Writing prompt Grade 4 English Language Arts
Should Copperlade Elementary Turn Off Its Courtyard Fountain?
A grade 4 opinion prompt on shutting off a school courtyard fountain during a dry spell, with background notes, a planning frame, an exemplar, and a four-level rubric.
Objectives
- Students will state a clear opinion about a school water decision.
- Students will support the opinion with two reasons and facts from the background.
- Students will link reasons with words such as also, because, and for that reason.
Vocabulary
- Reservoir
- A human-made lake, usually created by a dam, that stores water for later. Reservoirs supply cities and farms and help control floods.
Also: opinion, reason, evaporate, dry spell
Teacher overview
Students write an opinion piece for a school newsletter about whether a courtyard fountain should be shut off while the town is asking everyone to use less water. The question has honest support on both sides, since the fountain uses a small amount of water compared with the sprinklers already shut off, and the school is also being asked to set an example. Fourth graders often argue this kind of question entirely from feeling, so the background notes give them countable facts to point at, and the planning frame requires a fact under every reason. The exemplar and rubric below are written for grade 4 opinion writing rather than for argument with counterclaims.
Prompt
Background notes. Copperlade Elementary and the town of Oldbury are made up for this assignment.
- A small fountain sits in the school courtyard. Fourth graders eat lunch around it in warm weather.
- The fountain uses the same water over and over. A pump pushes it up, and it falls back into the basin.
- Some water still leaves the basin. It evaporates into the air on hot days. The custodian adds about 25 gallons a week from a hose in September.
- This summer was dry. The town reservoir dropped lower than it has in years.
- Oldbury has asked every home, business, and school to cut outdoor water use until steady rain returns.
- The school already shut off the lawn sprinklers, which used far more water than the fountain does.
- Birds drink at the fountain basin every morning. The custodian says a shallow pan of water would serve them just as well.
- The head custodian says the pump seal can dry out and crack if the fountain is switched off for many weeks.
- The school garden club still waters its beds with a watering can twice a week.
Your task. The school newsletter is running a page of student opinions. Write an opinion piece for that page. Tell readers whether Copperlade Elementary should turn the courtyard fountain off until the dry spell ends. Give at least two reasons. Use facts from the background notes to support each reason. End with a sentence that sums up your opinion.
Planning Organizer
Fill in every box before you write. Each reason needs at least one fact under it.
| Part of my piece | What I will write |
|---|---|
| My opinion, in one sentence | |
| Reason 1 | |
| Fact from the notes that supports reason 1 | |
| Reason 2 | |
| Fact from the notes that supports reason 2 | |
| Linking words I will use (also, because, for that reason, another reason) | |
| My closing sentence |
From Water for Schools (waterforschools.org). This material is in the public domain (CC0) and may be copied, edited, and shared freely.
Exemplar & Rubric
Exemplar response, written at grade 4
I think Copperlade Elementary should turn the courtyard fountain off until the dry spell ends. Our town asked every home, business, and school to cut outdoor water use, and our school is part of the town.
One reason is that the fountain still loses water even though it uses the same water over and over. The notes say some water evaporates on hot days, and the custodian adds about 25 gallons a week in September from a hose. That water comes out of the same reservoir that dropped lower than it has in years. Twenty-five gallons a week is not a huge amount, but it still comes out of the reservoir every week.
Another reason is that people watch what a school does. Families in Oldbury walk past our courtyard on the way to the front door. If our fountain is running while the town is asking everyone to cut back, some of those families will wonder why they should bother. If our fountain is off, the reason is easy to see.
I know the birds drink at the basin every morning, and I do not want them to lose their water. The custodian said a shallow pan of water would serve them just as well, and our class could keep it filled. I also know the head custodian is worried that the pump seal can crack if the fountain sits off for many weeks. The school could ask the custodians to run the pump for a few minutes once a week to keep the seal wet.
For those reasons, I think the fountain should stay off until steady rain returns and the reservoir comes back up. Then we can turn it on again and eat lunch beside it.
Rubric
| Criterion | Emerging | Developing | Proficient | Advanced |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Opinion | The opinion is missing or changes partway through the piece. | An opinion appears somewhere but is not stated in the opening. | The opening states a clear opinion on the fountain question in one sentence. | The opening states a clear opinion and names the situation that makes the question worth asking. |
| Reasons and support | Fewer than two reasons appear, or reasons come with no facts. | Two reasons appear, but only one is supported by a fact from the notes. | Two reasons appear, and each is supported by at least one fact from the background notes. | Two or more reasons are supported by facts, and the writer explains how each fact backs the reason. |
| Organization | Sentences are ordered so that reasons and facts are hard to tell apart. | Reasons appear in order, but facts are placed away from the reason they support. | Each reason has its own paragraph, and a closing sentence sums up the opinion. | Paragraphs are ordered from the reason the writer finds strongest, and linking words carry the reader between them. |
| Conventions | Frequent errors in end marks or capital letters make sentences hard to read. | Sentences are mostly complete, with errors that slow the reader in places. | Sentences are complete and correctly punctuated, with few errors. | Sentences are correct and vary in length, and quoted or restated facts are punctuated correctly. |
Differentiation
Support
Give these students the opinion sentence written two ways, one for each side, and let them choose one to copy into the first row of the organizer. Highlight three of the background notes as the ones most likely to support a reason, and accept a three-paragraph piece rather than five.
Extension
Ask these students to write a second short piece from the head custodian's point of view, using the pump seal note as the central reason, and then to mark which of their own facts appear in both pieces. Have them explain in two sentences why one fact can support two different opinions.
ELL supports
Pre-teach reservoir, evaporate, basin, and dry spell with a saucer of water left on a sunny windowsill and checked the next day. Provide the linking words on a printed strip, and let students say each reason aloud to a partner and record it before writing the organizer row.
Extensions
Have the class hold a five-minute newsletter meeting in which three students read their pieces aloud and the rest sort the reasons they hear into two lists, one for keeping the fountain on and one for turning it off. Ask students to note which reason appeared most often and whether it was supported by a fact each time.