Writing to learn differs from learning to write in that there is no process piece that will be revised until it reaches the finished project stage. Writing to learn, instead, is a way to provide students with opportunities to recall, clarify, and question what they know and would like to know about a subject.
What does writing to learn mean?
Writing to learn means using writing as a tool to promote content learning; when students write they think on paper. Content teachers assign writing activities to help students learn subject matter, clarify and organize their thoughts, and improve their retention of content.
Is it worth it to learn to write?
But, if you're on the fence, consider writing. It's low tech, it can be ugly for those with terrible handwriting, and it's pretty slow. But, in the end, you may just end up learning more.
Should writing be part of the curriculum?
Writing across the curriculum is one way to help students use writing to learn, as opposed to learning to write.
Do students think more when they type or write?
In their results, they found that students assigned to type notes had nearly twice the "word overlap" as students writing notes. This means that while students typed more notes, they may have done less thinking as they typed.
How do students understand text structure?
Students need to understand text structures in order to write well. When students write, they have to work through four structural levels: word structure, sentence structure, paragraph structure, and overall text structure. Difficulties on any level may cause writing to suffer. 29 Knowledge of word structure includes the ability to spell words correctly and join suffixes and prefixes to root words. Students need knowledge of the other three levels of text structure in order to organize and express their ideas in writing. In this sense, text structure represents thinking. 30
What are the different types of narrative writing?
Students need to learn the differences among the three types of writing, as well as the writing structure of each. Narrative writing typically tells a story of a real or imaginary experience, event, or sequence of events. Narrative text uses time as its main structure and the information and ideas can be organized around literary elements such as characters, setting, problem/solution, and theme. Examples of narrative writing genres include: diary, biography and autobiography, personal narrative, memoir, folktales, fables, myths, creative fictional stories, science fiction, poems, plays, and eyewitness accounts.
What are the Common Core standards for writing?
The Common Core standards related to writing are organized into several categories: Text Types and Purposes, Production and Distribution of Writing, Research to Build and Present Knowledge, and Range of Writing 12 The specific ELA anchor writing and related reading standards are listed in Figure 3. Writing standard #5 (Develop and strengthen writing as needed by planning, revising, editing, rewriting, or trying a new approach.) is directly aligned to the research finding noted above that students need to be taught to apply the writing process. 13 Writing standard #4 (Produce clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization, and style are appropriate to task, purpose, and audience.) addresses the importance of the prewriting and planning stages in order to produce organized writing pieces. 14
What is explicit writing strategy?
Explicitly teaching strategies for each stage of the writing process has a strong impact on the quality of all students’ writing, and it has been found especially effective for students who have difficulty writing. Strategy instruction can include teaching generic skills such as brainstorming a topic or how to use transition words, or it can include teaching strategies for a specific writing task such as how to write a summary or an argument. 28 Figure 6 lists examples of strategies that often require instruction before students can use them independently.
What is writing to learn?
Generally, writing-to-learn activities are short, impromptu or otherwise informal and low-stakes writing tasks that help students think through key concepts or ideas presented in a course. Often, these writing tasks are limited to less than five minutes of class time or are assigned as brief, out-of-class assignments.
How to write while students are writing?
While students are writing at the beginning and end of class, walk around the room and read over shoulders. This technique is especially easy if you have students writing on computers. Stop to talk to or jot a note on the writing of 3-4 students.
Why are WTL assignments not marked for correctness?
Alternatives for Evaluating WTL Assignments. Because they are informal and often impromptu, writing-to-learn activities aren't marked for correctness. Rather, teachers or classmates quickly read the writing for a general sense of what students understand and don't understand.
What does "transactional writing" mean?
As Toby Fulwiler and Art Young (1982) explain in their "Introduction" to Language Connections: Writing and Reading Across the Curriculum: Writing to communicate—or what James Britton calls "transactional writing"—means writing to accomplish something, to inform, instruct, or persuade.... Writing to learn is different.
What is the most effective way to develop thinking?
Writing is one of the most effective ways to develop thinking. (p. 162) The Consequences of Writing by Robert P. Parker and Vera Goodkin (1987) is an especially good early resource on writing to learn. Following a detailed discussion of the theoretical links between language (especially writing) and learning, these authors outline projects ...
Why do we write to ourselves?
We write to ourselves as well as talk with others to objectify our perceptions of reality; the primary function of this "expressive" language is not to communicate, but to order and represent experience to our own understanding.
