writing in kindergarten research

5 Research-based Practices for Kindergarten and First Grade

Here's what every kindergarten and first grade teacher should be doing..

Posted June 1, 2017

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[Note: In this guest post, two renowned former kindergarten teachers who wrote about the extraordinary literacy successes of children in their classrooms (Feldgus & Cardonick, 1999) show how today’s cutting -edge research in cognitive psychology and neuroscience supports the best practices they and their colleagues have advocated and honed for three decades. What they discovered intuitively and through reflection and collaboration is now cutting-edge best practice in 21st century kindergartens.]

5 Powerful Research-Based Techniques for Exemplary Kindergartens Today

By Eileen Feldgus PhD and Isabell Cardonick MEd

The recent high-profile spotlight on a landmark study in Developmental Psychology has drawn attention to research by Canadian cognitive psychologists Gene Ouellette and Monique Sénéchal (2017). In some respects Ouellette and Sénéchal discovered what we, Eileen and Isabell, have advocated for decades: a powerful connection to improved end-of-first-grade reading scores through the use of early writing and invented spelling. The study’s title, “Invented Spelling in Kindergarten as a Predictor of Reading and Spelling in Grade 1: A New Pathway to Literacy, or Just the Same Road, Less Known?”(Ouellette and Sénéchal, 2017), reflects what exemplary kindergarten teachers have known about the powerful writing/reading connection for years—kid writing is a pathway to reading success. But this work is still not well known or universally practiced. This less-known pathway is the one we traveled. Starting out as passionate kindergarten teachers in the 1960’s and 70’s, we were ardent about creating classrooms that worked for children. We devoured the research of that era and became life-long learners throughout our careers. Early on we discovered better outcomes for children as we focused more on writing, encouraged invented spelling, developed innovative strategies for teaching phonics and eliminated boring worksheets. Today in 2017 five best-practice techniques we discovered in our practice are now wholly supported by research and recommended for today’s kindergartens and first grades.

1. Use Invented Spelling (Ouellette & Sénéchal, 2017). We found invented spelling to be joyful, motivational for our students, and wonderful in terms of providing opportunities for scaffolding and systematically teaching almost all important aspects of the kindergarten literacy curriculum including phonics, phonemic awareness, knowledge of the alphabet, writing conventions, and vocabulary development. But perhaps the most amazing discovery throughout our journey was that kids had remarkable capacities to make meaning if we supported them in the process and allowed their creative juices to flow. Early on we learned as we had read in Don Graves’ research (1983), that kids write best when we step back and allow them to choose their own topics and give them ownership and autonomy. We called our teaching model, “Kid Writing” (1999). Our model fit perfectly with a growing model now called Guided Reading for differentiated reading instruction (Fountas & Pinnell, 2012) and we put in a whole layer underpinning Lucy Calkins work (2003) by showing teachers exactly how to get started and how to move forward with writing workshop and formative assessment. Here are a few samples that illustrate kids’ capacity to grow and flourish as writers in kindergarten:

When I was born my mommy and daddy used to pay a lot of attention to me. But now they don’t pay a lot of attention to me. They pay a lot to Conner.

2. Abandon teaching “Letter of the Week (Reutzel, 1992, 2015). Teaching one letter per week was standard practice in kindergarten when we began teaching. We tried our best to jazz up our teaching of the alphabetic principle because we knew it was essential to breaking the code and reading. Our students sang for the letter, danced for the letter, cooked for the letter, and cut and pasted for the letter. We took elaborate measures to teach the alphabet and sounds because we knew it was important. One fond memory was our “P” Party:” we served foods beginning with P—pizza, pretzels, popcorn, pepperoni, and the like. But with letter of the week the pace was too slow, and as far back as 1992 researchers were noticing the same problem and cautioning teachers to “break the letter-a-week tradition.” (Reutzel, 1992)

So in our classrooms we began to use children’s names on the first day of kindergarten—from Albert to Zoie—and learned to focus on all the sounds and letters from the very beginning. In contrast to when we were using letter of the week our students mastered letters and sounds far sooner.

Today, as reported by Reutzel (2015), “research has identified six evidence- based alphabet letter learning orders through which young children may acquire knowledge of alphabet letter names and sounds (Justice, Pence, Bowles, & Wiggins, 2006 ).” And guess what? “The first learning order is called the own-name effect.” (Reutzel, 2015) We got it right before the research proved it!

3. Use Invented Spelling and a Developmental Writing Scale to monitor progress (Gentry, 2006, 2000). Even before we published the first book on Kid Writing, we were collaborating with Richard Gentry on how to use a developmental spelling/writing assessment along with a developmental rubric to show how young children’s progression through five phases of developmental spelling revealed—among other things—the individual child’s understanding of phonics and his or her invented spellings as evidence of what the child knew or did not know. We found this work to be much more powerful for targeting instruction and monitoring kindergartners’ progress than traditional spelling tests or even measures of phonemic awareness and alphabet knowledge. Progress monitoring by phase observation is now supported by empirical research! (Ouellette & Sénéchal, 2017)

When we started out as neophyte teachers, kids were simply memorizing words that we gave them on a list. We learned to scaffold what they were using in their invented spelling and to show them how English spelling works. Our teaching went from giving lists of what to spell to showing kids how to spell and invented spelling was our vehicle! Without getting into the particulars of an analysis, look at the following samples that show one kindergarten child’s remarkable progress from fall to spring of her kindergarten year.

September sample: It was a sunny day.

June sample: Tuesday my tooth was wiggling. When it was in my mouth, it bled. When it fell out, it stopped bleeding. My mom gently pulled it out with a paper towel and I was happy that it fell out.

4. Let go of worksheets! (Palmer & Invernizzi, 2015). We found that teaching and learning in our classrooms improved when we abandoned worksheets. Remember those nonsensical work sheets where children were to write the letter that the word for each picture would begin with? When we first began teaching we remember students who squirmed with sit-at-the-desk busy worksheets and struggled over the Y is for Yak worksheet wondering why Y was the match for the first sound in “goat” which is the picture they saw on the worksheet.

5. Teach children to stretch though a word with a moving target. (Feldgus, Cardonick, & Gentry, 2017) Research by Ouelette, validated our Stretching Through a Word with a Moving Target teaching methodology. Their research, “confirmed that facilitating invented spelling within a Vygotskian teaching approach can bring about benefits in learning to read and spell, and these benefits go beyond the expansion of alphabetic knowledge and phonological awareness.

Our stretching through technique, for example, helped kids move from l for lady in Phase 2 to lad in Phase 3 to ladee in syllable chunks in Phase 4 on the way to conventional lady . The stretching through technique met kids where they were and supported them in moving to higher levels of spelling sophistication from phase to phase.

Keep the Faith—Keep the Passion—Keep Your Kids Writing

One thing that hasn’t changed over the years is our passion for literacy-learning classrooms for beginners. Today as staff developers and authors, we continue to encounter kindergarten teachers all over America and beyond who share our passion, devotion to children, and vision for joyful, play-based, academic kindergarten and first grade classrooms. We believe implementing these five research-based strategies surrounding kid writing will be transformational in America. It is the answer to reversing the decades-old trend of flat-lined first grade reading scores!

For details on these five strategies and creating joyful kid-writing classrooms that work, check out our comprehensive guide for kindergarten and grade 1 teachers: Kid Writing in the 21st Century: A Systematic Approach to Phonics, Spelling and Writing Workshop (Hameray, 2017).

Link to Kid Writing to learn more.

Dr. J. Richard Gentry is the author of Raising Confident Readers, How to Teach Your Child to Read and Write–From Baby to Age 7 . Follow him on Facebook , Twitter , and LinkedIn and find out more information about his work on his website .

Calkins, L. M. (2003). The Nuts and Bolts of Teaching Writing. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Feldgus, E., Cardonick, I. & Gentry, J. R. (2017). Kid Writing in the 21st Century . Las Angeles, CA: Hameray Publishing Group.

Fountas, I. and Pinnell, G.S.(2013). The Reading Teacher. 66 (4) 268-284.

Gentry, R. (2006). Breaking the code: The new science of beginning reading and writing . Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Gentry, R. (2000). A retrospective on invented spelling and a look forward. The Reading Teacher . 54 (3) 318-332.

Graves, D. H. (1983). Writing: Teachers and Children at Work . Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Justice , L.M. , Pence , K. , Bowles , R.B. , & Wiggins , A. ( 2006 ). An investigation of four hypotheses concerning the order by which 4- year- old children learn the alphabet letters. Early Childhood Research Quarterly , 21 ( 3), 374 – 389 .

Ouelette, G. & Sénéchal, M. (2017). Invented spelling in kindergarten as a predictor of reading and spelling in grade 1: A new Pathway to literacy, or just the same road, less known? Developmental Psychology . 53 (1) 77– 88. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/dev0000179

Palmer, J. & Invernizzi, M. (2015). No More Phonics and Spelling Worksheets . Portsmouth NH: Heinemann.

Reutzel, D. R. (2015). Early literacy research: Findings primary-grade teachers will want to know. The Reading Teacher . 69, (1), 14–24. DOI: 10.1002/trtr.1387 © 2015 International Literacy Association

Reutzel , D.R. ( 1992 ). Breaking the letter- a- week tradition: Conveying the alphabetic principle to young children. Childhood Education , 69 ( 1 ), 20 – 23 .

J. Richard Gentry, Ph.D. , is an expert on childhood literacy, reading, and spelling. He is the author of Raising Confident Readers: H ow to Teach Your Child to Read and Write—Baby to Age 7 .

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How Does Writing Fit Into the ‘Science of Reading’?

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In one sense, the national conversation about what it will take to make sure all children become strong readers has been wildly successful: States are passing legislation supporting evidence-based teaching approaches , and school districts are rushing to supply training. Publishers are under pressure to drop older materials . And for the first time in years, an instructional issue—reading—is headlining education media coverage.

In the middle of all that, though, the focus on the “science of reading” has elided its twin component in literacy instruction: writing.

Writing is intrinsically important for all students to learn—after all, it is the primary way beyond speech that humans communicate. But more than that, research suggests that teaching students to write in an integrated fashion with reading is not only efficient, it’s effective.

Yet writing is often underplayed in the elementary grades. Too often, it is separated from schools’ reading block. Writing is not assessed as frequently as reading, and principals, worried about reading-exam scores, direct teachers to focus on one often at the expense of the other. Finally, beyond the English/language arts block, kids often aren’t asked to do much writing in early grades.

“Sometimes, in an early-literacy classroom, you’ll hear a teacher say, ‘It’s time to pick up your pencils,’” said Wiley Blevins, an author and literacy consultant who provides training in schools. “But your pencils should be in your hand almost the entire morning.”

Strikingly, many of the critiques that reading researchers have made against the “balanced literacy” approach that has held sway in schools for decades could equally apply to writing instruction: Foundational writing skills—like phonics and language structure—have not generally been taught systematically or explicitly.

And like the “find the main idea” strategies commonly taught in reading comprehension, writing instruction has tended to focus on content-neutral tasks, rather than deepening students’ connections to the content they learn.

Education Week wants to bring more attention to these connections in the stories that make up this special collection . But first, we want to delve deeper into the case for including writing in every step of the elementary curriculum.

Why has writing been missing from the reading conversation?

Much like the body of knowledge on how children learn to read words, it is also settled science that reading and writing draw on shared knowledge, even though they have traditionally been segmented in instruction.

“The body of research is substantial in both number of studies and quality of studies. There’s no question that reading and writing share a lot of real estate, they depend on a lot of the same knowledge and skills,” said Timothy Shanahan, an emeritus professor of education at the University of Illinois Chicago. “Pick your spot: text structure, vocabulary, sound-symbol relationships, ‘world knowledge.’”

The reasons for the bifurcation in reading and writing are legion. One is that the two fields have typically been studied separately. (Researchers studying writing usually didn’t examine whether a writing intervention, for instance, also aided students’ reading abilities—and vice versa.)

Some scholars also finger the dominance of the federally commissioned National Reading Panel report, which in 2000 outlined key instructional components of learning to read. The review didn’t examine the connection of writing to reading.

Looking even further back yields insights, too. Penmanship and spelling were historically the only parts of writing that were taught, and when writing reappeared in the latter half of the 20th century, it tended to focus on “process writing,” emphasizing personal experience and story generation over other genres. Only when the Common Core State Standards appeared in 2010 did the emphasis shift to writing about nonfiction texts and across subjects—the idea that students should be writing about what they’ve learned.

And finally, teaching writing is hard. Few studies document what preparation teachers receive to teach writing, but in surveys, many teachers say they received little training in their college education courses. That’s probably why only a little over half of teachers, in one 2016 survey, said that they enjoyed teaching writing.

Writing should begin in the early grades

These factors all work against what is probably the most important conclusion from the research over the last few decades: Students in the early-elementary grades need lots of varied opportunities to write.

“Students need support in their writing,” said Dana Robertson, an associate professor of reading and literacy education at the school of education at Virginia Tech who also studies how instructional change takes root in schools. “They need to be taught explicitly the skills and strategies of writing and they need to see the connections of reading, writing, and knowledge development.”

While research supports some fundamental tenets of writing instruction—that it should be structured, for instance, and involve drafting and revising—it hasn’t yet pointed to a specific teaching recipe that works best.

One of the challenges, the researchers note, is that while reading curricula have improved over the years, they still don’t typically provide many supports for students—or teachers, for that matter—for writing. Teachers often have to supplement with additions that don’t always mesh well with their core, grade-level content instruction.

“We have a lot of activities in writing we know are good,” Shanahan said. “We don’t really have a yearlong elementary-school-level curriculum in writing. That just doesn’t exist the way it does in reading.”

