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For students in Mrs. Graumann's CONTEST WRITING ELECTIVE
CONTEST WRITING ELECTIVE
First Semester, Second Quarter 2008 – 2009
155th Academic Year
Upcoming Events, Contests, and Deadlines: First Semester, Second Quarter:
Monthly contest entries:
• Poetry, 20 lines or less
• Haiku poetry
October 28 due date: Patriot’s Pen Essay Contest
October 30 due date: Daughters of American Revolution Essay Contest
November 25 due date: Anthology of Poetry by Young Americans Contest
December 4 due date: Letters About Literature Contest
December 6 due date: Do the Write Thing Challenge Essay Contest
December 11 due date: A Christmas Memory, publication-ready for framing
In your three-ring binder that has been dedicated to your contest writing
elective, place dividers for each contest and event. Begin note-writing
ideas for each writing contest.
II – 1, October 21 & 23:
Patriot’s Pen Essay and Daughters of American Revolution Essay must be
publication ready next week.
II – 2, October 28 & 30:
Submit Patriot’s Pen Essay and Daughters of American Revolution Essay.
Begin the process of preparing an entry to the
LETTERS ABOUT LITERATURE ESSAY CONTEST
Deadline
December 4, 2008 Letters About Literature Essay Contest Final Draft,
Publication Ready and Delivered to Mrs. Graumann
What:
The Letters About Literature Essay Contest is sponsored by The Center for
the Book in the Library of Congress in partnership with Target Stores. To
enter, readers write a personal letter to an author, living or dead, from
any genre, fiction or nonfiction, contemporary or classic, explaining how
that author’s work changed the student’s way of thinking about the world or
themselves. Examine the website, www.loc.gov/letters, to read complete
information, including letters of previous year’s winning entries.
Levels of Competition:
There are three levels of competition: Level I for children in grades 4
through 6, Level II for grades 7 and 8, and Level III for grades 9 – 12.
Winners, announced in the spring of each year, will receive cash awards at
the state and national levels.
Directions:
First – Select a fiction or nonfiction book, short story, poem, essay, or
speech that you have read and about which you have strong feelings. Explore
those feelings and why you reacted the way you did during or after reading
the author’s work. Did the characters, conflict, or setting mirror your life
in some way? What strengths or flaws do you share with a character or
characters in the book? What did the book show you about your world that you
never noticed before? What surprised you about yourself while you were
reading this piece of literature? Why was this work meaningful to you?
Second – Write a personal letter to the author. Write honestly and in your
own voice, as if you were having a conversation with the author, telling the
author how his/her writing affected you.
Third – Prepare your letter for submission. See www.loc.gov/letters for
complete instructions and examples of winning entries from previous years.
• Level I (grades 4 – 6) entries should be between 100 and 400 words,
no more, no less.
• Level II entries (grades 7 & 8) should be between 300 and 600 words,
no more, no less.
• Level III (grades 9 – 12) entries should be between 500 and 800
words, no more, no less.
State and National Awards
Judges will select the top letter in each level of competition from each
state. State winners will receive a $50 Target Gift Card and will advance to
the national level competition.
Judges will select six national winners, two from each level, and twelve
national honorable mention winners, four from each level. The national
winners will each receive a $500 Target Gift Card, and their school library
will win a $10,000 Reading Promotion Grant. The national honorable mention
winners will each receive a $100 Target Gift Card, and their school library
will win a $1,000 Reading Promotion Grant.
All entries will be judged on the following criteria:
• Exposition (the writer’s use of language skills, organization, and
grammar
• Contest (the writer’s achievement in addressing the contest theme)
• Writer’s Voice (the writer’s style and originality of expression)
How to Submit Your Entry:
Print your name and complete return address (either your home or school) in
the upper right corner of the first page of your letter. Letters without a
return address and adequate contact information will be disqualified.
