Writing

In early writing, the working memory is mainly occupied by developing transcription skills, until they become more automatic. When working memory is no longer focussed on securing letter shape, size and position, it can focus on the other aspects like generating ideas, more considered word choice and reviewing, reflecting and improving writing.  Once the habits of the pre- and early writing stages are established, The Writing Revolution offers useful guidance and support to develop writing in a precise and structured manner.  The accompanying course was undertaken, but provided no more useful insights than reading the book, and so we created a website to share guidance and activities set in our context: Pembrokeshire's Writing Revolution. This work is complemented by our work on effective learning, particularly as executive function strengthens from around age 9, available on the Leading My Learning site.

Currently, Closing the Writing Gap by Alex Quigley appears to be a strong contender as a core text for developing a writing strategy for developing writers.  This also provides a useful reference point for clusters in developing a shared approach to developing grammatical knowledge and application.

The Writing Milestones at St Mark's playlist details how the school considered progress in writing and created headline features of progressive milestones in order to involve learners in assessing their writing and planning their own progress. 

Comparative Judgment was used within 13 schools in 2022-23, (10 continue into 2023-24, including YBG) after proving useful in two schools in recent years, including 3 in both English and Welsh.  This has proved helpful in stimulating productive conversations with colleagues on the features of strong writing and how best to scaffold and stretch writers, and at which stage key features should be introduced, taught, applied and expected.  We have not found the writing ages to be reliable so they should be used with caution, if at all.

Ensuring that authentic purposes for writing are woven through the curriculum and that learners are scaffolded and stretched to develop and apply their skills meaningfully and successfully is a key consideration for all planning and implementation.

In 2021, Estyn recommended that primary schools: improve the teaching of writing through consistent approaches to developing skills, for example in sentence construction, punctuation and spelling; teach learners to understand the conventions of form and genre, and of writing as a process; provide learners with a real reason to write and audience to write for; high expectations of learners, including the more able, to write well in different, challenging forms; opportunities for learners to write freely using the range of writing skills that they already have; extended writing opportunities and the expectation for learners to check, correct and re-draft their work.

• Set and maintain high expectations of all learners to write well in different, challenging forms.

• Teach learners to understand writing as a process and the conventions of form and genre.

• Ensure that authentic purposes and audiences for writing are woven across the curriculum, and that learners are supported and stretched to develop, apply and transfer their skills meaningfully and successfully into new contexts, including extended writing opportunities.

• Instil an expectation for learners to check, correct and re-draft their work, as well as respond purposefully to peer critique and adult feedback.

• Learners achieving fluency and legibility in writing is important, although we do not have evidence that cursive writing is the only way to achieve this for all learners.

• Provide regular opportunities for learners to write freely using the range of writing skills that they already have.

• Discuss, agree and implement consistent approaches to developing and transferring skills, for example in sentence construction, punctuation and spelling throughout your school/cluster.