Stages of writing in Kindergarten

Having just attended the Parent-Teacher Conference, many parents have seen samples of their child’s written work.  One factor that I became aware of at that time was that many parents wondered why their child was not writing at the same level as another child.  It needs to be stated here that learning to write is an ongoing process, a lot of which depends on a child’s maturation, experience and exposure to print.

All children go through several stages before they become competent writers.

The first stage as a Pre-Emergent writer sees a child with little or no understanding that all letters represent specific sounds. Although they have an overall understanding of content and structure and are able to dictate their writing, their writing consists of what appears as scribbles or random letters strung together.  In time, they begin to develop phonemic awareness and often it is the beginning and ending sound of a word that is recorded.  This eventually leads to invented spellings as well as the ability to manipulate sounds.

At the second stage, the young writer is able to use word families to form new words, write some sight words from visual memory and write words or phrases to complete patterned sentences – those sentences which have the same beginning or ending.  E.g. I see a cat.  I see a man.

At the third stage, a child is more confident in expressing him/herself using expanded sentences to express more complete thoughts.  Although invented spelling still persists, they are able to write stories that include a character, a setting and an action.  Their stories are usually descriptive or narrative. E.g. I have a dog. We play in the garden.  I love my dog.

The fourth stage sees a child expand three-part stories into five-part stories that include a character, setting, time, an action and response to that action (‘who,’ ‘where,’ ‘when,’ ‘doing what,’ ‘why’).  Standard spellings are used with greater frequency and some punctuation is seen inconsistently.  Stories are written with greater detail and different writing styles begin to emerge – like informational, descriptive stories and simple narratives.

In this last stage, a child is able to compose stories with a clear beginning, middle and end.  A more distinctive ‘voice’ begins to emerge.  Sight words are spelt correctly and more self-editing for completed sentences, capitalization and punctuation takes place.

Again I would like to reiterate that not all children will reach the final stage by the end of kindergarten although the teachers impart various writing skills and techniques to aid them.

Everything in its own good time!

Claire Nazeer, EAL – Kindergarten