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Source for articles on the techniques for teaching writing skills.

The Teaching of Writing Techniques

The most common problem that confronts teachers of a Writing Class does not lie so
much on what to ask students to write about; the difficulty is more on how to motivate the
students to write interesting and effective materials. Writing for writing sake is a drag, and
produces boring output. The lesson plan presented here, by combining the teaching of
writing with other skills, allows students freedom to express themselves meaningfully.
The first phase of the lesson begins one week before with the giving of the
ASSIGNMENT. I read (or write on the board, or make copies of) a list of as many topics
which I think to be of interest to the group. I allow the students to choose any one topic
that they are most interested in, and something that they would like to know more about.
Then I tell them to look for a short (the shortest is one paragraph, the longest is one
page) magazine or newspaper article, read thoroughly until they understood the content,
and make a copy to bring to class. No writing is done yet; students are required only to
completely comprehend the text they had chosen.
The second phase of the lesson is the INTERACTIVE PHASE which begins on the day of
the next class. Students who had chosen the same topic are called to sit together and
form a group. The are then told to take turns in reading- or reporting- each of their articles
to the group members, while everybody else listens and then ask questions to clarify
points that are unclear, or make comments . I allow as much time as the students are
willing to talk, or half of the whole class time. At this point, I make sure that students
within the same group recognize common or diverse aspects relating to the same topic.
For instance, on the topic on Environmental Problems, they would have chosen articles
on: Deforestration, Garbage Problems, Noise Pollution, etc.
The third phase of the lesson is the WRITING stage. I ask the students to get back to
their seats and write about two things: (1) the topic they had chosen to read and bring to
class, and (2) the other related aspects of the same topic that they found out from the
group interaction. I usually am surprised to find out that they write endlessly and use up
until the last minute of the lesson time.
The length of the written material required will depend on the skills to be tested, the
purpose of the lesson, and on the readiness of the class. The shortest can be a oneparagraph writing of either a summary or reaction to the articles they chose. The students
are required to hand in the finished material at the close of the period.
For a lesson on teaching skills on summarizing, I usually ask student to find 3-5
sentences indicating the main points in the article, and re-write these in their own 3-5
sentences.
For a lesson and at the same time an exercise on outlining, I ask them to identify 2-3
main ideas in the article- or as many as they can find, re-write these main ideas in their
own words. At the same time they are told to include a sentence supporting each of these
main ideas.
For a lesson on expressing personal opinions / beliefs, students are told to identify,
again, 2-3 main ideas (or as many as they think there are) and give their personal
reaction to each of these ideas.
At the end of the term, or the school year, I require them to do a summative writing which
tests the application of some or all these skills in a set of paragraphs forming a coherent
set of ideas to form an essay or a full composition. The final product would be an essay,
for example, which consists of: the 1st paragraph as a summary, the 2nd paragraph as

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the outline (with main ideas and supporting ideas indicated), the third paragraph
containing their personal reaction to the article, and so on.
The only hang-up with this technique is that it entails a lot of work on the teacher. To be
able to check students skill in summarizing or outlining, the teacher has to read every
student's article, thereby increasing work twice as much.
Teaching the set of skills of summarizing, outlining, reacting to a posted article using
writing as a medium helps Japanese college students organized ideas while allowing
them to express these ideas in complete sentences. They are trained to put ideas
logically and organize thought patterns and makes writing more interesting for both
themselves and the teacher. This technique allows the students to write freely, and gives
them a feeling that they have an investment on the topic to be able to produce really
dynamic writing expected at their level.

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Gathering evidence for effectively teaching writing

Advice from professional writers and the experiences of successful writing teachers offer some guidance in
developing sound writing practices. However, these accounts are frequently based on testimonials involving
the writing development of an individual or a single classroom. This makes it difficult to understand how or why
a writing strategy was effective and
what elements of the strategy would
be essential to make it work in new
situations.
Scientific studies of writing
interventions provide a more
trustworthy approach for identifying
effective methods for teaching
writing; they supply evidence of the
magnitude of the effect of a writing
intervention, how confident one can
be in the studys results, and how
replicable the writing strategy is in
new settings with new populations
of students.

What does the research show?

The list of recommendations presented below is based on scientific studies of students in grades 412. The
strategies for teaching writing are listed according to the magnitude of their effects. Practices with the
strongest effects are listed first. However, the effects of some writing interventions differ minimally from the
effects of others. Therefore, one should not assume that only the first several strategies should be
implemented. All of the strategies are potentially useful, and we encourage teachers to use a combination of
strategies to best meet the needs of their students.
Evidence of the effectiveness of each strategy or technique was compiled from research studies that met
several criteria. First, a recommendation was not made unless there was a minimum of four studies that
showed the effectiveness of a writing intervention. Second, in each study reviewed, the performance of one
group of students was compared to the performance of another group of students receiving a different writing
intervention or no intervention at all. This permitted conclusions that each intervention listed below resulted in
better writing performance than other writing strategies or typical writing teaching in the classroom. Third, each
study was reviewed to ensure it met standards for research quality and that study results were reliable
(reducing the chance that error in assessment contributed to the results). Fourth, studies were only included if
students overall writing quality was assessed post-intervention. This criterion was used to identify strategies
that had a broad impact on writing performance, as opposed to those with a more limited impact on a specific
aspect of writing such as spelling or vocabulary.

