Liz Chamberlain and Emma Kerrigan-Draper,Inspiring writing in the primary schools

Abstract

In today’s educational landscape, national and local literacy policies outline goals and standards for children that often overlook the type of authentic writing that happens for children outside school. In Inspiring Writing in Primary Schools, Dr Liz Chamberlain and a headteacher in a small city primary school, Emma Kerrigan-Draper, contextualize writing as an authentic meaning-making process and provide an overview of what it means to be a developing writer both in and outside school. The structure of the book provides an engaging experience with suggested activities, resources, guided questions and links for the reader to critically reflect upon educational practices. Throughout the chapters, the authors pose tasks to invite the reader in reflecting, discussing, writing, and recording their understandings and strategies to drive authentic instruction. The book is divided into two main sections: What it means to be a developing writer and Creating spaces and places for writing, with ideas in the primary classroom context. The skilful mix of theory with practice provides an outline and direction to the beginning teacher and the critical discussion on writing instruction provides a compelling narrative for even the most experienced teacher. Throughout the book, the authors describe spaces during literacy instruction that can be cultivated to invite and inspire young writers and develop a context where writing supports students’ out of school lives. An overriding message throughout the book is that writing must be anchored in authentic and relevant experiences for children:

But for all children, providing a purpose for writing needs to be at the core of quality writing experiences, and this is what should remain at the heart of your practice, regardless of government changes and policy initiatives. (p. 13)

The various chapters provide examples to engage the reader in thinking directly and explicitly about one’s purpose for writing and the types of activities to motivate learners despite restrictive aims.

Chapter 1 provides an overview of children’s writing. Here, the authors provide a portrait of writing instruction throughout Europe over time and the move towards a national curriculum for English. This chapter sets the stage for understanding the constraints and affordances of the current educational landscape, while weaving theories of literacy learning and the power of broadening perspectives on writing for the youngest of writers. Chapters 2-4 review the literature on writing instruction and children’s perspectives of themselves as writers. The authors emphasize the importance of adopting a writing stance that reflects a real-life vision of teaching writing. These chapters provide samples of student work and highlight the need to incorporate students’ voices, experiences and beliefs in the writing curriculum. Prominent themes throughout this section underscore the need for teachers to critically reflect and examine goals for reading and what activities and structures can be crafted for students to engage in authentic practices.

Chapters 5 and 6 emphasize the need for situating a purpose within one’s writing instruction. For example, Chapter 5, entitled Becoming a historical enquirer’, emphasizes the need for developing a purpose for writing, in this case a focus on a historical point in time, and provides the outline for a unit on contextualizing student knowledge of information within a historical topic. Chapter 6, entitled Creating a geographic soundscape, describes developing a narrative soundscape, or a way to tell a story using sounds found in one’s environment, to capture students’ journeys from school to a familiar place in their local environment. In this way, teachers are encouraged to include the environment and familiar local places that students inhabit and experience in their daily out of school lives as rich ideas for exploration. Chapter 7 details the practice of story stones for telling stories. Story stones is a “creative response to the ongoing challenge for teachers to make writing exciting and incremental… Story stones are simply a set of symbols that represent key plot lines, characters, or settings” (p. 75). Practical strategies, like the story stones, make this book a resource whereby teachers of all levels can reflect on their purpose in their teaching of writing. Additionally, the authors emphasize the in-depth knowledge needed of pedagogy and children in constructing engaging and authentic writing instruction. In one hands-on activity, the authors invite the reader to reflect and examine their practice by “taking your bearings” (p. 122) and documenting their understanding of how to incorporate multiple resources into the context of writing instruction and explain that:

You need to know the purpose of the application and be confident in the various functionalities. Knowing how to use it at your own level is one aspect, but knowing how to demonstrate the next steps is vital if children are to make the most of the technologies. (p. 122)

Finally, in Chapters 8–10, the authors incorporate additional practices to invite young children into the writing curriculum. Through the use of quality children’s literature and technology, the readeris encouraged to use multiple resources to foster agency in young children and their writing. The message within these chapters emphasizes how educators must understand and construct a writing curriculum supportive of all learners. Consider the message in the following passage and the language the authors use to engage the reader:

You will meet writers in your classrooms and every possible combination in between. You have to plan for them, motivate them, enthuse them, plan their learning against the national curriculum, assess them and explain them as developing and improving writers. (p. 2)

The authors provide practical activities to reflect on how writing instruction can be adapted to support and include children, their experiences and interests, in the writing curriculum. This is an engaging read and one that encourages purposeful writing across the curriculum.