Each letter must be accompanied by an entry coupon that has been stapled to
the last page of the letter. There must be a coupon for each student; I
cannot submit one coupon for the entire class. You may download a coupon
from this website, www.loc.gov/letters, or type this information on a
separate sheet of paper and staple it to the last page of the letter:
Student Name, Age, Home Telephone (optional), Grade, Level, Book or Story
Title, Author, Home Address, Parental Signature, School (Salem Lutheran
School), School Address (22607 Lutheran Church Road, Tomball, Texas 77377),
School Telephone (281-351-8223), School E-Mail (mgaertner@Salem4U.com),
Teacher contact (Kathy Graumann), E-Mail (kgraumann@Salem4U.com).
Timeline:
October 30 – Select book, story, or essay, and author. Determine theme
upon which you
will elaborate. Develop outline.
November 13 – Submit rough draft for editing.
November 20 – Submit first revision.
December 2 – Submit final revision to Mrs. Graumann.
December 4 – Submit publication-ready manuscript to be mailed December 5.
Writing Process for the Letters About Literature Essay Contest
Prewriting:
• Brainstorm before you start writing by thinking about books you have
read. Look at your Accelerated Reader list of books you have read. Think
about how you felt when you read the books. Think of the themes developed in
each of the books. Select a book that resonated with you and impacted your
life or your thoughts or feelings.
• Do your research! Go to the website, www.loc.gov/letters, to read
letters of previous year’s winning entries.
• Develop your theme:
o Determine a central thought, or focus.
o Include:
characters (provide an interesting description of what the
character
is like)
setting (create a picture of where the story is happening)
o Do not write a book report, but rather, elaborate upon how the book
affected you.
Writing:
• Capture the reader’s interest in the very first sentence.
• Each paragraph will have:
A topic sentence that conveys your main idea or activity
Several sentences within that paragraph to support your topic
sentence
A final sentence that re-emphasizes what you wrote
• Be careful about neatness, spelling, grammar, and punctuation.
• The first line of each paragraph is either indented or preceded by a
blank line. Either way makes it clear at a glance where your thoughts begin.
• Say what you want to say, but make sure you do it the right way!
• Tell what inspired you and why. Tell how the writing made you feel.
Include illustrations.
Evaluating:
• Does what you wrote make sense if you read it out loud?
• Does the order make sense?
• Did you use verbs and adjectives in your writing that create
pictures in the reader’s mind?
• Does the beginning of your writing grab the reader’s attention?
• Does your ending tie up all the loose ends?
• Are the supporting details congruent with the topic sentence of each
paragraph?
• Have you checked and rechecked your grammar and spelling?
• Are all the sentences complete?
• Have you created a picture with words to “show” more than “tell”?
Revising:
• Use a thesaurus to see whether some changes will make your words
create a clearer, more vivid, picture in the reader’s mind, provide more
information, or appear more convincing.
• As you revise, ask yourself, “Will people understand what I am
trying to say?” This means you may have to go back and rewrite things or add
new parts.
• If some parts do not fit in with the rest of the story, remove it
from your work, set it aside, and save it. Perhaps this piece of writing
might inspire something else and be a great part of another piece of writing.
• Many good writers often revise at least three or four times before
they move on to the next part of the process!
Editing:
• Editing is when you check to make sure that all the technical things
about your work are correct—including spelling, capitalization, punctuation,
grammar, sentence structure, subject/verb agreement, consistent verb tense,
and word usage.
• Correct punctuation helps the reader understand what you are saying.
• Be sure that every sentence has two parts: subject (who or what the
sentence is about) and predicate or verb (what is happening to the subject).
• Use sentence-combining words, such as and, but, or, yet, so, who,
whom, which, that, whose, because, and although.
• Use capital letters at the beginning and periods at the end of every
sentence. Use commas where necessary, but try not to overuse them.
• Do not overuse the exclamation mark!!! Your reader should see the
excitement in your words.
• Use a dictionary to check spelling and word use.
• Let a friend read and edit your work.
