Spark
When you have 5 minutes to learn a new writing strategy.
Browse by Writing Challenge
- Developing Ideas and Support
- Improving Evidence and Analysis
- Strengthening Structure and Flow
- Refining Sentence Fluency and Word Choice
- Building Foundational Skills
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Preview, List, Assign numbers, Note, Search (PLANS) Strategy
PLANS is a step-by-step strategy for informational and expository writing that helps students organize their thinking before drafting by previewing goals, listing main ideas with the FRAME organizer, assigning an order, noting ideas in full sentences, and searching for errors.
Set up, Text Evidence, Analyze, Restate (STAR) Strategy
This strategy helps students in upper elementary and middle school craft focused, evidence-based responses by providing a clear structure to organize their thinking, incorporate relevant text evidence, and analyze how that evidence supports their answer.
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The Hamburger Paragraph strategy uses a familiar visual metaphor to help students in grades 2–6 plan and draft writing across genres. By organizing topic sentences, supporting details, and conclusions like layers of a hamburger, it simplifies paragraph structure and encourages deeper content development.
Topic, Important, Detailed, Ending (TIDE) Strategy
TIDE is a practical strategy for planning and writing informative or expository paragraphs by giving students a clear, repeatable framework for organizing their ideas and making their writing structured and easy to follow.
Topic, Introduce, Quote, Analyze (TIQA) Strategy
TIQA is a straightforward strategy for informational writing and literary analysis that guides students through four key components to build strong, focused, text-based paragraphs: Topic sentence, Introduction of evidence, Quotation, and Analysis.