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Good Writing Skills

Students should be learning good writing skills as part of a classroom performance assessment.

Good writing skills is part of the communication domain. This is what effective writing skills look like in a Classroom Performance Assessment.

Effective writing skills are an integral part of literacy. There are many learning tools within the Classroom Performance Assessment domain that are used for improving writing skills.

good writing skills
Learning writing skills is important because many parts of it are the foundational skills of literacy.

Teachers expect students to show their developing writing skills in many ways.

The writing must be purposeful and able to be used in all content areas.

Improving writing skills in any of the components is done through focused lessons and daily practice.

Students also need to know that you value teaching writing to them and want them to learn to love writing.

Learning Writing Skills

There are 6 domains for learning good writing skills on the Classroom Performance Matrix:

Emergent Writing
Writing Vocabulary
Text Structures
Writing Process and Organization
Writing Conventions
Language Structure

This page will condense the domains, but it is by no means exhaustive. The areas are: Emergent Skills, Writing Vocabulary and Writing Content/Structure/Mechanics.

Emergent Skills

Good writing skills begin with developmental gains that set the foundation for future success in reading and writing.

Students have to understand that print expresses meaning and can serve different purposes.

Assessing Emergent Skills

The student should:

Consistently uses either the right or left hand
Correct pencil grip
Goes print orientation for specific language (left-to-right, right-to-left, up-down)
Correctly uses spaces and lines
Uses invented spelling
Correctly forms print and cursive letters
Begins to write to tell a story or give a message

Writing Vocabulary

Just as having a good listening vocabulary is necessary for listening comprehension, an excellent working vocabulary for writing is essential.

Students must be able to use their knowledge of words to express their thoughts and ideas on paper. They also have to have a wide enough vocabulary to be able to express meaning across genres.

Assessing Writing Vocabulary

The student should:

Use developmentally appropriate vocabulary
Make effective word choices to convey meaning
Use different words to convey similar meanings
Use descriptive words
Uze figurative language to enhance imagery
Match word choices to text genre
Be able to use a variety of resources to select vocabulary

Writing Structure, Mechanics and Content

Students with good writing skills adhere to correct structure, content and writing mechanics. The structures for writing vary according to the genre: narrative, expository, persuasive, journals, poetry, notes, letters, etc.

Process and organization are part of the content. We know we want our students to be able to write creatively, but we also want them to be able to organize their writing in a way that is pleasing to the reader.

As far as process, we teach general guidelines but I have found that many students develop their own writing process that is effective for them. I always teach the writing process steps, but allow for individualization and differentiation.

Assessing Writing Structure, Mechanics and Content

The student should:

Use text structure examples to write different genres
Uses dialogue, inferences, sub-topics and details
Gives appropriate amounts of support for main idea
Can express ideas, humor and imagination through written text

Creates webs, graphic organizers, mind maps or diagrams to organize ideas and details
Brainstorms or generates independent ideas
Writes a variety of sentences
Writes structured and coherent paragraphs
Proofreads selections and makes appropriate corrections
Edits and rewrites final copies for both meaning and mechanics

Seeks others to provide feedback
Prepares writing for publication
Shares writing with others as a means of self-expression

If a student is struggling with completing a writing task after planning it, there may be a deficit in executive communication skills.

Return to Top: Good Writing Skills in the Communication Domain

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