Paragraph of the Week - Writing Bell Ringers for English - Digital Print Bundle
The Paragraph of the Week Writing Bell-Ringers Program is a highly effective, full-year writing program designed to help students become stronger, more confident writers through consistent, low-pressure daily practice. With 40 weeks of standards-based paragraph of the week prompts, this writing program supports growth in argumentative, narrative, expository, and descriptive writing without overwhelming students or teachers. Instead of isolated writing tasks, students revisit and improve a single paragraph across an entire week—allowing them to focus intentionally on content, language, organization, and mechanics. This structured paragraph of the week routine builds real writing stamina, reinforces essential skills, and leads to noticeable improvement in student writing over time.
Each Monday, students respond to a high-interest paragraph of the week prompt tied to a specific writing skill. As the week progresses, they revise and refine that same paragraph through targeted daily tasks focused on language, craft, and conventions. By Friday, students produce a polished final paragraph that reflects meaningful growth. This writing program includes everything you need to implement a consistent daily writing routine that fits seamlessly into your classroom schedule while dramatically improving student outcomes.
This is a digital and print bundle which means there are both print-ready materials in PDF format and PowerPoint format and digital, Google-compatible options for all resources. This means students complete their work on a device. The digital portion works well with distance learning, 1:1 classrooms, remote teaching, Google Classroom, or for online education.
What Teachers Are Saying About the Paragraph of the Week Program:
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Another EXCELLENT package by Presto Plans. You can never go wrong with Presto resources - they are very well thought out, thorough, colourful and engaging. The weekly topics are engaging, and students appreciate the focus on a different style each week.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ This is AMAZING! I love that it is focused on specific things and that is how it is graded. It's all done for you and the students have so much flexibility within the prompt it hits all types of thinkers.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ I LOVE this resource. Each week the students are "forced" to focus on specific tasks in which they have the opportunity to practice. Well done! It has truly helped my students target skills they typically do not address.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ This is a phenomenal resource! I appreciate the intentionality behind each day's work for the week. The prompts are highly interesting for students and there really is something for everyone in the resource. This has helped me AND students.
Included in this Paragraph of the Week Digital Print Bundle:
➡️ Writing Bell Ringers Presentation: A comprehensive 200-slide Google Slides and PowerPoint presentation that guides students through all 40 paragraph of the week prompts. The writing program includes 10 weeks of each writing type—argumentative, narrative, expository, and descriptive. You can rotate through the writing styles as designed or focus on one mode at a time, making the program flexible for your pacing needs.
➡️ Student Response Handouts and Digital Response Slides: Weekly, double-sided response pages or slides provide space for rough drafts, daily revisions, and final copies. Each handout includes targeted daily tasks and a built-in rubric aligned to the skills and standards addressed that week, allowing students to clearly see expectations and track their growth within the paragraph of the week process.
How to use this Paragraph of the Week Digital Print Bundle in your classroom:
Each week of the writing program begins with a high-interest paragraph of the week prompt connected to a specific writing, language, or technical skill. Start the week by distributing the response handout and displaying the corresponding slide for the day’s task.
The writing program follows the same predictable daily structure each week, helping students build confidence and independence:
Each paragraph of the week follows the same daily structure outlined below:
- Musings Monday: Mondays are dedicated to free writing, where students respond to the paragraph of the week prompt and let their ideas flow into a rough draft. At this stage, students are encouraged to focus on getting their thoughts down on paper without worrying about grammar, structure, spelling, or conventions.
- Technical Tuesday: On Tuesdays, students learn and apply a new domain-specific, standards-based writing skill directly to their paragraph on the rough draft page. This may include skills such as writing stronger topic sentences, integrating evidence, organizing ideas, or developing a clear claim, depending on the writing focus for the week.
- Wordsmith Wednesday: Wednesdays are devoted to improving the language and craft of writing. Students revise their paragraphs by enhancing word choice, adding figurative language, strengthening descriptive details, or incorporating persuasive techniques.
- Technical Thursday: Each Thursday, students learn and apply a new technical writing skill related to grammar, mechanics, or structure. This may include revising for punctuation, sentence variety, capitalization, verb tense consistency, or formatting.
- Finalizing Friday: At the end of the week, students use a short checklist to complete a final review of the most important elements of the week’s writing task. They revise one last time and produce a polished final paragraph that reflects the skills practiced throughout the week.
A paragraph of the week rubric is also provided for assessment after each week, which students can also use to improve their paragraphs.
Skills Addressed in The Paragraph of the Week Writing Program:
This comprehensive digital and print writing program covers nearly all writing and language standards. Skills include, but are not limited to:
Argument Writing:
- Integrating evidence types (expert opinions, facts, statistics, testimonies)
- Writing topic sentences
- Writing concluding statements
- Writing arguments to support claims
- Opposing claims
- Organizing reasons and evidence
- Hooking the audience
- Writing a thesis statement
- Author's tone
- Persuasive language (ethos, pathos, logos)
- Formal writing style
- Transitions
- Using rhetorical questions
- and much more!
Descriptive Writing:
- Imagery (smell, sight, taste, touch, sound)
- Pacing
- Atmosphere
- Figurative Language
- Strong adverbs
- Strong adjectives
- Strong verbs
- Broadness vs. specificity
- and much more!
Expository Writing:
- Compare Contrast
- Cause Effect
- Problem Solution
- Procedural writing
- Autobiographies
- Travel writing
- Integrating interviews
- Fact vs. opinion
- Domain-specific language
- Formal writing
- Imagery
- Voice
- Transitions
- and much more!
Narrative Writing:
- Direct vs. Indirect characterization
- Building suspense
- Integrating foreshadowing
- Establishing mood
- Developing conflict
- Using flashbacks or flashforwards
- Integrating symbolism
- Describing the setting
- Establishing a theme
- Replacing dead words
- Adding sensory language
- Developing emotions
- and much more!
Technical Writing Strategies (Grammar, Mechanics, Structure):
- Balancing sentence lengths
- Verb-tense consistency
- Formatting dialogue
- Comma rules
- Transitions in writing
- Capitalization
- Spelling
- Semi-colons
- Apostrophes
- Homophones
- Misplaced modifiers
- Parallel structure
- End punctuation
- Run-on sentences
- Fragments
- Integrating quotations
- and much more!
If you like this, you'll love this program:
→ Reading Mysteries Program
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