Provides a framework for using journal writing in the primary grades to develop writing skills. Outlines techniques to help focus teacher observations, deepen insights, inform curricular decision making, and help teachers reflect upon the student's role in journal writing. (RS)

Offers guidelines on helping young children develop into independent writers. Explains what to expect at different stages, such as semiphonetic and phonetic stages, drawing as a prewriting activity, and writing and revising once drawing no longer dictates writing. Offers suggestions for providing an environment that supports the writing process.…

Helping first graders develop writing skills is the focus of this paper. The first part of the paper discusses 11 ideas likely to be crucial to any first grade writing program, such as the similarities between learning to talk and writing, and the teacher as the model writer. The second part of the paper outlines creative writing activities…

The writing activities in this book are designed to help children build writing skills through the communication of their own ideas, discoveries, and feelings. Developed and field tested as part of a basic skill development project, the book presents a rationale for primary children's writing, outlines the fundamentals of teaching writing, and…

Examines the reasons why a child's writing gets bogged down and discusses ways in which the child can be gently encouraged to take writing risks. Also included are descriptions of writing exercises designed to stretch student creativity. (GLR)

Describes an activity for primary school students, combining writing with computer-art quilt-making. Provides a bibliography of quilt books. (MM)

This speech indicates how teachers can use visual materials in classrooms to promote writing by children in primary school. Five classroom tested motivating experiences discussed are: (1) adding words to wordless picture books, (2) writing about artist's paintings, (3) writing story lines from films, (4) comparing variant editions of the same…

Recounts how observation of children who were just beginning to write convinced a teacher that very young children can write, and thus changed the way she taught. (JL)

Reviews research on handwriting instruction that focuses on these questions: (1) Do learners need particular writing instruments and paper? (2) Should educators encourage students to trace or copy? and (3) How can educators evaluate learners' writing? Offers implications and suggestions for handwriting instruction. (BB)

Research suggests that the informal language of journals is very important. Language scholars such as J. Vygotsky (1962), J. Moffell (1968, 1982), P. Elbow (1973, 1982), and M. Shaughnessy (1977) believe that human beings find meaning through exploration in their own talking language. To add to the evidence in this area, a study conducted in an…

Based on a year's work with 16 second grade students, this two-part paper reports the successful use of the Marathon Writing (continuous writing for short periods on a regular basis) strategy in encouraging beginning writers to write independently. The first part of the paper explains the technique of marathon writing, and notes that even though…

Pupils using a moving model of letter formation in the form of a flipbook demonstrate higher skill improvement than do students using a still model. (CJ)

The classroom setting is a source for daily and creative writing material for teachers as well as students. Teacher and student writing samples help to illustrate classrooms as cultures-in-the-making in which new rules are invented every day and suggest that stories of classroom life must of necessity end in question marks and untied threads.…

A study determined whether kindergarten teachers encouraged invented writing experiences among children to prepare them for reading and how teachers implemented invented spelling experiences in the kindergarten program. Subjects, 314 kindergarten teachers (out of 600 randomly selected kindergarten teachers in Iowa), responded to a survey of their…

An approach to teaching reading and writing through the use of children's books, poetry, and songs are described. It is suggested that reading be taught by presenting in chart form the words that already have been remembered orally in song, rhyme, or story, such as "Polly Put the Kettle On" or sections from the "Little Red…