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4.1 Effective teaching of writing demonstrated all the generic characteristics set out in the performance indicators published in How Good Is Our School? (HMI 1996). Teachers' expectations were high, they engaged in clear direct teaching and they interacted helpfully with pupils as they undertook tasks. Pupils were highly motivated, produced much independent work and collaborated constructively. Topics and tasks were well suited to pupils' current stage and potential and they received well judged support in addressing them. They also received much valuable feedback on their work from the teacher and from other pupils. In this section, after paragraphs on organisation for writing, these generic qualities of good learning and teaching in relation to writing are grouped under a series of headings. The headings relate to the writing ethos and to the key elements of the process of writing. Discussion of the quality of assessment is incorporated in "Evaluating and conferencing". Comment on the use of computers comes under "Preparing to Publish".
Organisation for writing
4.2 As in other areas of the curriculum, effective classroom organisation facilitated good teaching of writing. Most teachers set common writing tasks to the whole class and provided different levels of support and expectation in discussions with individual pupils. The whole class then formed the writing community and all were able to comment sensibly on each others' work, particularly when it arose from such activities as a class investigation or a text they had read together. In most cases, class writing tasks were sufficiently open-ended to allow pupils to respond to them at different levels. In the best practice, group teaching where teachers drew together pupils with similar attainment in aspects of their writing, complemented class teaching. Teachers worked with groups, for example, to provide additional teaching support or to define the level of challenge in a writing task to match their attainment more closely than is possible with a whole class. Well-organised group teaching of this kind allowed teachers to provide effective teaching which recognised the different needs and attainments of pupils. A careful blend of class, group and individual approaches allowed teachers to provide more support to pupils for their writing than where only class and individual approaches were used.
4.3 In some cases, pupils from across two stages (eg, P6 and P7) who were more independent and confident writers were brought together to form one writing set. These pupils were able to comment helpfully on one another's work in quite demanding tasks. Others, meanwhile, worked with a different teacher on easier tasks, which offered challenges with which they could more easily help one another. As elsewhere in the curriculum, teachers should consider the effectiveness of setting and mixed ability arrangements for raising standards in writing.
The writing ethos
4.4 Where teaching and attainment in writing were rated by HMI as very good, teachers had created a writing culture, often at all stages of the school. There was an ethos in which writing was obviously highly valued and writers, including pupil-writers, were highly esteemed. Steps taken to create this ethos included the following.
4.5 In the early stages of primary school, teachers often provided a designated table or area, with attractive paper, writing books and pens/pencils/crayons to enable pupils to choose writing as an activity. This continued into P1 and P2 good practice in "emergent writing" from pre-school provision. This allows children to choose whether and when to write, what to write about, for whom and what to do with their work in the end. Alongside experiences planned by the teacher specifically to develop writing, emergent writing is valuable, because it capitalises on the powerful early learning processes in which children copy adult behaviour. It also enables the teacher to be responsive to the children's interests and to their growing awareness of the function and form of writing.
4.6 Some schools gave advice to parents about this kind of activity. They encouraged parents to give their children similar "choosing" opportunities at home, letting them see adults writing for practical purposes (eg, shopping lists, instructions, notes, letters, cards...) and talking with them about this writing.
4.7 Throughout the primary school and in S1 and S2, teachers promoted the idea that writing is an interesting, satisfying activity to engage in by choice. In some primary and secondary schools there were popular lunchtime or after-school writing clubs. Some schools enthused pupils by inviting professional story-tellers and writers to perform or discuss their work.
4.8 Some teachers contributed strongly to pupils' positive attitudes to writing by modelling the activity themselves. They produced, and discussed with the pupils, poems, stories and real life communications of their own, such as letters, instructions, diary entries. One of the high points of the HMI task was a spontaneous burst of applause for their teacher's poem from a P6 class who clearly recognised its qualities and were inspired to try to do as well.
