Writing with kindergarteners
10 Tricks for Teaching Kindergarten Writing
When telling people that I teach kindergarten, I often am asked, “How do you do it?” Now, imagine teaching five year olds how to write entire paragraphs. Yes, we are superheroes with the powers of patience, perseverance and the ability to bend at the waist for long periods of time. Here are the best kindergarten writing tips that I have gathered over the years.
1. Teach letter formation in context
Kill two birds with one stone. Kindergarten students need to be taught how to form their letters. This can be done within the context of writing a sentence. Often, when students practice writing letters in isolation, they have trouble transferring handwriting skills to sentence writing. Teach capitalization, spacing and end punctuation while demonstrating proper letter formation.
2. Practice consistently
Have your students engage in meaningful writing from day one. Kids learn to talk by talking, and we know kindergartners have mastered that skill. They learn to write by writing even if it is a large string of letters at first or even scribbling. They have to start somewhere. We give them the tools to develop into confident writers by allowing them the time to write and draw every day.
3. Sight words, sight words, sight words
Students need to know how to read and spell several anchor sight words in order to build confidence with sentence writing. I use a word wall, songs and chants to teach students to spell sight words. For example, I sing the word like to the tune of “It’s a Small Word.” L-I-K-E, that spells like. L-I-K-E that spells like…. . Once they are armed with an arsenal of words that are essential to the structure of a sentence, they are well on their way to success.
4. Encourage invented spelling
Invented spelling refers to stretching out words and writing them exactly as they are heard by a beginning writer. If students become hung up on spelling words correctly, creativity and continuity suffers.
Students will only want to write very simple sentences. Kindergarten teachers double as detectives easily decoding sentences such as “I lik pesu and is kem (pizza and ice cream).”
[Check out our article on why invented spelling is so important.]
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5. Do mini lessons
Kindergarteners have the attention span of a fruit fly. This is why right before journal writing time, I teach them one quick skill. Mini lessons are great for teaching narrative, opinion writing, how to compose a topic sentence, and various stages of the writing process.
6. Try interactive writing
Morning message or class news is a good example of interactive writing. This refers to the teacher and student sharing the pen. One student gives the teacher news, and students are called up to the white board to help sound out words and place appropriate punctuation.
7. Choose meaningful topics
Kindergarteners love themselves, their family and their friends.
Let them write about the topics they choose in their journals. Sentence starters confuse kindergarten students. If they write about the same thing for a while, it is ok. It is much like reading the same book over and over again. They are building confidence
8. Write across the curriculum
Reading and writing go hand in hand. Students can write their favorite part of a story or compose a letter to a character. Reading informational text and drawing and labeling a picture are a great ways to combine science and social studies research with writing.
9. Remember that punctuation is tough
Kindergarten students often will put periods at the end of each word or line. Teaching kindergarteners the concept of a complete thought is difficult because their thoughts go on and on and on and on. I teach the students that if their writing answers the question, “Guess what?”, it needs a period.
10. Share, share, share
Give students the opportunity to share their writing with their peers.
The more opportunities kindergarteners are given to express themselves, the less likely they will be to shout out in the middle of the math lesson that they have a wiggly tooth or Uncle Joey is visiting.
Kindergarten writing is not for the faint of heart. Enjoy the strange spellings, humorous thoughts and the innocent excitement that will lead to young students becoming life-long writers.
What are your tips or questions for teaching kindergarten writing? Come and share in our WeAreTeachers HELPLINE group on Facebook.
Plus, 50 tips and tricks for teaching kindergarten and the best kindergarten books.
Kindergarten writing Writing | GreatSchools
Aside from decorative swirls, a few letters, and perhaps even their own names, most kindergartners start school not knowing how to write. That’s the point of school, after all… right?
In a word, yes. Kindergarten writing standards include scary terms like “research” and “publish.
” But don’t panic. Kindergarten is still the year children first learn about writing, which means learning to listen, speak in class, and write the ABCs.
Writing their ABCs
Teachers often start the year by introducing the letters of the alphabet — the building blocks of writing. Kindergartners learn how to form the shapes of letters, what sounds they’re associated with, and how to combine those letters to create words.
This year your kindergartner should learn to print most upper and lowercase letters.
Cn u rd this?
