Digital Storytelling

SKILL OF WRITING

What is writing?                                                                              

Writing is a form of communication that allows students to put their feelings and ideas on paper, to organize their knowledge and beliefs into convincing arguments, and to convey meaning through well-constructed text.

In its most advanced form, written expression can be as vivid as a work of art.

As children learn the steps of writing, and as they build new skills upon old, writing evolves from the first simple sentences to elaborate stories and essays.

Spelling, vocabulary, grammar, and organization come together and grow together to help the student demonstrate more advanced writing skills each year.

Objectives of teaching writing

    To enable the students to:

1.     Express ideas in clear and grammatically correct English, using appropriate punctuation and cohesion devices

2.     Write in a style appropriate for communicative purposes

3.     Plan, organise and present ideas coherently by introducing, developing and concluding a topic

4.     Write a clear description (e.g. of a place, a person, an object or a system)

5.     Write a clear account of events (e.g. process, a narrative, a trend or a cause-effect relationship)

6.     Compare and contrast ideas and arrive at conclusion

7.     Present an argument, supporting it with appropriate examples

8.     Use an appropriate style and format to write letters (formal and informal)

9.     Monitor, check and revise written work

10.  Expand notes into a piece of writing

11.  Summarise or make notes from a given text and

12.  Recode information from one text type to another (e.g. diary entry to letter, advertisement to report, diagram to verbal form)

Importance of writing skill

It is a:

•       form of output; thinking made evident; “thinking with a pencil”

•       means of building fluency

•       way of developing accuracy (in grammar, vocabulary, etc.)

•       premier way in which children think and express their ideas

•       way children express creativity, uniqueness, and indicate what they want

•       critical skill for academic or professional success

Sub-skills of writing

o   Visual Perception

o   Syntax

o   Organization

o   Grammar

o   Content of Subject Matter

o   Purpose

Needed Skills:

1.    Writing with reasonable speed, proper spacing and clarity

2.    Spell the words correctly

3.    Usage of appropriate vocabulary

4.    Punctuation marks for clarity of ideas

5.    Using appropriate sentence connectors – although, but, therefore, similarly, finally

6.    Organise thoughts and ideas in logical sequence

7.    Evaluating the significance of word/sentence

8.    Use the appropriate style and register which is suitable for audience

Types/Modes of writing

·      Expressive – emphasis on the writer

·      Persuasive – emphasis on the reader

·      Referential – emphasis on the reality

·      Literary – emphasis on the text

·      Narrative

·      Expository

·      Descriptive

·      Imaginative  

Narrative Writing: Narrative writing style, simply narrates a story to the readers, (where the story could be fact or fiction). In this written work, writer or author will make at least one distinct character. This writing style likewise uses creative writing – use of imagination and creativity, rather than dealing with the facts and figures. Alongside the character, the author likewise frames dialogue, event, action, emotions etc.

Example: Novels, Short stories, Poetry and so on.

Expository Writing: The most common types of writing skills, expository writing firmly concentrates on advising or explaining things. It is more of facts and figure about a particular topic or a subject; it is likewise to be in logical order and sequence. Among all the examples, textbook writing is a form of expository writing, where the authorintend to clarify the subject by giving a short introduction at the beginning on the pertinent topic. Afterward gradually focusing on the paragraph with accurate facts and figures. Paragraphs in expository writing are by and large limited.

Example: Textbook writing.

Persuasive Writing: Opposite to the expository writing, persuasive writing glares opinion, justification, explanation, a point of view etc. The purpose of this writing is to convince the reader or to furnish some of the thoughts (author) to the readers.

Example: Editorial page, Letter of complaint and so on.

Descriptive Writing: This written work style generally describes a lot more than the remaining styles. Thus, descriptive writing’s main purpose is to describe and describe. Simply, it’s a style of writing, which focuses on describing a character, an event, or a place with details. In this form, a writer or an author envisions what he feels, what he notices, taste and much more and describes intelligibly.

Example: Poetry, Diary writing and so on.

Imaginative writing: Imaginative writing is writing that expresses the writer's thoughts and feelings in an imaginative, often unique, and poetic way. It is otherwise called as Creative writing. It is guided more by the writer's need to express feelings and ideas than by restrictive demands of factual and logical progression of expository writing.

Example: Poems, Autobiography…

Process of Writing

Writing is an extremely complex undertaking with a number of operations such as

§  generating ideas,

§  planning and outlining,

§  drafting,

§  revising etc. 

At any time a line can be erased, a page thrown away, and even sometimes everything that has been written can be changed, added to, and deleted from and put into a completely different order. 

Writing is thus viewed as a series of overlapping and interacting process.

Linguists divide composition writing into three distinct stages:

Ø  Pre-writing

Ø  Writing

Ø  Post-Writing

Pre-writing is preparatory stage and involves thinking, reflecting and planning about what can go on.

Writing is the real act of putting ideas to pen, translating images into meaning.  It is a process of discovering and exploring ideas and putting these on paper.

Post-Writing is written, it needs reading, reviewing and editing to be modified and polished.

Difference between Spoken and Written Language

Both spoken and written discourse represents an interactive process of negotiation; however the process of speaking and writing are not identical.  Many writers have expressed their opinion regarding the differences between the two, which are listed below:

Difference	Spoken	Written
Function	Speech is basically interaction between the speaker and the listener.	Written language is mainly transactional in function.
Process	Speakers make use of linguistic, paralinguistic and prosodic features such as stress, speed, loudness, facial expression and gestures.  Speech can be interrupted for asking clarification.  A speaker can backtrack, clarify and revise ideas as listeners question or disagree.  Speech has to hear in real times.     Speech cannot be reorganized once delivered.	Writers, rely on linguistic and geo graph logical devices such as punctuation and capitalization to get the message across.  Writing cannot be interrupted and a writer has to compensate for all those disadvantages since writing is a monologue.  Written languages can be stores and can be read over space and time.  Writings can be revised even after written.
Product	Spoken communication can be planned, unplanned or spontaneous.  Spoken text does not necessarily follow the conventions. A good speech may not follow any given format, a title, heading, an introduction and a conclusion or may not clearly divided into paragraphs	Written communication is usually carefully planned and convention bound which allows to be understood by the readers. A good piece of writing should be coherent and cohesive.  It should have a title or heading; it should have an intro, a development and a conclusion and must be divided into paragraphs divided

Suggested Exercises

1.    Correct stroke practice

2.    Copy words from board, flash cards, textbooks etc.,

3.    Copy sentences from board, flash cards, textbooks etc.,

4.    Re-arrange scrambled sentences

5.    Transform sentences – active into passive, positive into negative

6.    Describe pictures

7.    Writing stories

8.    Writing letters

Reference

https://msu.edu/course/cep/886/Writing/page1.htm

http://www.masscommunicationtalk.com/definition-and-techniques-of-writing-skill.html