Shared Writing

As children share in the writing process with an experienced writer, they explore and expand their knowledge of how writing works through enjoyable, purposeful and meaningful experiences.

Shared Writing is a strategy which allows children to participate in the writing process by contributing ideas and knowledge without the pressure of having to write on their own. The teacher usually scribes, however, children may share the recording.

Why Shared Writing?

Children will gain:

• pleasure;

• a desire to write;

• independence;

• knowledge of writing behaviours;

• knowledge of writing strategies;

• newconcepts;

• an extended vocabulary;

• knowledge of variety of written forms;

• confidence to: – talk

  – think
  – share
  – compare – reflect;

• SUCCESS. 

  Features of Shared Writing

  • Each session should have a planned focus.

  • Children are in whole-class or small groups.

  • Children and teacher collaboratively create a text.

  • There is on-going discussion throughout the sessions.

  • The teacher encourages and scaffolds contributions.

  • Children have a safe, supportive time to explore and try out both compositional and secretarial aspects of writing.

    The focus may be on:

    • deciding upon the purpose and audience, for example, labels for our models, a list of things for the party;

    • generating ideas or gathering information;

    • agreeing the best way to present writing,for example,list,caption, instructions;

    • deciding what to write;

    • recording ideas or information;

    • attempting to spell or access words;

    • re-reading the text to check for sense;

    • making necessary corrections or improvements. Sessions are focussed and fun.

      Children should have opportunities to consolidate and transfer learning to other situations through a variety of supported and/or independent writing tasks, for example, shopping lists, recounting personal experiences, composing simple stories, greetings cards, menus.

      Careful observations of children’s writing behaviours need to be made to determine the appropriate teaching focus for each shared session. This will involve observing them, not only during whole-class shared sessions but during small-group sessions and informal interaction with text, for example, in role-play situations. 

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