Debunking edu-myths: “In Reception and Year One, composition is less relevant”

This line of thinking is common in the early years of education, and it’s easy to understand why. Young children are just beginning to learn the mechanics of writing – forming letters, spelling simple words, and stringing together sentences. But the claim that composition is ‘less relevant’ in Reception and Year One doesn’t stand up to what research, good practice, and cognitive science tell us. In fact, it’s an edu-myth that may be quietly undermining young writers’ confidence and development.

🧱 Where the myth comes from

This myth likely stems from a well-meaning desire to ensure children master the foundational skills of transcription (handwriting, spelling, and punctuation) before moving on to the supposed ‘harder stuff’ of idea generation. Teachers are often under pressure to produce neat, accurate writing, which can make transcription feel like the only priority in early writing instruction.

But here’s the thing, as our Writing Map shows: composition and transcription are not either/or. They’re both part of the intertwined writing process, especially for our youngest writers.

🧠 What the research says

Far from being ‘less relevant,’ the writing process – including ideation, planning, oral rehearsal, and revision – is not only appropriate for Reception and Year One but crucial for developing confident, capable young writers.

1. Young children are composing long before transcription is fluent

Research shows that children engage in complex compositional thinking even before they can write conventionally.

• Rohloff et al. (2024) found that young children make deliberate transformations of ideas between talk and writing, showing that composition is an active cognitive process from the outset.

• McIntyre et al. (2025) confirm that ideation (not just transcription) drives quality in both oral and written story retellings, even in early writers.

• Ray & Glover (2008) show that young children are already writers engaged in authentic composition from the very beginning of their schooling.

2. Emergent writing and informed spellings foster composition

Children who are encouraged to use emergent writing and informed spellings demonstrate stronger motivation and writing outcomes (see LINK for more on this).

• Schrodt et al. (2024) show that informed spelling instruction boosts both literacy achievement and writing motivation.

• Rodríguez et al. (2024) and Puranik et al. (2024) emphasise that oral language and transcription skills work together to shape the productivity and quality of young children’s writing – suggesting that composition cannot be divorced from either.

3. Composition and transcription develop best together

While transcription is foundational, it doesn’t need to be fully mastered before composition should be developed. In fact, integrating both yields the best outcomes.

• Graham et al. (2018) found that targeted handwriting and spelling instruction supports struggling writers, but must be paired with meaningful writing experiences.

• Berninger et al. (2002) demonstrated that teaching spelling and composition in tandem (not separately) leads to better writing outcomes.

• Harris et al. (2023) show that children as young as Year One can develop transcription skills while also learning to plan, write, and revise informational texts through meaningful writing experiences.

4. Children benefit from explicit writing instruction early on

There’s strong evidence that explicit, process-based writing instruction in the early years enhances both writing quality and engagement.

• Hall et al. (2015) found that preschoolers benefit from writing instruction that includes idea development, audience awareness, and text structure.

• Farrow et al. (2024) highlight strategies to develop composition in early years settings, showing that young children are capable of rich, expressive writing when supported appropriately.

5. Writing development is driven by multiple, interacting skills

Writing isn’t linear. It’s built through the integration of language, cognitive, and transcriptional processes.

• Kim & Schatschneider (2017) and Kim (2020, 2024) demonstrate that composition is the central outcome of writing development – shaped by a network of contributing factors including oral language, topic knowledge, working memory, and transcription skills. This model makes clear that supporting composition means nurturing all these interrelated domains from the earliest stages.

• Seoane et al. (2025) reinforce this by showing, through a large-scale meta-analysis, that oral language plays a direct and lasting role in shaping young children’s written composition – influencing both the quality and coherence of what they are able to express in writing from the earliest years.

✅ The truth?

In Reception and Year One, transcription is crucial but the writing process for composition is just as relevant.

Children thrive when they are given chances to think, talk, draw, and write their ideas. A centralist approach, where transcription and composition develop hand-in-hand, is not only possible, it’s what research tells us is most effective.

📝 Try This in the classroom:

• Storytelling and information-sharing before writing: Let children talk through and share their ideas with teachers and friends before writing.
  
• Drawing as planning: Use drawing as a form of planning to help children organise and translate their ideas to paper.
  
