Writing Strategy: Scaffolding Learning From Level 2
Indicators of Progress
- Students select content and form depending on their purposes for writing and describe the purpose and audience for their own and others’ writing.
- Students use planning strategies such as saying what questions they want to answer for people who read what they write, for example, for A project on Antarctica, How cold is it? and graphic organisers , word mapping and charting to plan what they will write.
- Students use drafting strategies such as one’s own vocabulary and graphic organisers to create a first draft.
- Students reread their own writing and use a range of editing resources to revise and clarify meaning.
- Students ask questions about others’ writing and their own writing.
- Students use corrective feedback from others to revise their writing.
- Students publish their writing in different forms, including the use of word processing in e-learning focus groups.
Teaching Strategies
The learning and teaching approach for writing is illustrated for students responding within the context of Mini-beasts.
Organising phase
Recording brainstorming ideas
Students describe some of the key ideas about slaters in words and phrases, for example, they write them on word cards or stick-ons so that they can move the ideas around, for example:
- Lots of little legs
- Tiny toes
- Make a ball
- Run very fast
- Grey curvy body
- No head
Organising their information
Students begin to organise the ideas around key ideas, for example, these say how slaters run, these say what slaters look like. Teachers discuss the ideas a student has listed and say “Which of these go together ?” / “What do these two tell you about ?”, for example, how a slater runs, what a slater looks like. The students can use a picture summary such as a network map to group the ideas into main ideas, for example:
Some students, particularly those with strong visual-spatial intelligence, learn to use concept maps quite quickly. Other students take longer to develop confidence and competence and may be assisted by becoming familiar with simpler forms of graphic organisers and picture summaries. Two examples of these are described at the website link below: network maps and concept layer maps Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority Publications
Reflecting on concept maps
Students reflect on how they will arrange the ideas: How will I arrange the ideas? Which idea will I talk about first / second? Theyexperiment with moving the word cards around, saying aloud the sentences around each card and asking themselves “Is this what I want to say first / second?” I will say what a slater looks like first and then how it runs away.
They review and modify the organisation of the ideas by asking:
- Why am I writing this? Who will read what I write?
- What do I want to tell the reader? They use the strategies to assist themselves to narrow their focus on a topic and add detail to aspects of the idea.
- Do they answer the set question / topic?
Evaluating quality of gathered information
Students ask themselves: Do I know enough? Where can I go to find more information? Have I collected enough information?
Reflecting on the quality of the planning
Students reflect on whether they feel ready to continue with the writing or whether they would prefer additional planning and collation activity. They do this by asking themselves Am I ready to write about my life as a slater? What more do I need to know before I begin to write?
The learning and teaching approach for writing is illustrated for students responding within the context of Mini-beasts.
Composing phase
Reviewing content and interest level for the reader
Students review their writing by asking themselves “Have I put enough information in the text to make it interesting?” They may decide to use words that are more feeling or emotive words. They can ask "What would make people think that slaters are interesting? What ways of talking about them would persuade people to think this?" They can express their opinions about minibeasts and support them with reasons or evidence. They can also begin to sequence details and comments for persuasive effect.
Responding to perceived audience need
Students learn to respond to questions about the audience for their writing, for example the teacher asks prompting questions such as:
- If your classmates read this, will they know what . . . . means? Do you need to say more about it?
- How could you make slaters seem more interesting/engaging for your classmates?
The learning and teaching approach for writing is illustrated for students responding within the context of Mini-beasts.
Revising phase
Evaluating whether the writing has met its purpose
Students evaluate their writing to identify the relevance of the content to the purposes for writing and the task parameters, they take the appropriate action to modify the content and focus of their writing.
Students learn to ask themselves the following types of questions:
- Is the writing on the right track? Does it do what it is meant to do?
- Do I say too much / too little?
- Is the passage easy to understand? Does it say what I want it to say? Are parts confusing?
- Are the main points in the right order?
- Does the writing begin smoothly? Does it begin by interesting the reader? Do I take too long to get started?
- Does each paragraph have one main idea? Are the paragraphs linked together well? Will I use sub-headings?
- Does the writing finish well?
- Is all of the information accurate? Have I checked it all?