Nevertheless, practitioners like Blevins work writing into every reading lesson, even in the earliest grades. And all the components that make up a solid reading program can be enhanced through writing activities.

4 Key Things to Know About How Reading and Writing Interlock

Want a quick summary of what research tells us about the instructional connections between reading and writing?

1. Reading and writing are intimately connected.

Research on the connections began in the early 1980s and has grown more robust with time.

Among the newest and most important additions are three research syntheses conducted by Steve Graham, a professor at the University of Arizona, and his research partners. One of them examined whether writing instruction also led to improvements in students’ reading ability; a second examined the inverse question. Both found significant positive effects for reading and writing.

A third meta-analysis gets one step closer to classroom instruction. Graham and partners examined 47 studies of instructional programs that balanced both reading and writing—no program could feature more than 60 percent of one or the other. The results showed generally positive effects on both reading and writing measures.

2. Writing matters even at the earliest grades, when students are learning to read.

Studies show that the prewriting students do in early education carries meaningful signals about their decoding, spelling, and reading comprehension later on. Reading experts say that students should be supported in writing almost as soon as they begin reading, and evidence suggests that both spelling and handwriting are connected to the ability to connect speech to print and to oral language development.

3. Like reading, writing must be taught explicitly.

Writing is a complex task that demands much of students’ cognitive resources. Researchers generally agree that writing must be explicitly taught—rather than left up to students to “figure out” the rules on their own.

There isn’t as much research about how precisely to do this. One 2019 review, in fact, found significant overlap among the dozen writing programs studied, and concluded that all showed signs of boosting learning. Debates abound about the amount of structure students need and in what sequence, such as whether they need to master sentence construction before moving onto paragraphs and lengthier texts.

But in general, students should be guided on how to construct sentences and paragraphs, and they should have access to models and exemplars, the research suggests. They also need to understand the iterative nature of writing, including how to draft and revise.

A number of different writing frameworks incorporating various degrees of structure and modeling are available, though most of them have not been studied empirically.

4. Writing can help students learn content—and make sense of it.

Much of reading comprehension depends on helping students absorb “world knowledge”—think arts, ancient cultures, literature, and science—so that they can make sense of increasingly sophisticated texts and ideas as their reading improves. Writing can enhance students’ content learning, too, and should be emphasized rather than taking a back seat to the more commonly taught stories and personal reflections.

Graham and colleagues conducted another meta-analysis of nearly 60 studies looking at this idea of “writing to learn” in mathematics, science, and social studies. The studies included a mix of higher-order assignments, like analyses and argumentative writing, and lower-level ones, like summarizing and explaining. The study found that across all three disciplines, writing about the content improved student learning.

If students are doing work on phonemic awareness—the ability to recognize sounds—they shouldn’t merely manipulate sounds orally; they can put them on the page using letters. If students are learning how to decode, they can also encode—record written letters and words while they say the sounds out loud.

And students can write as they begin learning about language structure. When Blevins’ students are mainly working with decodable texts with controlled vocabularies, writing can support their knowledge about how texts and narratives work: how sentences are put together and how they can be pulled apart and reconstructed. Teachers can prompt them in these tasks, asking them to rephrase a sentence as a question, split up two sentences, or combine them.

“Young kids are writing these mile-long sentences that become second nature. We set a higher bar, and they are fully capable of doing it. We can demystify a bit some of that complex text if we develop early on how to talk about sentences—how they’re created, how they’re joined,” Blevins said. “There are all these things you can do that are helpful to develop an understanding of how sentences work and to get lots of practice.”

As students progress through the elementary grades, this structured work grows more sophisticated. They need to be taught both sentence and paragraph structure , and they need to learn how different writing purposes and genres—narrative, persuasive, analytical—demand different approaches. Most of all, the research indicates, students need opportunities to write at length often.

Using writing to support students’ exploration of content

Reading is far more than foundational skills, of course. It means introducing students to rich content and the specialized vocabulary in each discipline and then ensuring that they read, discuss, analyze, and write about those ideas. The work to systematically build students’ knowledge begins in the early grades and progresses throughout their K-12 experience.

Here again, available evidence suggests that writing can be a useful tool to help students explore, deepen, and draw connections in this content. With the proper supports, writing can be a method for students to retell and analyze what they’ve learned in discussions of content and literature throughout the school day —in addition to their creative writing.

This “writing to learn” approach need not wait for students to master foundational skills. In the K-2 grades especially, much content is learned through teacher read-alouds and conversation that include more complex vocabulary and ideas than the texts students are capable of reading. But that should not preclude students from writing about this content, experts say.

“We do a read-aloud or a media piece and we write about what we learned. It’s just a part of how you’re responding, or sharing, what you’ve learned across texts; it’s not a separate thing from reading,” Blevins said. “If I am doing read-alouds on a concept—on animal habitats, for example—my decodable texts will be on animals. And students are able to include some of these more sophisticated ideas and language in their writing, because we’ve elevated the conversations around these texts.”

In this set of stories , Education Week examines the connections between elementary-level reading and writing in three areas— encoding , language and text structure , and content-area learning . But there are so many more examples.

Please write us to share yours when you’ve finished.

Want to read more about the research that informed this story? Here’s a bibliography to start you off.

Berninger V. W., Abbott, R. D., Abbott, S. P., Graham S., & Richards T. (2002). Writing and reading: Connections between language by hand and language by eye. J ournal of Learning Disabilities. Special Issue: The Language of Written Language, 35(1), 39–56 Berninger, Virginia, Robert D. Abbott, Janine Jones, Beverly J. Wolf, Laura Gould, Marci Anderson-Younstrom, Shirley Shimada, Kenn Apel. (2006) “Early development of language by hand: composing, reading, listening, and speaking connections; three letter-writing modes; and fast mapping in spelling.” Developmental Neuropsychology, 29(1), pp. 61-92 Cabell, Sonia Q, Laura S. Tortorelli, and Hope K. Gerde (2013). “How Do I Write…? Scaffolding Preschoolers’ Early Writing Skills.” The Reading Teacher, 66(8), pp. 650-659. Gerde, H.K., Bingham, G.E. & Wasik, B.A. (2012). “Writing in Early Childhood Classrooms: Guidance for Best Practices.” Early Childhood Education Journal 40, 351–359 (2012) Gilbert, Jennifer, and Steve Graham. (2010). “Teaching Writing to Elementary Students in Grades 4–6: A National Survey.” The Elementary School Journal 110(44) Graham, Steve, et al. (2017). “Effectiveness of Literacy Programs Balancing Reading and Writing Instruction: A Meta-Analysis.” Reading Research Quarterly, 53(3) pp. 279–304 Graham, Steve, and Michael Hebert. (2011). “Writing to Read: A Meta-Analysis of the Impact of Writing and Writing Instruction on Reading.” Harvard Educational Review (2011) 81(4): 710–744. Graham, Steve. (2020). “The Sciences of Reading and Writing Must Become More Fully Integrated.” Reading Research Quarterly, 55(S1) pp. S35–S44 Graham, Steve, Sharlene A. Kiuhara, and Meade MacKay. (2020).”The Effects of Writing on Learning in Science, Social Studies, and Mathematics: A Meta-Analysis.” Review of Educational Research April 2020, Vol 90, No. 2, pp. 179–226 Shanahan, Timothy. “History of Writing and Reading Connections.” in Shanahan, Timothy. (2016). “Relationships between reading and writing development.” In C. MacArthur, S. Graham, & J. Fitzgerald (Eds.), Handbook of writing research (2nd ed., pp. 194–207). New York, NY: Guilford. Slavin, Robert, Lake, C., Inns, A., Baye, A., Dachet, D., & Haslam, J. (2019). “A quantitative synthesis of research on writing approaches in grades 2 to 12.” London: Education Endowment Foundation. Troia, Gary. (2014). Evidence-based practices for writing instruction (Document No. IC-5). Retrieved from University of Florida, Collaboration for Effective Educator, Development, Accountability, and Reform Center website: http://ceedar.education.ufl.edu/tools/innovation-configuration/ Troia, Gary, and Steve Graham. (2016).“Common Core Writing and Language Standards and Aligned State Assessments: A National Survey of Teacher Beliefs and Attitudes.” Reading and Writing 29(9).

A version of this article appeared in the January 25, 2023 edition of Education Week as How Does Writing Fit Into the ‘Science of Reading’?

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Home » Literacy Lines » Teaching Writing in Kindergarten

Teaching Writing in Kindergarten

I just read another good blog post from Tim Shanahan , this one about how to teach writing in kindergarten…. on the same day that our new Keys to Early Writing book is going to the printer! So, I thought I’d devote this entry to kindergarten writing instruction.

You might be asking this question: Do young children in kindergarten even have the skills to be able to write? Part of the answer is how you define writing . If you substitute the word composing , it’s easy to see that the answer is yes! Kindergarteners definitely have the ability to compose, even if they can’t yet read or write letters.

One thing we point out in our Keys to Early Writing training is the difference between transcription skills and writing/composing skills. Transcription skills include spelling and handwriting, tasks for which students should become fluent by the time they leave grade 3. For reading, when students become fluent in decoding/word recognition, there is more cognitive energy available to focus on making meaning. It’s similar to writing – when students become fluent in transcription skills, it frees them to focus on determining what they want to say and how they want to say it. However, with both reading and writing, this doesn’t mean that students have to learn to decode, spell and write letters before we can teach them comprehension and compose. The Common Core writing standards recognize this. The opinion, informational, and narrative writing standards all begin in Kindergarten as shown below.

Kindergarten Common Core Writing Standards:

• # 1 Opinion Writing : tell the topic or name of a book, state opinion or preference; use drawing, dictating, and writing to complete an opinion piece
• # 2: Informational Writing : name what they are writing about; use drawing, dictating, and writing to compose informative texts; supply some information about the topic
• # 3: Narrative Writing : use drawing, dictating and writing to narrate a single event of several loosely linked events; tell about the events in the order in which they occurred; provide a reaction to what happened

Notice that the standards include drawing and dictating as an alternative to actual writing. Students enter kindergarten with a very wide range of skills – some can’t name the letters and do not know how to match sounds to letters, while others can independently apply basic reading and writing skills. Also, learning of these basic skills is highly accelerated in this grade. There is a big difference between the skills they have at the start of the school year and the end.

Drawing is a critical stage in early writing – it is a form of rehearsal for writing. The act of drawing and the picture itself provide a supportive scaffolding within which students can construct a piece of writing. Lucy Calkins (1994) notes that by using just a single word with a picture, a student is able to convey a story because most of the meaning is carried by the picture. Here’s what she has to say about kindergarten and grade 1 drawing:

“First drawings “hold the world still” – they tend to be a collection of objects placed on the page. Then students enter action by using lines, dots, arrows or something similar to show that the characters are interacting with each other in their settings. In these grades, students can convey their meaning more easily through drawing than through print because their word writing is limited.”

Young children often have a lot more to say than their drawings can capture. This is where the help of an adult comes in. When teachers ask students to explain the opinion, information, or narrative they are trying to convey in their drawing, and then transcribe (i.e., write down) their responses, the students are able to connect their composing to print.

Oral Rehearsal

Shanahan emphasizes the value of dictating throughout his blog post. Here’s some of what he suggests:

“I have always begun children’s writing with oral composition… Oral writing tends to be easier for young kids than writing by hand is and it helps them to gain the concept of writing—which very quickly bears fruit in guiding them into creating their own writing by hand. In kindergarten, I would usually start language experience out on a whole class basis. The first step is a shared experience… some hands-on activity or observational event in which everyone is engaged. Then gather kids around a chart and ask them to tell about the experience. Some of this can be “turn and talk,” some of it might be students responding individually to teacher questions. The idea is to help kids see that language allows them to relive experiences and to think about them.

Now that you have them buzzing, tell them that you want to write an article about the experience. Ask who has something they would like to say about the experience. Then help that child construct a sentence about it. This might be simply transcribing what was said, or it might be helping the child to expand a thought and then transcribing. Print the students’ ideas to get 4 or 5 sentences. I continue with this kind of thing regularly until students are able to do it easily…By the time you are done with language experience approach, the children should have a clear idea of the nature of book sentences, that print (the ABCs) is used to record one’s words, that print moves from left-to-right and from top-to-bottom. They should know the difference between pictures and writing, too.”

I’ll be sharing more from Keys to Early Writing in some upcoming blog posts. You may find some of the free templates and printables from the book helpful. Click here to access them.

Click here to learn more about Keys to Early Writing .

Calkins, L. M. (1994).  The art of teaching writing.  Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

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It was interesting when Shanahan talked about how oral writing tends to be easier for young kids than writing by hand. My husband and I want to find a great kindergarten program for our daughter to give her the best possible start on her formal education this fall. Asking about oral writing should help us find a knowledgeable kindergarten teacher, so thanks for sharing the idea!

I am most captivated when you wrote that the students can connect their composing to print when teachers request students to write down the opinion, information, or narrative they are trying to express in their drawing. I think that is a very good way to enhance not just the drawing skills of a child but also their writing skills. This made me convinced more that planning to enroll my son in kindergarten is a smart move.

This informative article provides valuable insights and practical strategies for effectively teaching writing skills to kindergarten students, emphasizing age-appropriate techniques and developmentally suitable approaches.

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Kindergarten writing

by: Jessica Kelmon | Updated: August 4, 2022

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Aside from decorative swirls, a few letters, and perhaps even their own names, most kindergartners start school not knowing how to write. That’s the point of school, after all… right?