At many schools, kindergartners are encouraged to spell words the way they sound, which is known as phonetic or “invented” spelling. For example, a student might spell the word water by writing “watr.” Children are often more comfortable using consonants and sounds at the beginning of words because they’re more distinct than vowels or sounds at the ends of words. Using invented spelling, children are demonstrating what they know. Research shows letting children use invented spelling (and not immediately correcting them) allows them to focus on the purpose of writing: communication.
Typically, kids learn the rules of spelling and transition to conventional spelling as they read and write. (If a child’s spelling does not improve or their invented spelling is arbitrary rather than phonetic, it could be a sign of a learning issue.)
By the end of the year, kindergartners should be able to:
• Connect most letters with their sounds.
• Phonetically or inventively write simple high-frequency words. (See our kindergarten snap words worksheets for examples of high-frequency words to practice, and check out this real-life example of what a kindergartner’s invented spelling looks like.)
• Write many consonant-vowel-consonant words, like cat, dog, mom, and dad. (See our kindergarten rhyming words worksheets for examples.)
• Write their own names.
Kindergartners who can’t write yet, can listen, speak, and draw!
Think of these skills as big steps toward writing. Teachers and parents should read books aloud and should ask questions along the way about the book itself — the title, author, illustrator, subject — and about what happens in a story, and what your child notices about events and characters’ actions.
Be sure to ask some questions that require your child to read between the lines, e.g. Who are the main characters in this story? Where was the frog sitting? Why do you think the dog is sad? Can you draw a picture to show something interesting that you learned? You can also ask questions about the illustrations.
When answering, your child should learn to use frequently occurring nouns and verbs and correctly use the most common “connection words” or prepositions — such as to, from, in, out, on, off, for, of, by, and with — to express their thoughts. They should also learn to answer questions using simple, complete sentences. Kindergartners also need to understand and use question words, including who, what, where, when, why, and how, when they speak or dictate writing so they’re familiar with these words when they begin writing on their own.
What exactly is “research” in kindergarten?
Your child’s first experience with research projects will be listening to a few books by the same author or on the same topic.
Students will be asked to recall information like the author’s name, and what they learned from the reading. Then, with help and prompting from the teacher, they may draw pictures to accompany dictated sentences or write one to three sentences about what they learned from these books.
Watch how kindergartners research and discuss a topic
3 types of kindergarten writing
Kindergartners should practice and learn three kinds of writing: opinion, informative, and narrative. All three will likely start with kids listening to books read aloud and responding to what they’ve learned. In an opinion piece, your child tells the reader his opinion or preference about a topic, such as a book, animal, activity, etc. (e.g. My favorite book is...). In an informative piece, your child names what they’re writing about and gives some information or details about it.
(e.g. Dinosaurs lived on Earth a long time ago…) Writing a narrative is like writing a story. Your kindergartner will describe an event — or a few loosely linked events — putting the events in the order they happen and reacting to what happened. (e.g. Then Goldilocks tried the second bowl of porridge.)
See what kindergarten writing looks like
By the end of the year, your child may be able to write a couple of sentences for each type of writing. Remember that drawing and dictating sentences count as writing.
Check out these real examples of good kindergarten informational writing:
• “All people can save water”
• “All people can save water”
bttr, better, share!
A big part of teaching kids to write well is helping them understand that writing is a multistep process. Before your child picks up a pencil, prewriting begins with reading and thinking.
This may mean rereading a book, discussing what your child has read, or simply brainstorming ideas for a picture or story. Then, the teacher will likely to go over your child’s first draft drawing, dictation, or writing with your child. The teacher or other students might ask your child questions about the work — and suggest details that could be added or better ways to organize information. Then your child may be asked to do a revision. After one or more revisions, the teacher might help your child with the final edit — focusing on spelling, capitalizing proper nouns and the first word of a sentence, and adding a period at the end. These steps — preparing to write, doing a first draft, revising that draft, and editing the final piece — help kindergartners learn that gathering and recalling information, organizing their thoughts, strengthening and clarifying their ideas, and improving grammar and presentation are all important parts of writing.
Kindergarten grammar
Kindergartners start learning the basics of sentence structure — namely capitalizing I (when referring to themselves) and the first letter of the first word in a sentence, ending their sentences with a period (and knowing that it’s called a period), and ending their questions with a question mark (and knowing that it’s called a question mark).
Check out these related worksheets:
• Sentences #1
• My first sentences
What about handwriting?
