Tuesday, July 17th- The Writing Process

The Writing Process: Twice as hard as the reading process and you need to be a great reader to write well!
Here is my writing process breakdown:

• attention to task
• motivation for writing activity
• sit down which takes into account kinesthetic processes including gross motor cordination, spatial awareness
• fine motor control for picking up paper and orienting the page ( left or right handed requires different skills)
• locate the pen or pencil ( writing device)- vision, spatial awareness
• pick up writing device ( motor planning, executive function, fine motor control)
• properpincer/ tripod grip on writing device- some kids don't have this skill and might need adaptations!
• proper pressure including grip, fine motor, attention, wrist extension
• orient page for task
• motor planning required for either printing or cursive text
• executive function for planning of what you want to write including attention, focus, long term memory, visualizing, there might also be long and short term retrieval, as well as the actual organization, prior knowledge,
• transferring pictures in brain to language
• structure, grammar needs to be explicitly taught
• sequencing info from long term memory
• actual writing: proprioception is critical to prepare for the task, as well as neuromotor
• writing is the opposite of reading- decoding text as opposed to encoding with reading
• recall the shape of the letters, syntax, graphomotor ( sequential symbols), spelling etc.
• lots of central auditory processing info required for the writing task
• time factor always comes into play throughout the process

I'm exhausted and I haven't even written anything down yet!!

Barb's version on powerpoint:

1. Graphomotor
2. Content skils: Lower level content skill- initiate
3. Organize ideas, mental planning, knowledge of language, vocabulary, sequential processing ( all at the same time)
4. Mechanical Skills- takes lots of brain energy, especially for spelling, and require components of all
5. Upper level mechanical- lower level skills with content
6. Upper level content skills- prior knowledge, experience, metacognitive etc.

AT:

• Draft Builder- structured writing or graphic organizer
• Clicker 5
• Writing with Symbols
• Write Outloud Solo
• Cowriter- strongest word prediction product available
• Dragon Naturally Speaking- 3 gigs of ram to run, and very expensive!
• Dragon dictation and Dragon app are better
• Cloze Pro
• Write out Loud with Cowriter component ( around $100 on book bureau now)
• Inspiration/ Kidspiration
• Start to Finish books- Don Johnston
• Speech to Text
• Typo

Take the pencil out of the process- Leslie Broun
Neuroanatomical output is huge!

Last weekend- typed written task:

30th High school reunion time!
A three hour drive to visit my home town
Nervously wondering if I will even remember some of my previous classmates
Mom and dad are so excited to see me
I'm worried about missing worktime, for the coursework I have for homework this weekend!...

Very interesting how many processes are involved in even getting ready for the written task, let alone organization, lower and upper level content and mechanical skills!