Best Practices in Writing for ELLs

Writing Is Thinking!

Management of a successful writing program might differ from one class to another, but it needn’t be a transitional process for our students. Using same and similar strategies will yield high results when students understand that writing is writing, and it has its place in each content area. You need to find and establish your own comfort zone here, because your students will only be as comfortable as you are in teaching it. Let’s begin by looking at the Stages of Writing Development, and teaching practices that work within them:

The Stages of Writing Development 

(Peregoy & Boyle, 2008):

Beginning level: Students must begin at the beginning, though not all ELL students enter our classrooms at the beginning of their writing development. Some more advanced than others, we must still approach their writing development with a similar, scaffolded approach by expanding expectations as they build on (or from) what is mastered. Here are the traits of beginning writers:

• Students write in one or two short sentences to express a single idea
• Ideas aren't necessarily logically sequenced, however they are there.
• Word order can be off
• Writes in the present tense
• Demonstrates limited English vocabulary; lapses into L1
• Lack of understanding of genre
• Sentence patterns usually span from one to two

Intermediate level: Intermediate level students have partial mastery over writing usage and syntax, however this too can vary in weighting. Some students might for example, have mastered sentence syntax but remain weak in usage and grammar. Below are the traits of students operating at the intermediate level, however bear in mind that these traits will vary from student-to-student in the degree to which they are experienced:

• Writes several sentences to express a single idea
• Begins to use sequencing of ideas
• Shows some persisting grammatical errors, especially with verb tenses
• Has a better store of vocabulary than a beginner, but still needs further vocabulary development; begins to explore the use of newly taught words
• Begins to apply understanding of genre, but needs further development, especially with expository writing
• Demonstrates an expanded (and often sophisticated) use of sentence patterns and transitional phrases

Advanced level: This is where students begin to demonstrate mastery over literacy concepts such as organization of their writing, usage and grammar, verb-tense, writing in response to genre, transitional phrases and use of other more sophisticated sentence patterns. Below are the traits of student writers at the advanced level:

• Writes multiple paragraphs in one writing piece
• Uses appropriate organizational skills: introduction, body paragraphs, conclusions
• Makes few grammatical errors
• Uses vocabulary consistent with that of a native English speaker; explores use of newly acquired (sophisticated) vocabulary
• Uses genre appropriately
• Uses a variety of sentence patterns and transitional phrases