Rules for Apples

I think one of the most misunderstood concepts from Kaplan's Depth and Complexity is "Rules". Often when I use this with students they think of it more as rules like "don't run". When I do activities with it, with the little ones, I usually have them think about what is always true about something. It's a challenging concept because as we know there are usually exceptions to every rule. So during my unit on apples, I had the students write "It is always true that apples....".

I LOVE seeing the beginning of progress in writing with my students. One of the hardest parts of teaching beginning writers is getting them to realize the sounds and letters they are learning to read can also be implemented to express their thoughts and they can sound out their words to write. You can see how some of them are starting to do that in their writing here.