Writing is language on paper. More than 85% of people in the world can write, and writing is intimately connected to every aspect of our lives. Children who fail to write well miss out on many aspects of being a fully-fledged member of our society and find themselves at a severe disadvantage. Poor writing skills can limit children’s academic, occupational, cultural, civic and personal ambitions.
At present, too many children are leaving school feeling the effects of inadequate writing skills. Ofsted and the DfE have repeatedly acknowledged that progress and attainment in writing has been consistently poor in England.
In a bid to turn the tide on writing underachievement, educators have rightly been interested in developing children’s ‘writing fluency’. This typically means developing children’s oral language, spelling, handwriting and sentence-level skills so that they can write freely and happily. This is sensible because we know that children who don’t internalise these ‘basic’ skills of writing early into their educational journey can go on to underperform and even experience school failure. In contrast, when these skills are well established, children have the cognitive space to focus on other aspects of writing and being a writer.
To help schools combat writing underachievement, this checklist will help you audit your school’s spelling and handwriting provision against evidence-based research recommendations.