How can teachers help students develop their thinking?
As teachers we can choose between (a) sentencing students to thoughtless mechanical operations and (b) facilitating their ability to think. If students' readiness for more involved thought processes is bypassed in favor of jamming more facts and figures into their heads, they will stagnate at the lower levels of thinking. But if students are encouraged to try a variety of thought processes in classes, they can, regardless of their ages, develop considerable mental power. Writing is one of the most effective ways to develop thinking. (p. 162)
What are the skills required to be a scientifically literate student?
A scientifically literate student must be able to communicate his or her ideas through writing or speaking , demonstrating the most essential skills of science literacy ( Norris & Phillips, 2003; Krajcik & Sutherland, 2010 ). In addition, science students must have sufficient background content knowledge in order to explore specific types of scientific issues in depth. For example, an ecologically literate individual would be able to articulate that (1) environmental systems are complex ( Jordan et al., 2009 ); (2) humans are a part of such systems ( Orr, 1992 ); and (3) perturbations of such systems will have consequences that may threaten the stability and sustainability of the system as a whole ( Berkowitz et al., 2005 ).
Do biology majors write more objectively?
Not surprisingly, biology majors wrote more objectively in all three of their essays ( Balgopal et al., 2012 ). Nearly half (n = 42) remained “stuck” in this place along the scientific literacy spectrum, despite prompts that encouraged them to incorporate personal and societal perspectives into their writing. They frequently wrote in the third person and invoked a nonspecific “other” to address environmental problems in a dispassionate way. However, this generalized response was observed mainly in students who received little guidance. In an unpublished study, when students (n = 13) received more guidance and opportunities for student-led discussions, more of them wrote authentically by their third essay, but this was dependent on the SSI. Students who wrote about GMO crops or meat consumption tended to write more subjectively. We attribute this to the personal nature of these issues, compared with hypoxia or ocean acidification. When given a new issue to investigate and asked to write a transfer essay in a style of their choosing, many of these students wrote objectively.
What is writing to learn?
Writing-to-learn activities can include freewriting (writing, without editing, what comes to mind), narrative writing (drawing on personal experience), response writing (writing thoughts on a specific issue); loop writing (writing on one idea from different perspectives) and dialogue writing (for example, with an author or a character.) "Not surprisingly," writes Jacobs, "writing-to learn activities are also known as 'writing-to-read' strategies — means by which students can engage with text in order to understand it ."
Why is writing important for learning?
Writing to Learn. Writing is often used as a means of evaluating students' understanding of a certain topic , but it is also a powerful tool for engaging students in the act of learning itself. Writing allows students to organize their thoughts and provides a means by which students can form and extend their thinking, thus deepening understanding.
How does guided reading help students?
Students move on to guided reading, during which they familiarize themselves with the surface meaning of the text and then probe it for deeper meaning. Effective guided-reading activities allow students to apply their background knowledge and experience to the "new." They provide students with means to revise predictions; search for tentative answers; gather, organize, analyze, and synthesize evidence; and begin to make assertions about their new understanding. Common guided-reading activities include response journals and collaborative work on open-ended problems. During guided reading, Jacobs recommends that teachers transform the factual questions that typically appear at the end of a chapter into questions that ask how or why the facts are important.
What do fourth graders learn in reading?
Around fourth grade, students must begin to use these developing reading skills to learn — to make meaning, solve problems, and understanding something new. They need to comprehend what they read through a three-stage meaning-making process.
What grade do you learn to read?
Jacobs explains that students learn and practice beginning reading skills through about the third grade, building their knowledge about language and letter-sound relationships and developing fluency in their reading. Around fourth grade, students must begin to use these developing reading skills to learn — to make meaning, solve problems, ...
Why is guided reading important?
Thus, guided-reading activities should provide students with the opportunity to reflect on the reading process itself — recording in a log how their background knowledge and experience influenced their understanding of text, identifying where they may have gotten lost during reading and why, and asking any questions they have about the text. As with prereading, guided-reading activities not only enhance comprehension but also promote vocabulary knowledge and study skills.
What is postreading in school?
During postreading, students test their understanding of the text by comparing it with that of their class mates. In doing so, they help one another revise and strengthen their arguments while reflecting and improving on their own.
Does word overlap affect student performance?
Notably, researchers did find that word overlap was negatively correlated with performance, meaning that the less overlap a student had, they better they remembered the material.
Do students who wrote notes have better recall?
