elaborate upon their ideas, and learn to sequence and connect them together. Young writers learn to develop these skills over time through play, storytelling, writing practice, and in modeled conversations with adults or older peers. When should children start learning to write?
Ideas & Insights: Helping Your Child Develop Strong Writing Skills “You can make anything by writing.” – C.S. Lewis, Writer and Author As adults, we write for a reason: to write a letter, to make a list, to leave a note, to communicate with a friend in a letter or e-mail or to create a story. Children learn to write most easily when they write with purpose too, rather than being told what they should write about.
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ike all other things, learning to write is a process. When children realize that writing communicates meaning, they begin to experiment with it and usually start by using scribbles on a page. From there they start to use symbols that look like letters and then they use real letters although they may go back and forth using real letters and their own symbols. These are exciting first steps, because it shows that children are aware of a difference between drawing and writing and you can support them by asking what the writing says. Over time, as children are exposed to examples of writing in their environment and in the books you read with them, they gradually incorporate the use of punctuation and conventional spelling as they pick up “mistakes” in their own writing and rewrite words 8
or letters. While they start out writing mainly to record and communicate messages, as you keep reading with them you will notice that they begin to write their own simple stories. As we continued to explore how a child develops these skills, we had an opportunity to ask Allison Willson, Senior Director of Curriculum and Innovation at Stratford School questions about how children are learning to write in school and below we’d like to share her expertise: How do children learn to write, focusing on the act of writing itself and not physical handwriting? To learn the skills to write stories, early learners must not only learn to handle a writing tool, but also learn how to generate ideas (brainstorm),
Writing is a complex skill that develops over time. Though your toddler won’t yet have the ability to write stories, they can certainly engage in experiences that support future reading and writing. Fine motor control and drawing are young children’s first steps toward writing. They will then progress to scribbles meant to mimic handwriting before reaching conventional writing and spelling. You can encourage your budding author to draw pictures that depict stories, their feelings and/or observations of their world. What does the current research say about teaching kids to write and what teaching practices are currently used in schools? Current research suggests that to write stories, young children must learn not only to handle a pencil or other writing device but also to generate ideas, elaborate upon them, and sequence and connect them coherently. Children develop these skills through scaffolded play, storytelling, writing practice, and in conversations – particularly with adults and older children. Knowing what we know about how children acquire these skills, early childhood classrooms should provide frequent opportunities for writing practice throughout the day through play and practice. (e.g., “Let’s create a list for our grocery store today.”). Explain the link between reading and writing. Reading and writing support each other. The more your child does both, the stronger their overall literacy skills will be. At an early age, children thrive on modeled behaviors. The act of listening to stories, poems, and