Helping Young Children Develop Strong Writing Skills

How to Teach Writing in Elementary School?

When students are beginning to write, the writing experience itself should be an important and unforgettable learning experience in their lives. As an educator, I face the challenge of teaching my students how to write and helping them develop a keen interest in writing.

Basically, writing is one of the fundamental skills that our students need to develop. Aside from the fact, that writing is an essential skill needed in communication, it is basically needed for our learners to succeed in their academic and personal lives.

Such is my fabulous idea when I teach my young learners how to write. I possess the skill and as a dispenser of life skills, I should do whatever it takes to make my students write with the same intensity when I teach them how to read.

Hello, my dear fellow educators! I am glad that you are here with me again. For today, allow me to dish out my best practices on how to teach writing in elementary school.

What Can You Do?

It’s important to remember that writing can be as difficult a subject to teach and assess as it is to learn. Many students have trouble writing with clarity, coherence, and organization, and this can discourage them from writing if they feel frustrated.

That’s where parent involvement can make a big difference. Encouraging your child to develop strong writing skills at a young age, and to become a better writer as she gets older, can have a lifelong positive impact on her writing, and may make writing an easier and more enjoyable process for her

To get you started, the Department of Education offers a number of ideas of things you can do help your child become a stronger writer. While many of these ideas apply to younger children, they can be adapted for older children as well. To learn more about ways to support your children if they continue to struggle with writing in middle and high school, read Tips for Parents of Struggling Adolescent Writers.

Resource:

https://teachersarethebest.com/teach-writing-in-elementary-school/
https://www.colorincolorado.org/article/helping-young-children-develop-strong-writing-skills
Helping Young Children Develop Strong Writing Skills

Why is writing important?

Writing is practical.
Every day, we need to write in order to complete our tasks, whether we are filling out a form at the doctor’s office or writing an important letter. These tasks require us to write clearly, and organize information effectively.

Writing is an important element of a student’s education.
Whether students are writing by hand or on the computer, many assignments and exams require students to write short answers or longer essays as a way of assessing what they have learned. As students get older, they will be expected to show more sophisticated writing skills, and to complete more sophisticated tasks through their writing. In addition, many colleges and universities require students to write essays as part of their admissions application.

Writing can be an important element of an employee’s job.
Employees in many kinds of jobs are required to write on a daily basis. Perhaps they are taking phone messages and doing administrative work, or writing research reports and newspaper articles. Whatever the task, their ability to do their job well may depend on their ability to write. Many job applicants also must submit a resumé and a letter of application when applying to a new job.

Writing is an important form of communication.
Writing letters and emails is a common way of keeping in touch with our friends, relatives, and professional colleagues. Writing is frequently the final stage in communication when we want to leave no room for doubt, which is why we write and sign contracts, leases, and treaties when we make important decisions.

Writing can be an important outlet.
Many people find writing to be therapeutic, and a helpful way to express feelings that cannot be expressed so easily by speaking.

What Can You Do?

How can I tell if my child has problems with writing readiness (pre-writing) skills?

Have an awkward pencil grasp.
Have difficulty controlling a pencil for colouring, drawing or writing.
Show a tendency to use their whole hand to manipulate objects rather than just a few fingers.
Have poor endurance for pencil based activities.
Display messy and/or slow handwriting.
Have difficulty staying within the lines when colouring.
Apply inappropriate pressure to the paper for pencil based activities (either too heavy and frequently breaks the pencil, or too light and ‘spidery’).
Have poor upper limb strength (weak shoulders).
Have difficulty coordinating both hands together for two handed tasks.
Have poor hand-eye coordination.
Be verbally skilled but has difficulty showing this on paper (i.e. writing, drawing or colouring).
Not meet the pre-writing expectations outlined below.

Behaviour: The may avoid or refuse to participate in pencil and other fine motor tasks.
Self esteem: when they compare their work against that of their peers.
Academic performance: They find it more difficult and be slower completing these tasks, contributing to slower skills acquisition (e.g. learning to write their name, or draw a person).
Self care: The ability to (age appropriately) master independence in everyday life activities (such as dressing, eating, cleaning teeth, brushing hair).
Avoidance: Preferring to get others to perform fine motor tasks for them under their direction, rather than actually doing themselves (e.g. “Daddy, draw me a house”, or “build me a rocket”, with refusal to do it themselves).

What can be done to improve writing readiness (pre-writing) skills?

Hand dominance: Determine and reinforce the dominant hand use in precision task performance.
Experience: Encourage participation in activities that involve grasping and manipulating small objects such drawing, puzzles, opening containers, threading or other related tasks.
Poking and pointing: Practice tasks that use just one or two fingers (not all at once) e.g. poking games.
Praise and encouragement when your child engages in fine motor activities, especially if they are persistent when finding an activity difficult.
Hand and finger strength (e.g. scrunching, paper, using tweezers, play dough, pegs).
Sensory play activities (e.g. rice play, finger painting) to assist the development of tactile awareness.
Hand-eye coordination: Practice activities that involve hand-eye coordination (e.g. throwing and catching) and crossing the mid-line (e.g. reaching across the body to pick up items).
Upper limb strength: Encourage play activities that develop upper limb strength (e.g. climbing ladders, wheelbarrow walking).

Threading and lacing with a variety of sized laces.
Play-doh (playdough) activities that may involve rolling with hands or a rolling pin, hiding objects such as coins in the play dough or just creative construction.
Scissor projects that may involve cutting out geometric shapes to then paste them together to make pictures such as robots, trains or houses.
Tongs or teabag squeezers to pick up objects.
Drawing or writing on a vertical surface.
Every day activities that require finger strength such as opening containers and jars.
Pre writing shapes: Practice drawing the pre-writing shapes ( l, —, O, +, /, square, \, X, and Δ).
Finger games: that practice specific finger movements such as Incy wincy Spider.
Craft: Make things using old boxes, egg cartons, wool, paper and sticky or masking tape.
Construction: Building with duplo, lego, mobilo or other construction toys.

Resource:

https://www.colorincolorado.org/article/helping-young-children-develop-strong-writing-skills
https://childdevelopment.com.au/areas-of-concern/writing/writing-readiness-pre-writing-skills/