Writing Across the Content

I agree that reading and writing go hand in hand and stated in the text, "learning to write and writing to learn, the two are intertwined", and each one helps the other in terms of comprehension (Richardson et al., 2012). The suggestions for integrating each into content area instruction are interesting and are certainly ones I will incorporate. Authentic writing seems to tap into the affective domain and provides students with an opportunity to see how writing can be used in real world situations. Whether hand writing or using a computer to write, it is still important to relate the new information to the student's world through their own words.

Writing seems to make the most sense, to me, in the reflection phase of the lesson. Cubing seems like a good way to provide assistance along the way without the teacher having to intervene very much. The article suggestions for RAFT writing are fantastic- I love the idea of taking on the role of a fraction to explain to a baker how to double a recipe, or a plant writing a thank you note to the sun! It's such a creative way to display new knowledge. The article suggests googling RAFT assignments, so I did and found this amazing lesson:

http://www.writingfix.com/Picture_Book_Prompts/Miss_Alaineus1.htm

It's a fashion show for vocabulary words! There are many other great ideas as well. This link shows student work for a lesson on friendly letter writing- and their role is something that can't actually write a letter:

http://www.writingfix.com/Picture_Book_Prompts/DearLaRue4.htm

I love how it shows different grade levels doing the same assignment and how detailed it gets with the upper grades. This definitely has sparked creativity in a lot of teachers and I look forward to trying this strategy. 

Cody, A. (2013). Writing across the content. Kentucky English Bulletin, 62(2), 9-12.

Richardson, J., Morgan, R., Fleener, C. Reading to Learn in the Content Areas. Wadsworth, Cengage learning, 2012.