Even though students who wrote notes had better recall, the students who typed notes had more notes to work with . In order to test this, researchers had the students study the notes and return back for an exam on the material.
Does writing notes lead to more learning?
If you're goal is to take down many pages of notes, then typing is the clear winner. However, which is better for learning?
How is writing different?
Real handwriting involves learning to make the letter with a few clean, deliberate strokes, the same way every time. Once you have this skill, you don’t have to think of how to form the letters. You know how to make them not only in your mind but from muscle memory. When you can write well, you can write neatly with your eyes closed. Getting in the rhythm of always making your letters the same way, neat and clean, is a long slow process. In the past, when students had beautiful handwriting, penmanship was a class that was taught right up through high school, because it is not a skill that develops easily doing a few quick worksheets when a child is 5.
Why do children write short words?
Because they are the easiest to form, stroke-wise, and a child can most easily start to create legible words with a set of all capitals. This will give the child the ability to put their name on things (the best part of writing according to most small children), and start to write short words.
How to teach a child to write in capital letters?
Take time to teach them how to first draw their shapes, then write in capital letters. Go slow, and keep in mind the goal of learning to really write, rather than rushing through the letters so that you can get to “real writing.”. Slow down, and realize that your child doesn’t need to write in paragraphs in first grade.
Why do children have bad handwriting?
They are struggling to keep up with a demand to use basic skills they don’ t actually have because no one taught them.
Is penmanship a skill?
In the past, when students had beautiful handwriting, penmanship was a class that was taught right up through high school, because it is not a skill that develops easily doing a few quick worksheets when a child is 5. For some students, the step into real writing is easier to make with writing in cursive than printing.
Where do lines start in a letter?
When they make B, for example, sometimes the lines start at the top of the letter. Sometimes they start at the bottom. They may make the top curve first, then the lower, but next time they make the lower curve first, then realized they still need one at the top.
Can you start a cursive letter from the bottom?
However, with cursive, the lower case letters can all be started from the bottom, as part of a connection line, and those that can also start from the top, like c, have a very clear starting place. If you try to start most cursive letters from the wrong place, you just can’t make them at all.
A Fuller Definition of Writing to Learn
- Theoreticians and practitioners alike agree that writing promotes both critical thinking and learning (See Adams, 1973; Applebee, 1985; Britton et al., 1975; Bruner,1975; Emig,1977; Herrington, 1981; Odell,1980; and Parker, 1985 in the citations below.) As Toby Fulwiler and Art Young (1982) explain in their "Introduction" to Language Connections: W...
Examples of Writing-to-Learn Activities
- Writing-to-learn activities can happen frequently or infrequently in your class; some can extend over the entire semester; some can be extended to include a wide variety of writing tasks in different formats and to different audiences. Use the list below to read more about writing-to-learn activities. 1. The reading journal 2. Generic and focused summaries 3. Annotations 4. Response …
Using Technology with WTL Activities
- If you teach in a computer classroom, if students can bring laptops or tablets to class, or if students have easy access to computers outside of class, WTL activities of all sorts can be adapted for in-class writing. What Kinds of WTL Tasks Can Be Carried Out in a Computer-Supported Classroom? 1. Summarize and respond to readings 2. Summarize key points from pri…
Alternatives For Evaluating WTL Assignments
- Because they are informal and often impromptu, writing-to-learn activities aren't marked for correctness. Rather, teachers or classmates quickly read the writing for a general sense of what students understand and don't understand. Because most teachers cannot read through and comment on every WTL activity students complete, we suggest the following alternatives: 1. Us…
Beyond The Basics
- The literature now available on writing-to-learn or writing-to-engage practices is deep and broad, encompassing far more than a brief bibliographic essay can accurately capture. Let me offer instead two pieces of advice - consult the more general resources noted here on low-stakes or writing-to-learn activities and look at the journals in your discipline that take up teaching issues. …
References
- Ablin, L. (2008). Student perceptions of the benefits of a learner-based writing assignment in organic chemistry. Journal of Chemical Education, 85(2), 237-239. Adams, P. (Ed.) (1973). Language in Thinking. Harmondsworth: Penguin Press. Allain, R., Abbott, D., & Deardorff, D. (2006). Using peer ranking to enhance student writing. Physics Education, 41(3), 255-258. Alvine…
Additional Resources
- For a more complete bibliography, go to http://www.iub.edu/~cwp/lib/wacgen.shtml and to the WAC Bibliography on the Clearinghouse.