Teaching a child to write is an interesting experience. In this post, I will share some basics ideas on one way this can be done.

To Read or not to Read

Often writing is taught after the child has learned to read. A major exception to this is the Montessori method of reading. For Montessori, a child should learn to write before reading. This is probably because writing is a more tactile experience when compared to reading and Montessori was a huge proponent of experiential learning. In addition, if you can write you can definitely read under this assumption.

Generally, I teach young children how to read first. This is because I want the child to know the letters before trying to write them.

The Beginning

If the child is already familiar with the basics of reading writing is probably more about hand-eye coordination than anything else. The first few letters are quite the experience. This is affected by age as well. Smaller children will have much more difficulty with writing than older children.

A common strategy to motivate a child to write is to have them first learn to spell their name. This can work depending on how hard the child’s name is to spell. A kid named “Dan” will master writing his name quickly. However, a kid with a longer name or a transliterated name from another language is going to have a tough time. I knew one student who misspelled their name for almost a year and a half because it was so hard to write in English.

A common way to teach actually writing is to allow the child to trace the words on dot paper. By doing this they develop the muscle memory for writing. Once this is successful the child will then attempt to write the letters with the tracing paper. This process can easily take a year.

Sentences and Paragraphs

After,  they learn to write letters and words it is time to begin writing sentences. A six-year-old, with good penmanship, will probably not be able to write a sentence with support. Writing and spelling and different skills initially and it is the adult’s job to provide support for the spelling aspect as the child explains what they want to write about.

With help, children can create short little stories that may be one to two paragraphs in length. Yet they will still need a lot of support to do this.

By eight years of age, a child can probably write a paragraph on their own about simple concepts or stories. This is when the teaching and learning can really get interesting as the child can now write to learn instead of focusing on learning to write.

Conclusion

Writing is a skill that is hard to find these days. With so many other forms of communication, writing is not a skill that children want to focus on. Nevertheless, learning to write by basic literacy is an excellent way to develop communication skills and interact with people in situations where face-to-face contact is not possible.