694
• ISBN-13: 978-0139711695
• Product Dimensions: 10.8 x 8.3 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,223,331 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Gary Robert Muschla has taught grades four through six for twenty-five years and has written dozens of teacher resource guides.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

50 of 53 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars I used this book very little in my writing classes, July 2, 2001

By 

Daryl Anderson (Trumansburg, NY USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Writing Teacher's Book Of Lists: With Ready-to-Use Activities and Worksheets (J-B Ed: Book of Lists) (Paperback)

I bought this book as a 3rd year math teacher delighted, but nervous, about facing the prospect of teaching two sections of 6th grade English. I can't say that it turned out to be a particularly useful tool - for me.

New teachers might consider purchasing this book if they are both (a) somewhat nervous about the "technical" level of their own skills and (b) intent upon giving those technical elements a significant role in their writing classes. For both of these, its variety of exemplary lists of grammatical forms and genres and the like may be useful to both teacher and, in photocopy, to students.

If, like me, you intend to focus more on writing, writing, and more writing, and to surround that extensive writing with process/context emphasis such as comes from peer-peer editing or writing response groups, the book will be less useful. I found that once students had created an extensive variety of written work and branched into a wide range of genres, each required a very personal approach from me when we worked together. The occasional listing of, e.g., sight-sound words was handy; but, frankly, the student's individual work usually suggested alternatives and choices to both of us in conference.

If you are a new writing teacher, don't just buy this book, as I realize I did, out of insecurity before your first teaching day! After all, it can be brought to your doorstep in a jiffy once you decide, in the midst of teaching, that you would really use it.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An effective tool for teaching writing, BUT..., June 29, 2007

By 

Z Hayes (TX, USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Writing Teacher's Book of Lists with Ready-to-Use Activities and Worksheets , 2nd Edition (Paperback)

The Writing Teacher's Book of Lists is a useful resource for teachers of writing, but it is more technical and perhaps better suited to beginning teachers who might appreciate the 90 useful lists for developing instructional materials, activities, teaching suggestions etc. I would recommend using this book together with another effective book on teaching writing titled, "Writing Process Activities Kit: 75 Ready-to-use Lessons & Worksheets for Grades 7-12".

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good Resource Book to Supplement other Texts, November 2, 2007

By 

R. Clarken (U.P. Michigan) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Writing Teacher's Book of Lists with Ready-to-Use Activities and Worksheets , 2nd Edition (Paperback)

I taught English for nearly eight years before I found this book. Now, I use it regularly for a community ESL class I teach in my spare time. The lists of words and writing prompts are useful for students to remember the words they already know and learn a few other words that they haven't been exposed to yet. My students like the question writing prompts because they are very useful for starting great discussions.

This book can be used in many more ways too. I am going to use some to the lists in this book in my college-level English class for journal/free writing prompts. Often my students complaint that they don't know where to start on writing assignments, so the list of words and questions can prime the pump and get the sentences flowing onto the page.

This book and the others in the Book of Lists series are excellent resources for any teacher's personal library. They are great go-to staples for ideas on regularly covered topics.