Creative Writing Alternate Ending for Any Text Middle and High School

Item description

Creative writing alternate ending to ANY
TEXT, geared toward high school and older middle school students

Included
in this creative writing mini-unit:

•
Assignment description

•
Scoring rubric

•
Three different pre-writing organizers

When
I teach this unit, I allow students to use whatever one of the three
pre-writing organizers they like. I designed them for different types of
learners—there’s an outline, a storyboard, and a modified plot diagram to
feature only the narrative elements necessary to complete this assignment.
Sometimes I have a student who likes to use portions of two different
organizers—I’m not that particular about it, so long as it assists them in the
process of planning their writing. Student choice does require more copying,
however, so if running things off is an issue, then feel free to pick one and
have everyone use it.

This is a very elastic mini-unit that you can use with ANY TEXT. The
assignment description says a text read “this year,” because I generally use it
with the stipulation that the students select something we’ve read in class so
that they’ll all be using texts I’ve read. It makes evaluating the fidelity
criteria on the rubric much easier for obvious reasons, but it doesn’t have to
be done that way. I’ve also done it as an enrichment, extra credit, or
end-of-year creative project and allowed the kids to pick any story, novel, or
graphic novel they like. If you want to do it that way, you can opt to not use
the first criteria on the included rubric, or you can evaluate that criteria on
creativity only and ignore the fidelity part. Or, if you have a good,
all-purpose creative writing rubric you like and have used, you can feel free
to swap it with the one I’ve included in this resource.

This is generally an assignment that goes over well and is liked by most
students, even your reluctant writers, because it’s non-academic and gives them
some freedom and opportunity to be creative. I hope you and your students find
this activity valuable and engaging.