Effective writing practices

Writing strategies: Explicitly teach students strategies for planning, revising, and editing their
written products. This may involve teaching general processes (e.g., brainstorming or editing) or
more speci?c elements, such as steps for writing a persuasive essay. In either case, we recommend
that teachers model the strategy, provide assistance as students practice using the strategy on their
own, and allow for independent practice with the strategy once they have learned it.

Summarizing text: Explicitly teach students procedures for summarizing what they read.
Summarization allows students to practice concise, clear writing to convey an accurate message of
the main ideas in a text. Teaching summary writing can involve explicit strategies for producing
effective summaries or gradual fading of models of a good summary as students become more
proficient with the skill.

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Collaborative writing: Allow students to work together to plan, write, edit, and revise their writing.
We recommend that teachers provide a structure for cooperative writing and explicit expectations for
individual performance within their cooperative groups or partnerships. For example, if the class is
working on using descriptive adjectives in their compositions, one student could be assigned to
review anothers writing. He or she could provide positive feedback, noting several instances of
using descriptive vocabulary, and provide constructive feedback, identifying several sentences that
could be enhanced with additional adjectives. After this, the students could switch roles and repeat
the process.

Goals: Set specific goals for the writing assignments that students are to complete. The goals can
be established by the teacher or created by the class themselves, with review from the teacher to
ensure they are appropriate and attainable. Goals can include (but are not limited to) adding more
ideas to a paper or including specific elements of a writing genre (e.g., in an opinion essay include at
least three reasons supporting your belief). Setting specific product goals can foster motivation, and
teachers can continue to motivate students by providing reinforcement when they reach their goals.

Word processing: Allow students to use a computer for completing written tasks. With a computer,
text can be added, deleted, and moved easily. Furthermore, students can access tools, such as spell
check, to enhance their written compositions. As with any technology, teachers should provide
guidance on proper use of the computer and any relevant software before students use the computer
to compose independently.

Sentence combining: Explicitly teach students to write more complex and sophisticated sentences.
Sentence combining involves teacher modeling of how to combine two or more related sentences to
create a more complex one. Students should be encouraged to apply the sentence construction
skills as they write or revise.

Process writing: Implement flexible, but practical classroom routines that provide students with
extended opportunities for practicing the cycle of planning, writing, and reviewing their compositions.
The process approach also involves: writing for authentic audiences, personal responsibility for
written work, student-to-student interactions throughout the writing process, and self-evaluation of
writing.

Inquiry: Set writing assignments that require use of inquiry skills. Successful inquiry activities
include establishing a clear goal for writing (e.g., write a story about conflict in the playground),
examination of concrete data using specific strategies (e.g., observation of students arguing in the
playground and recording their reactions), and translation of what was learned into one or more
compositions.

Prewriting: Engage students in activities prior to writing that help them produce and organize their
ideas. Prewriting can involve tasks that encourage students to access what they already know, do
research about a topic they are not familiar with, or arrange their ideas visually (e.g., graphic
organizer) before writing.

Models: Provide students with good models of the type of writing they are expected to produce.
Teachers should analyze the models with their class, encouraging students to imitate in their own
writing the critical and effective elements shown in the models.

What we know

Evidence-based practices for teaching writing include:

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Teaching strategies for planning, revising, and editing

Having students write summaries of texts

Permitting students to write collaboratively with peers

Setting goals for student writing

Allowing students to use a word processor

Teaching sentence combining skills

Using the process writing approach

Having students participate in inquiry activities for writing

Involving students in prewriting activities

Providing models of good writing

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Additional suggestions
With any combination of teaching strategies a teacher chooses to use, students must be given ample time to
write. Writing cannot be a subject that is short-changed or glossed over due to time constraints. Moreover, for
weaker writers, additional time, individualized support, and explicit teaching of transcription skills (i.e.,
handwriting, spelling, typing) may be necessary. For all students, teachers should promote the development of
self-regulation skills. Having students set goals for their writing and learning, monitoring and evaluating their
success in meeting these goals, and self-reinforcing their learning and writing efforts puts them in charge,
increasing independence and efficacy.
Teachers should supplement their current writing practices and curricula with a combination of evidence-based
practices that best meets the needs of their students.
A combination of effective writing practices
No single strategy for teaching writing will prove effective for all students. Furthermore, the above strategies
do not constitute a writing curriculum. Teachers should aim to supplement their current writing practices and
curricula with a mix of the aforementioned evidence-based writing practices. The optimal mixture of practices
should be tailored to best meet the writing needs of the class, as well as the needs of individual students. It is
especially important to monitor the success of each technique implemented to be sure that it is working as
intended, and to make adjustments as needed.

