Writing, Writing, Writing

We wanted to make sure we provided more opportunities for students to write in our classroom aside from small group writing and letter activities and writing their names on art work. Here is what we have come up with to include as part of our daily routine.

Student's write their names whenever they come in before sitting down at greeting time. They have name tags on symbols they recognize to use as a model if needed. They then place their name cards up on the wall in the blue pocket organizer. We can keep some of the name samples to see how their handwriting is developing over the school year.

After review, before washing their hands for snack, students get to 'sign-up' on our snack chart for the chore they want to help out with for the day. The assistants know their handwriting skills so even if they are at the beginning stages of writing their names, we can still recognize them.

Just and an FYI, these are the stages of writing that we see most of our students go through while in our class:

1. Random scribbling
2. Scribbling across in a horizontal direction
3. Creating letter like forms (including 0 and l )
4. Writing letters from their name (often starts with the first and the last)
5. Writing their name (by 5 years it's still big and all over the page, sometimes in random orders and that is more then ready for writing in kindergarten)