Things are starting to sizzle in second grade at Upland Heights. While looking for a way to keep their students engaged in writing, Mrs. Espindola, Mrs. Rucker and Mrs. McGinty developed a “Hamburger” rubric, a more visual approach to help students formulate and improve their writing.

Incorporating the District’s writing rubric and the STAAR composition rubric, this new formula allows the students to visually categorize their writing. Broken down into four categories - or layers of a hamburger - the students are able to evaluate their stories. Starting off with just the bottom bun, the students can begin building the hamburger by adding more details to connect the story, correcting spelling errors, making the story flow and exciting to read and so on. 

Not only were the students able to build up their writing piece by piece, but they also got to “grade” anonymous writing samples using the hamburger formula.

“It was really cool to see students working together and encouraging each other to make their writing better,” said McGinty. “They had great ideas and shared them beautifully with their peers.”

McGinty says the new lesson was a collaborative effort between the teachers to help keep learning exciting while also working toward one of the campus goals of writing improvement. The teachers hope this will help the students cook up some creativity and grow as writers.