In a word, yes. Kindergarten writing standards include scary terms like “research” and “publish.” But don’t panic. Kindergarten is still the year children first learn about writing, which means learning to listen, speak in class, and write the ABCs.

Writing their ABCs

Teachers often start the year by introducing the letters of the alphabet — the building blocks of writing. Kindergartners learn how to form the shapes of letters, what sounds they’re associated with, and how to combine those letters to create words.

This year your kindergartner should learn to print most upper and lowercase letters.

Cn u rd this?

At many schools, kindergartners are encouraged to spell words the way they sound, which is known as phonetic or “invented” spelling. For example, a student might spell the word water by writing “watr.” Children are often more comfortable using consonants and sounds at the beginning of words because they’re more distinct than vowels or sounds at the ends of words. Using invented spelling, children are demonstrating what they know. Research shows letting children use invented spelling (and not immediately correcting them) allows them to focus on the purpose of writing: communication. Typically, kids learn the rules of spelling and transition to conventional spelling as they read and write. (If a child’s spelling does not improve or their invented spelling is arbitrary rather than phonetic, it could be a sign of a learning issue.)

By the end of the year, kindergartners should be able to:

• Connect most letters with their sounds. • Phonetically or inventively write simple high-frequency words. (See our kindergarten snap words worksheets for examples of high-frequency words to practice, and check out this real-life example of what a kindergartner’s invented spelling looks like .) • Write many consonant-vowel-consonant words, like cat, dog, mom, and dad. (See our kindergarten rhyming words worksheets for examples.) • Write their own names.

Kindergartners who can’t write yet, can listen, speak, and draw!

Think of these skills as big steps toward writing. Teachers and parents should read books aloud and should ask questions along the way about the book itself — the title, author, illustrator, subject — and about what happens in a story, and what your child notices about events and characters’ actions. Be sure to ask some questions that require your child to read between the lines, e.g. Who are the main characters in this story? Where was the frog sitting? Why do you think the dog is sad? Can you draw a picture to show something interesting that you learned? You can also ask questions about the illustrations.

When answering, your child should learn to use frequently occurring nouns and verbs and correctly use the most common “connection words” or prepositions — such as to, from, in, out, on, off, for, of, by , and with  — to express their thoughts. They should also learn to answer questions using simple, complete sentences. Kindergartners also need to understand and use question words, including who, what, where, when, why, and how , when they speak or dictate writing so they’re familiar with these words when they begin writing on their own.

What exactly is “research” in kindergarten?

Your child’s first experience with research projects will be listening to a few books by the same author or on the same topic. Students will be asked to recall information like the author’s name, and what they learned from the reading. Then, with help and prompting from the teacher, they may draw pictures to accompany dictated sentences or write one to three sentences about what they learned from these books.

Watch how kindergartners research and discuss a topic

3 types of kindergarten writing

Kindergartners should practice and learn three kinds of writing: opinion, informative, and narrative. All three will likely start with kids listening to books read aloud and responding to what they’ve learned. In an opinion piece, your child tells the reader his opinion or preference about a topic, such as a book, animal, activity, etc. (e.g. My favorite book is.. .). In an informative piece, your child names what they’re writing about and gives some information or details about it. (e.g. Dinosaurs lived on Earth a long time ago… ) Writing a narrative is like writing a story. Your kindergartner will describe an event — or a few loosely linked events — putting the events in the order they happen and reacting to what happened. (e.g. Then Goldilocks tried the second bowl of porridge. )

See what kindergarten writing looks like

By the end of the year, your child may be able to write a couple of sentences for each type of writing. Remember that drawing and dictating sentences count as writing.

Check out these real examples of good kindergarten informational writing: • “All people can save water” • “All people can save water”

bttr, better, share!

A big part of teaching kids to write well is helping them understand that writing is a multistep process. Before your child picks up a pencil, prewriting begins with reading and thinking. This may mean rereading a book, discussing what your child has read, or simply brainstorming ideas for a picture or story. Then, the teacher will likely to go over your child’s first draft drawing, dictation, or writing with your child. The teacher or other students might ask your child questions about the work — and suggest details that could be added or better ways to organize information. Then your child may be asked to do a revision . After one or more revisions, the teacher might help your child with the final edit — focusing on spelling, capitalizing proper nouns and the first word of a sentence, and adding a period at the end. These steps — preparing to write, doing a first draft, revising that draft, and editing the final piece — help kindergartners learn that gathering and recalling information, organizing their thoughts, strengthening and clarifying their ideas, and improving grammar and presentation are all important parts of writing.

Kindergarten grammar

Kindergartners start learning the basics of sentence structure — namely capitalizing I (when referring to themselves) and the first letter of the first word in a sentence, ending their sentences with a period (and knowing that it’s called a period), and ending their questions with a question mark (and knowing that it’s called a question mark).

Check out these related worksheets: • Sentences #1 • My first sentences

What about handwriting?

In kindergarten, the focus is on printing upper and lowercase letters. Because kindergartners’ motor skills are still developing, the teacher will introduce handwriting with a range of approaches, like finger painting, writing in the air with a finger, and tracing letters. Kindergartners should learn how to hold a pencil and practice forming letters by writing their names, which gives them practice writing letters, shaping and spacing letters correctly, and writing from left to right.

For handwriting practice, check out these related worksheets: • Creating letter-shape patterns • Practicing letters a and b • The alphabet

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10 Tricks for Teaching Writing in Kindergarten

Lessons I’ve learned from years of teaching five year olds.

When telling people that I teach kindergarten, I often am asked, “How do you do it?” Now, imagine teaching five year olds how to write entire paragraphs. Yes, we are superheroes with the powers of patience, perseverance and the ability to bend at the waist for long periods of time. Here are the best kindergarten writing tips that I have gathered over the years.

1. Teach letter formation in context

Kill two birds with one stone. Kindergarten students need to be taught how to form their letters. This can be done within the context of writing a sentence. Often, when students practice writing letters in isolation, they have trouble transferring handwriting skills to sentence writing. Teach capitalization, spacing and end punctuation while demonstrating proper letter formation.

2. Practice consistently

Have your students engage in meaningful writing from day one. Kids learn to talk by talking, and we know kindergartners have mastered that skill. They learn to write by writing even if it is a large string of letters at first or even scribbling. They have to start somewhere. We give them the tools to develop into confident writers by allowing them the time to write and draw every day.

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3. Sight words, sight words, sight words

Students need to know how to read and spell several anchor sight words in order to build confidence with sentence writing. I use a word wall, songs and chants to teach students to spell sight words. For example, I sing the word like to the tune of “It’s a Small Word.” L-I-K-E, that spells like. L-I-K-E that spells like…. . Once they are armed with an arsenal of words that are essential to the structure of a sentence, they are well on their way to success.

4. Encourage invented spelling

Invented spelling refers to stretching out words and writing them exactly as they are heard by a beginning writer. If students become hung up on spelling words correctly, creativity and continuity suffers. Students will only want to write very simple sentences. Kindergarten teachers double as detectives easily decoding sentences such as “I lik pesu and is kem (pizza and ice cream).”

[Check out our article on why invented spelling is so important. ]

5. Do mini lessons

Kindergarteners have the attention span of a fruit fly. This is why right before journal writing time, I teach them one quick skill. Mini lessons are great for teaching narrative, opinion writing, how to compose a topic sentence, and various stages of the writing process.

6. Try interactive writing

Morning message or class news is a good example of interactive writing. This refers to the teacher and student sharing the pen. One student gives the teacher news, and students are called up to the white board to help sound out words and place appropriate punctuation.

7. Choose meaningful topics

Kindergarteners love themselves, their family and their friends. Let them write about the topics they choose in their journals. Sentence starters confuse kindergarten students. If they write about the same thing for a while, it is ok. It is much like reading the same book over and over again. They are building confidence

8. Write across the curriculum

Reading and writing go hand in hand. Students can write their favorite part of a story or compose a letter to a character. Reading informational text and drawing and labeling a picture are a great ways to combine science and social studies research with writing.

9. Remember that punctuation is tough

Kindergarten students often will put periods at the end of each word or line. Teaching kindergarteners the concept of a complete thought is difficult because their thoughts go on and on and on and on. I teach the students that if their writing answers the question, “Guess what?”, it needs a period.

10. Share, share, share

Give students the opportunity to share their writing with their peers. The more opportunities kindergarteners are given to express themselves, the less likely they will be to shout out in the middle of the math lesson that they have a wiggly tooth or Uncle Joey is visiting.

Kindergarten writing is not for the faint of heart. Enjoy the strange spellings, humorous thoughts and the innocent excitement that will lead to young students becoming life-long writers.

What are your tips or questions for teaching kindergarten writing? Come and share in our WeAreTeachers HELPLINE group on Facebook.

Plus, 50 tips and tricks for teaching kindergarten and the best kindergarten books.

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Kindergartner Janice writes a story for class.

Figure 1. andrew's story.

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Brindle, M., Graham, S., Harris, K., & Hebert, M. (2016). Third and fourth grade teacher's classroom practices in writing: A national survey. Reading & Writing , 29 (5), 929–954.

Calkins, L. M. (1994). The art of teaching writing . Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Cutler, L., & Graham, S. (2008). Primary grade writing: A national survey. Journal of Educational Psychology , 100 (4), 907–919.

Flower, L., & Hayes, J. R. (1981). A cognitive process theory of writing. College Composition and Communication , 32 (4), 365–387.

Fox, M. (1993). Radical reflections: Passionate opinions on teaching, learning, and living . San Diego, CA: Harcourt.

Juzwik, M. M., Curcic, S., Wolbers, K., Moxley, K. D., Dimling, L. M., & Shankland, R. K. (2006). Writing into the 21st century: An overview of research on writing, 1999–2004. Written Communication , 23 (4), 451–476.

Korth, B., Wimmer, J., Wilcox, B., Morrison, T., Harward, S., Peterson, N., & … Pierce, L. (2017). Practices and challenges of writing instruction in K–2 classrooms: A case study of five primary grade teachers. Early Childhood Education Journal , 45 (2), 237–249.

Puranik, C. S., Al Otaiba, S., Sidler, J. F., & Greulich, L. (2014). Exploring the amount and type of writing instruction during language arts instruction in kindergarten classrooms. Reading and Writing , 27 (2), 213–236.

Ray, K. W., & Glover, M. (2008). Already ready: Nurturing writers in preschool and kindergarten . Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Roberts, K., & Wibbens, E. (2010). Writing first: Preparing the teachers of our youngest writers. In G. Trioia, R. Shankland, & A. Heintz (Eds.), Putting writing research into practice: Applications for teacher professional development (pp. 179–205). New York: Guilford Press.

VanNess, A. R., Murnen, T. J., & Bertelsen, C. D. (2013). Let me tell you a secret: Kindergartners can write. The Reading Teacher , 66 (7), 574–584.

Watanabe, L. M., & Hall-Kenyon, K. M. (2011). Improving young children's writing: The influence of story structure on kindergartners' writing complexity. Literacy Research & Instruction , 50 (4), 272–293.

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Writing fluency and quality in kindergarten and first grade: The role of attention, reading, transcription, and oral language

Florida Center for Reading Research and School of Teacher Education, Florida State University

Jeanne Wanzek

Yaacov petscher.

Florida Center for Reading Research

Stephanie Al Otaiba

Simmons School of Education and Human Development at Southern Methodist University

Young-Suk Kim

In the present study, we examined the influence of kindergarten component skills on writing outcomes, both concurrently and longitudinally to first grade. Using data from 265 students, we investigated a model of writing development including attention regulation along with students’ reading, spelling, handwriting fluency, and oral language component skills. Results from structural equation modeling demonstrated that a model including attention was better fitting than a model with only language and literacy factors. Attention, a higher-order literacy factor related to reading and spelling proficiency, and automaticity in letter-writing were uniquely and positively related to compositional fluency in kindergarten. Attention and higher-order literacy factor were predictive of both composition quality and fluency in first grade, while oral language showed unique relations with first grade writing quality. Implications for writing development and instruction are discussed.

The act of writing is a vehicle for the expression of knowledge and the transmission of information across time and generations. Most would agree that the ability to write is critical for success throughout the school years and into adulthood, where poor writing skills can have a detrimental impact in the work place (National Commission on Writing, 2005). Students in the United States have demonstrated relatively poor writing ability over time (National Assessment of Educational Progress; Salahu-Din, Persky, & Miller, 2008 ). The most recent National Assessment of Education Performance writing test results reported only 33% of eighth and 24% of twelfth grade students exhibited proficient writing skills, a result essentially unchanged from 2002. While these data relate to adolescents, Juel (1988) found that students exhibiting difficulty in the area of writing as early as the first grade were highly likely to remain poor writers in the fourth grade, suggesting that problems in writing may begin in the early grades..

In recent years there has been a notable increase in expectations for writing skills of students, beginning in kindergarten and first grade. Among the most recent writing standards for kindergarten and first grade are expectations for students to write about experiences, stories, people, and events by composing informational/explanatory texts with a topic and relevant facts and writing narratives that recount events sequentially ( Common Core State Standards Initiative, 2010 ). Thus, research identifying the potential intractability of early writing difficulties, coupled with heightened expectations for writing, serves to emphasize the need for examining processes and components that influence writing development in the early elementary grades in order to provide possible targets of instruction, intervention and remediation. The present study sought to explore component skills of writing in the earliest years of schooling, kindergarten and first grade, by specifically investigating the relations of early literacy and language abilities, as well as attention, to the development of students’ compositional fluency and quality.

