Closing the Writing Gap

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This book explains seven critical steps to improve children’s writing. Though seemingly ‘natural’, writing proves devilishly difficult for far too many school pupils and closing this gap can have a lasting impact on their academic and life success.With the goal of giving every teacher the knowledge and skill to teach writing with confidence, it makes sense of the history and ‘science’ of writing, synthesising the debates and presenting a wealth of usable evidence about how children develop most efficiently as successful writers.It trains teachers to be an expert in how pupils learn to write, from the big picture of planning, editing and revising your writing, to the vital importance of grammar and spelling with accuracy. Highly practical strategies and easy-to use classroom activities are included to help teachers seize opportunities across the curriculum every school day to teach the critical writing process. Closing the Writing Gap will guide teachers at every stage of their career and when used with Alex Quigley’s much-loved books on Vocabulary and Reading gives school leaders evidence-based approaches to literacy that can be applied across a school or a group of schools. Closing the Writing Gap by Alex Quigley – eBook Details Novice writers, including those learning in schools, encounter teachers as gatekeepers of topics, forms, means and processes. But those teachers are often constrained by systems, including the accountability that tests and examinations required by governments engender." - Wyse, How Writing Works If I was to identify one important writing process that is most neglected by pupils, I would pose revising their writing. Why is this vital strategy so commonly neglected? In my ‘Closing the Writing Gap’ book, I propose that ‘revising’ writing is misunderstood and confused with ‘editing’. So, what is the difference between these admittedly … I am a blogger and the proud author of ‘Closing the Reading Gap’, ‘Closing the Writing Gap’, and ‘The Confident Teacher’. Less is more. This stands to reason - if you can’t make more time, then ask the child to do less. Perhaps they can continue with a task when others have moved on (if it doesn’t mean they’ll miss curriculum content) or use bullet points to structure but with one or two well written pieces to show depth. Quality not quantity.

Closing the Writing Gap - 1st Edition - Alex Quigley

There are few simple solutions in education. If you are being promised one, it is at best a hopeful fib, at worst a deceptive sales-pitch. But there are some helpful principles that can guide our actions. A useful one I think could help improve literacy in primary and secondary schools: write less; read more. It … So, this is a book that covers an admirable amount of ground, and I would highly recommend it to all teachers. But while the history of writing was a worthwhile discussion, and the practical approaches for grammar and sentence-level teaching invaluable, the chapter on the science of writing left me with more questions than answers. It expertly articulates the problems caused by gaps in vocabulary, reading and writing and outlines how solutions such as teacher training and planning throughout the curriculum can lead to success. Hold that thought’ is not something children with poor short-term memories can do. They say (or often blurt out) something brilliant and then it has faded away either naturally or because someone or something has disrupted the thought process. It can even happen mid-sentence. Have you met those children who begin telling you something and then hesitate and say, ”I’ve forgotten what I wanted to say now”? Or those children so desperate to tell you something that they put their hands in the air as if their lives depended on it, but when you get to them, they’ve forgotten the answer? This type of behaviour may mean a child has a short-term memory difficulty. This book provides an easy-to-read and entertaining synthesis of research on writing, beginning with a compelling overview of how writing developed. It has written text at its heart and offers readers a succinct insight into textual research and its practical application to the writing classroom. The book is a rich source of directions for further reading and examples of strategies for teaching writing which will support teachers to reflect on what happens in their writing classrooms and to make enabling changes.Develop all writing types, from note taking to narrative writing, along with ‘writing like an artist’, ‘writing like a geographer’, and much more. Whenever, and however, schools reopen as the coronavirus pandemic declines, unfortunately some children will be further behind their peers than ever. We would be very interested in you coming to speak about your new book? Is this something you do? We are trying to embed our Literacy Policy and could really do with some input from someone like yourself! Top 10 grammar moves. This infographic summarises the key grammar moves that feature in academic writing. Beginning with a potted history of writing pedagogy, and a section on the science of writing (more on that later), Quigley then turns to two crucial nuts and bolts of the craft: grammar and syntax.

Closing the Writing Gap by Alex Quigley | Perlego [PDF] Closing the Writing Gap by Alex Quigley | Perlego

Geoff Barton, General Secretary, Association of School & College Leaders, and former English TeacherWith the goal of giving every teacher the knowledge and skill to teach writing with confidence, it makes sense of the history and ‘science’ of writing, synthesising the debates and presenting a wealth of usable evidence about how children develop most efficiently as successful writers. We can take the brilliant complexity of sentences for granted. Each sentence written in the classroom is a distillation of a near-infinite number of complex moves. For pupils, practising one sentence brilliantly may be worth a hundred sentences written in haste. Too often, in the classroom, sentences are modelled, but pupils don’t have a strong …