Why Writing Should Be Part of The Curriculum in Primary Schools

The Primary School curriculum's main aim in all aspects of teaching is to equip students in skills that will assist them to function adequately within society academically and socially. Writing of course, is a crucial part of the Primary school curriculum it not only gives the students ability to communicate effectively but to experiment with language and express ideas. DET 2002:84 states "through writing students can reflect on experience, re order ideas to create new knowledge, and find relationships with the old and the new".

The intention of writing now goes well beyond students composing sentences or stories into a logical sequence or the pre 1960's drilling processes. We have now come to understand that texts are socially constructed and have a real life purpose. These purpose are of importance now when we are teaching children to write. It is understood that we need to clearly outline to students the purpose of why they are writing and what means we are asking them to write in. (DET 2002:1)

As capable writers, student's need to become aware of what texts are most appropriate to suit the message they are trying to convey and the importance of who they are trying to convey it to. There also is consideration to how they position their reader whether they mean to inform, persuade or entertain as this will influence their choices in the structure of their text and the language in which they use. Within the school curriculum every audience or context involves a specific genre Cope & Kalantiz (1993:2) Genre then being the way in which we compose texts to get certain things done. It is seen through language and the way we exchange information, knowledge and interact socially." Knapp and Watkins (1994:20). Knapp and Watkins (1994:20) describe genre as being " a useful way of categorising social processes that realised through the use of language" This forms what is now the genre based approach or text type approach that primary schools are currently implementing. Its place in the school curriculum is that it gives students a purpose to write and allows exploration of how text take different forms when they are required to do different things. Primary Schools focus on a range of genres each having its own social purpose, structure and function. The purpose of writing within the Primary school curriculum is to provide students with the ability to determine what function, structure and social purpose their writing has in relation to themselves and the world in which they live. These three key elements determine the way in which children view their text, construct their text and critique their writing. The function of texts is determined by its intended purpose. Each purpose then having a specific genre. Currently Primary schools work within a variety of genres. (Recounts, Reports, procedures, Explanation, Expositions and discussions) their purpose and structure vary. Example:

Recounts construct a past event or experience, its purpose is to tell what happened or occurred. Its purpose can be to inform or entertain. Events are usually written in a sequential manner.

Its generic (schematic) structure consists of an orientation and then the events to follow. Its language feature includes the use of past tense, clauses and processes. (DET 1991:12) We can then compare this to the exposition genre, which as mentioned shares it own structure and function. Its purpose or social function is to put forward a point, or argument. Its structure depends on its function if it is to construct point of view a thesis structure is used consisting of positions and previews. If its purpose is to to put forward an argument, then the generic structure consists of the point they are trying to make then the elaboration of each point.

Through the Metropolitan Disadvantaged School program in Sydney a curriculum model was trialed (The Martin/DSP'Wheel') on the genre approach. Its purpose was to give educators a workable model which gave practical learning activities which can be employed at different points of the model .It was to get the most out of the text and give the best possible means in supporting students to understand the purpose and structure of their text. It is a multifaceted cycle and stages can be revisited through the ongoing investigations thus it does not have a specific entry or exit point. (Cope & Kalantzis 1993:10)

Phase one of the modelling stage of the cycle, involves students reading or viewing a variety of text, which could be of a given topic. This phase shows the close link between reading and writing. For example, during Practicum students were shown and read many factual reports on the gold rush era during shared reading sessions.Cambell and Green 2000: 143 suggest that the exposure to different text types is an imperative part of developing writing skills in children they state "Unless teachers carefully select literature and other factual texts that can provide a bank of written texts on which children can draw upon, then it is likely to place limitations on the possible written text children can produce" The genre in focus was report writing so children were able to draw upon experiences and discuss the function of reports that were in context with their terms topic. It gave the students the opportunity to dissect the written text, look at the organization of text and the way language is influenced by the contents. The purpose of this dissection or analysis is an important one, the discussion and deliberation made by the children is likely to assist their learning when they are able to see, use and have modelled workable text.

The next Phases are the joint negotiation of the text. The initial part of this stage is for students to build field knowledge of their topic through activities such as observation, researching, interviewing, taking notes or drawing diagrams. For example during practicum students from Grade three were studying the water cycle, given that the genre type was a procedural report. Students took note of a scientific experiment that showed how the water cycle works. This was then discussed and the class wrote a joint construction of the text using the teacher as a scribe. It was written in the context of the genre and gave the students the opportunity to apply their knowledge of the structure of the genre, and the grammatical feature, which had been modelled in the introduction of the genre. (Cope & Kalantzis 1993:11)

The next stage is the independent structure of their text. It involves progressive stages that involve the preparation of their final piece of work. This process finds the students drafting, conferencing with peers and teacher to reach their goal, which is an independently constructed text. It's also an important part of the process of writing self-correction and self-evaluation. Students take a responsible role in their own learning processes. It also gives optimum opportunities for student's assessment when the teacher is able to see the learnt process collaborated.

In summary the place of writing in the Primary school curriculum is to enable students to construct text that meet social and real life purposes. It allows students to identify the specifics of text through exploration of language and structure of the various genres. It needs to be explicitly taught giving students exposure to a variety of genres that are modelled by the experts (teachers). Students will then have the knowledge, skills and confidence when constructing their own texts. They will also be able to respond in a variety of situations academically and socially, which are the main goals of the Primary school curriculum.