Component skills in early writing development

Some researchers have posited that the ability to write consists of attaining lower-level, more rudimentary skills such as spelling and handwriting (i.e., transcription skills) while also being able to utilize higher-level proficiencies such as creating, organizing, and elaborating ideas (The Simple View of Writing; Juel, Griffith, & Gough, 1986 ). More recently, Berninger and colleagues’ Not-So-Simple View of Writing ( Berninger & Winn, 2006 ) suggests three primary components: (a) transcription; (b) executive functions regulating focused attention, inhibitory control, and mental shifting during planning, reviewing, and revising of text as well as strategies for self-regulation; and (c) text generation, or transformation of ideas to language representations in writing. In addition, reading component skills may also impact early writing as the two have been called “two sides of the same coin” ( Ehri, 2000 , p.19). Thus, one may postulate that early developmental differences in transcription, language, or reading skills, or attention and self-regulation, could impact the development of writing.

Transcription skills

There is converging evidence that spelling and handwriting are strong predictors of writing fluency and to some degree, compositional quality as students learn to write in the primary grades ( Graham, Berninger, Abbott, Abbott, & Whitaker, 1997 ; Jones & Christensen, 1999 ; Juel, 1988 ; Juel et al., 1986 ). Graham and colleagues (1997) found that together, spelling and handwriting accounted for 25% and 66% of the variance in compositional quality and fluency, respectively, in Grades 1–3. Individually, after controlling for language ability, first grader’s spelling accounted for 29% of the variance in story writing in comparison to only 10% for students in fourth grade ( Juel, 1988 ). Meanwhile, handwriting fluency has been shown to account for just over one-half of the variance in student’s quality of writing in first grade, even after accounting for reading ( Jones & Christensen, 1999 ). In their recent meta-analysis, Graham, McKeown, Kiuhara, & Harris (2012) found that, on average, elementary students specifically taught transcription skills perform about one-half of a standard deviation (ES = .55) higher than comparison students on measures of writing quality. Most recently, Puranik and Al Otaiba (2012) found that in kindergarten, handwriting fluency and spelling added significant unique variance in predicting writing fluency after accounting for language, reading, and IQ.

Oral language

Investigating the contribution of oral language, primarily verbal reasoning and fluency, Abbott and Berninger (1993) found a statistically significant association with writing quality in first grade and compositional fluency in second and third grade. The structural relationships among the language systems of expressive language and writing have been found to generally change across development in Grades 1–3 with evidence suggesting strengthening relations over time ( Berninger et al., 2006 ). However, less than 25% of the variance in writing achievement was accounted for by expressive language ability. Specific to kindergarten, Hooper et al. (2011) found that expressive and receptive language proficiency longitudinally predicted narrative writing skill in later elementary grades (third to fifth grades). Further, word and syntax-level language skills in kindergarten have demonstrated unique concurrent relations to compositional fluency after accounting for other literacy skills ( Kim et al., 2011 ).

Given the multidimensional nature of both reading and writing processes, researchers have posited their important and reciprocal relationship may be due to shared knowledge (e.g., metaknowledge, knowledge of text attributes) and cognitive processes such as phonological and orthographic systems and short and long-term memory ( Fitzgerald & Shanahan, 2000 ; Shanahan, 2006 ). It has been demonstrated that word and sentence-level reading ability contribute directly to spelling, handwriting, and compositional quality in Grades 1–6 and to compositional fluency in Grades 1–3, with the strongest relationship for fluency evident in first grade ( Abbott & Berninger, 1993 ; Berninger, Abbott, Abbott, Graham, & Richards, 2002 ). Further, Abbott, Berninger, and Fayol (2010) found a longitudinal relationship between reading, specifically comprehension, and a measure of fluency and quality of writing across Grades 2–5.

Two recent studies have investigated several of these potential component skills of writing specifically for students in kindergarten ( Kim et al., 2011 ; Puranik & Al Otaiba, 2012 ). Kim and colleagues’ (2011) findings supported a model of oral language, spelling, and letter-writing fluency, although reading had a non-significant relation to writing fluency after accounting for other skills. However, overall, only 33% of the variance in writing production was accounted for with these variables. Similarly, Puranik and Al Otaiba (2012) accounted for 39% of the variance in writing fluency with handwriting, spelling, reading, oral language, as well as cognitive and demographic factors. Both findings suggest the need to examine other component skills.

Regulation of Attention

As theorized in the Not-so-Simple-View of writing, executive functions, including supervisory attention, goal setting and planning, reviewing and revising, and strategies for self-monitoring and regulation, are critical to proficiency in text generation and are posited to increase in importance throughout development as the complexity of writing increases in schooling ( Berninger & Winn, 2006 ). More specifically, Berninger and Winn view the supervisory attention system as responsible for selective attention during writing tasks; namely, focusing attention on relevant aspects of the task while inhibiting attention to non-relevant aspects, allowing shifting between mental sets, remaining on task, and metacognitive awareness. Specific executive functions that contribute to selective attention have been identified including inhibitory control, set-shifting, and updating of memory ( Lehto, Juuarvi, Kooistra, & Pulkkinen, 2003 ; Wilcutt et al., 2001 ). Similarly, cognitive research from Happaney, Zelazo, and Stuss (2004) identified cognitive and attentional flexibility, and inhibitory control, along with working memory, as important to individual self-regulation. Hooper, Swartz, Wakely, de Kruif, and Montgomery (2002) have argued that problems with attentional control may particularly interfere with executive processes that coordinate strategic writing- planning, monitoring, and revising of writing. Barkley (1996) has hypothesized that inattention is a symptom of difficulty with self-regulation of internal cognitive processes. Given that the foundation for self-regulatory behavior occurs early in life, most often in the first five years ( Blair, 2002 ), one would expect to see the influence of a self-regulatory skill such as attentional control, in the earliest grades.

Several studies have demonstrated the impact of attention on early academic outcomes, such as reading and math achievement, in preschool and early elementary grades ( Duncan et al., 2007 ; McClelland, Acock, Piccinin, Rhea, & Stallings, 2013 ; Rhoades, Warren, Domitrovich, & Greenberg, 2011 ). One might argue that the ability to regulate attention would also impact early writing, as it allows students engaged in a writing task to specifically attend to relevant tasks and keep previous content written in mind for use in subsequent composing, all while disregarding extraneous information. With regards to writing, Hooper et al. (2002) found that less competent writers in fourth and fifth grade, in comparison to more able writers, demonstrated less proficiency with initiating and sustaining attention, inhibitory control, and set shifting. Subsequently, Hooper et al. (2011) identified a model of writing in first and second grade, including attention, memory, and executive functions, language, and fine motor ability, that accounted for nearly 50% of the variance in outcomes on a standardized measure of writing achievement. Attention/executive function was the only unique predictor of first grade writing while both language and attention/executive function uniquely predicted second grade writing. Teacher ratings of student attentiveness have also been shown to predict substantive quality of writing and writing convention as early as first grade ( Kim, Al Otaiba, Folsom, & Greulich, 2013 ). Meanwhile, Thomson et al. (2005) have suggested that attention plays an indirect role in writing via influence on orthographic coding and rapid naming skills.

Intervention research has demonstrated that training student’s attentional processes (e.g., sustained, selective, and alternating attention), coupled with writing instruction, significantly improves compositional skills of students in fourth through sixth ( Chenault, Thomson, Abbott, & Berninger, 2006 ). Further, many self-regulatory strategies utilized during writing, which focus student’s attention on the task, have been postulated including goal setting and planning, organizing, self-monitoring, self-verbalizing, and revising ( Graham & Harris, 2000 ). The potential importance of such strategies during writing provided impetus for the development of the self-regulated strategy development approach, which subsequently has been proven effective across both grade and writing performance levels (e.g., Graham, Harris, & McKeown, 2013 ; Graham, McKeown, Kiuhara, & Harris, 2012 ; Graham & Perin, 2007 ).

Study Purpose and Research Questions

Although research interest in the area of writing has grown, the extant literature is still sparse at early developmental levels; only a few have specifically examined students as young as kindergarten ( Kim et al., 2011 ; Puranik & Al Otaiba, 2012 ). While several component skills involved in writing development have been investigated and their potential importance demonstrated, most studies have examined only one or two of these component skills rather than the contribution of multiple component skills on writing. Although recent multivariate research of component skills at the early grades is encouraging ( Hooper et al., 2011 ; Kim et al., 2011 , 2013 ; Puranik & Al Otaiba, 2012 ), no study has yet examined the unique and shared role of attention, transcription, reading, and language ability in a model of writing development at the kindergarten level nor has the contribution of these skills been examined longitudinally in kindergarten and first grade.

Given the importance of language and literacy and attention skills to early learning, the purpose of the present study was to build upon and extend the extant literature on early writing development by examining four primary research questions (RQ). First,

• What are the shared and unique relations of component skills of writing fluency in kindergarten by including attention, reading, transcription, and oral language skills?
• Does a model of kindergarten writing development with an attention factor fit better than one without?
• What are the longitudinal relations of kindergarten component skills to writing quality and fluency in first grade?
• Do kindergarten component skills exhibit a direct effect on writing quality and/or fluency in first grade or are these relationships mediated by kindergarten writing fluency?

Sample Characteristics

The present study examined extant data from a larger, five-year project examining a response to intervention framework for reading, including examination of general education classroom instruction for all students, within a school setting ( Al Otaiba et al., 2011 ). Participants in the present analysis included one cohort of students who participated in the project in both kindergarten and first grade ( n = 265).

In kindergarten, students represented 10 schools and 31 classrooms with a range of 1–15 students per participating classroom. The mean age in fall of kindergarten was 5.13 years of age. Sixty-one percent of the students qualified for free or reduced lunch programs, indicating a large proportion of the sample may be classified as low socio-economic status. The sample included 53.6% male students. Students represented a diversity of races/ethnicities, with 54% African American, 31% Caucasian, 8% Hispanic, 4% multi-racial, and less than 1% of Asian or Native American. Data on special education status were available for 253/265 (95%) students with approximately 11% eligible for services; most (over 70%) were identified with either a speech or language impairment. As demographic data was collected from schools, we were unable to obtain specific information relative to medical diagnoses such as Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). However, in this representative sample of students, only two (< 1%) students were eligible for special education as Other Health Impairment, a category often comprised of students with ADHD.

Transcription Skills

Student’s spelling and letter writing automaticity/fluency (accuracy and fluency in writing individual letters) were both assessed. On the spelling subtest from the WJ-III students write the corresponding graphemic representation of orally presented letters or words. Responses are scored dichotomously (correct or incorrect) on this measure. Median split-half reliability is .90. On a separate, untimed spelling measure students were presented 10 decodable or high-frequency words (e.g., dog, man, one, come) and 4 nonwords (e.g., sut, frot) used in previous literacy research ( Byrne & Fielding-Barnsley, 1993 ). Using a standard protocol from Byrne et al. (2005) , examiners explained to the students that some presented words were real and some were nonwords. All real words were presented orally, used in a sentence, and then repeated, while nonwords were repeated three times. Student performance on each word was assigned a development score ranging from 0 to 6 based on modification of a rubric from Tangel and Blachman (1992) . A developmental score, in contrast to a dichotomous score was chosen given the age of the sample in order to capture differences in how students orthographically represented phonological word features. This scoring method has been utilized in recent studies with kindergarten students and in previous research ( Jones & Christensen, 1999 ; Kim et al., 2011 ; Puranik & Al Otaiba, 2012 ). The following guidelines were utilized: no response or a random string of letters was assigned a 0, providing at least one letter that was related to the target spelling word phonetically was scored as a 1 (e.g., writing an “o” or “g” for dog), writing the correct initial letter followed by random letters was scored as a 2, including more than one correct phoneme resulted in a score of 3, a score of 4 was given for words spelled with all letters represented and phonetically correct (e.g., “dawg” for dog), a 5 was assigned when all requirements of a score of 4 were met and student made an attempt to mark a long vowel (e.g., “bloo” for blue), and a word received a score of 6 when spelled correctly.

Student’s ability to access, retrieve, and automatically write letter forms was also measured. The task was modified from Berninger and Rutberg’s (1992) task of handwriting automaticity. Students were given 1 min to write, quickly and accurately, all lower case letters of the alphabet in order ( Jones & Christensen, 1999 ; Wagner et al., 2011 ). Consistent with prior research, the letter writing fluency (LWF) task was scored primarily on penmanship and correct letter formation with a score of 1.0 given for a letter that was correctly formed and sequenced, .5 for letters poorly formed yet recognizable and/or reversed, and 0 for illegible letters, cursive letters, letters written out of order, or uppercase letters.

Oral Language

Student’s oral language ability was assessed using measures of word and syntax knowledge. Expressive vocabulary was assessed using the Picture Vocabulary subtest of the WJ-III ( Woodcock, McGrew, & Mather, 2001 ). Students were presented with pictures of common objects and asked to say the word depicted in the picture. The reported median split-half reliability was .77. Knowledge of syntax, or grammar, was measured by the Grammatic Completion subtest of the Test of Language Development—Primary, third edition (TOLD-P: 3; Newcomer & Hamill, 1997 ). This task, measures the ability to use various morphological forms found in English (e.g., “Here is a cat. Over there are four more ___ .”). The Sentence Imitation subtest of the TOLD-P: 3 (30 items), measuring auditory short-term memory and grammatical understanding, was also administered. Students were asked to repeat sentences that increase in length and complexity. Reliability was reported to be .90 and .91 respectively, for these subtests.

