I used a lot of fantastic mentor texts in my classroom last year and I’m proud of that. What I’m not so proud of is the way that I used them to “spark” ideas in the students for their own writing. I would read a book and then I would give them a writing prompt: “Now write about a time that you _______ (wanted something, got mad, left your favorite stuffed animal at the laundromat).” I was telling the students the experience they should have gotten from the book instead of allowing them to tell me (which leads to zero critical thinking). In order to allow students to have their own ideas, I plan to keep my mouth shut at the end of a story and let them tell me what it makes them think about. I will let them ponder the words and choose their favorites to add to their notebooks. I will encourage them to read as much as possible on their own.
Here are some of my favorite mentor texts:
A River of Words: The Story of William Carlos Williams by Jen Bryant
Big Blue Whale by Nicola Davies
Big Moon Tortilla by Joy Cowley
Not Afraid of Dogs by Susanna Pitzer
Those Shoes by Maribeth Boelts
How else can we use mentor texts to help students with prewriting?