Publishing:
• Your work should be neatly presented in blue or black ink in good
handwriting or typed carefully on your computer using Arial or Times New
Roman in 12-point font.
II – 3, November 4 & 6:
1. Work on Letters About Literature Essay Contest.
2. Begin work on Haiku poetry for Anthology of Poetry contest entry.
Structure of Japanese 17th Century Haiku Poems:
• Three lines in classical structure:
o 1st line has 5 syllables
o 2nd line has 7 syllables
o 3rd line has 5 syllables
• Refers to nature
• Uses ordinary things to write about significant issues or concepts,
like finding happiness in the beauty of nature, falling in love, being left
alone, not having friends, etc.
• Can be happy, sad, humorous, frightening, etc.
Examples:
The mighty Eagle
Catches prey with talons bare
Listen to the squish
Night and silver moon
Neighbor playing on his flute
Very out of tune
Small, alone, a child
Sobs and tears in a corner
Darkness gives a hug
Rainy winter day
Playing in the big puddles
Water everywhere
Related Books:
Haiku Picturebook for Children
By Keisuke Nishimoto
Cool Melons-Turn to Frogs!: The Life and Poems of Issa
By Matthew Gollub
II– 4, November 11 & 13:
• Continue work on Letters About Literature Essay Contest.
• Begin work on Do the Write Thing Challenge Essay Contest entry.
DO THE WRITE THING CHALLENGE ESSAY CONTEST
Deadline, December 6, 2008: Do the Write Thing Challenge Essay Contest
Manuscript must be publication-ready and delivered to Mrs. Graumann by that
date.
The Do the Write Thing Challenge Essay Contest is sponsored by the
Houston/Harris County organization affiliated with the National Campaign to
Stop Violence. Two students from Salem Lutheran School who submit the best
entries will be selected as School Finalists and will be invited to a
recognition celebration at Reliant Stadium. If our school has a minimum of
25 entries submitted for grading, our students will have the opportunity to
have their writing entered in the national competition.
Essays of seventh and eighth grade students are eligible to be entered in
competition. Students are to address three questions:
• How has violence affected my life?
• What are the causes of violence?
• What can I do about violence?
Essays are to be 500 – 1,000 words (with the exception of poetry, which can
be less) and no more than four pages. Entries must be typed or written
legibly in black ink on
8 ½” x 11” paper. Only one side of the paper may be used. The pages should
be numbered. Notebook paper may not be used.
Writing Process
Prewriting
Examine the Texas Do the Write Thing Challenge website at www.texasdtwt.com.
Brainstorm before you start writing about what you want to say, and begin
the research process:
• Think about these questions to generate ideas for writing:
o When you hear the word violence, what thoughts or memories do you
have?
o Where are you confronted by violence?
o Were you confronted by violence in the past?
o Do you think you can tell when another person is on the brink of a
violence act? Would you intervene? Under what circumstances would you
intervene?
o What do you think provokes people to be violent?
Read sources you might want to use to illustrate your point. Use this search
engine: www.goodsearch.com . List Concordia Historical Institute (CHI) as
the charity of your choice. (CHI will receive a penny for each search made.)
• Develop a story:
o Determine a central thought, or focus.
o Include:
characters (provide an interesting description of what the
character
is like)
setting (create a picture of where the story is happening)
plot (the events and action that take place in your writing)
o Develop at least three key activities to write about, and provide at
least three details with each activity.
Writing:
• Capture the reader’s interest in the very first sentence.
• Each paragraph will have:
A topic sentence that conveys your main idea or activity
Several sentences within that paragraph to support your topic
sentence
A final sentence that re-emphasizes what you wrote
• Be careful about neatness, spelling, and punctuation.
• The first line of each paragraph is either indented or preceded by a
blank line. Either way makes it clear at a glance where your thoughts begin.
• Say what you want to say, but make sure you do it the right way!
