Write, Write, Write!
We spend a great deal of time developing excellent writers here at Vicentia. We write every day in the classroom through interactive writing and independent writing and we do it in all curricular areas. We begin writing on the first day of school. Many of my students enter kindergarten able only to spell their name and hold a pencil. Over time, their skills improve, and by the end of the year they are able to write a paragraph that includes a topic sentence, star ideas, and a conclusion. There are some things that you can do to support your child in this amazing growth!
- Come to Family Learning Friday and learn the writing vocabulary and strategies we use in the classroom every day.
- Click the link and print the letter formation page Letter Formation and the journal page Journal Pages to use at home when practicing writing.
- Support your child in guiding them through proper letter formation. Talk to them constantly about starting at the top only, touching top, middle, and bottom of the lines, etc. When in doubt, follow the letter formation guide.
- Never write for your child!. They can do it on their own and they do it every day in the classroom. It may sound funny, but every year I correct homework that has clearly been done by a parent.
- Keep the sight words close to where they work on homework because they use these to build sentences.
- When they are writing words they do not know how to spell, they will use their sounds to do it. Don't ever do the spelling for them. We do not spell for each other. They use their sounds and write exactly what they hear. Do not correct them.This may be difficult for you to do, but is very important for their development as writers. I should not see perfect spelling from any child. There are words that they may know how to spell such as, "mom" and "cat." You know what those words are-and so do I. All other words should be written phonetically. For example, if they want to spell friend, you might see frd and that is perfect kindergarten writing. The "n" is hard to hear. The "i " makes no sound at all, so they have no idea it is there. So, if I see "friend" perfectly written in homework, I know that someone has spelled it for them. An exception to this is if the word friend is somewhere in the house and they know that and they go find it and copy it. We do this in the classroom. We check the room to see if we have already read or written the word and we use it to help us.