The Development of Writing Abilities

Abstract

Every day in schools children write—in exercise books, in rough work books, on file paper, on worksheets. A major concern of some teachers was technical accuracy which took precedence—or so it seemed to the pupils—over content. The power of the teacher was dramatically illustrated by the recollections of some of the students who could remember clearly how a single remark by a particular teacher influenced their feelings about writing for months—even years—afterwards. A sense of audience—how the writer pictures his reader—is obviously very important in determining how the writing is done. Although the boundaries are not clear-cut, the writing research team suggested three broad categories of function to which recognisably distinct kinds of writing belong. The trouble with most school writing is that it is not genuine communication. Pupils cannot operate a range of functions for a teacher who evaluates narrowly whatever is produced.

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