Rory and the blank page

TIM TAYLOR

I once had a student called Rory. Rory was 'lively', you know what I mean - a child who can't sit still, is always on the move, full of ideas, some useful, others not, he had a mind full of wonders, but struggled to put them on the page.

For Rory writing was a chore. Not because he had nothing to say. The opposite, if anything. The problem was the gap between what was going on in his head and what would come out when he put his pencil to the paper. He knew enough to understand the gap, but not enough to close it. So he'd fidget, look around, sharpen his pencil, look around again. Sometimes he'd make a start and cross it out. A lot of the time he'd just wait for the session to be over.

Most of us have worked with a child like Rory. Children who are bright, curious, and full of things to say, but who see a blank page as a threat rather than an invitation. Writing for many children is hard work; it can take years to learn the technical skills of letter formation, spelling, punctuation, grammar, and syntax, but they make their way through it, starting off as mark makers unaware of the complexities, but eventually becoming skilled enough to express themselves effectively. As teachers we want that journey to be as quick and painless as possible, but it is hard and for some, like Rory, it is painful.

Overcoming this problem is about seeing learning to write as a combination of approaches involving acquisition, application, and development. Acquisition is the gradual accumulation of technical skills taught over the course of primary education, while application and development are the opportunities we give children to express themselves and communicate in purposeful ways.

The key thing is that acquisition and application and development are not best taught in the same way; we need to use a combination of teaching strategies. For acquisition, the best approach is direct instruction taught regularly and in short sessions. Longer sessions have the disadvantage of cognitive overload. Small and often is the best approach.

Application and development, on the other hand, are best taught in context - that is, giving children a purpose to write, something that motivates them to want to communicate. Something that feels urgent and important.

Imagine, for example, a teacher representing a farmer with a bad back to a class of four-year-olds. She starts by telling them that when she sits on the chair she's going to be someone in a story. She sits and starts wincing and rubbing her back. She gets off the chair, comes out of the story and asks them what they think is going on. The children say she's got a bad back. The teacher says, "Not me, the person in the story. He's actually a farmer and he needs help feeding his pigs. Would you like to help?" The children say they would, so the teacher says, "Well, stand up and we'll go into the story." Excited, the children spring to their feet. Immediately the teacher starts talking as the farmer: "Oh, thank goodness you've arrived. I really need help. You'll need to put on gumboots, it's very muddy near the pig pens."

And so on. The children, now inside the story, follow the farmer's lead and help feed and clear out the pigs. They even pretend to be the pigs for a while, because that's fun.

Once this part of the story is over, the teacher brings them back to the mat and asks them to sit down. She says, "Thank you for coming today, that was a big help. Will you be able to help me tomorrow?" The children say they will. "Wonderful. Well, when I need to remember something I write it down. That might be useful for you." She turns on the whiteboard and shows them an image.

"Can you remember what we did first?" she asks, and then writes down their answer on the board, asking them to help her spell the words using their developing phonic knowledge. She carries on until there is a list and then says, "Well, you're going to need a list of your own; there's some paper on the tables. Why don't you get started."

And the children go off and start making their own lists, mark-making at their own levels, using the pictures and writing on the board to help them.

You'll see here how the teacher is applying the skills the children have acquired in previous lessons and then giving them an opportunity to use and develop those skills. They are not perfect yet, far from it, but they can see how these skills are useful and have a purpose in the real world, even though they're exploring it through the world of a story.

This approach is called dramatic inquiry; it involves children stepping into stories as people who can make a difference, and the teacher using the story as a context for making their learning meaningful and important. This is the subject of an online course we've created for the Dramatic Inquiry Network Aotearoa Trust called 'Developing Students' Writing: A Teacher's Guide'.

Here is another example, this time with older students.

A class of ten-year-olds is working as a conservation team at an animal sanctuary. They've been building this world for a while: discussing the animals, deciding what the park does, establishing who they are within the fiction. The teacher, speaking as a member of the team, says, "We've just had news, and I'm afraid it's not good. An injured elephant is being transported here by helicopter. Its injuries are severe and it's unlikely to survive surgery. It will be here shortly."

The students gather round on the mat and create an outline of the elephant using string. They talk about what might have happened to the elephant and decide it has been shot by poachers. They add the bullet holes to the image using red paper cut into circles. The teacher narrates the arrival of the injured elephant and they begin to enact the operation. They scrub their hands, pull on imaginary gloves, examine the animal's injuries and do what they can. There are decisions to make: how badly is it hurt, what do they do first, do they have enough time? The situation is serious; an animal's life hangs in the balance. You can imagine Rory, among the group, utterly absorbed.

At the end of the operation, the teacher pauses the story and asks the students how they want it to end. "It could be a happy ending or a sad ending," she says, "you can decide." There is some discussion; some want the happy ending, others say it doesn't end well. The teacher repeats, "How it ends is up to you. But we'll need to write this up for the records. Are you confident we did everything in the right way? Those bullet wounds were serious. I expect we'll be contacted by the authorities; they will want to track down the poachers. Let's get to work."

At this point she pauses the story and talks to them about what a report of this kind might look like. She shares a template on the board and goes through the conventions of report writing with them.

She then works with them to fill in the first section, before leaving them to complete the rest of the report for themselves, finishing it as they choose.

Later the team are visited by a police officer (represented by the teacher in role) who is gathering evidence to prosecute the poachers. They interview the team and take a copy of the team's reports for their inquiries.

You can see, once again, the process of acquisition, application and development. The teacher teaches how to write a report in a conventional way, at a point where the students need to know. She then works together with them to immediately apply this new knowledge in a situation that matters to them. The students are next given the opportunity to take ownership of the story and develop it in the way they choose. Finally, they see the report making a difference in the world of the story as it helps to bring the poachers to justice.

This way of teaching and learning was a breakthrough for Rory. Once he had an audience, even if that audience was an imaginary one in a story, and once he had a purpose to communicate about something important to him, you couldn't stop him writing. At first, the spelling was a bit inconsistent, the handwriting a bit wonky. But that didn't matter. He was writing and very soon his writing caught up with his imagination, and what he began to write was truly wonderful. The blank page was no longer a threat, it was suddenly an opportunity to share his ideas.

Click here to find out more about the Dramatic Inquiry Network Aotearoa Trust writing course.

Click here to find the planning for the Farmer With the Bad Back and an accompanying slideshow.