Writing

Children aged 8-14 in Australia recently submitted a 100 word story responding to the prompt ‘A different world – living in lockdown’ for a story-writing event. Their word choices were analysed and in this infographic, we see how their word choices compare to previous instalments of the event.

‘Feedback is identified as one of the most powerful strategies to progress student learning.’ Today’s article explores the nature and impact of high quality feedback, and shares how one school’s focus on teacher feedback on students’ writing is driving real change and improving outcomes.

Literacy is a core set of skills that can help students overcome social and economic barriers and underpin success in everyday life. Tanya Vaughan and Susannah Schoeffel share recommendations for the development of good literacy skills among primary students.

In today’s reader submission Lanella Sweet, Extension and Enrichment Teacher at Wesley College in Melbourne, shares examples of classroom investigations designed to help students understand and develop their use of mathematical language, and its links with other areas of the curriculum.

Southbank International School in London introduced a structured writing program in the primary years to improve students’ narrative writing. In today’s article, teacher Stefanie Waterman explains what they learned throughout the process.

‘How quick we are as teachers to put our students on the spot to write a complete narrative piece and wonder why we are constantly plagued with, “I can't think!”. South Australian primary school teacher Bec Drozdoff explains how she tackles this challenge in her writing lessons.

How do preschool services support children to develop language and literacy skills and help them get ready for school? A recent study has explored this question and provides some practical literacy activity ideas.

At the Art Gallery of Ballarat, a group of secondary school students, pre-service teachers and English teachers spend two-and-a-half days writing together in order to encourage creativity and improve students’ writing skills.

Oxford University Press compiled a list of the 500 most frequently used words written by students in Australia in their first three years of schooling. This video infographic looks at how the list has changed over time and some interesting gender differences.

Dr Lyn Sharratt explores three practical learning, teaching and leading approaches – writing to improve critical literacy skills, bump-it-up walls, and collaborative assessment of student work – that each support teachers’ focus on creating critically literate graduates.