Writing: The Sixth Essential Component of a Reading Program

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Writing The Sixth Essential Component of a
Reading Program

• Louisa C. Moats, Ed.D.

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• Student writing sample 9th grader

(expression)
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Writing Requires High and Low Level Abilities

• Hayes and Flowers (1980) studied proficient,
  adult writers and proposed that three recursive
  processes are engaged when mature people write
• planning the output
• translating ideas into written words
• reviewing and revising what is written

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Three Major Components
Plan Generate Ideas Set Goals Organize Ideas
Review Revise, Edit Read as audience Repair,
improve Proofread
Translate Generate Text Transcribe onto the page
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(1)Planning to Write

• Planning involves three major sub-processes
• Generating ideas what I am going to say
• Setting goals what I want to accomplish
• Organizing the writing what form I will use to
  express my ideas

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(2)Translate Words Into Print

• Two major sub-processes highly dependent on
  working memory, automatic symbol recall, and
  linguistic proficiency
• (Virginia Berninger et al., U. of Washington)
• Transcription the translation of language into
  conventional written symbols
• Text generation the translation of ideas into
  language The process of choosing words

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(3)Review and Revise

• Two major sub-processes
• Read from the readers perspective Is the
  message complete, logical, written with
  conventional symbols and grammar?
• Revise, edit Are my ideas clearly expressed? Did
  I reach my audience? Are the conventions
  respected? What will add interest?

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Poor Writers Characteristics

• Primary and significant problems with
  transcription (spelling, handwriting,
  punctuation)
• Impoverished language development overall
• Limitations of working memory difficulty
  planning, organizing, retrieving, sorting,
  juggling many balls at once

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Poor Writers Lack Basic Skills

• Poor writers are limited to a great extent by
  spelling, handwriting, and working memory
  problems in both the primary and intermediate
  grades (Berninger Graham and Harris)
• Handwriting problems affect both fluency and
  quality of writing spelling problems especially
  affect the amount that is written

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What Does Research Say About Skills?

• (1) The ability to copy text fluently
  (handwriting proficiency) is related to the
  ability to identify letters and letter groups
  quickly, the ability to program the fingers to
  make specific movements, and the ability to print
  the alphabet in order.

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What Does Research Say About Skills?

• (2) Spelling ability in the primary grades is
  related to skill in copying geometric forms,
  recalling and writing the alphabet from memory,
  nonsense word reading, and overall verbal
  reasoning ability especially knowledge of word
  meanings.
• Later on, only the language skills account for
  variance in written composition.

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Role of Working Memory

• Working memory coordinates all the processes of
  planning, translation, and revising the product.
  It holds sentences in mind while they are being
  formed/revised.
• Transcription and working memory explain much of
  the variance in composition quality and fluency
  at intermediate level.

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Implications

• The ability to transcribe words into written
  symbols fluently and accurately is essential for
  fluent production of quality writing.
• Composition (content and organization) will be
  limited in the intermediate grades if spelling
  and handwriting are poor.
• Children need a great deal of systematic practice
  to master the tools of writing.
• (Berninger et al., 1999)

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Student Writing Sample Third Grader
(basement)
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One time when I was frightened was when.. He ask
me did I want some candy One time when I was
frightened! When I was sleeping in my room. When
I was frightened, it was because I was watching a
scary movie that I have not seen before, I
jumped! It was one thing I saw too was a box.
I askt Woody why are you laughing.
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Implications

• Writers workshop is not sufficient!
• Lessons must balance skill development with
  stages of the writing process (prewriting,
  drafting, conferencing, editing and revising,
  publishing)

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A Lesson Design

• 15 minutes Letters word segmentation
  sound-symbol match morpheme study
  sentence dictation.
• 25 minutes Composition with a prompt and a
  purpose.
• 5 minutes Vocabulary study.
• 10 minutes Author sharing and feedback.

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Teaching Transcription Skill

• Frequent, distributed practice routines.
• Practice on spelling and handwriting is
  juxtaposed with composition in the daily lesson.
• Emphasis on short drills 1-5 minutes.
• Develop habits with pencil and lined paper not
  pens and unlined paper.

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Handwriting

• Ensure the students can form each letter
  accurately. Follow a sequence of component
  strokes that have been made explicit through
  numbered arrow cues. Cover the letter after it is
  figured out have child write letter from memory.
• Have students write the entire alphabet from
  memory once a day and time themselves after they
  become accurate.

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Spelling
(muv or move?)

• Teach the most useful correspondences between
  phonemes and graphemes explicitly.
• /k/ /w/ /e/ /n/
• q u ee n
• Then practice the whole word in dictation,
  proofreading, and writing many times.

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Teach Word Building by Morpheme
co in sub con contra uni
-ion -ity -ible -ation -ical -atile
VERT, VERS
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Building Sentence Fluency (2)
eagle
flew
each
its
to
perch
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Paragraphs

• EXPLICIT INSTRUCTION WITH GRAPHIC ORGANIZERS
• Narrative or time sequence paragraph.
• Reason paragraph (cause-effect).
• Descriptive paragraph.
• Compare/contrast paragraph.
• Enumeration or example paragraph.

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Planning Organize!
My Story Outline
When and where did it happen? Who is it
about? What is the problem?
beginning
middle
First, next, then, after
How is the problem solved? How does it end?
end
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The End

• Structured, explicit, cumulative instruction in
  language for reading and writing needed for
  ALL low language children!