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How to Teach Writing Skills

Teach letters. Teaching the fundamentals of letters (what a letter is, what each letter is
called, and how it sounds) is where you should begin if you want to teach literacy
effectively. Regardless of age level or language, literacy must begin with an
understanding of letters. If you are teaching a language with a non-roman alphabet, the
same principle applies: teach the characters first.
Teach your students how to recognize the different shapes of the letters. They will

need to be able to easily differentiate between letter which look the same or letters which
sound the same.
Size variation is an important part of learning to write letters. Teach your students

about capital letters and lowercase letters and when to use them. If teaching a non-roman
alphabet, this will be less of a problem.
Directionality is another important skill. Your students will need to know what

direction letters face and how to properly place them next to each other. For roman
lettering, this will be right to left and horizontal. For other languages it can also be left to
right or vertical, depending on the region.
Spacing is an important skill as well. Teach your students how to place space in

between words, sentences, paragraphs.

Teach phonics. Phonics is all about learning what sound letters make, how to identify
those sounds, and how to work with them. Developing your students understanding of
phonics will be key to teaching them to read and write.

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Teach your students to hear. They need to be able to listen to speech and

recognize that those words are composed of individual sounds.

Once they grasp the concept of those sounds, teach them to identify the sounds.

For example, your students will need to be able to hear an aaaaahhhh sound and know
that it is written with an a.
Once they are comfortable identifying sounds, you will also need to teach them

how to manipulate sounds within words. They should be able to recognize when words
rhyme or when one word out of a set begins or ends with a different sound than the
others. They should be able to think of their own examples as well.
Teach compound sounds as well. You will need to explain that when certain

letters appear together, it changes how they sound. For example, in English the th or
sh, in Spanish the ll, and in German the ch or eu.

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Teach the forming of words. Once your students have a solid grasp on letters and their
associated sounds, you can move on to using those letters and sounds to form words.
Read to them frequently at this stage, as well as writing lots of examples for them to look
at. This will give them opportunities to see how words are formed.
An important part of teaching word formation is teaching your students the

difference between vowels and consonants. Teach them which letters are which and
explain the necessity of vowels within a word. Teach the basic principles regarding where
in a word vowels can go. For example, it is very rare for the only vowel in a word to go at
the very end of the word but quite common to have the second letter or sound of a word
be a vowel.

Understand sentence structure. You students will need to learn and understand
sentence structure once they have mastered forming words. Sentence structure is the
order in which words or parts of speech go, the sequences in which they are used.
Understanding sentence structure will be necessary if they are to form written sentences
which sound correct. Often people will have difficulty writing naturally like this, even if they
speak correctly.

Your students should learn how to identify nouns. Teach them what a noun is and
where it usually goes in a sentence. The easiest way to explain it will likely be the triedand-true person, place, thing or idea.

Your students will need to be able to identify verbs, too. Teach them about action
words and give them lots of examples. You can have them act out different verbs in order
to solidify the concept in their mind. Explain where verbs go in a sentence.

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Your students will need to be able to identify adjectives as well. Explain that

adjectives describe other words. Teach them where these words go in a sentence and
how they attach to other words.

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Teach proper grammar. Teaching proper grammar will be absolutely essential to your
students learning to write sentences which can be understood and sound natural.
Using parts of speech together is an important concept in grammar. Your

students should develop an understanding of how nouns, verbs and adjectives interact
and how they fit together. Where these words go in a sentence and when they must be
preceded or followed by another is also important to understand.
Tense is a key concept to understanding how to form proper sentences. Your

students should learn and practice creating sentences which take place in the past,
present, and future. This will teach them how words must be changed in order to indicate
time. This is a complex skill and is often not truly mastered until much later.
Conjugation and declension are other important skills. Conjugation is how verbs

change, depending on how they interact with the other words in the sentence. For
example, in English we say I jump but we also say she jumped. Nouns can go through
a similar process, called declension, but it is nonexistent in English.
Though it has largely been removed from English, many other languages have

case systems which your students will need to understand if they are learning one of
those languages. Cases denote the different functions that nouns and pronouns can
serve in a sentence and, at least in those languages with a case system, how the case
changes the noun (generally with a shift in suffix).

Dont forget punctuation. A difficult skill to master, the use of proper punctuation will be
vital to creating well constructed sentences. Later in life, proper punctuation is often seen
as a mark of intelligence and education, so building your students skills in this area will
be very important for opening up opportunities for them in the future.