Sometimes when you ask students to begin writing, they have no idea what to write about. I always liked to make time available during the week for my students to complete daily writing. I would provide them with a list of prompts (maybe 3-5 at a time) that they could use to help them begin their writing.
Check out my post, 31 Daily Writing Ideas To Help Kick Start Your Students Writing for some of the prompts that I have used.
This follows on from the previous point. But rather than you providing the list, you get your students to create their own list/s. Provide a heading as the stimulus, then students jot down their thoughts on the topic. These can just be key words and short sentences that come to mind. These ideas can be used later as a platform for writing. Some examples of topics could be:
Sometimes it’s much easier to orally share a story, idea, feelings and thoughts (rather than writing about these things). I have used a tape recorder for students to record their ideas. They have then listened to the recording and written down what was said.
This is an activity you can use in small groups. It is best to use a template for this to guide how much students write. Each student has a turn to write an introduction. They then pass this on to the next student in the circle. He/she reads the introduction and then writes the middle of the text. Finally with the last pass around the circle, each student reads the introduction and middle and then writes a conclusion. The writing is passed back to the original writer to read and share with the group.
Once students have finished writing it is always important to go back through the text to proofread and edit. Some students find this particularly difficult as they have spent a great deal of effort just putting their ideas down on the paper.
I find that it is good to break this down into smaller chunks. Firstly, you may want students to focus just on possible spelling mistakes. Using a highlighter, students can go through and highlight the words that they think are spelled incorrectly. Once students have edited the spelling, you may focus on punctuation. Sometimes by breaking a task down into manageable chunks, students can have more success.