Reading Skills

Three measures of letter and word reading and decoding were utilized as indicators of student’s reading ability in kindergarten. On the Woodcock-Johnson (WJ-III) Letter-Word Identification subtest ( Woodcock, McGrew, & Mather, 2001 ), which includes 76 items increasing in difficulty, students were required to name individual letters, as well as decode and/or identify real words presented. Median split-half reliability was reported to be .94 for this measure. Decoding skill was measured using the WJ-III Word Attack subtest. Utilizing pseudowords, items proceed from identification of a few single letter sounds to decoding of complex letter combinations. Reported median split-half reliability was .87. The ability to decode phonetically regular words fluently and accurately was assessed using the Phonemic Decoding Efficiency (PDE) subtest of the Test of Word Reading Efficiency (TOWRE; Torgesen, Wagner, & Rashotte, 1999 ). The PDE measures the number of pronounceable nonwords accurately decoded within 45s. Reported test-retest reliability was .90.

Student’s attention regulation was assessed through teacher report using the Strengths and Weaknesses of ADHD-symptoms and Normal behavior scale (SWAN; Swanson et al., 2006 ). This 30-item scale, assessing students’ attention-based behavior was completed by classroom teachers. Some example items include “Engage in tasks that require sustained mental effort” and “Remain focused on task”. Students are rated in comparison to their peers along a 7- point continuum that ranges from “far below” to “far above”, based upon observations made over the past month ( Swanson et al., 2006 ). The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM-IV; American Psychiatric Association, 2000) criteria used for identifying individuals with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder was utilized in the development of the SWAN. Although the SWAN is frequently used as one aspect in an ADHD evaluation, it also provides a direct measure of student’s attention skills across a continuum. Recent research ( Saez, Folsom, Al Otaiba, & Schatschneider, 2012 ) has supported the items on the SWAN as representing three separable factors of selective attention, including attention-memory , attention-set shifting , and attention- inhibitory control , which align with the specific components of self-regulation described by previous research ( Happaney et al., 2004 ; Lehto et al., 2003 ; Wilcutt et al., 2001 ). The mean score across the items representing each of these three factors was calculated to form three indicators of selective attention. Cronbach’s alpha for this measure across all 30 items was .99.

Writing Skills

In the spring of kindergarten, students were asked to compose a writing sample in response to an examiner-presented prompt. Examiners introduced the task and facilitated a brief group discussion to orient students to expectations. Specifically, examiners said, “You have been in kindergarten for almost a whole year. Today we are going to write about kindergarten. Let’s think about what you enjoyed about being in kindergarten. What did you learn in school? Did anything special happen to you in kindergarten?” These questions and student responses were not written down by examiners. Examiners also instructed students to write what they had learned in kindergarten until instructed to stop and that they could not receive help with spelling words. Students were allowed 15 min to complete the task. This specific researcher-developed task was developed in response to the lack of validated measures to assess students writing in kindergarten.

Students’ writing was scored for the number of words, sentences, and ideas using a coding scheme developed by Puranik, Lombardino, and Altmann (2007) . Due to limited production, scoring of correct word sequences (CWS) was not suitable in kindergarten. All actual words, explicitly related to the prompt, that students composed were counted in the computation for the number of words written (e.g., “The end” was not counted), while number symbols and random letters were not counted. All complete sentences were counted in the total number of sentences, regardless of punctuation. When punctuation was absent, raters broke the writing into sentences with the criteria that a sentence had to express a complete thought, feeling, or idea and have an explicit or implied subject and predicate with a verb (e.g., “I eat and play [STOP] and go outside and laugh [STOP] and draw pictures.” counted as three sentences). For calculating the number of ideas in a student’s writing sample, only ideas that could be identified in the writing were counted, Ideas required a subject and a predicate, but could use a common subject/verb (e.g., “I like playing” would be scored as one idea; “I like playing and writing” would count as two ideas). Repeated ideas were only counted once. These scoring measures for writing fluency (i.e., production) have been utilized in previous studies with students in the earliest grades ( Kim et al., 2011 , in press ).

In the spring of first grade, students were asked to compose a brief narrative text when presented with a story prompt (i.e., One day when I got home from school …’) developed by curriculum based writing researchers ( McMaster, Du, & Petursdorrir, 2009 ). Brief 5 min prompts are widely used in writing research as global indicators of writing performance in first grade and also through the elementary grades ( Lembke, Deno, & Hall, 2003 ). Students’ writing was evaluated in two different ways. First, analytic scoring of student essays for the following components was completed: organization of text structure (e.g., beginning, middle, and end), ideas (e.g., development of main idea), word choice (e.g., use of specific/interesting words), and sentence fluency (e.g., grammatical use of sentences and sentence flow). These components of writing were adapted from the widely utilized 6 + 1 Traits of Writing Rubric for Primary Grades ( NREL, 2011 ). These four components were recently identified as representing a separable factor in students’ writing, capturing substantive quality ( Kim et al., in press ). Second, writing was evaluated for the number of CWS, a commonly used metric within curriculum-based writing measures; in the present study, CWS serves as a proxy for writing fluency in first grade. For writing quality each domain was assigned a score from 1 (“experimenting”) through 5 (“experienced”) based on the degree of proficiency exhibited in the writing. A score of 0 was assigned for each trait if the student’s writing sample was unscorable due to being illegible, the student did not produce any writing, or the student simply rewrote the prompt. For CWS, a word sequence was defined as the sequence between two adjacent words or between a word and punctuation mark. For a sequence to be scored as a CWS, the adjacent words must be spelled correctly and be syntactically and semantically correct within the writing context. To take into account the beginning and end of sentences, the beginning word must be capitalized and the end of the sentence properly punctuated in order to receive a CWS for those writing sequences. All CWS in the student’s writing were summed to create a total score.

Reading, spelling, and letter writing fluency assessments for the current study were collected during spring of kindergarten as was the WJ-III Picture Vocabulary measure. The additional oral language measures from the TOLD-P: 3 were part of the fall of kindergarten assessment battery. Writing samples were collected at the end of both kindergarten and first grade. Trained research assistants (RA) served as examiners. Reading and oral language assessments were administered individually, whereas spelling and writing assessments were done in small groups or entire classrooms. Letter-writing fluency, spelling, and writing quality were all scored by trained research assistants using specific rubrics.

For LWF, spelling, and writing scoring, RAs were trained to use each rubric on a small subset of the sample through practice and discussion of scoring issues. A randomly selected 15% of the complete data set for LWF and spelling were scored by each RA individually to calculate reliability. Kappa was .98 for letter-writing fluency and .99 for spelling. For writing samples, interrater reliability for each variable coded was calculated on a random selection of 20% of writing samples. For writing scoring in kindergarten, agreement averaged 88% for total number of words, sentences, and ideas. For first grade samples, inter-rater agreement was 92% for CWS and averaged 91% across the quality components. All discrepancies in scoring were resolved through discussion.

Data Analysis

Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and structural equation modeling (SEM) were utilized to answer the research questions. Initially, the appropriateness of the measurement model was established utilizing CFA including latent factors of reading, spelling, letter-writing fluency, oral language, attention, and writing production in kindergarten and writing quality in first grade. While all observed measures of most latent constructs were collected in spring, students’ scores from the TOLD-P: 3 subtests collected in fall of kindergarten were utilized to create an oral language factor. Correlations between the TOLD-P:3 subtests in fall and a vocabulary measure in the spring ranged from .39 to .49 and were statistically significant. Next, a series of SEMs were specified to address the research questions: Model 1- Kindergarten component factors and a single-indicator of letter writing fluency predicting kindergarten writing fluency (research question 1); Model 2- Same as model 1 but with all covariances with, and direct paths from, the attention factor constrained to 0 (RQ 2); Model 3- Kindergarten component skills predicting first grade writing quality and writing fluency (RQ 3); and Model 4- kindergarten factors predicting kindergarten writing production and direct and indirect effects on first grade writing quality and fluency (RQ 4). Measurement error for single indicators of letter-writing fluency and the writing production fluency in kindergarten was accounted for by fixing the residual variances of each observed variable (i.e., [1- reliability]* σ 2 ). Multiple indices were evaluated to assess model fit including chi-square, root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA), comparative fit index (CFI), Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI), and standardized root mean square residuals (SRMR). Given that chi-square values tend to be influenced by sample size, RMSEA values below .085, CFI/TLI values greater than .95, and SRMR below .05 indicate excellent model fit ( Kline, 2011 ).

To account for the non-independence of observations, cluster-corrected standard errors using CLUSTER option and TYPE=COMPLEX in Mplus 6.1 were derived. This approach is an appropriate method for accounting for the nested nature of data without specifically answering questions about variance components at different levels ( Asparouhov, 2006 ). However, for analyses purposes, clusters (i.e., classrooms) with less than 5 students were removed resulting in removal of seven clusters and 10 students. There were no statistically significant differences in sample means for any variable with removal of these 10 cases.

As the extant data utilized in these analyses was collected on students in school, missing data was to be expected. Complete data were available for 195 students, or close to 75% of participants. Missing data was treated as missing at random, which Mplus handles using full-information maximum likelihood estimation.

Descriptive Statistics

Descriptive statistics are presented in Table 1 and where available, standard scores are provided in addition to raw scores. Students in the sample demonstrated mean scores within the average range for word reading, decoding, spelling, and expressive vocabulary, while grammar/syntax skills were low average to below average. Sample means for each area of attention were consistent ( M = 4.59–4.69). Kindergarten writing production averaged almost 13 words (0–50). Approximately one in five (22%) kindergarten writing samples were either unscorable due to illegibility or the student was unable to compose any actual words suggesting the presence of a floor effect on this measure. In first grade, students averaged 32 words written ( SD = 14.5) and 21 CWS ( SD = 12.4) for the narrative writing prompt. Mean ratings on each of the first grade writing quality components ranged from a low of 2.45 on Word Choice to a high of 2.95 for Ideas with only three prompts deemed unscorable. Table 2 presents bivariate correlations among observed variables, all of which were statistically significant ( p < .01).

Correlations between observed variables

Note. All coefficients are statistically significant at .05 level.

LWID= Letter-Word Identification; WA= Word Attack; PDE= Phonemic Decoding Efficiency; LWF= Letter Writing Fluency; PV= Picture Vocabulary; TOLD-SI= Test of Language Development Sentence Imitation; TOLD-GC= Test of Language Development Grammatic Completion; CWS= Correct writing sequences

Measurement Model

Initial evaluation of the fit indices for the proposed measurement model indicated excellent data fit: χ 2 (119) = 234.62, p =.000; CFI= .963; TLI = .952; RMSEA = .060 (CI [ .049, .072]); and SRMR = .048. All predictor factors were significantly and positively related to one another (.33 ≤ r ≤ .95) and with writing in kindergarten and first grade, with generally moderate correlations (see Table 3 ). Reading and spelling factors were very highly related ( r = .95). Given approximately 90% of the variance in one factor was accounted for by the other suggested that the two constructs may be captured by a second-order factor (e.g., global early literacy skills). Previous research has suggested a unitary language and literacy construct at first grade ( Mehta, Foorman, Branum-Martin, & Taylor, 2005 ).

Correlations among reading, spelling, letter-writing fluency, oral language, self-regulation, and writing

Note. All coefficients are statistically significant at the .01 level.

K = Kindergarten; First = First grade

For this reason, CFA was used to examine whether an alternative model with a second-order “literacy” might better explain the data than the existing correlated factors model. The alternative model also demonstrated good fit [χ 2 (123) = 243.21, p =.000; CFI = .961; TLI = .952; RMSEA = .061 (CI[.049,.072]); and SRMR = .049]. Results from a chi-square difference test (Δχ 2 = 8.84, df = 4, p = .065) suggest this more parsimonious model would be preferred and thus, was used in subsequent analyses. 1 Figure 1 displays factor loadings for each latent factor.

Factor loadings for kindergarten and first grade latent variables

Research Questions 1 & 2

The first research question addressed the unique and shared relations of component skills of writing fluency in kindergarten. Standardized parameter estimates and standard errors for the hypothesized SEM of writing production in kindergarten, are presented in Figure 2a . Results suggested good model fit: χ 2 (79) = 186.53, p =.000; CFI = .965; TLI = .954; RMSEA = .076 (CI [.062, .090]); and SRMR = .050. Literacy (i.e., reading and spelling), letter-writing fluency, oral language, and attention were all positively related to one another (φ range = .35–.57, ps < .01). Attention-related skills (γ = .16, p = .001) exhibited a unique and statistically significant relation to kindergarten composition fluency after controlling for literacy, handwriting fluency, and oral language. Early literacy skill in reading and spelling (γ = .58, p < .001), as well as letter-writing fluency (γ = .13, p = .047) were also uniquely and positively related to students’ composition fluency, while oral language (γ = −.10, p = .237) demonstrated no relationship when accounting for the other factors. This model accounted for approximately 49% of the variance in compositional fluency in kindergarten.

Standardized structural regression weights (standard errors in parentheses) for SEM of kindergarten component skills and writing (a) and model with attention constrained to 0 (b). Solid lines represent p < .01; dashed lines p > .05; dotted lines represent paths constrained at 0

For the second research question, we further sought to confirm the appropriateness of including attention in the model in comparison to a model with only literacy, letter-writing fluency, and oral language as predictors of writing production ( Figure 2b ). The model including attention had a statistically significant better fit than a model without this factor (Δχ 2 = 73.5, df = 4, p < .001) supporting its inclusion.

Research Question 3

The third research question considered the longitudinal relations of kindergarten component skills to first grade writing. As presented in Figure 3 , a SEM predicting compositional fluency and quality in first grade from kindergarten component skills exhibited excellent fit: χ 2 (104) = 203.32, p = .000; CFI = .964; TLI = .953; RMSEA = .061 (CI [.049, .074]); and SRMR = .047. In this longitudinal model, attention in kindergarten was uniquely related to both compositional fluency (γ = .23, p < .001) and quality (γ = .19, p = .001) in first grade after accounting for the other factors. Literacy skills in kindergarten were also uniquely and positively related to fluency (γ = .60, p < .001) and quality (γ = .36, p < .001) of writing in the spring of first grade, while kindergarten letter-writing fluency exhibited no statistically significant relationship to either first grade outcome (γ = −.05 and −.03, ps > .41). Oral language skills in kindergarten were not uniquely related to compositional fluency in first grade (γ = −.07 p = .50) but did exhibit a unique relation to quality of writing in first grade (γ = .16 p = .05). Compositional fluency and quality were moderately related (φ = .42, p < .001). Overall, the model accounted for 33% and 45% of the variance in compositional quality and fluency respectively, in first grade.

Standardized SEM coefficients (standard errors) for kindergarten component skills predicting 1 st grade writing quality and fluency. Solid lines represent p < .01, dashed lines represent p > .05

Research Question 4

The final question examined whether kindergarten component skills had a direct or indirect effect on first grade writing quality and fluency. The resulting model (see Figure 4 ) again demonstrated excellent model-data fit: χ 2 (149) = 289.34, p = .000; CFI = .962; TLI = .951; RMSEA = .061 (CI [.050, .071]); and SRMR = .046. After accounting for both compositional fluency in kindergarten and all other component skills, attention (γ = .19, p < .01), literacy skills (γ = .36, p < .001) and oral language (γ = .16, p = .05) in kindergarten exhibited statistically significant direct paths to first grade writing quality. Direct effects to first grade compositional fluency were only statistically significant for attention (γ = .22, p < .01) and early literacy (γ = .53, p < .01), while oral language had no unique relation (γ = −.06, p = .55). Letter-writing fluency demonstrated no unique relationship with composition fluency or quality in this model. Despite the moderate factor correlations between fluency of written composition in kindergarten and first grade compositional quality ( r = .37) and fluency ( r =.52), kindergarten writing was not predictive of either writing quality (γ = .00, p = .99) or fluency (γ = .12, p = .24) in first grade, after accounting for the direct effects of kindergarten component skills. Thus, kindergarten writing fluency does not appear to mediate the relationship between kindergarten component skills and writing quality or production one year later. This model accounted for approximately 33% of the variance in writing quality and 45% of the variance in first grade writing production. A summary of model-fit statistics for all CFA and SEMs is presented in Table 4 .

Full SEM with standardized structural regression weights (standard errors) of direct and indirect effects of kindergarten component skills on 1 st grade writing quality and fluency. Solid lines represent p < .01, dashed lines represent p >.05. Model separated by outcome for presentation purposes

Model Fit Statistics for CFA and SEM

Note. RMSEA = root mean square error of approximation; CFI = comparative fit index; TLI = Tucker-Lewis index; SRMR = standardized root mean square residuals; CI = confidence interval.

The present study provides preliminary findings regarding early predictors of writing development. Based on longitudinal data collected on a diverse sample of students in their kindergarten and first grade years, evidence supports a model of early writing including attention as a component factor given its unique relation to compositional fluency and quality above and beyond early literacy and language ability. An early literacy factor, related to word reading and spelling proficiency, accounted for statistically significant variation in concurrent and future writing outcomes. Student’s handwriting automaticity in kindergarten showed a unique, concurrent relation to fluency of composition but not to writing quality and fluency one year later. Finally, after accounting for other component skills, kindergarten oral language was only related to quality of writing in first grade. Of particular note, all statistically significant relations of component skills, both concurrently and longitudinally, to writing outcomes were direct effects.

Substantiating the important role of attention, an aspect of self-regulation, in writing development serves to bolster previous research findings of this relationship in older grades ( Graham and Harris, 2000 ; Hooper et al., 2002 , 2011 ) and extend recent evidence with students at this young age (e.g., Kim et al., 2013 ). Difficulties in working memory and attention, both assessed in the present analyses, have been linked to poor writing outcomes in both lower and upper elementary grades ( Chenault et al., 2006 ; Kim et al., 2013 ), and this study provides emerging evidence of this role in writing development as early as kindergarten. To our knowledge, the present results are the first to examine a component skill model of early writing in kindergarten, and longitudinally to first grade, that includes attention with literacy and language-related skills. Given constraints in self-regulatory processes such as attention during writing, novice writers have been previously described as engaging in “knowledge-telling”, with a primary focus on the act of putting thoughts to words on paper ( Bereiter & Scardamalia, 1987 ; McCutchen, 2000 ). Our findings suggest that higher levels of attention regulation at this emergent level may free cognitive resources to assist not only in efficient text production by allowing students to remain engaged, abstain from competing demands, and transfer ideas and thoughts to the written word, but also engage in self-regulatory strategies during writing that promote higher quality compositions. While strategies such as goal-setting, planning, and revising has been attributed to older and more skilled writers ( Bereiter & Scardamalia, 1987 ), it is possible that students, particularly those with better attention skills, may begin to develop these strategies at an earlier age.

The individual relations of reading and spelling could not be modeled due to the extreme overlap with these two factors. As previously stated, this finding is not without precedent at this age level ( Mehta et al., 2005 ). Nonetheless, the important role of early literacy on kindergarten writing fluency, as well as both composition fluency and quality one year later, was clearly evident. Both reading and spelling are influenced by phonological, orthographic, and morphological knowledge ( Berninger et al., 2002 ). One could reason that stronger knowledge in these areas facilitates access to written text via reading and subsequently, better understanding of the written language system, potentially aiding the generation of written text. Further, greater phonological, orthographic, and morphological knowledge may allow students to form a lexicon of letter/word forms that can be accessed quickly and accurately ( Berninger et al., 2006 ) and thus, allows ideas to be represented in text at the word, sentence, and discourse levels through efficient encoding.

Automaticity in handwriting also had a small, yet statistically significant relation to the efficient production of words, sentences, and ideas in writing in kindergarten, clearly supporting the extant research with students in the earliest grades ( Jones & Christensen, 1999 ; Kim et al., 2011 ; Puranik & Al Otaiba, 2012 ). Although a separable construct, letter-writing fluency, which was moderately correlated with spelling (φ = .54), likely operates similarly to automaticity in spelling skill in that without automatic retrieval of letter forms, generating text becomes slow and effortful and the strategic thought processes required for writing are impeded, particularly on timed measures of writing ( Graham et al., 1997 ; McCutchen, 2000 ). Of note was the absence of relation between handwriting fluency in kindergarten and writing outcomes one year later. Although evidence exists supporting the role of handwriting fluency on writing in first grade (e.g., Jones & Christensen, 1999 ; Kim et al., 2013 ), the present study did not include concurrent measures of these skills in first grade.

The relations of oral language to writing outcomes were mixed, with a small, yet statistically significant finding for writing quality but not compositional fluency. This supports research at the earliest grades demonstrating individual differences in oral language were not related to writing fluency when accounting for other factors ( Abbott & Berninger, 1993 ; Puranik & Al Otaiba, 2012 ). Our findings do however differ from the Kim et al. (2011) finding of oral language as a unique predictor of writing fluency in kindergarten. The act of writing requires the development and elaboration of ideas and therefore, limitations in children’s vocabulary and knowledge of language structures may serve to constrain the quality of text generated ( McCutchen, 2000 ). Prior research has established the relations between oral language and writing increase across the early grades ( Abbott & Berninger, 1993 ; Berninger et al., 2006 ), it is plausible that the importance of oral language to compositional quality grows across the grades much like it does to reading comprehension after the earliest grades ( Storch & Whitehurst, 2002 ). Furthermore, Juel and colleagues ( Juel, 1988 ; Juel et al., 1986 ) have also found that student’s ideation, likely related to language ability, becomes more important to writing after first grade. It may be that larger relations are apparent after first grade because writing production for students becomes less constrained, and thus, individual differences in language skills are more evident in the quality of composition.

In general, findings suggest that students’ literacy and language skills may work in tandem with self-regulatory functions such as attention to influence writing at this early level. Our findings clearly dovetail with results from other studies ( Kim et al., 2011 , 2013 ; Puranik & Al Otaiba, 2012 ) demonstrating the role of early component skills of writing including language and literacy skills, as well as regulation of attention. However, the present study further adds to our understanding of their influence over time (i.e., longitudinally). So, while knowledge of the writing system (e.g., Fitzgerald & Shanahan, 2000 ), automaticity with transcription, and oral language proficiency appear necessary for early writing development, they may not be sufficient. Individual differences in level of attention also play a role efficient text production (fluency) and qualitative elements of writing such as ideation, organization, structure, and word choice for these early writers. Berninger and Winn’s (2006) view of text generation posits that executive functions, particularly supervisory attention, do play a role in beginning writing along with transcription skills, Thus, we believe that the results of this present study do indeed lend support to their theory at the stage of beginning writing. The Not-So-Simple View ( Berninger & Winn, 2006 ) also stresses the increased role of multiple, more complex functions, such as the link between working memory and long-term memory and the reliance on strategies for self-monitoring and self-regulation for older students; however these particular executive functions were not assessed in the current study. This may represent an area of further exploration at the younger grades.

Despite the prevailing focus on early literacy skills in schools, particularly in kindergarten through third grade, concerns remain. Namely, the amount of explicit instruction in many of these component skills, as well as in writing instruction, in kindergarten may be lacking. Graham et al. (2012) have recommended students in kindergarten spend at least 30 minutes daily writing and developing writing skills. However, Kent, Wanzek, and Al Otaiba (2012) have observed that only 10% (9 minutes) of an appropriated 90 min kindergarten literacy block was allocated to writing instruction, including spelling and handwriting instruction and only 3% explicitly devoted to vocabulary and language development. Additional observational research in kindergarten reported similar amounts of writing instruction, with the majority of time devoted to independent writing rather than teacher instruction such as modeling and group instruction ( Puranik, Al Otaiba, Folsom & Greulich, in press ). Further, handwriting instruction was observed for less than 2 min across fall and spring observations. If such skills have a clear link to writing development (e.g., Graham et al., 2012 ), increased instructional attention would be warranted at this early level.

Limitations

Several limitations to the present study should be mentioned. The sample for this study comes from a single school district in the southeast. Although relatively diverse, there were few English Language Learners. In order to have more confidence in the conclusions drawn from these analyses, cross-validation with a different sample would be warranted. Second, although several aspects of writing were assessed, both within fluency and quality, this data was drawn from only a single writing sample in the spring of kindergarten and first grade. Moreover, these writing prompts and the time students were allowed to respond differed. In kindergarten, there was little research guidance to inform the choice of prompt, but for first grade, a CBM-W prompt used in prior research was used. Kindergarten students had more time to respond to the writing prompt. Further, at kindergarten, it was not possible to code correct word sequences; thus differences in the prompts, the time, or scoring methods could have impacted the correlation between writing at both times. The inclusion of multiple samples of student writing, via both authentic and direct assessment, may have increased measurement reliability. Additionally, the presence of a floor effect on the writing sample in kindergarten (about twenty percent deemed unscorable), although attributable to developmental constraints, may have served to decrease the resulting relationships among component skills and writing. Third, only a teacher rating of attention/self-regulation was included in the study. Although the SWAN appears to capture distinct factors related to attention regulation ( Saez et al., 2012 ) further research using additional, more direct measures of executive functioning and self-regulation and their relationship to writing production and quality would be warranted. This might include direct observations of student and teacher behavior during writing tasks (e.g., teacher scaffolding and student planning, reviewing, revising) or the utilization of new technology that allows researchers to record student verbalizations (i.e., self-talk) when engaged in the process of writing which may reflect early attempts at self-regulation.

Future Directions

In the present study, a model of early components of writing that included attention as well as early literacy and language skills accounted for more variance in writing fluency than in studies without this component ( Kim et al, 2011 ; Puranik & Al Otaiba, 2012 ). Nonetheless, there is still much unexplained variance. It is possible that early writing models could be advanced by examining the role of instructional factors alongside student-level factors. While Kim et al. (2013) recently found that instructional quality during reading and writing instruction in first grade was not uniquely predictive of writing outcomes after accounting for student-level factors, specific research has demonstrated that writing outcomes can be influenced by time allocated to writing instruction ( Mehta et al., 2005 ) and quality of instruction in writing ( Moats, Foorman, & Taylor, 2006 ). However, research has also demonstrated the relative dearth of time allocated to writing instruction in the early grades ( Puranik et al., in press ; Kent et al., 2012 ; Mehta et al., 2005 ). Thus, there is a continued need for research examining specific instructional “ingredients” that promote early writing skills, particularly when examined in a model accounting for individual differences in student skills. The examination of additional student-level factors may also be warranted, such as student attitude or self-efficacy regarding writing. Given its’ complex nature, it reasons that individuals who have greater belief and judgment regarding their ability to complete given writing tasks may demonstrate increased willingness to engage in the task and be more persistent. To date, studies have shown the positive relationship of self-efficacy to writing for students in upper grades ( Shell, Colvin, & Bruning, 1995 ) but we know little about the impact on writing at the earliest grade levels.

In conclusion, the results from the present study offer preliminary findings substantiating the role of attention, as well as early literacy and language skills, in the development of writing fluency and quality in the earliest grades. While further validation is necessary, these findings help provide additional evidence as the field moves toward a more complete understanding of writing development and ways in which such development can be promoted.

Acknowledgments

This research was supported by Grant P50HD052120 from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, and Grant R305B04074 from the Institute of Education Sciences. Dr. Petscher’s time was also supported by Grant R305F100005 from the Institute of Education Sciences. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, the National Institutes of Health, or the Institute of Education Sciences.

1 A CFA with a single factor “literacy” variable was also conducted resulting in significantly worse fit than either the correlated factor or higher-order factor model.

Contributor Information

Shawn Kent, Florida Center for Reading Research and School of Teacher Education, Florida State University.

Jeanne Wanzek, Florida Center for Reading Research and School of Teacher Education, Florida State University.

Yaacov Petscher, Florida Center for Reading Research.

Stephanie Al Otaiba, Simmons School of Education and Human Development at Southern Methodist University.

Young-Suk Kim, Florida Center for Reading Research and School of Teacher Education, Florida State University.

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How to Teach Information Writing in Kindergarten: Create Engaged and Purposeful Writers!

An overview.

Science Notebooks

Independent Book Making

On-Demand Writing

Page references are from Kindergarten Writing and the Common Core: Joyful Pathways to Accelerated Literacy! 2015, Nellie Edge.

Information Writing: W.K.2. Use a combination of drawing, dictating, and writing to compose informative/explanatory texts in which they name what they are writing about and supply some information about the topic.

Multisensory ABC and Phonics Immersion strategies: Teach fingerspelling and American Sign Language (ASL) and differentiate learning.

Make a fist and cover it with your other hand. Your wiggling thumb becomes a turtle’s head moving up and down.

Early readers become early researchers.

• Our ABC Phonics: Sing, Sign, and Read! book is an information book featuring real children demonstrating American Sign Language (ASL). For kindergartners who are already proficient writers early in the year, it becomes the motivation for an animal research project: Study your favorite animal! Parents of early readers and writers appreciate that ALL children are receiving an art-rich, Talented and Gifted (TAG) curriculum. They are amazed at our focus on voracious vocabulary instruction and kindergartners as researchers!

Learning to draw with detail supports the writing process.

• We teach children how to focus, observe closely, draw with detail, and label their drawings: my house, dog, cat, tree, me … labeling becomes more detailed later in the year with in-depth animal studies.

Authentic kindergarten writing has meaning and purpose.

• Children use labeled photos to make their own real world grocery lists! They begin building independence and stamina as writers and learners using the tote: We Love Lists. Every child’s writing and drawing are unique, and every child is successful. (58)

Authentic word work and guided drawing motivate young writers: Kindergartners love to make books!

• Children make “Draw an Animal Books” while developing efficient handwriting, drawing skills and fluency with high-frequency “heart words.” All children love to draw animals and make books!

In our Comprehensive Writing Program, kindergartners build fluency with high-frequency “heart word” sentences.

• Children enjoy the challenge of daily “quick writes”: How many “heart word” sentences can you write today? Within a few months, children have writing power with several high-frequency “heart word” sentences. We intentionally create a positive mindset for learning… Wow! How did you teach your brain to write that whole sentence?
• Systematic writing lessons build mastery of consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) words. Fluency with high-frequency “heart word” sentences and proficiency with phonics-based spelling feeds the writing process.

Weekly Science Notebooks

• Weekly Science Notebook entries develop skills in drawing and writing: Scientific inquiry, close observation, and hands-on science experiments feed into the writing and drawing process. (264)

The skills of becoming a writer are taught during Writing Workshop.

• Writing Workshop is where we systematically apply phonics skills , expect a growing collection of high-frequency words to be spelled conventionally, and teach the writing process. Teachers coach into the writing process and honor “kid writing” development. All of our high-impact writing strategies build motivation and stamina for the Writing Workshop .

Kindergartners love Information Writing: It has a purpose!

• All about Me: A Letter to My First Grade Teacher becomes a powerful, motivating, and purposeful end-of-year Information Writing piece. (More proficient writers prided themselves in write two pages!) First grade teachers delight in reading these! (235)

Nonfiction studies inspire published books.

Kindergartners, like 12th graders, will write, edit, and publish books.  – Lucy Calkins

• Students are fascinated by nonfiction studies; some choose information writing for their final published books. They show great pride in reading their published books to their kindergarten friends.

We know how to grow engaged and purposeful writers with "Parents as Partners".

Kindergarten writers learn to observe closely, draw like scientists, and craft information stories. We provide joyful, authentic pathways to the Common Core.

My name is Carlos Lowe. I was born in Salem, Oregon. I have 1 brother and 2 sisters. I like to play with my Legos and cars. My favorite food is chicken nuggets. When I grow up, I want to be a race car driver.

Thank You Bill & Melinda Gates

Thank you, Bill & Melinda Gates and authors of the ELA Common Core Writing Standards: We raised our expectations, developed high-impact strategies, and discovered there is no ceiling to early writing success! Powerful kindergarten writing instruction in our Title 1 schools may be one step towards breaking cycles of poverty.

Dramatically Accelerate Kindergarten Writing Proficiency!

Writing workshop #3 with nellie edge from independent writing centers to published books,  april 13, 2019 in salem or.

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Information Writing Resources

Free downloads.

• A Yearlong Overview: New Heart Words, Handwriting, ABC Phonics, and Bookmaking
• Kindergarten Writing and the Common Core: CCSS Progression Overview
• Great Drawing, Writing, and Word Work Resources – Where to Get Them
• For Animal Research information see ABC Phonics page
• Science writing templates on our Freebies Page

See From Folded Books to Kindergarten Publishing

Additional Information

Future Information Writing Weekly Focus essays will include: Sciencing Songs and Voracious Vocabulary; Publishing Kindergarten Books; Authentic Writing Assessments; Optimal Use of Independent Writing Totes; and Kindergarten How-to Books

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We have gathered other authentic kindergarten Information Writing ideas on our Pinterest Information Writing board .

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Research and Play

4 Easy Strategies for Teaching Writing in Kindergarten

Teaching writing has been one of the most challenging things about teaching kindergarten. Not only do students come in with a variety of skills, including the inability the hold a pencil for some students, but they also need support in so many different ways. Our students have an entire step of writing development that other grade levels don’t typically see: pre-writing. We have to navigate our way through the development of pre-writing and early writing skills and make sure we nurture that growth for all students.

It’s hard.

I’ve been talking to lots of you who feel the same as I do, so I wanted to compile some of my favorite strategies for taking all of my writers to the next level in their writing. These strategies include some old favorites as well as some things that I’ve just pulled out of the air that ended up working well! I hope these strategies help you feel more confident in your ability to support your writers, too!

Let’s start by looking at the what of teaching writing. If we just go by the standards, they don’t help us a lot. The Common Core Standards list 3 main writing focus areas for kindergarten:

• W.K.1 – Using a combo of writing, dictating, and drawing to compose opinion pieces in which they tell a reader the topic or name of a book they are writing about and state an opinion or preference about the topic or book.
• W.K.2 – Using a combo of writing, dictating, and drawing to compose informative/explanatory texts in which they name what they are writing about and supply some information about the topic.
• W.K.3 – Using a combo of writing, dictating, and drawing to narrate a single event or several loosely-linked events, tell about the events in the order they occurred, and provide a reaction to what happened.

While I want my students to be able to write across genres and content areas, I first must make sure they understand what writing is. I explain that in math, word study, reading, writer’s workshop, or science time, writing is how we can share our ideas when we aren’t able to tell with our words. I always model this idea using pictures FIRST before adding a single letter to the page.

I always begin a writing session with a mini lesson. While I do use the Lucy Calkin’s Writer’s Workshop Units of Study, I feel compelled to add a little more structure after we finish the first month or so. At first, we write to build stamina. Then, we write to build excitement. Next, we start writing to build structure and actually begin to tell stories with words. You can click HERE to read an older post about my writer’s workshop part of my day.

I think October is a great time in kindergarten to START having students add words to each page of their writing. Up until then, I ask them to write a “story” (always a story, never a one-page writing prompt) using pictures. I give them the option to add letters to their pages in the form of labeling the first sound (which comes with the ever-popular “Label Your Teacher” with post-its mini lesson) and even encourage them to sound out any words that they think would help tell the story using “stretchy snake” (stretching out the word and writing all the sounds they hear, also taught during a mini lesson).

The main reason why I have students write stories instead of one-page writing prompts during our writer’s workshop time is so they can continue working on a piece multiple days in a row. I want my students to get used to revisiting work, revising, adding more, and making sure their story has a sequence. Eventually, they’ll start working with a writing partner. This will be effective if they actually have a larger piece of writing to look at that has a sequence. Published stories don’t usually come on one page, so I’m asking my budding authors to write a multi-page story!

One of my favorite things to do to end a writing session is a share out. I think share outs in all content areas are extremely powerful for showcasing students’ strategies, building their confidence, giving them a chance to question one another, and to reinforce your mini lesson.

My goal for writing by the time my students leave kindergarten is that they are able to use a combination of words and pictures to tell complete thoughts and convey a complete message. However, I’m very aware that even well into kindergarten (as we are currently in the middle of March), some students still are not ready to independently add words to convey complete thoughts. I have some strategies for that.

Sentence stems are your best friend for so many reasons. I use them in every single content area, but especially in math ( Number Talk Sentence Stems ) and in writing. I want to make sure my students start developing the concept of a sentence rather than labeling individual words. Sentence stems are the best tool for this that I’ve come across. I don’t always model writing during my mini lesson, but when I do, this is when I’ll use a particular sentence stem myself. When I’m not writing, though, I simply write the sentence stem I want them to use on our boards.

I’ve created a resource that has some great sentence stems for each kindergarten writing topic: opinion, informative, explanatory, and narrative. Included are both color as well as black and white posters you can hang in your room to support your students. Also included, possible topics for each of the writing standards! If you have any students who struggle with coming up with ideas and getting started, this resource is for you. Click below!

This strategy is harder to implement, especially if you’re alone without an aide or volunteer, but it’s so meaningful. Students who are not yet writing words still need to hear and see their story come alive through writing. Having students dictate their writing to you while they watch you write it directly on their page is one of my favorite strategies. When I’m transcribing, I tell my other students I’m off-limits for help so that I can focus on the students who need my support.

Here’s a tip: If you’re walking around transcribing, wear a hat! It tells the rest of your class you’re off limits. I own a large wizard hat from Amazon that it easily seen from around the room. When students see me with the hat, they don’t come talk to me! You can also have the students who need to dictate meet you in a special spot in the classroom (at your teacher table, in the reading area, etc.). When you’re in that special meeting spot, other students will learn not to disturb you.

Establishing writing partners is beneficial for many reasons. It allows students to collaborate and discuss their writing. It gives each student a voice. It takes pressure off of having to read in front of the class or to the teacher each day (if you do share-outs at the end of your writing time, which you should!). And it gives you the ability to let the students take charge while you turn your voice off.

Writing partners work best when they are students who have different but similar writing abilities. For example, if a student is not yet writing words, they would work well with a partner who is using sentence stems to begin adding words. Students who are successfully using sentence stems would work well with partners who no longer need stems to support their writing. This method works well because the ability levels are similar enough that one partner does not feel self-conscious about their skills while the other partner does not need to provide a ton of assistance and can still get something from the partnership.

Here’s a tip: Be flexible! Allow your writing partners to move seats or meet on the floor, writing with clipboards. Have your partners in close proximity to each other, and set up the routine of moving near your partner at the very beginning of your work time. You can use a song for the transition, and by the time the song goes off, your partners are next to each other ready to write!

You know those students that, no matter what strategy you try, they just WON’T write? Even if you know they can, they have the skills, they’re so bright with so many ideas, but they just won’t do it! I’ve been there. And while I can say that the happy ending of that story was that my writer eventually wrote many great books with plenty of words, it was a long process to get him there.

You’ll know a reluctant writer when you realize that for the 10 minutes you’ve been transcribing and meeting with partners, this writer has done nothing beyond write his or her name and look out the window. Maybe they have scribbled a little bit of a picture, but likely their page is still empty. Sometimes they may lay their heads down, sometimes they may start conversations with their writing partners about Minecraft. Whatever they may do, writing is not happening and there is no growth.

I encourage these writers to JUST DRAW. They’re allowed to start with drawing things they like. It can be totally off-topic and have nothing to do with the mini lesson. In the same way we want to build a love for reading by letting students be surrounded with fun and interesting picture books, we should allow students to grow their love for writing by writing (drawing) about anything they like! This usually starts with a conversation with me about their interests. I ask them about favorite movies, games, sports, foods, you name it. I even make a list of all the favorites that he or she tells me. This is a great reference for me to continue to support the writer, but it’s also great for the writer to see that there are plenty of things to write about!

Use the topics posters to help push them in a direction! You need to support their thought process, but sometimes they might just need a list to choose from.

Don’t push coloring. I’ve learned that many of my reluctant writers are not ready to add colors. To grow their confidence, we call their drawings “sketches.” They love to feel like they are doing something special that no one else is doing. I love to show their sketches a couple of times a week at our end-of-writing share outs. Eventually, you can ask them to add a few colors, but in the beginning just request a picture.

Eventually, you will want to see words on a page. Start with that original strategy of sentence stems and go from there. Like I said, it may not be on topic or match your mini lesson, but that’s okay for a little while. Once your writer is using stems, then give them a partner. You may want to coach the partners first, reminding them that their partner will use less words or words that may not be spelled very clearly. Coach them that that is okay! Remember, progress with a reluctant writer (or reader for that matter) will look different from the rest of your eager writers. Celebrate the small victories and build, build, build their confidence.

I hope that these strategies and tips help you feel a little less stressed about teaching writing in kindergarten. It’s one of the most complex things we do as K teachers, but these strategies have helped me manage it much better. I’m still continuing to grow as a writing teacher, so if you have any strategies that you love, head over to Facebook and leave them on this thread!

