Non-Fiction PSA Writing Pathway - Resources

One of my favourite projects this year was a group planning project involving 4 schools from our district. We developed a 3 week plan for students to learn about Public Service Announcements.

I learned so much and it was great working with a group.

We just rapped up the final project this week with one of the grade 3/4 classes. Here are the steps and resources just in case you are interested in giving some of these resources a try. We used them with junior division students but the resources can be used in the intermediate division too.

1. We met as a group of about 12 teachers, resource teachers and administrators for a full day and decided that we would create a pathway for learning (3 weeks) which had as the BIG idea: Writing Non-Fiction Public Service Announcements . We wanted the students to write for a purpose and audience.

2. During the morning of our first meeting day, we looked at diagnostic writing samples and talked about the writing the students had done. Students had written sample public service announcements.

3. After the discussion of what writing samples look like we developed a three week plan. This took the better part of the afternoon.

4. We decided on a common rubric that we would all use.

5. It was my task to collect appropriate public service announcements on various topics in order for students and teachers to be able to deconstruct the PSAs [during Week 1 and 2] before they constructed their own. [Gradual Release]

I had to...

a) download appropriate PSAs,
b) type the scripts for each one and,
c) storyboard them [Thank you Comic Life]

Here is the complete package of materials. Download the Complete Set of PSA videos, Scripts and Storyboards [17.5 mb]

6. The next step [during Week 3] the students planned, scripted and created storyboards for their own PSAs based on their new found knowledge of what a PSA looks like and sounds like. The students used a PSA Characteristics chart and a glossary to assist them in writing their own PSAs. Teachers incorporated critical literacy in their lessons as they talked about creating a meaningful message.

7. Once the PSAs were written and storyboarded, then it was the teacher's decision whether to invite me back to assist with filming and editing the PSAs.

So, there you have it, an amazing project where all the pieces came together and although the task seemed daunting, we all worked together to pull it off.

Definitely a hard one to top!