Writing Essentials

I chose to write about the 12 writing essentials because I think the most challenging aspect of writing is becoming overwhelmed with everything that is supposed to go into a writing piece. I think that many students sit down to write a story and instantly become stressed about the many features that are required to create a solid piece. I really like these 12 writing essentials because it paints a very clear and manageable picture of what needs to be done from both a writer’s perspective as well as a teachers.
From a writers standpoint I think it would be helpful to go through this checklist and use it as a guide in starting a writing piece. I really like the order in which they are distributed because I think the first couple skills are essential to think about before you even put your pen to the paper. As the list goes down it focuses more on revising your paper such as “reread, rethink, and revise while composing” and “apply correct convention and form”.
I think that each of these writing essentials is a skill that can be taught. For instance, writing for a specific reader is a skill we are working on in my middle school dyad as we speak. The students are required to take the same subject and write to two separate audiences. It is fascinating as a teacher to watch some of the students grasp this concept and watch some of them really struggle. It took some students a few tries to get how to change the voice of their paper but after a few lessons where they were shown how to correct what they had wrote they were finally able to grasp it. This shows me that this is a skill that can be taught and more importantly, is a very important skill to teach these students.
The writing essential that I found to be the most fun and at times easy for students to grasp is to, “create engaging leads”. We worked on this in my dyad as well and the entire class really enjoyed doing this. It was an opportunity for them to use their imagination and they all seemed to grasp the importance of the “hook”. I think the trickiest part for the young writers is to find a way to engage their readers from the beginning with a sentence that relates to the rest of their story. Many of the students wanted to begin with a catchy sentence that had nothing to do with their story but after a few tries and examples they were able to see that it needed to somehow relate back to their main topic. This made it a little more challenging for the students but they were all still able to come up with some wonderfully creative openings.
I think the most powerful writing essential is to “read widely and deeply- and with a writer’s perspective”. I found this to be the most powerful because as writers we forget how important it is to read in order to become a successful writer. This essential is saying that not only do we need to read but we need to read from a writers perspective meaning we need to notice what other authors are doing and trying to pay attention to the different characters and genres. It’s amazing what we can learn from different authors if we pay attention. I think this is extremely important and something that students don’t do enough. Reading and writing can go hand and hand but one must actively connect the two in order for it to benefit their skills as a writer.