Mentor Texts

[Carol Owen]

Besides using my own writing to teach students, I like to use mentor texts to give students good models of "how to..." in their writing, and I'm always looking for more. For example, I can't teach an exploded moment without using that scene from Barry's book "After THE END" in which Janie poors the milk over Carol's head (hmmm...maybe it's because my name is Carol and I have a sister named Jane). Anyway...I was hoping some of the other teachers in the "Comunity of Teachers Who Write and Writers Who Teach" may have some favorite mentor texts they can share. Any grades (I work with K-12).

[Gaetan Pappalardo]

I've read the Spiderwick Chronicles a few times, and Holly Black scratches out many good descriptions. The books are good to use because they are short, challenging at times, and offer great examples of how fiction authors weave dialogue, description, and narration effectively. I would say the books are written on a 3-5 grade level.

[Vicki Steinberg]

I assume you've heard of Lynn Dorfman and Rose Capelli's two books: Mentor Texts and Non-fiction Mentor Texts. They are classroom teachers, terrifically knowing about books, and teacher-consultants with the Pennsylvania Writing and Literature Project at West Chester University.

[Carol Owen]

Thanks Vicki! I haven't heard of those texts. I will have to look for those books.

[Carol Owen]

Excellent! I have a few teachers who use the Spiderwick Chronicles with their 3rd-5th grade students. They love them!

[Sue]

In First Grade the "Never lets me down" author is Cynthia Rylant. It may be Henry and Mudge, Mr. Putter and Tabby, Night in the Country, or any other Cynthiadelic book. I just reach for the book and I can find the writing technique. Too easy!

[Sue]

Did I mention the word godess?

[Freida Hammett]

The Nevada Writing Project has some great ideas for using mentor texts. Right now I am working on using Dog Breath by Dav Pilkey and using their resources. They have several samples of writing based on the book, along with a thought-gathering form to use for pre-writing.

Also, the Capelli and Dorfman book was discussed on the RealWritingTeacher listserv (Yahoo) several years ago and there are a number of resources related to it in their files, if you are a member. One of them is a list of the books they mention in their text and how they suggest they be used. Since I created the list, (Excel) I see that I can upload the file here. Let's see if that will work:

Freida Hammett

[Tracey Streit Fritch]

Couldn't agree more! I think other people get sick of me talking about her.... : )

Sue said:

Did I mention the word godess?

[Ken C]

Carol -- I tend to use "mentor pages" more than "mentor texts," but maybe we're talking the same thing. That is, I use a page out of Raoul Dahl's Boy, and a page out of Hemingway's "Big Two-Hearted River," and a page out of Tom Perrotta's Bad Haircut. I think, as readers, teachers are always on the alert for examples of good writing to use for our classrooms.

Jeff Anderson (author of books for English teachers) micromanages it even more. He uses "mentor sentences." Then again, he's one of those "grammar mavens." I'm still figuring out what a "maven" is, but I'll let you know.

[Corbett Harrison]

As the guy from the Northern Nevada Writing Project who posts all the lessons, I just wanted to say a) thanks, Freida--the Dogbreath lessons is one of my personal favorites, and b) the entire list of mentor texts we have lessons posted with can be found here: http://www.writingfix.com/About_us/books.htm

--Corbett Harrison, WritingFix and NNWP Webmaster


Freida Hammett said:

The Nevada Writing Project has some great ideas for using mentor texts. Right now I am working on using Dog Breath by Dav Pilkey and using their resources. They have several samples of writing based on the book, along with a thought-gathering form to use for pre-writing.

Also, the Capelli and Dorfman book was discussed on the RealWritingTeacher listserv (Yahoo) several years ago and there are a number of resources related to it in their files, if you are a member. One of them is a list of the books they mention in their text and how they suggest they be used. Since I created the list, (Excel) I see that I can upload the file here. Let's see if that will work:

Freida Hammett

[Jason Lilly]

I also use "mentor pages", much like Ken, in which I am sharing good examples of writing with my students. For writing advice, I have used excerpts from Stephen King's On Writing, Ann Lamott's Bird by Bird, William Zinsser's On Writing Well, and of course Strunk and White's masterpiece The Elements of Style. Some of the books (nonfiction and fiction) I have included excerpts from are:

Nonfiction
The Night Country by Loren Eiseley
Angela's Ashes by Frank McCourt
Palm Sunday by Kurt Vonnegut
The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank
Night by Elie Wiesel
More Than Penny Candy by Dolly Withrow
Beyond the Apple Orchard by Dolly Withrow

Fiction
Bridge to Terbabithia by Katherine Patterson
Because of Winn-Dixie by Kate DiCamiilo
Charlotte's Web by E.B. White
Dandelion Wine by Ray Bradbury
Watership Down by Richard Adams
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
On the Road by Jack Kerouac
The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
Any short story by Ernest Hemingway
Any short story by Ray Bradbury
Various short stories by Stephen King

That's just to name a few. There are plenty more.

[Rina Kasper]

I just finished reading Carolyn Coman's Many Stones, and I know this will become an important mentor text for next year. Her writing is so fresh and unexpected I just had to stop and reread some of her sentences three or four times.
Another great resource for non-fiction is Craig Wilson's articles in USA Today. His humor and sarcasm are great for boy writers. You can find his archived articles online on the USA Today website.