The Writing Revolution By Pg Tyre

Writing is an intricate, intellectual activity that helps students learn to analyze information. Teaching fluency in writing goes beyond training students how to master grammar and mechanics. When you teach writing, you are giving students the ability to reason and communicate clearly with others. Writing requires the ability to convey facts and details to others in a coherent and logical manner. This means that the very act of writing about a topic encourages a deeper understanding of the subject matter because the writer must process the information they’ve been taught. It is important to spend more time and effort explicitly teaching proper grammar, writing mechanics, and how to clearly and logically communicate with others to children in

In her article, Tyre quotes Steven Graham, a professor of education instruction at Arizona State University. He explains that this new trend was based on the theory that writing skills should be “caught, not taught.” Tyre describes how this approach involved getting rid of the old, tried-and-true methods of writing instruction in favor of more interesting, creative writing assignments. This meant that teachers no longer focused on lessons in grammar and mechanics. Writing instruction in grade school now involved students keeping writing journals filled with personal stories and poetry. Students would also engage in peer editing without worrying about formal details. Tyre goes on to explain how, with the passage of No Child Left Behind, formal writing instruction became an even lower priority as math and reading became more important. Unfortunately, for many children, this laissez-faire method is ineffective. This is especially true for many underserved children who don’t grow up in language-rich

She landed on a method developed by Judith Hochman, the former head of the Windward School. This small, private school costs about $55,000 per year to attend and caters to students with language-based learning disabilities. DeAngelis was fascinated by the Windward School because it has an excellent reputation for turning these students into competent writers after only two or three years. The program used at this school involves explicitly teaching writing skills. Instruction begins with learning how to construct simple sentences and builds toward composing paragraphs and then essays. Hochman insists that teachers need to start teaching these skills, and stop acting like students should simply be able to intuit what to do. She explains why this program works by stating, “The thing is, kids need a formula, at least at first, because what we are asking them to do is