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Writing Habits
1.
What did you do today?
2.
What did you learn in school?
3.
Describe some places you would like to go.
4.
Describe likes/dislikes.
5.
Describe anything relevant to the child’s world.
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Good writers are
expected to generate topics and content for writing.
To do this you can have your child read a book to get some
ideas.
Reading
and writing go hand in hand. Since
the child are required to read everyday, why not have them write about
something based on what they have read.
You will be surprised at the ideas or topics your child can
generate.
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Good writers are
expected to reread their work often with the expectation that others
will be able to read it. Have
your child read what he or she has written.
In the classroom, our author’s chair is the rocking chair.
Have your child read or share his/her writing from a special
chair at home. Children
who otherwise are not likely to share their writing are often more apt
to share what they have done if there is somewhere special they may
share from. Students in
the class who initially did not want to share their writing now thrive
on sharing because they want the chance to sit in the author’s
chair.
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Good writers are
expected to solicit
and provide responses to writing.
After reading a book, discuss the writing style of the author
with your child. See if
your child notices any patterns. Have
them look for word families, rhyming, or rhythm.
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Good writers apply a sense of what constitutes good writing.
When your child is sharing his/her writing, ask them about it.
Here are some questions you may wish to ask:
1.
Ask if your child feels they
have written a good piece of work.
2.
Ask what they would change in
their writing.
3.
Ask what they like/dislike
about their piece of writing.
4.
Ask where they got the topic
from.
5.
Ask why they wrote about that
specific topic.
Types of Writing
Narrative Writing or Writing a Story
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Good writers are
expected to be able to write a fictional and autobiographical story.
By the end of first grade, the students are expected to be able
to write a story about themselves.
The story may be a retelling of an actual event or it can be
something made up. A good
activity that you can do to get your children writing about themselves
is to have your child write about what they have done on a weekend
every Sunday afternoon. Have
them write a story about what they did that weekend.
You may also have them write a story about how the school week
went on Friday or Saturday. Children
love the opportunity to share their experiences.
Have them share their experiences through writing.
To have children write a made up story about themselves, have
them write about what they wished they could have done.
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Good writers evidence a plan in their
writing, including making decisions about where in a sequence of
events they should enter. This
is where your child plans the events in his/her own story.
To do this, have your child plan what will happen first, next,
and last. Tie this to your
reading. After reading a
story, discuss the specific sequence of events in the story.
Have your child tell you what happened first, next, and last in
the story. They should be
able to do this since we have been doing this all year.
Then have your child write his/her own story, keeping in mind
to follow a sequence of events.
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Good writers develop a narrative or retelling containing two or more
appropriately sequenced events that readers can reconstruct easily,
which the author then often reacts to, comments on, evaluates, sums up
or ties together. Again,
this ties into the statement above regarding first, next, and last.
Your child’s writing needs to contain a first event, followed
by a second event that is tied to the first event, and then a last
event that sums the story up. Use
books that you have read with your child to model this.
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Good writers frequently incorporate drawings, diagrams or other suitable
graphics with written text, as well as gestures, intonation and
role-played voices with oral renditions.
Quite simply, have your child draw a picture that relates to
their written story. Use
picture books to model this aspect of writing.
The students often pick the books that contain colorful
pictures. Use that to help
your child write. Have
them create their own colorful picture to make his/her own story more
fun. As for gestures,
intonation, and role played voices, model that when you read to your
children. Make up funny
voices for different characters. You
will find the more you do that, the more your child will imitate that
and begin to do that with his/her own writing.
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Good writers demonstrate a growing awareness of author’s craft by
employing some writing strategies, such as using dialogue, transitions
or time cue words; giving concrete details; and providing some sense
of closure (for example, “The End,” “And I will never forget
that day,” “I was glad to have my dog back. I will never forget to
love him again”). Have
your child use dialogue (or “talking marks”) in his/her writing.
If you happen to read a book to your child that contains
“talking marks”, see if your child can spot them.
Ask your child to explain what they are and then use them in
his/her own writing.
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Good writers imitate narrative elements and derive stories from books they
have read or had read to them. There
is nothing wrong with having your child imitate a writing style he/she
has observed in a story read to them.
The children are beginning writers.
This allows them the opportunity to grow and develop their
writing skills. They will
eventually develop their own writing style but in the meantime, allow
them to attempt to imitate what they see.
Bill Martin’s Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What do you See? was an excellent book that provided
the students an opportunity to imitate a very easy writing style.
The students each wrote over a dozen sentences based upon this
book alone. Granted, they
imitated the book but they also added their own touches to the story.
Imitating a writing style allows your child to experiment with
his/her own writing as well as feel successful.
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Good writers in some cases, begin to recount not just events but also
reactions, signaled by phrases like “I wondered,” “I noticed,”
“I thought” or “I said to myself.”
