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Mentor Texts
What is a mentor text? It's a written piece (usually a positive model) that helps students to analyze what makes good writing.
Many teachers use mentor texts as a springboard. In other words, they plan a writing lesson that is somehow inspired by a published piece. For example, a teacher might read Diary of a Worm by Doreen Cronin and suggest that students write diary excerpts from the point of view of an animal or object. This is a terrific response to literature IF . . . if books are occasionally selected for this purpose. The works of others can inspire us to try something new, but shouldn't be used as regular writing prompts.
Why not? Because prompts deny students the much-needed practice of coming up with viable, focused (and often more successful) ideas of their own. And in order for students to be fully independent during writer's workshop (to truly know that there is no such things as "being done"), students need to know that THEY are writers, and are therefore responsible for coming up with their own topics. (To read more about student choice vs. prompts, visit my blog.)
I know. We teachers can't help ourselves! We see lessons everywhere. So it's hard to resist having our students try this "absolutely fabulous idea" that came to us when we first read a story. So don't resist. Make the springboard suggestion optional. Say something along the lines of, "When I read Diary of a Worm, I thought it might be fun to try my own diary from the point of view of an animal. Perhaps some of you will want to try this today as well."
Remember, prompts alone are not writing instruction. They do not teach students to write well. In order for students to learn to write well, they need explicit models - and that's where mentor texts serve their best purpose.
So pull out your well-worn copy of Diary of a Worm and, for our students who desperately want to write funny pieces, investigate how Doreen Cronin creates humor (notice the frequent use of repetition with a twist). Or compare the voice of the worm to the voice of the wombat in Diary of a Wombat by Jackie French. Then, while you're at it, look at the punctuation in these two books. Notice how both authors favor the colon?
One last tip: Connect the technique to the writer by using the author's name. When you say, "Let's look at Doreen Cronin's work to see how she uses dialogue," you are reminding students that we're all writers, and we learn from one another.
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