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Developing Students` Writing Skills

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Submitted By munaflower
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One of the most important things to remember when teaching writing is that writing is a process.
Very few native speakers will ever start writing at the top of the first page and continue straight through until they finish at bottom of the last one. The entire process has five steps, but the first step in the writing process is coming up with your thoughts and ideas, also known as prewriting. Prewriting helps students gather ideas and give them a bank of possibilities for their writing. This way, as students write they do not have to make decisions simultaneously about content and language. Help your students get a head start before they write with any of these six methods for prewriting. The bank of ideas they will generate will be an invaluable resource as they write.
How To Generate Writing Ideas
Brainstorming
Brainstorming is an activity with which most people are familiar. The object in brainstorming is to compile as large a list as possible of potential examples for a given topic. This is a great activity to do in small groups or with the entire class. Brainstorming a list of ice cream flavors is an easy one to start with when introducing the concept. Naturally, one idea will spark another, so it is helpful to have students working together when brainstorming. Give your students permission to be as creative as they like. Anything goes with brainstorming. Challenge your students to come up with as many examples as they possibly can for whatever topic you give them.
Free writing
Free writing is an individual activity for getting thoughts from your head on to paper.Explain the concept of stream of consciousness to your students and tell them that free writing is simply putting on paper every thought that is going through their heads. Like with brainstorming, anything goes. The goal of this activity is to never let your pen or pencil stop writing. Help

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