Brandi J. Clark

This post is the start of a new series of posts where I answer the questions that teachers often ask me.

Today’s Question:

How do I get students to add periods in the right places?

First, make sure that you taught students what a sentence is. I found a lovely video to illustrate this.

Here is where the trouble starts.

Notice in the video, there are only short sentences with a period, question mark or exclamation mark placed at the end of a sentence, always on the right hand side of the video.

When students see these examples, they think of periods as having a location on the page.

This is because students are first exposed to sentences as beginning and ending on one line.

• their early leveled readers have short sentences, beginning and ending on one line
• teachers model short sentences beginning and ending on one line
• students write short sentences, beginning and ending on one line

They see periods as going “at the end”, rather than at the end of a group of words wherever that happens to be on the page. See below.

It has happened to me too.

I have asked students to add periods and they come back with something like this.  See below.

There is not a sense of sentence but rather a sense of location, they think a period goes at the end of a line.

How do you solve this issue?

Model for students sentences that go onto the second line. In other words, demonstrate for the students how to wrap the text.

Wrapping the text means to start the sentence on one line and continue onto the next line where the period is added. See below.

When students see sentences wrapped across two lines, they begin to understand that periods are added at the end of a sentence not at the end of a line.

Students need to know when one sentence ends, another begins.

Students need to create story problems. Story problems are connected to the character in their stories. However, students need to know some things about their character to create a suitable problem. Let me explain what I mean.

Problems are a matter of  perspective.

A problem is not considered a problem unless it goes against a character’s wishes or makes their every day worse. For example, if someone were to cancel their Friday plans with me, the introvert in me would be excited.

“Yes, I get to stay home and read.”

Yet, for some people, if Friday plans are canceled they are quite upset. However, canceled plans are not a problem unless it causes a person to view it that way. Problems are a matter of perspective.

Problems do not have to be big.

Teachers rarely forget their school keys but if they do, it’s a problem. Your day begins with waiting for someone inside the building to let you in and sheepishly borrowing a replacement key. The rest of the day you’re thinking about your keys. “Are they in my other coat?”

Students have a tendency to choose big problems for their characters when often a small one will be more manageable. For example, here is a list. What else can you brainstorm?

1. Lost items…homework, toy, jacket, chapstick
2. Forgotten items…lunch, a field trip form
3. Friendship troubles…fight with a friend, rules broken in a game
4. Scared of …a “monster” in a closet, the weather, a bully, speaking in public
5. Being late for…
6. Needing money for…

Problems are the opposite of the character’s desired comfort zone.

For some characters speaking in public or standing up to a bully are outside of their comfort zones. Speaking in front of larger groups and standing up to a bully are considered problems when the character prefers the status quo of not being seen, not causing waves.

Students need to think about what is the status quo for a character. What would happen to cause the character to feel intruded upon or uncomfortable?

Let’s look at the beginning trailer for the first Shrek movie. The character is clearly in love with himself and his swamp. He LOVES his solitary independent life.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMn8XYt2RCQ

Now, the movie would be dull if this continued for two hours. Something  has to happen, a problem needs to be perceived.

So this happens to Shrek

Shrek’s every day is upended when his personal space is invaded by other fairy tale characters. Shrek sets off for a solution to his problem and then the rest of the story is set in motion.

Problems can be created for well known book or TV characters.

To help students understand how to create problems for a character, have them think about book and TV characters that they know.

What would be a problem for Fancy Nancy who loves using fancy words?

For example: What if Fancy Nancy got sick and lost her voice?

Problems can be created by using yourself as a character.

Have students think about themselves. What bothers them enough to be a problem for a story?

Keep a “Problem List” in your class. Remind students that this list contains “maybe” problems. They are problems for some characters but maybe not their characters.

I hope this has triggered some new thinking about characters and how the story problem is intertwined. Next time we will look at the importance of setting and how it is also intertwined with character and story problems. 

Until next time,

Coach Clark