Learning Partnership
This Week's Learning bulletin: WRITING
Supporting Your Child to Develop as a Writer
Learning to write is a complex skill. Unlike reading, where children decode written words, writing requires children to encode their ideas into written language. There are many steps involved in this process.
First, children need to have an idea and orally compose that idea into a sentence. They then need to break the sentence into individual words, break each word into sounds, and represent those sounds using the correct graphemes (letters or letter combinations). At the same time, they are thinking about grammar, punctuation, vocabulary and the appropriate structure for the type of text they are writing. All of these skills need to come together so that their written message is clear and effective.
This is a huge cognitive process and requires children to draw on many skills at once.
When looking at your child's writing, it can be tempting to focus on the things we can easily see – handwriting, spelling and punctuation. While these are important aspects of writing, writing is so much more than this. We also need to support children to develop their ability to generate ideas, compose sentences, choose interesting and precise vocabulary, organise their ideas and communicate a message effectively.
Today, your child will be bringing home their Learning Portfolio and sharing their writing with you. We encourage you to celebrate their writing and, most importantly, talk to them about what they were learning to do as a writer. Please refer to this week's Bulletin entries for the specific learning intention for your child's writing.
Here is a snapshot of the writing focus across the school:
- Prep: Using picture prompts to generate ideas and form sentences.
- Years 1–4: Writing procedures, with a focus on using precise and interesting words to communicate ideas clearly.
Years 5–6: Writing poetry. As well as considering rhyme, students were challenged to communicate ideas and a message about a topic while working within the vocabulary constraints created by the need to rhyme.
When discussing your child's writing, try asking questions such as “What were you learning to do?”, “What was your idea?”, “What words did you choose to make your writing interesting?” or “What message were you trying to share?”
By focusing on the writer behind the writing, rather than simply correcting errors, we can help children develop the many skills they need to become confident, capable and effective writers.
Connie Apostolos
Assistant Principal