Kate De Goldi on writing

Here is the link to Kate De Goldi's post on the NZ Book Council blog as follow up to her visit to Northland schools in 2008, with her advice for children on becoming a writer...
http://bookcouncil.blogspot.com/2008_04_01_archive.html

How do you become a writer ?

1. First you must be a passionate, attentive and wide-ranging reader…
   
2. A good writer is second of all A Noticing Person - a good writer is alert in the world, seeing, hearing, tasting, touching, smelling...
   
3. A good writer Records : you must note down everything you observe... keep a notebook...keep several.
   
4. A good writer Connects: once you get into the habit of noticing and recording, inevitably you start making connections between things...
   
5. A good writer takes what they have observed, recorded and connected up and gives it back in surprising ways... Two of the best tools are simile and metaphor…

And a bit more detail on encouraging that "noticing" from a talk Kate gave to teachers at REAP:

• All writers are readers and they are also incredibly observant people – they use their senses – need to encourage children to do this too – list the senses
• Ask the children to write down everything in the room that is red – from biggest to very smallest things…
  
• Then listening – their bodies, near them, in the room, outside…
  
• Be observant, notice…
  
• Smell – list a smell they love, one they hate… try to avoid bodily functions – no fart smells, also try to think beyond food - think about the smell, describe it in detail, what it is about it that they like, if it had a colour what colour would it be, what shape…
  
• Encourage children to be in the world in a sensory way and to include this in their writing… Start the day recording 5 things they noticed on way to school.

"Picture book a day" blog

I've just come across this blog which may be of interest - Anastasia Suen’s Picture Book of the Day blog at http://6traits.wordpress.com/

This blog recommends a picture book each day of the week (some days have a special focus eg Non-fiction Monday, Poetry Friday) with a 1 or 2 line plot summary, a short quote from the text, and a suggested writing activity for one of the six traits of writing

The six traits of writing were identified in the 1980s as a way to help young writers look at their own writing. They are

1. Ideas
2. Organization
3. Voice
4. Word Choice
5. Sentence Fluency
6. Conventions

The books featured in Anastasia Suen's blog are American, but many are available from National Library and may trigger ideas for using similar books / activities.

Here is a link http://educationnorthwest.org/resource/503 for more information about the 6 Traits which has been expanded to now include a 7th - presentation...

The 6+1 Trait® Writing analytical model for assessing and teaching writing is made up of 6+1 key qualities that define strong writing. These are:

• Ideas, the main message;
• Organization, the internal structure of the piece;
• Voice, the personal tone and flavor of the author's message;
• Word Choice, the vocabulary a writer chooses to convey meaning;
• Sentence Fluency, the rhythm and flow of the language;
• Conventions, the mechanical correctness;
• and Presentation, how the writing actually looks on the page.

ERO Report : Reading and Writing in Years 1 and 2

Here is a link to the newly published ERO report on Reading and Writing in Years 1 and 2, due to be sent to schools in Term 1 2010.

http://tiny.cc/EROreportReadingandWritingYears1and2

I was interested to see how the library fitted into effective teaching of reading and writing at Years 1 and 2 from ERO's perspective... I was disappointed.

The word library does not appear at all in the report.

The word libraries appears once in the report in the following sentence on page 18 :
Children had plentiful and appropriately levelled texts in their reading boxes, big books, poetry cards, reading games and in class and school libraries.

The word literature appears 4 times in the report, in each instance referring to professional reading about best teaching practice.

I can't believe that a report about reading and writing in the junior school does not mention the vital importance of ready access to a range of literature and engagement with stories for reading motivation and pleasure, teacher reading role models "readers are made by readers", well-resourced and well-used school libraries to enrich teaching practice, and the creation of a reading culture in the classroom and school...