Writing Traits: Keys to Writing Success

 

 

Trouble getting your students to write a good writing piece?

Well look no further, here’s what my Blog is all about this week. 😊  

 Incorporating the traits of writing and the writing process as students advance from one writing development stage to the next, will benefit both the student as they grasp the knowledge required to become exceptional writers. The teacher is also taken into consideration as they work together to impart this knowledge that will eventually turn into skills. The writing process which includes the planning, drafting, revising, editing, and publishing of any writing piece is the step-by-step process that writers use to develop their writing pieces. When students are taught the writing process, they become better-structured writers who spend less time on the development of their written pieces. As they advance from one grade to the next, students who master this skill as well as the six writing-related attributes will benefit immensely because it helps them identify the parts of their writing that may require development and supports them in developing and improving those parts. Hence, the primary objective of any teacher should be to produce "exceptional writers" at every level, which can be achieved by teaching students this knowledge and skills.

 

Six Traits of Writing

 

What would your writing really look like without ideas? That’s like going into a dark cave with a blindfold. Ideas are the content of your writing piece. Ideas are how we communicate to the world orally and visually, especially through pen and paper. Teachers can help students build their ideas by requesting them to write about something they love.  

 

Just like our bodies need our skeletons to support their structure, our writing pieces must be structured to bring forth the ideas developed. Organization involves the writer’s development of the writing piece which can be in the form of a beginning, a middle, and an end. Teachers can help their students develop their organizational skills by giving them a processing activity. Within this processing activity, students will be given the topic “Getting ready for School”, students will outline the step-by-step process of them getting ready for school which they will be assisted in structuring their paragraphs.

Voice does not technically mean the sound produced in a person’s larynx and uttered through the mouth. Not in this case. Voice, however, refers to the rhetorical combination of vocabulary, tone, individuality, and syntax that makes phrases, sentences, and paragraphs flow and reveals the writer's personality while establishing a connection with the reader. Teachers who can assign their students to write about a certain topic that piques their interest can aid in their development of this skill, for they will be able to exercise their voice through writing.

What would happen if you started reading a book but you are unable to understand what it really is about because the choice of words used become somewhat confusing. How would you feel? The ability to select the best words to convey meaning in writing is referred to as word choice. Depending on the genre, readers can relate to real-life situations, gain an understanding of a certain topic, experience emotions, and much more by utilizing the right words to convey meaning. Students can be aided through the use of books introduced to them, where they will read aloud or the teacher can have a read-aloud activity where she becomes the reader in the lower grades. Once students can hear what they read they will be better able to understand the story. And from this students are also able to have first-hand knowledge of how the choice of words is important when writing.

The rhythm you hear once reading a good book that keeps you wanting to read more and more. Yes, that’s the rhythm I’m speaking about today. Sentence fluency is the rhythm and flow of the language.  A teacher can help his/ her students greatly through the use of class discussions about a story read as a class, paying keen attention to the words used and sentence structures and how it overall flows. Students can learn through the inductive and deductive teaching of fluency in sentences based on the story they have read, and this will help them since they can now utilize the knowledge they have learned when given the task of producing their own writing pieces

Imagine reading an article with no commas, question marks, full stops, or quotation marks. Would you really understand what you have read properly? Conventions refer to the grammar and mechanics of your writing piece. This is in the form of capital letters, punctuation marks, spelling, the indentation of your paragraph, and grammar usage. By giving students the task of identifying errors in a short story, such as missing and/or incorrectly placed punctuation marks, capitalization, and grammatical errors, teachers can help their students learn this skill. The value of conventions in everyday writing will become clear to the pupils at the conclusion. With the use of conventions students reading their class members writing pieces as they publish them, will be able to understand them.

 

As we digested the core ingredients needed for teaching our students in Lit102, I was able to grasp so much knowledge and skills. The impactful lessons aided my development of the main topics so much that I have already thought about ways I can go about teaching my students when I return to the classroom. The goal is to improve their writing skills, which I have found that many students may struggle with in my experience. The highlights of this week’s class sessions for me, involved videos that not only give information but demonstrated how this knowledge can be used in the classroom for students as low as kindergarten and grade one.

 

What were your highlights from this week’s lessons?

Below is a graphic organizer created to showcase the incorporation of knowledge gained this week: