NCCL's Writing Program

Above all else, writing is communication. If we think of what constitutes good writing, we think of a writer who has reached us with an idea or feeling, clearly, uniquely, expressively. The chief goal of the writing program at NCCL is to nurture a child's ability to communicate and develop his ideas in this way.

Many of us remember writing experiences in school where we handed in a piece of writing that the teacher saw for the first time, graded, made a few comments on, and handed back. What did we learn about writing? Probably, that writing is only an assignment and that the audience is often just the teacher.

At NCCL, we spend hours each week working with children throughout the crafting process. We listen, consult, ask questions, and praise children on their writing in one-on-one conferences. Kids share their writing with each other. We want children to become intimate with the process of writing as well as being proud of a finished product that will be shared with and read by a community.

We start by looking at writers who've reached us. What do we like about this passage or poem? How did the writer get her idea or feeling across so well? We point children's attention to subjects, words, styles, techniques, and elements that inspire us as writers across genres.

We give children the opportunity to write in many genres at NCCL. This allows children to experiment and find strengths as well as appreciate the breadth of writing. Projects include: poetry, journal writing, stories, letters, reports, family history, ABC books, personal narrative, newspaper writing, essays, historical fiction, and vignettes. Since the beginning of the school, we've found it essential to give children the freedom of choice within these genres. What they write needs to be important and meaningful to them. How can you learn to invest yourself in and cultivate a piece of writing when you're not even interested in the subject you're writing about?

Writing for an audience adds to this sense of purpose. We begin with each other. Group 1 students share their writing with classmates in a special authors chair and as the kids get older, they gradually learn how to support each other as a community of writers by offering constructive feedback and praise. The idea is that were all part of this together and that we can learn from each other.

Ultimately, our audience is larger than the classroom. Sometimes our writing appears on the walls and hallways of our school. Often we go further, submitting work for publication or producing our own newspaper that we deliver to area businesses such as local barber shops and take-out food restaurants. Unlike many other subject areas, writing offers this big payoff and we relish it. More than any other part of the process, publishing allows kids to see themselves as writers and feel a sense of accomplishment.

There are times of course when we need to bring children's attention to the nuts and bolts of writing. When not done well, functions of writing like spelling, capitalization, punctuation, sentence structure, and organization can interfere with communication. We approach each of these functions at a developmentally appropriate level. In Group 1, kids are often using invented spelling and learning to put spaces between words. They're just getting comfortable with these basic elements. In Group 2, kids are learning to become more regular with spelling, capitalization and punctuation and are learning beginning paragraphing. They continue to smooth out these areas in Group 3 and begin to tackle organization, learning to see the whole rather than just the parts of their writing. All of these elements continue as the children move into Group 4. They also learn more nuanced functions like the use of semi-colons.

By the time a child reaches Group 4, we want him to see himself as a writer with the habits of mind of a writer. We know if we encourage his strengths and support his struggles, hell improve while he's with us. In the end though, we want him to become patient, flexible, thoughtful, and to challenge himself because these habits are what will allow him to grow in his writing abilities beyond NCCL. We encourage these habits of mind to help children develop into good writers, but of course, we nurture children in this way across all of our studies at NCCL.

—Sean Kerrane, Group 3 Teacher