4.9 Praise for writing was a standard feature at all stages. Pupils' work was frequently published and/or performed in readings. Publication might be on prominent class or school display areas, or in "books" - compilations of group, class or individual work, which were circulated to pupils and teachers elsewhere in the school and were available on parents' evenings. In one school, pupils' reviews of books had been published in a national periodical for teachers. Readings were given to various classes, at assemblies and at parents' meetings.
4.10 Some schools incorporated a competitive element into the ethos with a weekly "Star Writer" system. This was in fact only one element in an approach which strongly praised all pupils for their output and teachers took care to award stars to a wide range of pupils for different kinds of success and progress. The system was very successful in motivating pupils at all stages: the stars for the week wore their badges with great pride and others enjoyed reading the wide range of published star writing from all classes.
4.11 A key element in the writing culture was the consistent promotion of the idea that a writer both practises the craft and is knowledgeable about it. There was therefore regular discussion, both formal and informal, about the qualities and techniques of writing between teacher and pupils and among pupils.
Putting a good process of writing into action
4.12 The key elements in a good process of writing are those referred to in section 3.25. Pupils observed by HMI who wrote very well were thoroughly familiar with all the elements in this process and put them into effect. Their teachers consistently emphasised the value of these different elements. There is an obvious logic to the order in which they are set out and, generally, pupils and teachers dealt with them in this order. However, the four "stages" of the process are not independent and they were often combined instinctively in the writing process. Some adult writers and some pupils prefer to write in a more holistic way, others are more systematic in their approach. In practice, and especially as pupils become more experienced and confident as writers, the stages in the process intermingle. For example, HMI noted that, where pupils were very familiar with the process, they would seek the teacher's and other pupils' comments at an early planning stage, not only after a first draft. In these schools, teachers encouraged pupils to get spelling, grammar and punctuation right at the first draft, not only in final proof-reading. The speed at which pupils implemented the writing process also varied, according to the nature of the task. For simple tasks pupils became used to working through the process quickly. For more complex tasks, such as extended stories or reporting on several aspects of an investigation, pupils worked over an extended period on the processes of thinking, drafting, discussing, re-thinking, re-drafting and finalising.
Thinking, planning and using the plan
4.13 A frequent weakness in writing at all stages was lack of substance and limited development of ideas. The thinking/planning stage is crucial in avoiding this problem. It is the means by which the writer forms strategies and thinks of suitable content for the particular purpose(s) of the task.
4.14 Effective teachers helped pupils to think and plan well. They ensured that thinking and planning focused on the purpose of the task and the reader's needs - what the finished product should do. They helped the pupils to understand the topic and clarify their views on it, through such activities as questioning, discussion or direct teaching of note-making and summarising. They reminded pupils about their previous experience of this type of writing and the qualities which capable writers achieve in it. They often involved pupils in analysis and discussion of specific examples to model the type of writing required.
4.15 Skilful teachers also gave pupils strategies for finding content. These included individual or group brainstorming of a wide range of ideas, from which each writer could then make a personal selection. One approach to the problem of how to keep in mind several things which are necessary to achieve the purpose of the writing was to encourage "mind-map" or "spider diagram" planning. Pupils noted ideas to be used in relation to different elements in the writing (eg, in planning a story, three separate characters, setting, events/plot, impact on the characters). Another technique was the use of questions or prompts to structure pupils' thinking. For example, pupils were prompted to think about the purposes of their tasks by sets of questions such as "Who?" "What?" "When?" "Where?" "How?". Older pupils were given similar kinds of questions relating to the qualities sought in the relevant type of writing. Other types of prompts gave pupils markers of both appropriate structure for the task and style of language, for example, by providing the opening sentence of several paragraphs.
4.16 In helping pupils to think and plan using such prompts, the best teachers did not inhibit individual approaches to the problems presented by the task. Pupils were encouraged to give themselves aims and questions to address in their tasks, but the teacher did not provide these for them, nor establish a common class or group plan. The crucial requirement for each writer to make her or his own decisions was strongly emphasised.
