Sunday, December 20, 2015

Holiday Letters - Using Google Docs To Help Jumpstart Student Writing!


This week students are finishing up letters that we started several weeks ago.  

Third graders added their own writing to an outline of a holiday letter that I shared with them in Google Drive. It was a great opportunity to teach them how to make a copy of an original and then edit using the word processing tools in Google Docs! Students were able to practice their word processing skills while writing their loved ones. Some students wrote Santa, while others wrote their parents, grandparents and other extended family members.  Students who did not want a holiday letter wrote letters to reflect their family traditions. In the end, they all had beautiful letters that they were proud of!  We rarely print the projects from media class, but students were excited to take home these letters in hard copy!


Students began by logging into their Google accounts and linking to a letter template that I created in my Google Drive account. I added /copy to the end of the URL for the letter in Google Drive. This prompted students to make a copy of the letter and not start editing the original. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1HInWdWyeFuDF1w850vyxUg1asFMl-Jqij_WkyD17rYc/copy
Once they copied the letter template, they renamed it and saved it to their Google Drive. 



In the letter that students copied, I was able to leave them notes to help with their writing. Once their letter was in their own Google Drive, they began personalizing it to make it their own. I loved reading student letters and I know their families will enjoy them too!