If you're students are still struggling with putting words or sentences onto paper, this episode/blog post is for you!
Shared writing is the perfect tool in your writing toolkit to support your emergent writers. Get your students interacting and helping you write with shared writing. I'll walk you through how to get started - it's as easy as picking up your pen!
I have devoured a lot of good books (and some not so good) on teaching writing. I even spent my own money for a writing curriculum since my district didn’t offer one.
I learned a lot in my early teaching days by sprinkling together my own research with observing other teachers’ lessons. The bottom line is that you have to search for the best fit for you and your students. What makes you the most comfortable in your teaching style? Try to use that in your writing lessons.
What is shared writing?
If you are not familiar with shared writing, it is most likely what you are already using in your writing lessons but maybe just didn’t have the official term for it.
Shared writing is when the teacher is the scribe (writer) and the students help to share in the writing of the story. They are not physically helping you write the story but you guide them and have them make suggestions to help you based on your writing focus for the day. During shared writing, the teacher is the scribe.
An Example Mini-Lesson
Let’s take a peek into what this might look like in my classroom when my class has gathered on the carpet and I am ready at my easel or document camera.
T: Today we are going to be writers. First, writers think of an idea of what to write. Who has some ideas about what we can write about?
S: Cars
T: Great, let’s record that as an idea.
S: School
T: I will add that to my list under cars.
(Continues for 1-2 more suggestions)
T: I like the suggestion about school. Let’s use that idea today. How about we write a story about how we felt starting school as first graders? What do I need to start my story?
S: The date
T: Yes, we always like to start with the date. Can someone tell me the code date?
S: One dash eighteen dash two three two four
T: Thank you, that’s correct. Where do I put my date?
S: At the top of the paper.
T: I’ll put my code date at the top right of my paper.
(This continues until the story is complete. The focus on this lesson might have been how we set up our paper and generate an idea list- a review from previous lessons).
What Is Shared Writing?
Sound familiar?
Maybe they are lacking the phonics knowledge to put the letters together to write what they want. Maybe they have horrible pencil grip and can’t comfortably make marks on paper. Maybe they don’t even know they are supposed to make marks on paper!
Your students need to be shown a good example of how to get started. Walk them through the process. Tell them this is how we start. I teach my students that we always start by writing our code date on the top right of the paper (or teach them to use the date stamp instead). But give them the structure that they crave.
Side note: I like having them put the date because it gives me an idea of how long it is taking them to write one story.
Shared writing works well for all grades and is easy to tweak to suit your own purpose. Third graders also need to be shown how to set up their writing paper (if you like to have control and consistency over that type of thing in your classroom like I do). If you teach English Language Learners, shared writing will help build those important oral speaking skills, vocabulary and sentence structure that is needed when writing.
The important thing to remember is that shared writing is a strategy that can be used for any grade level.
What do I need to get started with shared writing?
At your most basic you need a student, paper, and a writing instrument and you are in business my friend. This is the beauty of teaching writing. But beyond the obvious basics, you also need to have a teaching focus for the day (or week).
What specific skill or strategy do your students need to learn right now? Are you focusing on a genre? What is something about that genre you want to highlight for your students? For example, in informational text you might be focusing a few days on headings and subheadings.
How much time should I spend on a topic or teaching focus?
When I am mapping out my lessons, I like to make sure I give plenty of time for my students to really get a handle on the writing topic or teaching focus before I move on. I have been fortunate in my teaching career to usually have the flexibility and time – so important! – to spend several days on one thing before pushing on to the next outcome to be covered. Well, during writing at least.
What Do Your Student Need?
If you can, try to listen to what your students need. Did they get how to make a list after a day or two? Great! Time to move on and teach something else. Are they really struggling on topic selection? Spend a couple more days and then revisit it often throughout each week or even move it into your writing center for extra practice.
Just because a writing program or scope and sequence says it takes 10 days doesn’t mean it must. Unless your district is demanding strict adherence to that I say use it as a guideline and move on when your students show you they are ready. You are the best person for determining what your students need.
Remember to just start modeling writing for your students. They need to see and hear the thought process that goes into writing a short story much like you would teach them the process of reading.
If you need some ideas of where to start, check out my FREE K-3 writing skills progression chart. It’s perfect for 1st and 2nd grade teachers, like you, to find the skills your students should have coming in and the skills they need leaving your class.
Click the picture to get the instant download.
