One of the things that is holding back some of our learners in writing, is they fail to remember their whole story, so get part way through writing and forget what great idea they had and therefore what goes next. Last Wednesday while I was at University, Michelle trialled them recording their story using their voice and then using this to play back again and again as they wrote. It seems to have been a success although early days yet!
Accompanying this, we have allowed learners the opportunity to type their story. Some still prefer to use their book, but some have taken to the typing and can actually create a much longer story using the keyboard than they would using a traditional pen and paper. In fact, on Friday, we had a spare twenty minutes to our day, and when given a choice, some learners chose to write on their iPads as their 'free choice' activity! With some amazing results. These stories were not scaffolded at all - they were able to write about whatever they wished. I had a few requests for "how do you spell this" but the ideas, the structure and the location of many of the words were done independently by the learners. I was amazed with what they created!
We will continue to offer the keyboard option on some occasions, particularly when we get results like this:
Very interesting in the thoughts and reflections here Karen. I really believe that 'editability' is a key to unlocking and enabling writing and extending it beyond product and into process. Will follow developments with interest
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