Literacy- Week 3: Excited to get Kids to Write!

     Could there possibly be a better book out there on how to get students to love writing, than Regie Routman’s, Writing Essentials? I love to write, I’ve never thought myself particularly brilliant at it, but I love that I can get my thoughts down on paper and reflect on those thoughts at a later time. So, the question always comes out, “How can you get a student to come to that same realization and make them see the benefits of writing?”

     Routman says that too many teachers are either not confident in their own writing or teach writing based on test scores only. They have come to believe that the published programs on writing (curriculum) is the best to teach and have forgotten the fact that if a student is taught to love writing first, then they will do well on the tests. But how do you do that? How do you teach writing so that all students become effective and joyful writers and communicators?

     Routman has her 12 writing essentials that lists such things as “write for a specific reader”, “create engaging leads”, and “craft authentic voice”. Apply correct conventions and form is listed as number 10. It was after reading this that it hit me! Teachers are doing it all wrong! We should be helping students find their voice first, we should be celebrating their “risk taking” by helping them find writing topics that they can relate to, and most of all, we should be encouraging them, even if there is only one sentence written in a 30 minute class.

     I liked how Routman said that teachers should model writing in front of their class. Explain you should be your heart on the page when writing. Show them how to take a topic that is interesting to them, or an everyday happening, and begin a “list” of things to talk about. It can be a small list written on a post-it note and build on it from there.

     Routman’s one line that affected me the most? “Kids enter kindergarten loving school and full of the promise of possibilities. They see themselves as writers…they want to write. It’s our job to ensure they don’t lose that positive, I am a writer spirit” (p. 20).

    Isn’t this what it is all about? To make kids love to write! I know that after reading these first three chapters I am ready, and excited, to teach it!


Regie Routman's website:
http://www.regieroutman.com/