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Let’s Chat all Things Writing

Let’s talk writing! Hey friends! I wanted to take a moment (or a few moments) of your time today to visit about all things WRITING! Writing has always been one of my favorite subjects to teach but for sure not the easiest! I mean when you start the year there is SO MUCH to learn… what a pencil is, how to hold a pencil, how to write with a pencil, what to write, how to stretch words, how to put words into sentences and it goes on from there! Sometimes teaching writing can be intimidating because there are SO many varying opinions. Should you give them a starter? Should you give them a sentence frame? Should they spell words phonetically. Should YOU spell words phonetically when modeling stories and so on!

I finally realized that there is not ONE way to teach writing and if someone tells you that there is only ONE way to do it… then you smile, nod and close your door. All of our students will start at different levels and need different instruction. That brings me to writing instruction and curriculum. There are of course many different writing programs! I was first given the writing lessons from my “big box” curriculum. The top of the lessons started with ALL YEAR, “Students will draw a picture to tell their story. You can dictate the story for them after.” REALLY? I mean yes there will be some kids that start lower and some that still might not get to sentences by the end of kindergarten. However, I’m going to assume that first grade teachers won’t be real happy with me if I only EXPECT my kiddos to color pictures for writing throughout the entire year. That brings me to the opposite end of writing curriculum *cough I’ve shared this program on my own blog before.* I liked this program and it had/has REALLY good parts. The problem is goes TOO fast and leaves out the majority of my students. Sure the program says that the teacher will scaffold by modeling but if the program is too tough for the majority of my class then that means the majority is not receiving the instruction they so deserve.

My first couple of years in the classroom I was constantly changing my kindergarten writing approach due to the above mentioned lack luster big box writing program.  One day I would give them a sentence starter.  The next day I didn’t.  At the end of the year my writers were where they needed to be but there was one thing I noticed… not all the kids enjoyed writing like I enjoyed it!  I knew that there was something I had to change!  After much research and chatting with colleagues I realized that writing is a work of heart!  When the kids are inspired and then able to express that into their kindergarten writing… they too will fall in love with writing!  What I didn’t realize those first couple of years was that I was writing and modeling stories that were near and dear to ME.  I can’t tell you every story I modeled for them but I am going to guess that a story about four-wheelers or Minecraft wasn’t wasn’t one of those!  By turning it over to the kids and having them choose their writing topics, I saw my kids BLOSSOM and year after year my writers fell in love with writing just like me! This is something that the second above mentioned program did but it was SO hard or me to “buy into” that one because it was just not the level of my kiddos. I took that same new passion and worked hard to put it into to easy to read lesson plans!  That is when KinderWriting was born! 🙂 In this post, I will share all about my favorite writing lessons I’ve done through the years, give you the freebie templates so you can plug them right into your lessons and I will be sharing all about the writing program I created called, KinderWriting .

What is KinderWriting?

KinderWriting Curriculum is an engaging, kindergarten, genre-based writing curriculum. KinderWriting encourages young learners to look inward at their endless possibilities as a writer. KinderWriting is based upon nine units: Writing With Pictures, Writing With Sentences, Writing With Stories, Writing With Narrative, Writing With Opinion, Writing With Direction, Writing With Persuasion, Writing With Imagination, and Writing With Information. Each unit is broken down to 20 lessons. The units cover 20 days of academic instruction. The lesson plans have listed unit objectives, “I can” statements, Common Core writing standards and needed mentor texts.

KinderWriting encourages a daily routine of a minilesson, independent writing, and a share time. Each of the lessons in KinderWriting are well thought out for the young writer and spiral back to previous lessons to ensure students are retaining their skills. KinderWriting also includes unit anchor charts, a variety of writing paper, conferring schedules and note sheets, sample writings, student writing goals display, writing rubrics, and step-by-step guides that are made specifically for each unit.

What is included in KinderWritring Curriculum?

-Teacher “simple read” lesson plans. You will not need to rewrite these lesson plans, unless you choose do. If so I have included editable lesson plans. -Each unit I have planned out the; big idea, focus standard, essential questions, and so much more! -Writing paper -Unit posters -Student material -Unit rubrics -Spanish posters included

What about the standards? 

Each unit has a focus standard that is based upon the Common Core Standards. Units further into the year will have more than one focus standard. If you teach to a varying set of standards, you can email me for assistance. Thanks!

What Units are Covered?

Unit 1: Writing with Pictures Unit 2: Writing with Sentences Unit 3: Writing with Stories Unit 4: Writing with Narrative Unit 5: Writing with Opinion Unit 6: Writing with Direction Unit 7: Writing with Persuasion Unit 8: Writing with Imagination Unit 9: Writing with Information

Let’s get started with Unit 1: Writing With Pictures.  This unit is all about setting the kiddos up for success!  If we jump right into “writing” our kiddos can sometimes feel unsure of themselves.  They might worry if their words are spelled correctly or if their pictures are perfect!  In unit 1, we introduce students to writing using illustrations! This is big, big, big especially for those lower kiddos! We want them to and NEED them to LOVE writing. We want to set them up with success from the very beginning.

Unit 1: Writing With Pictures

Lesson 1: Illustrators! Yes? Lesson 2: Establishing the Minilesson Lesson 3: Drawing Sticks, Circles, & Boxes Lesson 4: Establishing Independent Write Lesson 5: Share Time Lesson 6: Illustrating the Best I Can Lesson 7: Detailed Pictures Lesson 8: Visualizing My Story Lesson 9: Looking Closely Lesson 10: Setting Goals Lesson 11: What is a Label? Lesson 12: Adding Labels Lesson 13: The Pencil Lesson 14: Labeling for Detail Lesson 15: Ask and Write Lesson 16: Show and Retell Stories Lesson 17: Labeling Your Name Lesson 18: Sticky Conferences Lesson 19: A Picture Book Lesson 20: Celebration

I recently had a Facebook live all about Unit 1!  You can listen into that video below!  If the video doesn’t load, you can access it HERE !

I have organized my units into a plastic tote!  Each unit has a folder in the tote!

The plans include your needed materials, minilesson and ideas to expand your teaching during the share block!

For independent writing I have offered a variety of writing journals and writing paper!  You can choose between landscaped and portrait style! I include lots and lots of styles so that you can decide what works best for your kiddos!

Now let’s take a look at unit 2! In Unit 2 we start to introduce students to writing words and stringing some SIMPLE words together to make sentences!

KinderWriting Unit 2 is all about encouraging students to stretch words, write words and then place those words into sentences!

Below is a full listing of the lessons found in Unit 2 of KinderWriting!

Unit 2: Writing With Sentences

Lesson 1: Authors! Yes? Lesson 2: Authors Persevere Lesson 3: Writing Tools- ABC Chart Lesson 4: Making Words Lesson 5: Writers Make Mistakes Lesson 6: Stretching Sounds Lesson 7: Stretching More Sounds Lesson 8: Writing Tools- Sight Word Chart Lesson 9: Color Words Lesson 10: Letters vs. Words Lesson 11: Conferring and Writing Partnerships Lesson 12: Speech Bubbles and Emotion Lesson 13: Using the Room Lesson 14: Are You Really Done? Lesson 15: Capitals Lesson 16: Spacing Lesson 17: Punctuation Lesson 18: Words Make Sentences Lesson 19: Writing Storybooks Lesson 20: Sharing Storybooks

Also in the folder is the unit spiral bound lessons, unit posters and the student mini poster rings!

The student resource rings are perfect for the kiddos to keep in their pencil boxes!  You can also use them back at your guided reading table!

We will use the mentor text, The Alphabet Tree, and build words!

Unit 3: Writing With Stories

Lesson 1: Storytellers! Yes? Lesson 2: Authors Write About What They Love Lesson 3: Authors Write About What They Can Do Lesson 4: Authors Write About What They Know Lesson 5: Authors Write About The Past Lesson 6: Mechanics Matter Lesson 7: Names and Places Use Capitals Lesson 8: Tap Out the Story Lesson 9: Powerful Punctuation Lesson 10: Ask More With Writing Partners Lesson 11: A 5 W’s Story Lesson 12: Topics are Everywhere Lesson 13: Books are Stories Lesson 14: Places are Stories Lesson 15: Colors are Stories Lesson 16: Elapsed Time Lesson 17: Adding On Lesson 18: Illustrations Tell Stories Lesson 19: Storytelling Booklets Lesson 20: Sharing Storybooks

The big push in Unit 3 is to help those that struggle with generating their own witting topic each day! We want them to be confident in realizing that there are stories ALL AROUND US! We use included pictures to help students generate writing ideas.

We also teach them about using color as a writing inspiration!

What do writers write about? Well, the write about things they love, things they know, things they can do and things from the past!

We work on STRETCHING those words!

In unit 3, we become mechanics so we can work on all of those important skills, too!

Establishing writing goals are vital!

In each unit I supply you with a lot of learning posters to present to the kiddos!

We can’t forget the rubrics in each unit!

The student resource rings!

Unit 3 of KinderWriting wraps up the “basics” units! Units 4-9 are genre-based writing units! Let’s jump into those now!

I like to play ninjas.

Also, here is the story booklet we used for this lesson!  You can grab yours for free below!

Now let’s talk about Unit 4 of KinderWriting ! Unit 4 is all about Narrative writing! In unit 4, we take take the kiddos through the entire Narrative writing process! There is a week that we spend on mechanics and adding in adjectives/verbs into our stories as well!

Lesson 1: Narrators! Yes? Lesson 2: Narratives Use Words Like I, Me and My Lesson 3: Narratives Have a Setting Lesson 4: Narratives Have a Problem & Solution Lesson 5: Narratives Have a BME Lesson 6: Starting With a Hook Lesson 7: Ending With Feeling Lesson 8: Sequential Words Lesson 9: “Zoom” In Moments Lesson 10: Using Details Lesson 11: Writing With the 5 Senses Lesson 12: Adding in Adjectives Lesson 13: Adding in Verbs Lesson 14: Words Have Families Lesson 15: Mechanics Lesson 16: Narrative Booklets Lesson 17: Writing With a Rubric Lesson 18: Writing Process- Draft Lesson 19: Writing Process- Polish Lesson 20: Writing Process- Publish

Below is a look at the mentor texts for this unit! You can see there are three specific to narrative writing and three for the mechanics focus!

In Unit 4, we discuss all of the parts of a narrative story!

Unit 4 posters to teach all of the important tasks!

Unit 4 rubrics!

Student resource rings!

Unit 4 writing goals!

Now let’s talk opinion writing!  I  will discuss first some of my favorite opinion writing lessons over the years and then jump into opinion writing from KinderWriting!   I love introducing the kiddos to the big word for our opinion writing, because!  I always give a big hoopla over making sure we pronounce it correctly!  This might not be an issue in other parts of the country, but here in Missouri it’s usually pronounced as “becuz!”  So, after this talk they are correcting me the rest of the year if my pronunciation isn’t spot on!  We start with some simple opinion writings! We also talked a lot about what an opinion is and how it’s okay to have a different opinion then our friends!

We also write opinions on if we like the tooth fairy best or Santa Claus! Below students wrote their thoughts in the opinion graphic organizer!  {Download the freebie below}

Let’s talk KinderWriting Unit 5 which is all about opinion writing!

Lesson 1: Opinionators! Yes? Lesson 2: Giving Opinions Lesson 3: Fact vs. Opinion Lesson 4: Opinions Around Us Lesson 5: Opinions on the Spot Lesson 6: Using the Word Because Lesson 7: Giving Two Reasons Lesson 8: Using a Mentor Text Lesson 9: Opinion Starters Lesson 10: Defending an Opinion Lesson 11: Using the Word Wall Lesson 12: Spacing for Our Readers Lesson 13: Setting Letters on the Line Lesson 14: Reversals and Handwriting Lesson 15: Sounds in Words Lesson 16: Sharing Opinions Lesson 17: Writing With a Rubric Lesson 18: Writing Process- Draft Lesson 19: Writing Process- Polish Lesson 20: Writing Process- Publish

Unit 5 writing posters!

Unit 5 rubrics!

Writing goals are a must!

In unit 5, we work on fact vs. opinion!

Unit 6-9 (Procedural writing, persuasive writing, fiction writing, informational writing) are also part of the KinderWriting bundle!

A note about pricing! 

Snag this bundle for  25% OFF  .  Each of the writing units sells for $12 each, a total of $108.  You can view KinderWriting HERE or clicking below!

Now let’s talk letter writing! Depending on your district/standards, you might also be required to teach letter writing!

Now let’s talk a little about assisted writing! I like to use assisted writing sheets mainly during independent writing times! This would be for example during daily five work on writing! My kiddos can’t get enough of my writing story starters!  I use them in their work on writing folders and as a choice for early finishers! I have found these story starters to work absolute wonders in my classroom!  What I love about the story starters the most is their ability to assist the students when working independently.  Students WANT to work without the assistance of their teacher, but sometimes they just don’t know how.  This can be especially true in writing.  Students of course would love to write a story of their own, but they at times don’t know what to write about.  The story starters take that out of the equation.  Students simply look at the picture given to them and start to write their story!

I like the spider and web.

You can download an additional set of freebie writing posters HERE or clicking the images below!

Well I hope you enjoyed these freebies! Leave me some love if you were able to use any of these and feel free to pass them along! 🙂

If you’re unsure if KinderWriting would work in your classroom, I recommended that you take a moment to read TEACHER feedback here ! There is no one that will tell you more accurately than fellow teachers!

Snag this bundle for  25% OFF . Each of the writing units sells for $12 each, a total of $108. You can view KinderWriting HERE or clicking below!

Do you teach first grade? Snag the FirstieWriting curriculum HERE .

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