4.17 Sensitive professional judgement was also needed in deciding how much of the writing plan should be written down. Some pupils like to have the reassurance of a fully detailed plan. Sometimes, however, such detailed written planning can have the effect of curtailing the pupil's thinking about the task's problems. The pupil simply "writes out" the plan and does not effectively adapt and modify it as the writing proceeds. There were examples in the HMI task of relatively skimpy planning on paper (though pupils had given the tasks a good deal of thought) which led to more extended and imaginative writing than other more detailed plans. The best teaching encouraged pupils to recognise that it is a normal part of a good writing process to re-think how best to achieve purposes and meet the reader's needs while actually writing.
Evaluating and conferencing: assessment as part of teaching
4.18 The term "conferencing" derives from the work of Donald Graves1. A key factor in the writing workshop approach he advocates is regular conferences about the writing task as it progresses. The pupil discusses the draft (or sometimes the plan) with the teacher and often also with other pupils, whose views are sought on how the writer is succeeding in achieving her or his aims. In the most effective practice seen by HMI this collaborative approach to ensuring the best possible content, structure and language choice to achieve the purpose(s) was well established. Often, conferences happened spontaneously as and when pupils thought they needed help. Sometimes pupils undertook this evaluation of how well the draft achieved the purpose on their own, while with other tasks they collaborated. One effective technique was "the author's chair". This was a regular event in which pupil-writers explained to others what and how they were trying to achieve in a piece of writing. The audience commented and made suggestions. Whatever the pattern of collaboration among pupils, the teacher took care to give every individual writer praise and ideas for improvement, in the form of either questions or suggestions to consider.
4.19 This approach created circumstances in which pupils received more pertinent advice, and acted on it, than when the teacher marked the finished product. Much marking by both primary and secondary teachers in schools in the HMI general inspection programme was ineffective. Sometimes it was too superficial to improve key writing skills, and sometimes pupils ignored very constructive comments. The teacher is certainly a very important reader of and commentator on all of a pupil's writing, but a conferencing ethos can make the teacher's input to the process more effective. It can reduce some demands on the teacher's time, because other pupils are consulted on some points, rather than the teacher. It also means that the teacher becomes familiar with pupils' work in the process of writing and can make many helpful comments during this, reducing the need for time-consuming written responses to the final product.
4.20 Where learning and teaching were very good, the creation of a writing culture and the development of evaluating and conferencing activities ensured that "assessment as part of teaching" was fully integrated in the process of writing. Teachers and pupils were clear about the qualities expected in each task. There was much exchange of views about whether they were being achieved and what other ways of pursuing them the pupil writers might try. Because teachers were actively involved in helping pupils to evaluate their work as they were producing it, they often gave them more directly effective feedback than where the teacher simply marked the finished work. They also built up a deeper knowledge of the pupils' strengths and needs as writers.
4.21 In many schools, this high quality writing process was not established and assessment as part of teaching was weaker. Almost half of the primary schools and a fifth of secondary English departments inspected in the general inspection programme had important weaknesses in assessment as part of teaching in English language. Assessment of writing reflected this picture. Tasks were often set without pupils being clear about the purpose of the task or the qualities that they were expected to achieve. Pupils received very little comment on their work, beyond a tick or "Good Work", even when possible improvements were obvious. Teachers' response to pupils' writing often conveyed a message of low expectations. Pupils were left unclear about their next steps in learning.
4.22 Teachers were increasingly developing confidence in making judgements about pupils' attainment of 5-14 levels in writing. The publication of revised national test criteria was an important step which made it easier for teachers to develop a sense of the qualities expected at each level, both in specific national test tasks and more generally in pupils' classwork. Some teachers shared criteria which were relevant to particular writing tasks with pupils.
