As part of my inquiry I am looking at improving the level of writing for my target children. However the other children will benefit from this new way of teaching I plan to do. After looking at the children's writing and discussing with the children I have discovered that some children need to work on adding more depth to their writing. After doing some research and discussing with colleagues I have decided to use a method called Talk to Write. I was reminded of a course I went to a year or two ago where I heard Stephen Graham talk about using oral language and drama to help tell stories before the children write. I also remember him working on grammar this way to add more to sentences. When I begun my search to get more information on this I came across Pie Corbett and Julia Strong who have come up with the Talk to Write book. I have since purchased this and have begun to read this and get some good ideas on how to approach teaching writing in a different way. One of my children I am targeting is pretty good at orally telling about his stories so am hoping this method will help him. It may not but it is worth a shot.
I admit though I have my concerns that it will take longer to get something written by them as they will talk about it and add actions to it before writing about it. Because of the environment the children are in I hope that we don't disturb others around us so will need to take this into consideration.
As a benchmark I think I will ask for their opinions on writing so that I can get some ideas from the children if this new way of teaching is working.
Here is the link to the website Talk to Write across the Curriculum
Term 2
This term I have been implementing some of the ideas I gained from reading the Talk to Write across the Curriculum book. I started out with finding out what they already know on how to write instructions. I did not give them much information and got them to write how to make breakfast. When looking at these pieces of writing I noticed that they needed a bit of work as they did not have the set out for it or some of them could not write much in the time given . There was also a lack of engagement when it came to the writing part and many struggled with getting all the ideas in a logical order.
From this I could see that there was a need to teach them the correct structure of a instructional piece of writing. I began by getting a topic that was fun them to do and write instructions for. I choice to do pop up cards as we could make these easily and with equipment in the class and also could make different ones by making small changes. We started with making a simple pop up card and we made this together and talked through a lot of what we were doing. I wrote up with the help of pictures the instructions and then we practised this orally quite a few times with actions. The next step was to get the children to give the instructions to a partner to make the pop up card. This aspect was interesting as the children really knew what they were doing and a few were quite animated when doing this and were able to do this successfully. I was observed during this lesson and it was noticed that two children were more talkactive than normal explaining the instructions. I thought this was a good achievement in it self. The children then wrote out the instructions themselves with no support. All children remembered the structure and although not many finished they still wrote more than they normally would.
From the results I thought they needed more work on numbering of the instructions and ensuring they always start with a verb. We went about the next session by learning how to make a different type of pop up card and then talking about it orally. We then came up with a chart again which had diagrams and actions to explain how to make this type of pop up card. After practising a few times saying it aloud the children then had a go at explaining this to a partner. At the end of this session we discussed any problems with the instructions and adjusted the instructions and went over the usage of verbs at the start.
Reading-
The Importance of Storytelling- This blog talks about how storytelling can be a variety of things but it is talking more about how children develop their stories by talking it through. Which I agree with her is like adults as I often read aloud my reports or things I have written to hear how it sounds and to correct my work. It is important that children have the opportunity to talk about what they are going to write so as to develop their literacy skills. From an early age children develop their language by copying and working out how best to communicate their ideas by speaking aloud.
She talks about how children need to work out orally what and how they are going to say something before writing it. I think some children can easily internalise what they want to write and others need more time to orally talk about it before committing in to paper. By talking aloud their stories this should help with "flow, fluency and feel of their writing" (Cremin 2002).
I think the more the children have the language and practise speaking aloud what they are going to write the easier writing can be. Of course it is important to continue working on giving a rich literacy base which includes being read to and reading a variety of text but also allowing them time to talk about their experiences and things they want to write about.
Term 3
This term I decided to try and get the children to write an animal report using the technique of talking and then writing. We first read some information from books on an animal going over what the facts are in this and what needs to be included in a report. We then looked at some examples of reports and took these apart looking at and discussing the different parts. As we began our reports we did this together and talked heaps about constructing the different parts of the report. Because we read the information earlier together all children felt confident to participate. Once we had finished we read through the report and did this a few times and so that the children could understand the order of the information in paragraphs and be very familiar with the format.
The next step was for the children to write an animal report on their own. To make it easier I gave the children books at their level and made sure they had access to websites that are suitable. I also tried to give a lot of support here by helping with reading of any information on the websites. I met with them to ensure they were taking notes (this was also covered in whole class work) and ordering their information.
Notes we made together for the animal report.
Start of the report we did together.
The children enjoyed writing the reports and were confident doing this. They were able to select the information they needed with many being able to write the information in paragraphs.
Writing wrap up
This year I have tried the Talk to Write approach to writing which I think was somewhat successful as the children were definitely more engaged and interested in the writing. The children also wrote more than they would normally as well. I think this approach to writing worked well for instructional and report writing. I am unsure how this would work for other type of writing though and maybe I could try it. I would like to continue doing this approach to writing a bit next year and am particular interested in the Readwriteperform approach which I have come across which is from the UK.
http://www.readwriteperform.com/
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