One of the standards of second grade is creating alternate endings for stories. I've been trying to come up with many different and of course fun ways to work on this skill with my students. An idea that came to me today was to let them start by predicting endings. I plan on reading a book aloud and stopping before the end...then as a class discussing/predicting what we think will happen. Each student will then write an ending (How they think the story will end). We will share the ideas and then I will finish reading the story and we will discuss correct predictions, realistic predictions, and how things in the story would have had to change for some of the predictions to be true.
Another idea I had was reading a whole book to the class, discussing the ending and then giving my students a "What If...?" question and having them write an ending to the story. For example, after reading a Magic Tree House Book, I may ask them, "How would the story have been different if Jack or Annie had been alone?" You could also make simple changes in the story and discuss their differences. For example, "What would have changed if the story took place on an island rather than a snowy mountain?"
I created a simple writing page with a picture spot and lines for my students to use when we are working on alternate endings. Download it by clicking the link below. Enjoy! Thanks for stopping by!
