Experts Say These Tips Can Drastically Improve Students’ Writing Skills

Whether you’re a teacher, tutor, or parent who wants to help the kids in your life learn to write, the best approach might be to eschew some of the most popular methods used in most public schools.

Mastering the process

The reason so many students struggle to excel in writing is that it encompasses a number of skills, each of which must be executed correctly in order to achieve the desired result. The most obvious among them are legibility, punctuation, grammar, and expressing ideas.

Traditional education has sought to tackle these skills separately, but a relatively new concept known as the copybook method attempts to combine multiple necessary components into one exercise.

The step-by-step strategy is simple enough:

• The instructor reads the student a brief, age-appropriate passage
• The student responds to a series of questions about the content
• The instructor reads that summary aloud and writes it down
• The student copies those sentences with the instructor’s supervision

Proponents of the copybook method say it addresses all of the fundamental skills involved in writing without burdening students with the frustrating aspects of some other common lesson plans.

Getting the best results

The steps might be straightforward, but there are a few details educators should remember in order to maximize the payoff.

For starters, keeping all lessons to about 10 minutes will help prevent kids from getting bored or restless, meaning they’ll be more likely to have a positive experience and get the most out of the exercise.

Professionals also urge parents and teachers to avoid the urge to limit repetitive assignments. While adults find such tasks monotonous, repetition is key for kids learning how to write.

Perhaps most importantly, remember to give kids an opportunity to express their imagination and be creative when showing off their newfound skills.

Chris Agee November 4th, 2024

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