Developing Writerly Voices, 5 Minutes a Day
As a new teacher, I was stumped when it came to writing instruction. I had interesting prompts, visuals of the recursive writing process, graphic organizers, rubrics and mini-lessons to support students’ understanding of all of these important instructional tools. We wrote every day – we wrote in connection to reading – we wrote in connection to life events. And yet, every writing piece was the same, in that their writing wasn’t changing or growing. The instructional tools were important, but they weren’t enough to push my students to develop their own voice.
Until I began to write myself.
My previous experience with writing was purely functional: essays for academic writing, emails, lists, directions, lesson plans, etc. I did not identify as a writer and without a reason to put pen to paper or fingers to keyboard, I was not interested.
Short, daily writing practice changed everything for me, and my students. Now, these quick writes are the thing I look forward to in my daily routine in and out of the classroom.
Here are the hard-fought practices I have learned that support students and myself in developing our writerly voices:
- Write every day. Ask them to write; Write when they write. This models the importance of the process and develops our empathy and understanding for the demands and benefits of writing.
- Set a timer and stick to it. 5-8 minutes is enough, just keep the pencil going. The timer gives structure to resistant writers and pushes prolific writers to start with their most pressing ideas. Do not be tempted to add time – the time creates a sense of urgency and equity.
- Have an interesting prompt – and let them write about whatever they want. Provide quotes, images, graphs, artwork, etc. that is open ended and might inspire writing. AND, remind students they can write about the prompt, or anything else that they need to write.
- Writing is personal – no one sees my writing, and I don’t ask to see theirs. This maintains the low-stakes nature of the process and allows students to express themselves without fear of judgment or evaluation. This is how we find our writerly voice.
- Write however you want – Show them different ways their entries can look. Entries might look like a poem, mind map, illustration, list or block of text. This builds awareness of self-processing style and encourages creativity.
- Build a community of writers – Provide opportunities for students to share their ideas from their writing and how the process went for them. This is done best through pairs or small writing groups and builds rich academic conversation skills, as well as a writerly identity.
The low-stakes nature of this type of writing helps students see writing as something that they value, that builds their voice as well as metacognition. It is a high-impact routine for self-reflection, meaning making and developing voice and craft.
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