Writing

I want to engage, inspire and motivate the writers in my class. Children write daily in class, yet often their audience is the teacher, a writing buddy or the class. I want to build a sense of authorship and audience for my budding "writing stars".

We use a range of online and printed photos. There are links below to some great collections.
 * Motivation**

We have used the following tools to plan, write, publish and create. When introducing a new tool I found children needed time to jump in and have a play. Their first pieces of writing on each tool was often not their best. Once they know how to use the tool they can then focus on the content and deeper features of their writing. We are still learning about giving effective feedback. My term four focus will be getting the children to give feedback to a buddy and others in their writing group. They will pick one piece of writing to comment on each week.
 * Introducing e-tools**

=**Google Drive**= Google Drive allows children to collaborate, share, give feedback and have access to their writing anywhere/anytime. There are so many google apps for education that can be used to enhance and support learning.

=Writing e-tools= Students can create their own books using templates. Also a source of online books for children to read. || An 'old' favourite that I didn't plan on using, but I tried a more complex comic creator and then found this one was simpler to use. || A very cool tool for story starter ideas. It also gives online formats for children to create their writing in. || This is a child friendly word cloud creator BUT it was tricky to save at the end so I ended up using Tagexdo. ||
 * [[image:storyjumper.PNG width="214" height="45" align="center" caption="storyjumper.PNG" link="http://www.storyjumper.com/"]]

I am going to use this this year scan and show childrens published writing. I want to encourage hand written published work as much as typed work.

|| The artwork available on this site is beautiful. It was the most motivating out of all of the e-tools. || I use this as for photos to us as motivation to  write. Also great for building on vocab and poetic writing. || Word clouds - great for poetry, vocab etc || I am going to use this as part of  my comic writing this year. ||  A weekly writing competition that hooked my children in. A fab group of New Zealand authors have been doing this for 3 years.Fingers crossed they do another this year. ||
 * [[image:storybird.PNG align="center" caption="storybird.PNG" link="http://storybird.com/"]]

=Writing Starters, Planning and Motivation= Has some wonderful images and story starters that provide a great motivation. || Some great images that children can use as a starter || ||  || I use some of these organisers and planners with the whole class || I've found tonnes of amazing resources in particular printable story starters - although I just show on screen/TV || [|Writing Prompts]
 * [[image:teaching ideas.JPG width="107" height="78" caption="teaching ideas.JPG" link="http://www.teachingideas.co.uk/english/contents_writinginspiration.htm"]]
 * [[image:readwritethink.JPG caption="readwritethink.JPG" link="http://www.readwritethink.org/classroom-resources/student-interactives/"]]

This has lots of great ideas ||  ||

[|Example of storybird story written by room 16] =Apps for writing= **Voice recorder** - We have used this for children recording their story verbally before writing.
 * Camera** - We have used the camera to take photos and print out for writing, as a starter for writing and the video for recording children planning before writing
 * Book Creator** - Lets children insert a photo/picture and record their voice and text
 * Sparklefish** - a fun app that lets children add their own interesting adjectives and verbs to stories. Has been great for reinforcing our focus on using rich language
 * Sock Puppe**t - great for oral language and conversational writing
 * Pupper Pals** - great for oral language and conversational writing
 * Popple**t - We use this for class planning and brainstorming ideas before writing
 * Story Ideas** - This has been a great starter for children writing - gives a character, plot idea and setting
 * Kids Write Text Types -** This has been useful for showing children the structure of different genre and types of writing. It has story starter ideas and a planner
 * Screen chomp -** children can plan, draw write annotate on this and record themselves as they work
 * Storylines -** With pass and play children can work with friends to write a story, illustrate it and add more.
 * Rory's Story Cubes** - we use this as a reading activity as well as starter for storytelling (oral language) Have tried to use as a starter for whole class writing but wasn't as effective
 * Storymake**r - Can be used to create characters and setting.
 * Picturebook** - Children can create their own stories. It comes with preset pictures that you can drag onto pages.
 * Paper** - a lovely layout for drawing/planning