Developing High End Thinking through Literacy

I recently attended a free workshop provided through the Christchurch Association for Gifted Education on "Developing High End Thinking through Literacy".

Heather McQuillan (a published author and winner of the Tom Fitzgibbon Award in 2005) spoke about providing gifted writers with plenty of opportunities to write creatively and with an authentic voice.

Some of her suggestions to help teachers improve student engagement and achievement are listed below:

• Writing must have clarity and honesty - remove the road blocks where possible.  Often students are focussed on adding extra adjectives and similes to improve their work, when really nouns and verbs are more important.  We worked on the example of "The dog ran around the tree".  When asking students what is needed to improve this sentence, most students will respond with an adverb such as quickly.  "The dog quickly ran around the tree".  Try and encourage students to give specific details to make the meaning clearer for the reader.  "The golden labrador lumbered around aged oak tree".
• Use plenty of short writing exercises and warm ups in your writing programme - this provides students with ideas that can flow into their other writing activities.  Discussion and sharing time is also important as these can act as a springboard for other students in their writing.
• Explain to students that writing is like a ball of string - you don't want it to unravel all at once.
• Love editing - share with students that teachers who offer suggestions of how a piece of writing could be improved really value their writing.  Remind students that they are re-drafting for the reader.
• Some gifted writers can actually write without a detailed plan.  Encourage students to have a few key ideas, a goal in mind and an event or incident and then let them write to find out the rest of the details.  
• Know your students - pack a bag of interesting and engaging writing activities.  For example, describe a moment when Mum/Dad or a sibling made you giggle, what would you put in a book character's Christmas stocking?

Tracey Young