Using shared writing to teach children
In shared
writing
the teacher (or parent) and the students work together to create a
piece of writing. The teacher is the guide and the scribe. The students
(with support as needed) come up with ideas and put them into words.
This is a powerful oral language activity because it teaches children
how to organize their thoughts. The teacher models the process of
taking thoughts and putting them down on paper. It is also a way to use
and practice vocabulary.
This is how you do a shared writing activity:
- Choose a shared experience to talk about with your students. (This could be something that you have read together, an activity that you have shared, or something that you all have knowledge of.)
- Ask questions relating to the shared experience that allows and encourages the children to respond. For young children, pattern sentence responses are just fine. Model some ideas. “I like____________.” “I saw a ______________.”
- Write the children’s responses.
- Continue on in the same manner. Ask the children questions and then write down the responses.
- You can choose how much to probe and when to stop. For very young children, this should not be a long activity.
- When you are finished with this process, together with the children, examine, perhaps modify and reread all that has been written.
This activity can be done with different types of writing. Click on the links below to see examples.
