I love this article. The SoR movement is working to include writing and the reading-writing connection but may be at different places in the journey. You are absolutely right that curriculum have not gotten there yet. As someone who has gone through adoptions at state and district levels, you are correct that most states put a full ELA curriculum because they do have to apportion funding. I am one of those who has used thinkSRSD and it has been great and flexible. I also tie my reading to what we write about - that has been great. I am new in my journey but we keep moving on, right.
Some very important reminders here, especially the value of writing about reading--but also a glaring omission. The research by Ouellette and Senechal shows that encoding (writing) is one extremely important way that students develop phonemic awareness. They should be allowed to do this using 'invented' (also called 'estimated' or 'temporary') spelling right from the beginning regardless of what their sentence construction skills look like. Children need lots of opportunities to write. My kindergarteners did freewriting in their journals while we did 'process' writing as a class to develop an understanding of both sentence structure and genre, which they then applied to their own pieces. Another researcher, Steve Graham, actively promotes allowing 'untrained' children many different opportunities to write. I am concerned that this topic is becoming yet another example of throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
Writing, expressing thoughts with words, and spelling may not be the same. One may be very good at spelling but cannot construct more than a simple sentence. Another may be poor at spelling (auditory discrimination and the schwa sound issues), but may be very good at expressing themselves in writing complex sentences. Children do need lots of opportunities to write. When writing sentences, have them use two vocabulary words in each sentence instead of one. Make spelling a part of the phonemic awareness process. They can read and write "Nat, the fat cat sat on the mat."
Yes, spelling is an integral part of the dictation of ‘word chains’. And those of us who teach Linguistic Phonics begin with encoding, not decoding. I recommend the “hear it, say it, write it, read it, use it” routine from Gentry and Ouellette’s Brain Words: How the Science of Reading Informs Teaching.
Absolutely, reading and writing should be connected -- and beyond that, reading and writing should both be seen as subsets of the learning in general. I have a few further observations, although I should perhaps say at the outset that I am the co-author, with Judy Hochman, of The Writing Revolution book (I have no official connection with The Writing Revolution organization, other than being on their advisory board).
-- Ideally, writing instruction should be embedded in whatever content is being taught--not just in ELA but across the curriculum. One reason is that in addition to being a valuable skill, writing can be a powerful lever to deepen knowledge of whatever content is being written about. That's true even in social studies, science, even math.
-- Any of the truly knowledge-building curricula will have writing prompts connected to the content of the curriculum--which is great, and a necessary first step in writing instruction. But I don't think any of them, by themselves, include writing INSTRUCTION that will be explicit enough for most students. So they will need to be supplemented by a more explicit method of writing instruction. From what I've heard and seen, EL Education (which seems to be held up as a model in this post) is particularly lacking in explicit writing instruction. (Louisiana's ELA Guidebooks 2.0 is the only knowledge-building curriculum that actually incorporates activities from The Writing Revolution, but even teachers using that curriculum will need some additional support to unlock the full potential of those activities.)
-- In response to some of the other comments on this post: The Writing Revolution activities as described in the book are best suited to grades 3 and up. However, many of the activities can and should be done orally (or mostly orally) with students in K-2. That modulates cognitive load for kids who are still learning to form letters and spell words, and it lays the groundwork for later writing.
"But don't think any of them, by themselves, include writing INSTRUCTION that will be explicit enough for most students. So they will need to be supplemented by a more explicit method of writing instruction."
Sadly, this has continued to be a problem--writing is 'assigned' rather than 'taught'--since I wrote my master's thesis on writing instruction (Teaching the 'F' Word: Getting Form without a Formula Using Procedural Facilitation) three decades ago.
I strongly agree that explicit teaching of writing and tying to reading is necessary. It is also the primary way we help kids with executive dysgraphia and is thus much more inclusive.
However, I have trouble with one part. You're talking about doing this in kindergarten when many kids are not yet developmentally ready to read or write more than letters. Finland has a 100% literacy rate. They wait until kids are 7 years old, not 5, to start this kind of education. When we start too soon, we succeed with some kids but demoralize many others. There is no reason to start so early. Studies show that kids who learn early and those who learn later are typically at the same level by age 9. Further, those who learn later are often reading more at age 15.
