Selecting Two Convention Targets in a 15-Minute Station
Mr. Brooks runs a 15-minute editing station with four third graders. The students revise a narrative about a class field trip. Four sentences are on the board: (1) 'The two girls was excited about the trip.' (2) 'Me and my friend packed sandwiches.' (3) 'We seen a hawk near the pond.' (4) 'The afternoon was more sunnier than the morning.' Mr. Brooks knows Grade 3 language standards focus on subject-verb agreement, pronoun case, irregular past-tense verbs, and comparative adjectives, but he cannot teach all four in 15 minutes. The group's writing samples show that sentence 1 occurs often, sentence 2 appears in speech but rarely in final drafts, sentence 3 appears in about half the drafts, and sentence 4 appeared once. He wants to choose two targets that will transfer to independent writing and leave the others for later.
1. Which two sentences should Mr. Brooks target in the 15-minute station? Justify using frequency, transfer, and Grade 3 appropriateness, and explain why the other two are lower priority.
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Target sentences 1 and 3. Sentence 1 ('The two girls was excited') is frequent in the group's writing, so a subject-verb agreement lesson has immediate transfer. Sentence 3 ('We seen a hawk') appears in about half the drafts and is a high-utility irregular past-tense verb; third graders can learn to check a short list of common irregular verbs. Sentence 2 ('Me and my friend') appears mostly in speech and rarely in final drafts, so it is less urgent for written transfer, even though it is worth a quick oral reminder. Sentence 4 ('more sunnier') appeared once and is a double comparative; one occurrence does not justify taking time from a pattern that affects many drafts. The two targets also fit a 15-minute station: one agreement routine and one irregular-verb check. Mr. Brooks can note sentences 2 and 4 for a future lesson or individual conference.
2. Write a short think-aloud Mr. Brooks could model for one target sentence, and explain what students should do next.
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For sentence 1, he could say: 'I need to find the subject. Who was excited? The two girls. That is plural, two girls, not one. My verb is was. Was is for one; were is for two or more. So I change was to were: The two girls were excited about the trip.' Then students should try two new sentences with plural subjects and check the verb. The think-aloud names the decision, not just the answer: find the subject, decide singular or plural, match the verb. For transfer, Mr. Brooks should ask students to underline the subject and circle the verb in their own drafts, then fix one sentence. A quick exit ticket with two items, one correct and one incorrect, would show whether they can apply the routine independently.