Ask your child if they noticed anything about his/her own
writing. This will promote
higher level thinking in your child and ultimately improve his/her own
story writing skills.
Informing Others: Report or
Informational Writing
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Good writers gather information pertinent to a topic, sort it into major
categories – possibly using headings or chapters – and report it
to others. Report writing
is taught at the end of first grade.
You can, however, start now by doing a few things.
First of all, have your child research what they are learning
about in science. For
example, we are studying plants in science.
Have your child look up the term in a dictionary.
If you have an encyclopedia, have your child look up plants in
the encyclopedia. They may
not be able to read what they find but it gets them in the habit of
looking for information. Allow
them to use the internet if possible.
An excellent search engine for children is
http://www.yahooligans.com . This site is child friendly and
easy to navigate. Visit
the public library and research topics there.
You may also have your child research things he/she may be
interested in. You may
also have your child research holidays or current events.
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Good writers can independently recognize and exclude or delete extraneous
information according to appropriate standards governing what
“fits”. After your
child shares his/her writing, ask them if all of the information they
wrote fit in with the report. Model
this by researching something in the encyclopedia or off the internet.
As you read something to your child, insert a silly sentence
that does not belong with what you are reading.
Chances are your child will question the statement.
Have them explain why the statement does not fit.
If they do not question you regarding the statement, ask them
if the statement belongs. Again,
this promotes higher
order
thinking as well as gets your child in the habit of sticking to the topic
in his/her writing.
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Good writers demonstrate a growing desire and ability to communicate with
readers by using details to develop their points; sometimes including
pictures, diagrams, maps and other graphics that enhance the
reader’s understanding of the text.
Allow your child to research various topics and focus on the
pictures, diagrams, etc. the author uses in his or her book.
When your child writes a report, allow them to include their
own illustrations to support their writing.
Getting Things Done: Functional
Writing
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Good writers are
able to write clear instructions.
When having the students write instructions, I have them use 4
specific words to start each of their sentences.
They must use First,
Then, Next, and Last.
By using these words, the students are forced to keep their
instructions in
order
and focused. To get your children in the habit of
using instructions, allow them to look at instructions for a game or a
recipe book. Let them
write how to do things such as ride a bike or bake a cake.
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Good writers describe, in appropriate
sequence and with a few details, the steps one must take to make or do
a particular thing. By
getting the students in the habit of using First, Then, Next, and Last, it is keeping the
students writing in sequence.
Producing Literature
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Good writers are able to write stories, memoirs, poems, songs and other
literary forms. By the end
of the year, the students should be able to write in a variety of
styles. This is why we ask
that they read many genres besides simple fiction.
I strongly urge you to allow your children to read non-fiction,
fables (stories with a lesson), poetry, action/adventure, mystery,
fantasy, and fairy tales to name just a few.
For an assortment of stories, visit http://www.readingatoz.com. I would
also suggest using http://www.yahooligans.com.
to research other sites as well.
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Good writers demonstrate not only an awareness of but also an ability to
reproduce some of the literary language and styles they hear and read
in the classroom (these may include alliteration, metaphor, simile,
rhythm, complex syntax, descriptive detail, sound effects, dialogue,
gestures, familiar story grammars or plot lines and rhyme schemes).
As I stated before, allow the children to try to imitate the
writing styles of author’s they have read.
This will help them to develop their own style in the long run.
-
Good writers imitate a text or write in a genre when they respond to it.
Responding to Literature
-
Good writers can re-enact and retell stories,
songs, poems, plays and other literary works they encounter.
After reading a story to your children or even after they read
a story, have them respond to the story.
Ask them to tell you a little bit about the story in writing.
Allow them to also draw a picture.
This will not only improve their writing but will also improve
their reading comprehension.
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Good writers produce simple evaluative expressions about the text such as
“I like the story because…” or “I like the part where…”.
After reading a story, you can even start their written
response for them with some of the following statements:
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I like it when..
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My favorite part
was when…
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I like the part
when…
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This story reminds
me of…
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The main character
reminds me of…
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This story made me
think of...
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Good writers can
compare two books on the same theme.
To do this, I suggest looking for fairy tales such as The
Three Little Pigs or Cinderella. Most of
these types of stories have multiple versions written in a different
style. They may even have
a different title but they are an excellent starting point for
comparing books on the same theme.
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Good writers can discuss several books on the
same theme.
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Good writers can make explicit reference to parts of the text when
presenting or defending a claim and present a plausible interpretation
of the book. A simple way
to get your child to do this is to ask him/her why they wrote
something. For example, if
after reading Cinderella , your child
responds that Cinderella’s sisters were mean, ask him/her why.
Your child should be able to site specific examples from the
story to support that statement.