We need all the explicit, integrated, scaffolded instruction you're talking about. But, we need to wait until age 7. Pre reading / writing activities can start in earlier play...as long as it's child initiated and joyful.
Joyful education is written into the education code in Finland. It's neglected in ours.
Foundational skills should be the bulk of writing instruction in K-1, supplemented with practice activities. For these novice writers, skills instruction shouldn't be a supplement, any more than phonics should be a supplement in reading. SRSD and the Writing Revolution don't provide foundational skills and are best for 2nd grade and up. If you would like a detailed picture of what a skill-based curriculum might look like (since examples of this are scarce!) there's an article I wrote called The Writing Pyramid for K-2: A Tool for Designing Structured Literacy Lessons. If you'd like a copy you can respond to this post and I'll send you the link.
Writing instruction is key for raising ALL outcomes - reading comprehension, content learning, academic language.
It is worth keeping the big picture in view, rather than zeroing in on one model. There are excellent research models worth knowing - Cognitive Strategies Instruction, SRSD, Cognitive Toolkit and others - all with deep roots in the original University of Kansas Strategies Instruction Model (SIM) dating back to the 1970s. All incredibly well-researched.
Rather than getting locked into one model, it may be worth looking at the underlying mechanisms that the IES Writing Practice Guides synthesize across this wide research base. The IES Guides are free and represent the best available evidence, more broadly.
thinkSRSD (now Releasing Writers) helped our school, then our large district, take an integrative approach to adopting evidence-based practices for teaching writing- not one model, but the key underlying practices the broad research base supports. And Releasing Writers makes the (free) IES guides genuinely easy to adopt in classrooms.
Writing Curriculum or A Writing Curriculum. Writing skills are difficult, even for those writing about using a writing curriculum. Master teachers need to be able to write a curriculum for writing instruction.
I love this article. The SoR movement is working to include writing and the reading-writing connection but may be at different places in the journey. You are absolutely right that curriculum have not gotten there yet. As someone who has gone through adoptions at state and district levels, you are correct that most states put a full ELA curriculum because they do have to apportion funding. I am one of those who has used thinkSRSD and it has been great and flexible. I also tie my reading to what we write about - that has been great. I am new in my journey but we keep moving on, right.
Some very important reminders here, especially the value of writing about reading--but also a glaring omission. The research by Ouellette and Senechal shows that encoding (writing) is one extremely important way that students develop phonemic awareness. They should be allowed to do this using 'invented' (also called 'estimated' or 'temporary') spelling right from the beginning regardless of what their sentence construction skills look like. Children need lots of opportunities to write. My kindergarteners did freewriting in their journals while we did 'process' writing as a class to develop an understanding of both sentence structure and genre, which they then applied to their own pieces. Another researcher, Steve Graham, actively promotes allowing 'untrained' children many different opportunities to write. I am concerned that this topic is becoming yet another example of throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
Writing, expressing thoughts with words, and spelling may not be the same. One may be very good at spelling but cannot construct more than a simple sentence. Another may be poor at spelling (auditory discrimination and the schwa sound issues), but may be very good at expressing themselves in writing complex sentences. Children do need lots of opportunities to write. When writing sentences, have them use two vocabulary words in each sentence instead of one. Make spelling a part of the phonemic awareness process. They can read and write "Nat, the fat cat sat on the mat."
Yes, spelling is an integral part of the dictation of ‘word chains’. And those of us who teach Linguistic Phonics begin with encoding, not decoding. I recommend the “hear it, say it, write it, read it, use it” routine from Gentry and Ouellette’s Brain Words: How the Science of Reading Informs Teaching.
Absolutely, reading and writing should be connected -- and beyond that, reading and writing should both be seen as subsets of the learning in general. I have a few further observations, although I should perhaps say at the outset that I am the co-author, with Judy Hochman, of The Writing Revolution book (I have no official connection with The Writing Revolution organization, other than being on their advisory board).
