Fourth and Fifth Grade Writing Partnerships

By Anonymous -
Our current literacy unit involves reading and writing about the American Revolution.  Students are taking part in book clubs as they read various expository and narrative nonfiction texts.  Along with thinking critically about this time period, they are gathering information in order to write an expository (five-paragraph) essay.

The writing unit was designed to simultaneously introduce the new essay form to fourth graders and help fifth graders develop a deeper understanding of essay writing.  In order to meet these goals, fifth grade students have been enlisted with the task of teaching this new writing structure to their fourth-grade peers.  

For the past two weeks, fifth graders have been preparing to be teachers.  They brushed up on their essay-writing skills and learned some teaching techniques.  Each fifth grader is responsible to lead between 1 and 3 fourth graders through the essay-writing process.

On Monday, fifth grade teachers began their work of teaching their younger peers.  Here are some glimpses into their work:


Here are some words that students shared about the process after the first and second days of their small-group work:
  • Sometimes it’s hard to listen to fifth graders because you think they’re only a year older than me.  
  • I got a lot of work done.  [My fifth grade teacher] really explained things really well.  Now I understand what a thesis statement is. 
  • Compliments to the [fifth grade] teachers...My teacher, he had some really good ideas and was pretty thoughtful, and if we had a question he would immediately answer it.  He didn’t tell us exactly what to do.  He let us discuss it for ourselves.  
  • I thought this went better than I expected.  Originally I was thinking, I’m only 10. I can’t be a teacher yet.  This is going to be a disaster.  
  • I just got a little bit of help and it helped me so much.  I finished the first paragraph in like 10 minutes!
  • My teacher gave us websites to do extra research.
  • The tone seemed really focused and it looked like people were getting a lot of work done today. 
  • Some people [in my group] really wanted to get to the essay and they were zealous.  Others were really thoughtful about their words.  [One of my group members] really wants it to be just right, and I admire him for that.

Teachers have made many observations as well: So far, the fifth graders have been very prepared and supportive. Fourth graders have been very focused and open to the teaching from their peers.

We look forward to seeing the fruit of all this labor in a couple weeks.

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