• Shared and guided writing: Model how writers plan, draft, revise – even with simple sentences.
  
• Celebrate meaning: Respond first to what children are saying in their writing before correcting sentence-construction, spelling or handwriting.

Final word

Dismissing composition as ‘less relevant’ in the early years risks turning writing into a purely technical exercise. If we want children to see themselves as writers, creators of meaning, storytellers, information sharers and thinkers – then we must value the full writing process from the very beginning. Young children are capable of more than we think. Let’s make sure we’re not the ones holding them back.

References

• Berninger, V. W., Vaughan, K., Abbott, R. D., Begay, K., Coleman, K. B., Curtin, G., Hawkins, J. M., & Graham, S. (2002). Teaching spelling and composition alone and together: Implications for the simple view of writing. Journal of Educational Psychology, 94(2), 291–304. [https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-0663.94.2.291](https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-0663.94.2.291)
• Farrow, J., Wasik, B. A., Hindman, A. H., & Farrow, M. J. (2024). Translating Ideas into Language: High-Impact Strategies to Nurture Children′s Creative Composing in Early Childhood Classrooms. Early Childhood Education Journal, 1-16.
• Graham, S., Harris, K. R., & Adkins, M. (2018). The impact of supplemental handwriting and spelling instruction with first grade students who do not acquire transcription skills as rapidly as peers: A randomized control trial. Reading and Writing, 31(6), 1273-1294.
• Hall, A. H., Simpson, A., Guo, Y., & Wang, S. (2015). Examining the effects of preschool writing instruction on emergent literacy skills: A systematic review of the literature. Literacy Research and Instruction, 54(2), 115-134.
• Harris, K. R., Kim, Y. S., Yim, S., Camping, A., & Graham, S. (2023). Yes, they can: Developing transcription skills and oral language in tandem with SRSD instruction on close reading of science text to write informative essays at grades 1 and 2. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 73, 102150.
• Kim, Y. S. G. (2020). Structural relations of language and cognitive skills, and topic knowledge to written composition: A test of the direct and indirect effects model of writing. British Journal of Educational Psychology, 90(4), 910-932.
• Kim, Y. S. G. (2024). Writing fluency: Its relations with language, cognitive, and transcription skills, and writing quality using longitudinal data from kindergarten to grade 2. Journal of Educational Psychology, 116(4), 590.
• Kim, Y. S. G., & Schatschneider, C. (2017). Expanding the developmental models of writing: A direct and indirect effects model of developmental writing (DIEW). Journal of Educational Psychology, 109(1), 35.
• Kim, Y. S. G., Yang, D., Reyes, M., & Connor, C. (2021). Writing instruction improves students’ writing skills differentially depending on focal instruction and children: A meta-analysis for primary grade students. Educational Research Review, 34, 100408.
• McIntyre, A., Scott, A., McNeill, B., & Gillon, G. (2025). Comparing young children’s oral and written story retelling: the role of ideation and transcription. Speech, Language and Hearing, 28(1), 2357450.
• Puranik, C., Duncan, M., & Guo, Y. (2024). Unpacking the relations of transcription and oral language to written composition in kindergarten children. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 67, 227-238.
• Rodríguez, C., Jiménez, J. E., & Balade, J. (2024). The impact of oral language and transcription skills on early writing production in kindergarteners: Productivity and quality. Early Childhood Education Journal, 1-11.
• Rohloff, R., Ridley, J., Quinn, M. F., & Zhang, X. (2024). Young Children’s Composing Processes: Idea Transformations in Verbalizations from Pre-Writing to Post-Writing. Early Childhood Education Journal, 1-11.
• Rowe, D. W. (2018). Research & policy: The unrealized promise of emergent writing: Reimagining the way forward for early writing instruction. Language Arts, 95(4), 229-241.
• Schrodt, K., FitzPatrick, E., Lee, S., McKeown, D., McColloch, A., & Evert, K. (2024). The Effects of Invented Spelling Instruction on Literacy Achievement and Writing Motivation. Education Sciences, 14(9), 1020.
• Seoane, R. C., Wang, J., Cao, Y., & Kim, Y. S. G. (2025). Unpacking the Relation Between Oral Language and Written Composition: A Meta-Analysis. Review of Educational Research, 00346543251320359.