Language Use and Conventions
-
Good writers can vary sentence openers instead of relying on the same
sentence stem (for example, “I like books,” “I like dogs,” “I
like my mom,”). When your
child writes, if you notice the word “I” used frequently at the
beginning, have them see if they can re-write the sentence in a
different way.
-
Good writers use a wide range of the syntactic patterns typical of spoken
language. Again, all of the
sentences should vary in your child’s writing.
-
Good writers use newly learned words they like from their reading, the
books they hear read, words on the classroom walls and talk.
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Good writers produce writing that contains a large proportion of correctly
spelled, high frequency words. This
is why the students are expected to know almost 200 sight words by the
end of the year. The more
they practice the words, the better their spelling will become.
This is also why students are asked to read at least 15 minutes a
day. The more words a child
is exposed to, the better they become at reading and writing.
-
Good writers write text that usually can be
read by the child and others- regardless of the scarcity of correctly
spelled words – because most of the perceived sounds in unfamiliar
words are phonetically represented.
You will notice in your child’s writing that he/she will spell
words the way they sound. This
is not incorrect initially. This
is how writing begins. The words will eventually be spelled correctly as
your child’s vocabulary increases.
-
Good writers draw on a range of resources for deciding how to spell
unfamiliar words, including strategies like segmenting, sounding out,
and matching to familiar words and word parts.
This is why it is very important not to spell out every word for
your child. Make them look
up the word on their sight word list.
Allow them to sound the word out in an attempt to spell it.
They will make mistakes but as their vocabulary grows, the
writing will become better.
-
Good writers automatically spell some familiar words and word endings
correctly. This is why it is
so important for the children to know their sight words.
These words must be automatic by the end of the year.
If they practice a few of the sight words each week, they will
master them by the end of the year.
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Good writers demonstrate interest and awareness by approximating the use
of some punctuation, including exclamation points, quotation marks,
periods, question marks, ellipses, colons, and capitalization of proper
names and sentence beginnings. As
your child writes, make sure they are writing in complete sentences.
Use books that they have read to model how they are supposed to
write. Children learn by
observing so allow them to observe punctuation in actual texts.
Ask them how a sentence ends in a story they have read.
Point to specific punctuation marks and ask your child to explain
them to you.
-
Good writers use punctuation accurately and sometimes use conventions that
are borrowed from a favorite author to add emphasis, suggest mood, be
clear and direct readers to use particular intonations.
Again, use books to model this.
Have your child observe the conventions in a book.
Suggested
Links
http://www.yahooligans.com
http://www.cs.bilkent.edu.tr/~david/derya/ywc.html
http://www.storycraft.com/
http://www.cyberkids.com/
http://www.kidpub.org/kidpub//
http://www.kidinfo.com/Language_Arts/Writing.html
Quick
Writing Ideas
1.
Have
your child write daily in a journal or diary.
Give them free choice on what they want to write about.
2.
Have
your child respond to a story that has been read to them or that he/she has
read. Here are some suggested
prompts:
-
This
story makes me think of…
-
I
like the part…
-
I
don’t like when…
-
This
story reminds me of…
-
My
favorite part was when…
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My
favorite character was…
3.
Allow
your child to use the word processor or computer to write on.
4.
Participate
in writing contests whenever possible.
5.
Visit
websites that allow for story writing and sharing of stories.
6.
Allow
your child to email friends or relatives.
This is excellent writing practice as well as practice for computer
usage.
7.
Encourage your child to write for different purposes (grocery lists,
thank-you letters, invitations) and praise his/her work
8. Practice
in writing will help your child to become a
better writer.
9.
Have your child write notes to you to tell you where he is going and
what he/she is doing when he goes out to play.
10. Work with your
child to write letters to friends and relatives. Give stamps, envelopes and
writing paper to your child as a gift.
11. Have your child
write letters, notes, or reminders
for you.
12. Make original
greeting cards and
envelopes.
13. Write stories
together about things that interest
your child.
Suggested
Prompts
What is...
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What
is something you like about yourself?
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What
is something you do well?
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What
is your favorite room in your home and why?
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What
is a good neighbor?
-
What
is your favorite time of day?
-
What
is your idea of a dull evening?
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What
is your most indispensable possession and why?
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What
is your favorite song and why?
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What
is the best birthday present you ever received?
-
What
is the best birthday present you could receive?
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What
is something that makes you feel sad?
-
What
is your favorite book and why?
-
What
is something that really bugs you?
-
What
is something that really makes you angry?
-
What
is your favorite holiday? What makes this holiday special?
-
What
is your favorite day of the week?
-
What
is your favorite month? Why?
What if...
-
What
would happen if you could fly whenever you wanted? When would you use
this ability?
-
What
would happen if there were no television? Why would this be good? bad?
-
What
would happen if everyone lived in space? What type of houses would they
live in? What type of clothing would they wear? What type of food would
they eat? How would they travel?
-
What
if cows gave root beer instead of milk?
