"Read! And your Lord is the Most Generous.
Who has taught (the writing) by the pen."
[96:
3-4]
Writing
Instruction Tips
Though the names may
vary,
there are basically five steps to the writing process:
1. Pre
Writing
2. Writing
3. Revising
4.
Proofreading
5. Publishing
Prewriting
the stage where the writer gathers and organizes ideas. A writer may prewrite using some of the following methods:
Making lists.
Conducting
research.
Formal or informal
reading.
Interviews.
Brainstorming.
Webbing,
clustering, or use of
graphic organizers.
Outlining.
Remembering
Drawing.
Discussion.
Free writing,
notebook or journal writing.
Note taking.
Prewriting is an
important step of writing. It should not be skipped or cut short. I
typically tell my "students" that after prewriting using some sort of
graphical organizer and then writing a good outline, the paper practically
"writes itself."
Writing
is the stage
where the writer, using his prewriting materials and gets his thoughts down on
paper. Many feel that at this stage, the writer should write and not
worry too much about mechanics or style or organization or anything other
than getting everything down on paper as quickly and as easily as possible.
The writer turns
sketches, notes, and ideas into sentences and paragraphs at this point. The
writer should have a "recognizable" beginning, middle, and end.
Tips for the writing
stage include:
- Double spacing
the draft so you have room to add editing marks
-
Before you write,
determine who the audience is. Establishing your audience before you
write, will make your writing easier as you can write “to that
audience.”
-
Sometimes writers may put down their work for a day or two before moving
on to revising.
During the revision
stage, the writer may also want
to get a
response from a reader.
Writers
usually go through three stages of revision:
Adding on.
This is the easiest kind of revision to accomplish. After hearing
from readers, writers often realize they have left out important
details.
Moving around.
As the writer adds more materials, ideas may begin to "bump" into
each other or interact in unforeseen ways. Getting things in the
right order becomes more and more important.
Cutting out.
This is the hardest thing to do, but it is often the most valuable.
By this point the writer may have accumulated far more material than
he originally planned.
At this point, the
writer focuses on mechanics: grammar, usage,
punctuation, spelling, capitalization, etc.
This is the point in the process where traditional editing occurs.
Grammar, usage, punctuation, spelling and minor text changes (word
choice, formatting) are, ideally, the only work the paper should
need at this point.
Ideally no
changes of any kind occur at this point except those that affect
presentation. Keep in mind, who your audience is and what the best
form is for presenting your writing.
Publication can
take many forms, including:
-
posting in
classroom/study area
-
submitted
for formal publication to a magazine, etc.
-
read out
loud
-
collected
in a portfolio or web gallery
-
email to a
relative
BE CREATIVE!
Some methods of
teaching writing include giving a writing assignment the first
day of the week and alloting a day for each stage of the writing
process.
Ideally, the
homeschool writing teacher will walk the student through each step
with each assignment until the writer is comfortable on his/her own.
Writing isn't a skill that comes naturally for many people and, like
other skills, is best learned with continual, guided practice. We
can't expect children to become good writers by assigning a writing
assignment and wait for them to turn in a great piece of
writing at the end of the week without any guidance.
How do I actually teach writing?
Use the above 5
stage writing process model, walking your writer through each step.
What
types of assignments should I assign?
Real
life writing assignments are the most valuable types of writing
assignments because, after all, that is the purpose of teaching
writing--for real life use. You will probably want to expose your
student to as many types of writing as you can. Keep in mind the
purposes of writing: to inform, to entertain, to persuade,
to describe, etc.
Below
is a list of real writing assignments you might try. You may try to
draw assignments from things you are studying in other subjects such
as history, literature, science, Islamic studies, etc.
compiled from a variety
of resources:
|
advertisement
arrest warrant
anecdote
biographical
sketch
brochure
book/movie
review
business letter
commercial
script
compare/contrast
cover letter
declaration of
war
deed
descriptive
writing
dictionary entry
editorial
email
eviction notice
friendly letter
game review
greeting card
how to article
humorous essay
job application
job manual
journal entry
inspection
analysis
interview
letter of
complaint
letter of
recommendation
love letter
menu description
monologue
narrative |
news article
newscaster
script
obituary
parody
personal
narrative
persuasive essay
picture book
story
play
poetry
preface/forward
problem/solution
essay
product
evaluation
product jingle
public
announcement
reader response
log
recipe
rejection letter
research paper
restaurant/food
review
resume
satire
scene for a
TV/radio show
screenplay
short story
speech
summary
survey results
analyzed
survival story
technical
support manual
thank you note
transcript
travel log
|
Before
assigning these or other types of writing, try to show your student
good examples of the particular writing format so that they know
what one looks like and how it is written.
Below
is a sample writing "curriculum" that I have compiled.
My
approach was to rotate back and forth between the four categories, i.e.
one week descriptive writing, say write about a person, the next week,
expository-compare two things, the next week, persuasive writing, and so
forth, cycling between the four categories.
Keep
completed assignments in a portfolio or web gallery.
Children usually
love to go back and read completed work and you can also share it with
others.
