How To Write Across The National Curriculum

The national curriculum is made up of reading, writing, and arithmetic. Emphasis must be placed on language and communication for education to be able to reach its growth potential. Writing is used significantly in our culture to communicate with one another. Students use writing everyday as a tool to show comprehension and communicate their thoughts. Although writing is a time consuming activity the education system needs to place more emphasis on writing. In 2003, the National Commission for Writing was convened to look at how to improve writing in the learning process. The commission made these five recommendations; national writing agenda, time, measurement of results, technology, and professional development to create and launch a writing

“We recommend that state and local education agencies work with writing specialists to develop strategies for increasing the amount of time students spend writing” (The Neglected "R", 2003, pp. 28). Although writing is important not a lot of time is spent teaching students to write, therefore most students do not write well. To change this, preface the commission recommend three changes to the learning process which encompass creating more time, writing across the curriculum, including writing and assignments as homework. According to the commission, doubling the amount of time that students spend writing is the most important change that can be implemented by local and state school officials to improving students writing performance. Using writing as a tool throughout the curriculum will definitely increase the amount of time a student spends writing. The feasibility of doubling writing can be achieved if teachers use writing in all areas of the curriculum, not just in language arts. Writing can be used in history, foreign language, mathematics, home economics, science, physical education, art and social studies which will increase a students’ time writing. The commission believes that increasing the time students spend writing throughout the curriculum makes doubling writing time more feasible and will help students write more