The writing process

Writing is a process which involves four stages.

Stage 1 - Planning

This stage requires students to plan their writing. the focus for this stage is thinking about the task in relation to identify the structural and then to identify the structural and language features of that text type. Once this has been done a planning scaffold of that text type should be completed.

Stage 2 - First Draft

Stage 2 requires students to write their first draft. During this stage students need not to be too overly concerned with accuracy of their writing but more so with adhering to the structural elements of their writing and content or ideas.

Stage 3 - Editing

At this point a student needs to focus on what they have already written. Students need to ask themselves whether what they have written is well organised, whether their expression is clear and whether their ideas are expressed carefully. It is here that students need to fix up spelling, punctuation and paragraphing problems but more so they should also focus on how appropriate their writing is to the task or question they have been given. Do they need to add more information or do they need to change the structure ? At this point a student may need to re-draft their work.

Stage 4 - Publishing

Now is the time to prepare for the finished copy. At this stage a student needs to think about how their work is to be presented and in what format. If instructions about presentation have been given with the task then these need to be followed. However if there is no instructions about presentation have been given then a decision needs to be made. points to think about at this stage may include the layout of the work, should images or graphics be use of other technologies be appropriate to use for the task? Once these decisions have been made, a student can prepare their final draft or published work.