Writing is more than ‘exciting’: equipping primary children to become reflective writers

Abstract

This article describes work undertaken as part of a partnership programme initiated to encourage collaborative research between teachers and university tutors. In the Teaching Reading and Writing Links project (TRAWL) primary school teachers, working as research partners, explored ways of developing children as reflective writers. The research group wanted to know whether, through examining how texts are crafted by expert writers during literacy sessions, children might be encouraged to pay more attention to compositional rather than secretarial aspects of narrative writing during writing workshops. The overall writing achievement of 338 children was monitored over one school year and narrative writing from 60 case study children was evaluated at the beginning and end of the research period. In this article the impact on achievement is illustrated, some examples of writing are analysed and evidence of development in children's metacognition and confidence as writers is discussed.

Strategies to support the writing of narrative texts

“…La investigación básica acerca del desarrollo metacognitivo comprobó tempranas capacidades en niños pequeños; sin embargo, en un principio, los niños de este estudio revelaron escasa o superficial regulación en la revisión y corrección de sus textos. Basados en los resultados de nuestra investigación y en investigaciones previas, se considera que si se usan prácticas educativas adecuadas, se puede hacer buen uso de las capacidades que los niños presentan muy temprano en relación con su reflexión sobre la escritura, y se puede contribuir muy temprano al desarrollo de escritores autorregulados en las escuelas (Corden, 2003;Perry, Karen, VandeKamp, Mercer & Nordby, 2002;Yarrow & Topping, 2001).…”

“…Al reconocer la importancia de la metacognición para la enseñan-za de la escritura, los investigadores han diseñado muchos programas de intervención, con el fin de mejorar el funcionamiento metacognitivo de los estudiantes durante el proceso de escritura (Corden, 2003;Graham, Harris & Mason, 2005;Lienemann, Graham, Leader & Reid, 2006;Peronard, 2005;Saddler & Graham, 2005;Santangelo, Harris & Graham, 2007;Schunk & Zimmerman, 2007).…”

Writing with peer response using genre knowledge : a classroom intervention study

“…Five studies were conducted from a genre perspective (Corden 2003(Corden , 2007Kos & Maslowski, 2001;Peterson, 2003;Sims, 2001). All five studies show positive effects on aspects of writing proficiency, such as improved text quality, revision skills, planning processes, criteria for good writing, use of metalanguage and self-confidence.…”

“…Researchers described classroom practices in which teachers worked according to this approach (Freedman, 1987). In general this approach is typified as 'founding a writing community in school' (Corden, 2003). It is directed to the affective (involvement, motivation, self-confidence), communicative (goal-and audience orientation) and process-oriented (planning, formulating, revising) aspects of learning to write.…”

“…In the studies of Kos and Maslowski (2001) and Sims (2001) genre-instruction is combined with strategy-and interactioninstruction. In the studies of Peterson (2003), and Corden (2003Corden ( , 2007 genreinstruction is accompanied with interaction-instruction. All studies report positive effects of peer response on text quality when writing narratives (measured with diverse criteria as structure, style, conventions, audience orientation), process factors (task orientation, the connection between students' talk and revisions, and attitudes (conceptions of good writing, self-esteem).…”