Informational Report Writing

I have had a chance to work in several classrooms to help students develop their informational report writing.

Student-Created Anchor Chart

Using informational articles from magazines like Ranger Rick provide great mentor texts for students.  One teacher took the mentor article and created an interactive anchor chart with Features of a Great Informational Report. Here are some of the features the students discovered by reading mentor texts:
*Title that describes the topic
*Strong Introduction/Lead
*Strong Conclusion that restates the main idea
*Listed Sources
*Precise Nouns and Powerful verbs
*Linking words that add information and connect ideas
*Captions
*Bold Key words
*Photographs
*Labeled Diagrams
*Illustrations