-- Ideally, writing instruction should be embedded in whatever content is being taught--not just in ELA but across the curriculum. One reason is that in addition to being a valuable skill, writing can be a powerful lever to deepen knowledge of whatever content is being written about. That's true even in social studies, science, even math.
-- Any of the truly knowledge-building curricula will have writing prompts connected to the content of the curriculum--which is great, and a necessary first step in writing instruction. But I don't think any of them, by themselves, include writing INSTRUCTION that will be explicit enough for most students. So they will need to be supplemented by a more explicit method of writing instruction. From what I've heard and seen, EL Education (which seems to be held up as a model in this post) is particularly lacking in explicit writing instruction. (Louisiana's ELA Guidebooks 2.0 is the only knowledge-building curriculum that actually incorporates activities from The Writing Revolution, but even teachers using that curriculum will need some additional support to unlock the full potential of those activities.)
-- In response to some of the other comments on this post: The Writing Revolution activities as described in the book are best suited to grades 3 and up. However, many of the activities can and should be done orally (or mostly orally) with students in K-2. That modulates cognitive load for kids who are still learning to form letters and spell words, and it lays the groundwork for later writing.
"But don't think any of them, by themselves, include writing INSTRUCTION that will be explicit enough for most students. So they will need to be supplemented by a more explicit method of writing instruction."
Sadly, this has continued to be a problem--writing is 'assigned' rather than 'taught'--since I wrote my master's thesis on writing instruction (Teaching the 'F' Word: Getting Form without a Formula Using Procedural Facilitation) three decades ago.
I strongly agree that explicit teaching of writing and tying to reading is necessary. It is also the primary way we help kids with executive dysgraphia and is thus much more inclusive.
However, I have trouble with one part. You're talking about doing this in kindergarten when many kids are not yet developmentally ready to read or write more than letters. Finland has a 100% literacy rate. They wait until kids are 7 years old, not 5, to start this kind of education. When we start too soon, we succeed with some kids but demoralize many others. There is no reason to start so early. Studies show that kids who learn early and those who learn later are typically at the same level by age 9. Further, those who learn later are often reading more at age 15.
We need all the explicit, integrated, scaffolded instruction you're talking about. But, we need to wait until age 7. Pre reading / writing activities can start in earlier play...as long as it's child initiated and joyful.
Joyful education is written into the education code in Finland. It's neglected in ours.
Foundational skills should be the bulk of writing instruction in K-1, supplemented with practice activities. For these novice writers, skills instruction shouldn't be a supplement, any more than phonics should be a supplement in reading. SRSD and the Writing Revolution don't provide foundational skills and are best for 2nd grade and up. If you would like a detailed picture of what a skill-based curriculum might look like (since examples of this are scarce!) there's an article I wrote called The Writing Pyramid for K-2: A Tool for Designing Structured Literacy Lessons. If you'd like a copy you can respond to this post and I'll send you the link.
I would love to read your article. gilbertson31@gmail.com
Hi! I would love a copy of your article. Could you send it to brighterfuturesedtherapy@gmail.com? Thanks!
Writing instruction is key for raising ALL outcomes - reading comprehension, content learning, academic language.
It is worth keeping the big picture in view, rather than zeroing in on one model. There are excellent research models worth knowing - Cognitive Strategies Instruction, SRSD, Cognitive Toolkit and others - all with deep roots in the original University of Kansas Strategies Instruction Model (SIM) dating back to the 1970s. All incredibly well-researched.
Rather than getting locked into one model, it may be worth looking at the underlying mechanisms that the IES Writing Practice Guides synthesize across this wide research base. The IES Guides are free and represent the best available evidence, more broadly.
thinkSRSD (now Releasing Writers) helped our school, then our large district, take an integrative approach to adopting evidence-based practices for teaching writing- not one model, but the key underlying practices the broad research base supports. And Releasing Writers makes the (free) IES guides genuinely easy to adopt in classrooms.
Writing Curriculum or A Writing Curriculum. Writing skills are difficult, even for those writing about using a writing curriculum. Master teachers need to be able to write a curriculum for writing instruction.