4.23 The implementation of national testing in writing had been slower than in reading or mathematics. Some schools had not yet started to use writing criteria and in others teachers still lacked a shared understanding of their meaning and application. This understanding can best be achieved by teachers working together to evaluate the qualities of samples of writing and comparing them with models which have been assessed by other teachers. In some schools, groups of secondary English teachers and primary teachers had worked successfully in evaluating writing. The process takes time but it is an important one in promoting staff teamwork towards common aims and improving consistency in reporting to parents, pupils, other teachers and schools.
4.24 Some schools had adopted a good system of gathering representative samples of pupils' writing in a "folio" for summative assessment. The use of folios worked best where samples were selected carefully, dated and limited in number. This made it possible for teachers to concentrate most of the time on assessment as part of teaching and occasionally to consider a range of samples of work in deciding whether a particular level had been attained securely. In best practice, this evidence was used alongside, and to exemplify, brief descriptive comments on records of pupils' strengths, development needs and progress. This is the approach to assessment recommended in national advice.
4.25 Nevertheless, just as too few schools had developed high quality assessment as part of teaching and good feedback to pupils, too few had yet taken steps to ensure accurate and reliable summative assessment in keeping with the national guidelines. In the general inspection programme it was rare for HMI to find evidence of cross-marking or discussions to standardise teachers' assessments. In many cases, teachers were making judgements about the attainment of a level on the basis of very little writing (often because the programme did not require enough of pupils). The Standards and Quality English report refers to important weaknesses or unsatisfactory assessment in 20% of English departments. It indicates that these departments often made no use at all of the 5-14 national assessment guidelines, the levels or the national tests.
4.26 Schools should take action to support and standardise teachers' summative assessments of writing (and of other curricular areas). They should recognise, however, that, while this is an important need and improved summative assessment will be beneficial to the teaching of writing, it is not the only action required to address writing issues. Many of the key characteristics of effective writing programmes and learning and teaching will remain unaffected if a school devotes all its developmental effort to summative assessment.
Preparing to publish - getting the technical quality right
4.27 A key characteristic of good teacher feedback, whether oral, as pupils were writing, or written, in response to a draft, was high expectation. This applied to pupils' ability to think out solutions for themselves, or to use techniques like further brainstorming to come up with new ideas. It also applied to the quality of expression, spelling and punctuation. The best teachers did not accept writing littered with errors which, with some thought and care, pupils were able to correct. Pupils learned that a crucial requirement for publication in whatever form was to bring their text to as high a level of accuracy as possible. This was one of the means by which teachers inculcated the idea that praise for writing was certainly going to be regular, but only if the writer really earned it.
4.28 Preparation for publication also included, where relevant, illustration and layout of the text. Sometimes stopping work on the production of the text itself to spend a little time on these presentational aspects created a valuable rest period, during which pupils could clarify their thinking about the writing. However, good teachers did not allow presentational aspects of writing to become more important, or to take up more time and effort, than the composition itself.
4.29 There were examples of good use of ICT by pupils for presentation of their writing in a small proportion of the schools inspected. Few primary schools or secondary English departments, however, fully exploited its potential. Where possible, pupils should have access to facilities which enable them to modify text easily. They should be taught the relevant ICT skills and techniques and encouraged to use them both for drafting/re-drafting and for effective presentation.
4.30 HMI frequently observed cases where pupils' limited keyboard skills led to very slow production of text and the loss of valuable time for thinking and composing. Schools should ensure that classes, groups and individuals receive sufficient support to develop appropriate word-processing skills.
4.31 ICT is adding new dimensions to the craft of writing itself. New styles of writing are developing in the use of E-mail and Internet communications. These add to the range of purposes of writing and of language techniques which pupils can call on. They also extend the range of abilities expected in writing, since they introduce new requirements or new possibilities in respect of decisions about appropriate style for purpose. Some pioneering schools are already making their pupils aware of and confident in creating "hypertext". This enables readers to move to new pages to search for more information relevant to one topic or keyword, without reading the text from start to finish.
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