THEORY OF WRITING

Theory of Writing June Elizabeth Gay Florida State University

LAE 3333 Teaching Writing and Language to High School Dr. Garland November 4, 2012

THEORY OF WRITING

My experience with many writing assignments and studying Smagorinskys The Dynamics of Writing Instruction has taught me that the theory of using Individualized Instruction seems to be what would work best for my students and me. In this approach to teaching writing, the students composing processes include exploring and discovering, planning, composing, conferring, revising, editing, and publishing, (Smagorinsky, 2010). This theory allows for students to research information on their own and be able to write more in detail in my opinion, because they actually know what they are talking about. Writing is so important for students to practice. This is because students will use writing throughout the rest of their life no matter what they do. Making students interested in learning more about writing is the teachers job, and in my opinion it is all about the approach the teacher takes. All students have different learning styles, and so this means that it is important for the teacher to approach writing instruction with the different learning styles in mind. The Dynamics of Writing Instruction gives readers many useful activities to have students do, they all are different and so the teacher would not always be accommodating only one learning style. Free writing is an effective way to have students practice writing. To be even more specific, narratives are really good genres of free writing. According to Deans Genre Theory, genres are not fixed, this means that if a student was free writing a narrative, whether personal or fictional, they would be able to write on just about anything they wanted (Dean, 2008). This is good practice for the students, because they will probably write on something they are interested in and it will be more fun for them. If the narrative that is assigned is a fictional narrative, The Dynamics of Writing Instruction suggests that the gateway activity should be about the setting and conflict of the topic of the narrative. I think this is good because this goes back to the idea that teaching writing is all

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about the approach. If the teacher starts out making the students have their own imagination about their writing then they will be more likely to enjoy what they are writing and get more out of it. A hallmark of a structured process approach to writing instruction is to include a gateway or introductory activity. A gateway activity gives students a clear framework for the task ahead, (Smagorinsky, 2010). When there is variety in the way class begins and how writing assignments are approached it allows for students to enjoy learning instead of getting in a routine, where they will lose focus. When teaching personal experience narratives, The Dynamics of Writing Instruction says Students pay attention to the specific details of a mundane object -their left shoe- and describe them clearly, vividly, and distinctively enough so that another student can identify the shoe in a big pile of shoes, (Smagorinsky, 2010). While I do not think that the shoe is the best idea, there are other items that can be described for this activity. However, this is another great approach to teaching this genre of writing and is something different that will captivate the students attention. It will allow for students to practice descriptive writing and then they will be able to free write a personal narrative easily. Overall, my theory of writing is that it is all about how the teacher approaches the writing instruction. Making writing interesting and appealing to students is key in helping them succeed. Teachers must always be flexible in their teaching styles, so that they can always meet the students learning styles. Free writing is great practice for students to practice and improve their writing; because it is something they will be more interested in and be able to prosper from with more formal writing assignments.

THEORY OF WRITING

References Dean, Deborah.(2008).Explaining Genre Theory.Genre Theory,10-11. Smagorinsky, Peter.(2010).Teaching Fictional Narratives. Teaching Personal Experience Narratives.Dynamics of Writing Instruction,37-59.