• You might include a separate introduction to your work telling what
inspired you to write and why. You could write about how the writing makes
you feel and what you hope it accomplishes for the reader. You will want to
include some illustrations.
Evaluating:
• Does what you wrote make sense if you read it out loud?
• Is there a reason why everything happens in your story/essay? Why
did your character say and do the things he said and did?
• Do the events in the story happen in an order that makes sense?
• Do the characters seem like real people? Would you want to know them
in real life?
• Did you use different verbs in your essay/story?
• Does the beginning of your writing grab the reader’s attention?
• Does your ending tie up all the loose ends?
• Are the supporting details congruent with the topic sentence of each
paragraph?
• Have you checked and rechecked your grammar and spelling?
• Are all the sentences complete?
• Have you created a picture with words to “show” more than “tell”?
Revising:
• Use a thesaurus to see whether some changes will make your words
create a clearer, more vivid, picture in the reader’s mind, provide more
information, or appear more convincing.
• As you revise, ask yourself, “Will people understand what I am
trying to say?” This means you may have to go back and rewrite things or add
new parts.
• If some parts do not fit in with the rest of the story, remove it
from your work, set it aside, and save it. Perhaps this piece of writing
might inspire something else and be a great part of another piece of writing.
• Many good writers often revise at least three or four times before
they move on to the next part of the process!
Editing:
• Editing is when you check to make sure that all the technical things
about your work are correct—including spelling, capitalization, punctuation,
grammar, sentence structure, subject/verb agreement, consistent verb tense,
and word usage.
• Correct punctuation helps the reader understand what you are saying.
• Be sure that every sentence has two parts: subject (who or what the
sentence is about) and predicate or verb (what is happening to the subject).
• Use sentence-combining words, such as and, but, or, yet, so, who,
whom, which, that, whose, because, and although.
• Use capital letters at the beginning and periods at the end of every
sentence. Use commas where necessary, but try not to overuse them.
• Do not overuse the exclamation mark!!! Your reader should see the
excitement in your words.
• Use a dictionary to check spelling and word use.
• Let a friend read and edit your work.
Publishing:
• Your work should be neatly presented in blue or black ink in good
handwriting or typed carefully on your computer using Arial or Times New
Roman in 12-point font.
• It should follow the format:
Do the Write Thing Challenge Essay Contest
(Subtitle)
Student Full Name
Student Address
Student telephone number with area code (school phone may be used: 281-351-
8223)
Salem Lutheran School
Grade (7 or 8)
22607 Lutheran Church Road
Tomball, Texas 77377
• Number the pages.
• With some of your writing, you might include a separate introduction
to your work telling what inspired you to write and why. You could write
about how the writing makes you feel and what you hope it accomplishes for
the reader. You might want to include some illustrations.
II– 5, November 18 & 20:
• Continue work on Letters About Literature Essay Contest.
• Continue work on Do the Write Thing Challenge Essay Contest entry.
• Anthology of Poetry contest poetry must be publication ready.
II – 6, December 2 & 4:
• Letters About Literature contest entry must be publication ready.
• Do the Write Thing Challenge Essay Contest must be publication-ready.
• Begin work on writing A Christmas Memory for display at the
Christmas program on December 16.
Guided Writing for A Christmas Memory:
Ideas:
• A moment in my life when I was proud of someone else
• A moment in my life that was a struggle that I lived through
• A memory I want to keep forever if everything else were erased from
my memory
• A moment that involves a gift I gave someone else
• A moment that involves a special gift I received
Questions to Answer:
Where were you?
Who was with you?
In your memory of that moment, what happened first?
What happened next?
What was the last thing that happened?
Right at that moment, what did you think?
What is one life lesson that came to you as a result of that memory?
II– 7, December 9 & 11:
Continue work on the manuscript, A Christmas Memory. It must be publication-
ready on December 11 and prepared for display.
II – 8, December 16 & 18:
Salem Lutheran School Christmas Program preparations