Writing Fluency Strategies
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Link to Literacy In Action Module 1 - Writing Fluency (Introducing Writing Tracker)
Early Writing Fluency Tracker Chart (as used in 2008 modules)
Fluency Trackers
Toolbox for Routine Writing - Ilinois SBE ELA Foundational Services: Writing To Read, 2016
Writing Fluency Strategies (Retrieved from Schoolwide Strategies for Managing Writing, http://www.jimwrightonline.com/php/interventionista/interventionista_intv_list.php?prob_
Feb. 13, 2013)
Use low-stakes writing every day, in every subject to foster student voice, self-confidence, and critical thinking skills.
Low-stakes writing is a tool to help students build comfort with sharing and developing their thoughts through writing. A defining element of low-stakes writing is how it's graded -- the grade doesn't carry a lot of weight. This removes much of the pressure from having to do the assignment a certain way, putting value instead on student thought, expression, and learning, rather than punctuation, grammar, or getting a correct answer the first time.
Strategies
1: Grade Low-Stakes Writing Simply
2: Have Students Share Their Low-Stakes Writing
3: Differentiate Learning Through Group Work
4: Use Challenge Questions Instead of Giving Traditional Feedback
5: Create Open QuestionsSample Low-Stakes Writing Prompts You Can Use in Your Classroom Today
Here is a list of low-stakes writing prompts from University Park Campus School teachers that you can adapt to fit your needs.
Early Writing Fluency Tracker Chart (as used in 2008 modules)
Fluency Trackers
Toolbox for Routine Writing - Ilinois SBE ELA Foundational Services: Writing To Read, 2016
Writing Fluency Strategies (Retrieved from Schoolwide Strategies for Managing Writing, http://www.jimwrightonline.com/php/interventionista/interventionista_intv_list.php?prob_
Feb. 13, 2013)
- Fluency: Have Students Write Every Day (Graham, Harris & Larsen, 2001). Short daily writing assignments can build student writing fluency and make writing a more motivating activity. For struggling writers, formal writing can feel much like a foreign language, with its own set of obscure grammatical rules and intimidating vocabulary. Just as people learn another language more quickly and gain confidence when they use it frequently, however, poor writers gradually develop into better writers when they are prompted to write daily--and receive rapid feedback and encouragement about that writing. The teacher can encourage daily writing by giving short writing assignments, allowing time for students to journal about their learning activities, requiring that they correspond daily with pen pals via email, or even posting a question on the board as a bell-ringer activity that students can respond to in writing for extra credit. Short daily writing tasks have the potential to lower students’ aversion to writing and boost their confidence in using the written word.
- Fluency: Self-Monitor and Graph Results to Increase Writing Fluency (Rathvon, 1999). Students gain motivation to write through daily monitoring and charting of their own and classwide rates of writing fluency. At least several times per week, assign your students timed periods of ‘freewriting’ when they write in their personal journals. Freewriting periods all the same amount of time each day. After each freewriting period, direct each student to count up the number of words he or she has written in the daily journal entry (whether spelled correctly or not). Next, tell students to record their personal writing-fluency score in their journal and also chart the score on their own time-series graph for visual feedback. Then collect the day’s writing-fluency scores of all students in the class, sum those scores, and chart the results on a large time-series graph posted at the front of the room. At the start of each week, calculate that week’s goal of increasing total class words written by taking last week’s score and increasing by five percent. At the end of each week, review the class score and praise students if they have shown good effort.
Use low-stakes writing every day, in every subject to foster student voice, self-confidence, and critical thinking skills.
Low-stakes writing is a tool to help students build comfort with sharing and developing their thoughts through writing. A defining element of low-stakes writing is how it's graded -- the grade doesn't carry a lot of weight. This removes much of the pressure from having to do the assignment a certain way, putting value instead on student thought, expression, and learning, rather than punctuation, grammar, or getting a correct answer the first time.
Strategies
1: Grade Low-Stakes Writing Simply
2: Have Students Share Their Low-Stakes Writing
3: Differentiate Learning Through Group Work
4: Use Challenge Questions Instead of Giving Traditional Feedback
5: Create Open QuestionsSample Low-Stakes Writing Prompts You Can Use in Your Classroom Today
Here is a list of low-stakes writing prompts from University Park Campus School teachers that you can adapt to fit your needs.