Adventures in Writer's Workshop

Developing mini lessons was one of the most challenging components of the Writer's Workshop model.  How do you present an entire lesson, with all components, in ten minutes?  What I learned after quite a few failed attempts, is that the lessons have to have a micro-focus.  That is, they have to zero in on one part of a skill.  For example, rather than talking about overused words in writing, focus the lesson on a single word.  One lesson that was effective was eliminating the word "very" and using stronger verbs.  This page contains some ideas for mini lessons.  Some I have effectively used, others are collected from various websites.  And still others, some hybrid of the two.