It’s one of the “three Rs”…reading, writing & ‘rithmetic. In my opinion, it’s the most challenging of the three. And also, in today’s society, it may be the most important.
LuLu, like most children with challenges that affect their learning, struggles with writing. While there are distinct learning disabilities that affect a child’s ability to read (like dyslexia) and do math (like dyscalculia ), writing requires so many different skills used at once, that many children have problems with writing. These problems often manifest themselves as an intense dislike of the activity.
So sorting through what is keeping a child from learning how to write well can be a difficult process. Writing requires that a student have a basic understanding of language, spelling, mechanics. But it requires more than that. Writing about something means you have to know about the topic. You have to anticipate what your readers will need to know and give them your knowledge, selecting the right words to convey your information. And you have to be able to organize what you’re writing in such a way that the reader will understand it, using logical thought patterns. And then, there’s the whole handwriting thing…
So the breakdown can occur in several places. If a child is struggling with reading, it’s not hard to understand that writing will be a challenge as well. If a child has problems with grammar and other mechanics, these problems will challenge his ability to write. But a child will also struggle with writing if he has working memory problems (inability to recall information about the topic) or executive functioning and attentional problems (inability to organize the topic or logically convey their thoughts)
Then there’s the social component. Writing is done to communicate with someone…there’s an intended reader. Children with any type of social challenges will have trouble identifying not only who their audience is, but identifying with their audience in a way that lets them figure out what they need to tell the reader and how they need to convey the message.
Dysgraphia, also known as a Disorder of Written Expression, refers specifically to problems with problems with the actually act of writing…the formation of letters, spelling, irregular letter size, fine motor skills, etc.
The major challenge in learning to write is that you have to pull all these skills together and use them successfully if you’re going to write well. And if there are holes in any of these abilities, writing can be a very frustrating task.
Most children do not have the ability to organize, decide logically how a message needs to be convened, and apply immerging spelling and mechanics skills at the same time. If they have trouble with the motor aspects too, things are even more frustrating.
So, writing is a complex series of skills that must be taught. And frankly, I’m not sure how well many programs do at teaching it. I’m impressed, so far, with LuLu’s writing curriculum through Georgia Virtual Academy. It breaks down writing into many skills and activities. The actual writing of a composition is a several day assignment, starting with listmaking (pre-writing), then defining your topic, then thinking about your audience, then drafting, then editing on both content and mechanics(two steps), then finalizing.
Writing is by far the most complex subject a young student is introduced to. So it is important that the writing instructions are more than just “write an essay about what you did last summer”, but that the various writing tasks actually be taught.