In kindergarten, the focus is on printing upper and lowercase letters. Because kindergartners’ motor skills are still developing, the teacher will introduce handwriting with a range of approaches, like finger painting, writing in the air with a finger, and tracing letters. Kindergartners should learn how to hold a pencil and practice forming letters by writing their names, which gives them practice writing letters, shaping and spacing letters correctly, and writing from left to right.
For handwriting practice, check out these related worksheets:
• Creating letter-shape patterns
• Practicing letters a and b
• The alphabet
Updated August 2022
rules of conduct and useful tips
We have already written an article about how many things annoy parents in kindergarten and school WhatsApp chats.
By the way, in the survey "What pisses you off the most?" the leading option is "All". Therefore, we decided to offer you instructions for using these very groups, namely, the rules of conduct in modern chats of this type and instructions for disabling annoying notifications and uploading photos. After all, if you stop seeing all these 500 messages per hour, then they will not be so annoying.
So, how to make parent group in messenger better and more enjoyable?
Modern rules of correspondence
1. Try to convey to others the idea that only important information should be in the parent chat. For other discussions and chatter, you can create a separate chat. For example, there is a chat "5 B class". And there are a lot of moms sharing recipes for pies with kittens. Create another chat called "5 B Chat Chat" and invite all parents there. Let there be only announcements from the teacher in the official group, and all "left" discussions take place in a separate group.
Well, don’t forget yourself that tips for whitening your forehead with plantain are in another chat.
2. If the teacher wrote in the chat: "We'll come tomorrow at 8 to dig potatoes", do not answer: "Thank you, Antoshka will come." Such messages will be sent by half of the class, they are not informative, but there is a lot of chirping. Answer only if you definitely won't come or you were asked the question: "Who will be able to come tomorrow at 8?"
9 APPS THAT EVERY STUDENT MUST HAVE
3. There is an unspoken rule about questions like: “Who can come and help with the transfer of desks?”. If you are NOT you can - don't write. They didn’t ask about those who couldn’t, and even less about the reasons for this (“They’ll just install a pool in our country house, we have to go, otherwise they would come”), but about those who will come to make a list.
4. Do not write like this:
This is one message. It must be written not in parts, but in its entirety.
5. Personal matters can be discussed in a personal conversation. If in the general group, the mother wrote that all the girls of the class were invited to her daughter's birthday, you should not ask there: "Oh, when, oh, what to give???". Parents of boys are not interested. Write a private message, or better, offer to create a separate chat to discuss this issue for all invitees. This also applies to personal questions to the teacher, which it is not necessary for everyone to know about.
6. Be mindful of the time you write the message. Stick to the rule - no earlier than 7, no later than 22.00. This is the time at which children and their parents are most likely to be awake. Writing at night or early in the morning is ugly unless the information is very urgent. If you found out at 4 in the morning that a flock of wild meerkats got into the school and you don’t need to come until they are smoked out, you can write at 4, but it’s better to wait until 7. It is unlikely that children will leave the house before their parents read this.
And if you found out at 4 in the morning that a biology teacher is dating a physics teacher, then this is completely non-urgent information, leave it for later. Or better yet, leave it at all.
HOW DOES THE INTERNET AFFECT CHILDREN'S LITERACY?
7. Write well. At least try to put commas in the official chat, refuse emoticons. In a chat chat, this rule may not be observed, but still remember that many are enraged by grammatical errors, shusi-pusi and a huge number of emoticons.
8. Don't send postcards to chat. Basically, nobody needs them. Then why? If you do not congratulate the parents of your classmates on Easter, no one will be offended. But if 10 pictures with Easter cakes and bunnies come to the chat, it can infuriate someone for the 10th time. Also, you don’t need to respond to each of the cards with something like: “Thank you!!! And you!!!". If you really want to congratulate your parents on some holiday (major, not Miner's Day), just write a message with congratulations.
This, moreover, is more sincere than the downloaded picture.
9. The same goes for funny pictures. Everyone's sense of humor is different. Therefore, the abundance of "funny" pictures in the general chat can annoy those who do not find it funny.
10. Don't get personal or gossip. Be polite. And imagine that this is not an Internet communication, but a live conversation at a parent meeting. Say only what you would say to your face and in front of everyone.
