Artistry of Education: Writing the Five Paragraph Essay -- Free Organizer and Rubric

Last year and this year I have been working on teaching my fourth graders the five paragraph essay format. The freebie I'm sharing today is my latest version of the printable forms I use to teach and grade this form of writing.

Using the gradual release of responsibility model, I had my students write a five paragraph essay about school. We filled in the graphic organizer for three activities we do at school. After we filled in the information for the body paragraphs, I modeled how to create information for the lead and conclusion.

Next, I modeled how to take the information and put it into paragraphs. More advanced writers used their own information and worked ahead at this point. I use yellow legal pads for student rough draft and have them copy onto notebook paper or type up their final copy.

At the beginning of the year, I collected all the rough drafts and edited myself. As we are nearing the end of the school year, I am asking students to peer and self-edit.

Here is what my rubric looks like. By giving similar assignments throughout the year and evaluating them using the same rubric, I can easily record my students' growth in writing.