-
What
if all the streets were rivers? What would be different?
-
What
would happen if people never co-operated? Why do you think it is
important to co-operate?
-
What
would happen if animals could talk? What are some of the questions you
would like to ask animals?
-
What
would happen if you could become invisible whenever you wanted to? What
are some of the things you could do that you cannot do now?
-
What
would happen if everyone wore the same clothes?
-
What
would happen if you threw a piece of trash on the ground? What if
everyone did?
-
What
if you could walk up walls and across ceilings?
-
What
would happen if you grew taller than trees? How would this change your
life?
-
What
would happen if children ruled the world?
-
What
would happen if there were no cars, buses, trains, boats, or planes? How
would this change your life?
-
What
if everyone lived under water? Where would people live? What games would
children play? What would school be like?
-
What
would happen if you found gold in your backyard?
-
What
would you do if You were the teacher and everyone forgot his homework?
-
What
would you do if Your friend had a broken leg? How would you cheer him
up?
-
What
would you do if your jelly sandwich fell upside down on the floor?
-
What
would you do if you were at home and your homework was at school?
-
What
would you do if you dropped the cookie jar and it broke?
-
What
would you do if you were invited to two parties on the same day?
-
What
would you do if someone said you did something wrong and you didn't?
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What
would you do if your new shoes felt fine in the store but now they are
hurting?
-
What
would you do if you found in the street?
-
What
would you do if you found a magic wand?
-
What
would you do if you wanted to be friends with someone who spoke no
English?
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If you
could have been someone in history, who would you have been?
-
If you
could only take 3 people with you on a trip around the world, who would
you take and why?
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If you
could give any gift in the world, what would you give and to whom?
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If you
could live anywhere in the world, where would it be?
-
If you
received as a gift, what would you do with it?
-
If you
could do whatever you wanted to right now, what would you do?
-
If you
were principal of this school, what would you do?
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If you
were a mouse in your house in the evening, what would you see your
family doing?
-
If you
were five years older you would...
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If you
were lost in the woods and it got dark, what would you do?
-
If it
were your job to decide what shows can be on TV, how would you choose?
-
If
there were no rules, what do you think would happen?
-
If you
could participate in an Olympic event, which one would you choose and
why?
-
If you
could break the Guinness Book of Records it would be for?
-
If you
had to describe yourself as a color, which would you choose?
What do you think...
-
What
do you think of 3D movies?
-
What
do you think the world needs now?
-
What
do you think your friends say to each other when you're not around?
-
What
do you think about the amount of violence on T.V.?
-
What
do you think about having set rules for people to follow?
-
What
do you think the world will be like when you are a grown up?
-
What
do you think makes a good friend?
-
What
do you think makes a happy family?
-
What
things do you think are beautiful?
What...misc.
-
What
do you like most about yourself?
-
What
do you like to do in your free time?
-
What
kind of animal would you like to be and why?
-
What
kind of trophy would you like to win?
-
What
TV or movie star would you like to invite to your birthday party?
-
What
are you afraid of? Why?
-
What
are junk foods?
-
What
are some nutritious foods that you like?
-
What
are some rules you have to follow at home?
-
What
makes your best friend your best friend?
-
What
makes you laugh?
-
What
would you invent to make life better?
-
What
would you do to entertain your family without spending any money?
-
What
effects does watching violence have on people?
-
What
effects do cigarette and alcohol advertising have on young people?
-
What
kind of TV. commercial would you like to make? Describe it.
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What
kind of pet would you most like to have--monkey, snake, goat--why?
-
What
kind of program do you enjoy most on TV--detective shows, comedies, game
shows--and why?
-
What
advice would you give a new student?
-
What
advice would you give to someone who stole something but now feels
guilty?
-
What
things are better than going to school? Why?
-
What
talents do you have?
-
What
three words would describe you right now?
-
What
four things are most important in your life?
-
What
color makes you think of happiness?
-
What
has been the most fun activity at school so far?
-
What
quality do you like about yourself--creativity, personality,
appearance--why?
-
What
do you do for exercise?
How...
-
How do
you feel when it's your birthday? Why?
-
How do
you feel on the first day of winter? Why?
-
How do
you feel when you do something wrong?
-
How do
you feel when you do something that is very good?
-
How
would you feel if a new child moved into your neighborhood?
-
How do
you think the new child would feel?
-
How do
you feel when you have had a fight with your best friend?
-
How do
you think your friend felt?
-
How do
you feel when you are in bed with the lights out?
-
How do
you feel when you want something very badly and you cannot have it? Why
is this so important to have?
-
How do
you feel on a warm sunny day?
-
How do
you feel when you stay with a babysitter?
-
How do
you feel when you're leaving home on vacation?
-
How do
you feel when you sleep at someone's house?
-
How do
you feel during a thunderstorm?
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How do
you feel on the first day of school?
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