What is Writing?
"Everyone has the capacity to write, writing can be taught, and teachers can help students become better writers." - NCTE 2004
Writing is a major form of communication that allows people to interact with, and learn from, others. Instruction in writing helps students understand how to organize ideas and construct meaning, processes similar to those they use while reading.
Often, when people think of writing, they think of texts -- finished pieces of writing. Understanding what writers do, however, involves thinking not just about what texts look like when they are finished but also about what strategies writers might employ to produce those texts. Knowledge about writing is only complete with understanding the complex of actions in which writers engage as they produce texts.
Writing is a major form of communication that allows people to interact with, and learn from, others. Instruction in writing helps students understand how to organize ideas and construct meaning, processes similar to those they use while reading.
Often, when people think of writing, they think of texts -- finished pieces of writing. Understanding what writers do, however, involves thinking not just about what texts look like when they are finished but also about what strategies writers might employ to produce those texts. Knowledge about writing is only complete with understanding the complex of actions in which writers engage as they produce texts.
Why is it Critical to Literacy?
Writing well is not just an option for young people—it is a necessity. Along with reading comprehension,
writing skill is a predictor of academic success and a basic requirement for participation in civic
life and in the global economy.Yet every year in the United States large numbers of adolescents graduate
from high school unable to write at the basic levels required by colleges or employers. In addition,
every school day 7,000 young people drop out of high school (Alliance for Excellent Education,
2006), many of them because they lack the basic literacy skills to meet the growing demands of the
high school curriculum (Kamil, 2003; Snow & Biancarosa, 2003). Because the definition of literacy
includes both reading and writing skills, poor writing proficiency should be recognized as an intrinsic
part of this national literacy crisis. (From Writing Next article)
Assessment Ideas
- Written-Expression Curriculum Based Measurement (WE-CBM): Students write a story for 3 minutes given an age-appropriate story starter. This is a reliable and valid general outcome measure of general written expression for typically achieving students through Grade 6 and for students with severe writing problems. Go here for a list of story starters.
- Journal writing: Check out these writing prompts, 8th grade, 9th grade, 10th grade
- Writing conferences: The writing conference is at the heart of teaching writing and is the core of the writing workshop.The writing conference is a one-on-one strategy, that takes place between the student writer and the teacher. Conferring is perhaps the best opportunity for direct and immediate teaching of the complex processes and skills involved in writing. Individual conferences generally are short, about two to five minutes, and occur while the other students are involved in their own independent writing projects.
- Exit Slips: allows the teacher to collect students’ responses and plan accordingly for the next class session, differentiating for the abilities and understanding of different students. This strategy is extremely useful in the classroom because it takes just a few moments to do, and gives teachers an informal measure of the students’ understanding of a new lesson or concept.
- Words their Way spelling inventory
- Free writes/Quick Writes: a way to build students' confidence, develop fluency, and it brings out the writer in them. Quickwrites stimulate student thinking and make it easier to "find" words for their ideas. Grammar and spelling are not graded.
- District Writing Assessments
Instructional Strategies
Researchers behind the Writing First article, a companion to Reading First, found through rigorous research that there are 11 elements that support adolescent students’ (grades 4-12) acquisition of writing skills.
1. Writing Strategies, which involves teaching students strategies for planning, revising, and editing their compositions.
- Self-regulated Strategy Developments
- Teaching brainstorming
- Peer revising
2. Summarization, which involves explicitly and systematically teaching students how to summarize texts.
- Summarization strategies
- http://meade.k12.sd.us/PASS/Pass%20Adobe%20Files/March%202007/SummarizingStrategies.pdf
3. Collaborative Writing, which uses instructional arrangements in which adolescents work together to plan, draft, revise, and edit their compositions.
- Peers writing as a team
- Online Writing Community
4. Specific Product Goals, which assigns students specific, reachable goals for the writing they are to complete.
- Adding more ideas to a paper when revising
- Write a specific kind of paper
- Structural elements
5. Word Processing, which uses computers and word processors as instructional supports for writing assignments.
- Use personal laptops
- Creates neat, legible papers
- Allows students to use spell checker
6. Sentence Combining, which involves teaching students to construct more complex, sophisticated sentences.
- Enhances quality of writing.
- Teach different types of sentences (simple, compound, complex, complex compound)
- http://www.readingrockets.org/strategies/sentence_combining/
7. Prewriting, which engages students in activities designed to help them generate or organize ideas for their composition.
- Visual/Graphic organizers
- Assign pertinent reading materials
- Brainstorming
8. Inquiry Activities, which engages students in analyzing immediate, concrete data to help them develop ideas and content for a particular writing task.
- Touch objects while wearing blindfolds
- Listen to sounds/music
- Examine pictures
- Act out dialogues
- Examine mentor texts
9. Process Writing Approach, which interweaves a number of writing instructional activities in a workshop environment that stresses extended writing opportunities, writing for authentic audiences, personalized instruction, and cycles of writing.
- Extended opportunities for writing
- Writing for real audiences
- Develop supportive writing environments
10. Study of Models, which provides students with opportunities to read, analyze, and emulate models of good writing.
- Analyze mentor texts
- Compare well-written to poorly written works
- Compare different kinds of writing (persuasive vs. expository)
- List of mentor texts for teaching 6-traits writing
11. Writing for Content Learning, which uses writing as a tool for learning content material.
- Writing as part of other subjects
- Writing-to-Learn approach
Other Ideas:
Useful instructional strategies: http://www.eduplace.com/rdg/res/literacy/lit_ins4.html
30 Ideas for Teaching Writing: http://www.nwp.org/cs/public/print/resource/922
Differentiated Instruction for Writing: http://www.k8accesscenter.org/training_resources/writingdifferentation.asp
Writer's Workshop: http://www.ttms.org/PDFs/05%20Writers%20Workshop%20v001%20%28Full%29.pdf
Writer's Workshop List of Resources
Resources
Lucy Calkins Writer's Workshop books & other resources
Fletcher, R. J. (2003). A writer's notebook: Unlocking the writer within you. New York, NY: HarperTrophy.
Fletcher, R. J. (2006). Boy writers: Reclaiming their voices. Portland, ME: Stenhouse.
Fletcher, R. & Portalupi, J. (2001). Writing Workshop: The Essential Guide. Portsmouth, NH: Heinneman.
Portalupi, J. & Fletcher, R. (2001). Nonfiction Craft Lessons: Teaching Information Writing K-8. Portland, ME: Stenhouse.
Graham, S., & Perin, D. (2007). Writing next: Effective strategies to improve writing of adolescents in middle and high school (Rep.). Retrieved February 26, 2012, from http://www.all4ed.org/files/WritingNext.pdf
Fletcher, R. J. (2003). A writer's notebook: Unlocking the writer within you. New York, NY: HarperTrophy.
Fletcher, R. J. (2006). Boy writers: Reclaiming their voices. Portland, ME: Stenhouse.
Fletcher, R. & Portalupi, J. (2001). Writing Workshop: The Essential Guide. Portsmouth, NH: Heinneman.
Portalupi, J. & Fletcher, R. (2001). Nonfiction Craft Lessons: Teaching Information Writing K-8. Portland, ME: Stenhouse.
Graham, S., & Perin, D. (2007). Writing next: Effective strategies to improve writing of adolescents in middle and high school (Rep.). Retrieved February 26, 2012, from http://www.all4ed.org/files/WritingNext.pdf
Personal portfolio
Here is a PowerPoint I created with some colleagues during the first quarter of my Master's program, Winter 2011:
writing_powerpoint.pdf | |
File Size: | 849 kb |
File Type: |