Instructions for use
Not all parents understand how to make life easier for themselves without leaving the annoying WhatsApp parent group. A lot of moms and dads complain that they can't turn off chat beeps during a work meeting, or that the constant greeting cards clog up their phone's memory. Therefore, the editors of Tlum.Ru decided to answer these two pressing questions.
How to turn off notifications
To turn off annoying notifications, you need to go to the messenger, press the button in the upper right corner (on Android - three dots, on iOS - a pen above a piece of paper) and select "Settings".
Go to "Notifications". Here you can uncheck "Sounds in chat" - this will mute the sound for incoming and outgoing messages in all chats. To turn off notifications, click on "Pop-up notification" and select "No pop-ups".
You can also turn off the notification of a specific group. Go to the group chat, click on the group name at the top and select "No notifications". Or, in the group window, click on the icon in the upper right corner and, by pressing the "No notifications" button, select the time you need: "8 hours", "1 week" or "1 year". At the same time, you can enable or disable pop-up notifications by clicking or unchecking the "Show notifications" box.
How to disable image uploads
Go to the messenger, click on the icon in the upper right corner and select "Settings". In the window that opens, click on "Data". Next, you can choose your settings for the three items "Mobile network", "Wi-Fi" and "Roaming".
By clicking on one of these items, check the boxes only where you need to. No checkmarks - the file will not be downloaded automatically, you will have to click on it to download it.
If you are afraid that pictures will eat up your traffic on your phone, it is most logical to uncheck all items except Wi-Fi. And if the pictures bother you, filling up the phone’s memory, just uncheck all the boxes, and download the files you really need by clicking on them manually.
Patience to you and adequate interlocutors!
Interesting topics:
How to protect children on the Internet?
Hacker kids who bypassed the system
“Are you sure you have covid?!”: the life of the parent chat here and now
We recently tried to figure out if it was possible to turn the flow of emotional statements in the parent chat into a useful tool for everyone. And today our blogger Natalya Goncharova tells how the kindergarten chat this year has turned into a reflection of reality: some do not believe in viruses, some panic, and some try to remain calm.
On Monday, a commotion broke out in the parent chat of the kindergarten junior group. After wiping my SARS snot and taking a sip of instant coffee, I plunged into the correspondence of twenty people. The reason for the contention hung in the first message - covid broke out in the family of one child. The woman took the child from the group and warned the teacher about a possible illness. The whole family passed the test and waited for the results.
Moms didn't stop chatting. In addition to the fact that an ordinary week-long quarantine for a seasonal cold loomed over the children, an alleged long-term quarantine for coronavirus entered the scene. The parents were startled. Memories of the March-April-May pastime in a cramped apartment space were refreshed in my memory. Then only those who were strong in spirit and not strong in prohibitions did not go crazy. On the example of a children's, courtyard playground, where the bulk of now kindergarten children walk, the persistence of the janitor of the HOA was traced.
Every morning he patiently wrapped the carousels and the slide with barrier tape. By lunchtime, white and red scotch tape was torn by adults and carried into trophies by kids. By dinner, the janitor restored the former order. In the morning everything was repeated.
In the spring, in the parental chat, the correspondence rushed from one extreme to another: they suffered, then they complained, then they cried, then they supported, then they believed, then they cursed. Having gone through seven stages of accepting the inevitable, we reconciled ourselves and dived into a successfully warm, by St. Petersburg standards, summer. The second wave of the coronavirus reared its head during the off-season and in December came as a threat to our kindergarten. The chat participants unanimously sang an angry and suffering song. The lines were as follows:
- “I will have to stay at home with the child until the New Year and longer”
- “Parents need to think a thousand times what cause of illness to announce.
They will get sick, and we will be left without a garden!” - “Why did the parents admit to the teacher that they had covid? They would say simple - viral "
- "Three-year-olds do not need to take the test"
- "I didn't test my children"
- "Is there a sick mother in the chat?"
- "Is it covid?"
- "How long is the test?"
And rhetorical:
- “Why do we need all this?”
After an hour and a half, I couldn't stand the phone's vibration and turned off the information battle of notifications. Thanks to the correspondence, I woke up, cheered up and, frankly, surprised. On the one hand, mothers can be understood: having got used to kindergarten, it is hard to regress back to maternity leave and face-to-face communication with the child for many days.
Towards the end of the conversation, a covid mother emerged from the abyss of indignant messages and categorically wrote: “Everyone in my house is seriously ill.
