Teaching Interactive Writing with ICT Tools

1. Teaching Interactive Writing with ICT Tools By Gamra ZENAIDI CREFOC Rades 11/10/2004

2. Writing should be :

3. regarded as a natural way of communicating. • naturally linked to oral language and reading • both an individual and shared experience. • an interactive experience. • challenging and fun. • promoted by ICT.

4. What Writing Activities Can We Teach with ICT? • Simple sentences • Enriched sentences • Descriptions after a reading activity • Letters/ E-mails • Postcards • Articles • Interviews • Reports • Ads • End of stories • Beginning of stories • Stories • Cartoons • Poems

5. ICT and Writing ICT has opened up enormous possibilities for the promotion of writing. These may be summed up as follows: • The use of Microsoft Word Processor : Facilitating the process of revision and editing. This includes typing labels, writing simple sentences, rearranging lines in a poem, arranging a string of ten items from a shopping list into a horizontal list, typing speech into a speech bubble or deleting words to break up longer sentences. Pupils could produce a picture book by writing text to go with the pictures to tell the story. • Using PowerPoint for presentations. • The use of electronic mail, which has become a daily form of written communication for millions of people. Writing becomes an interactive activity.

6. When pupils write to peers in other countries, writing no longer becomes a simulated classroom activity, but rather a means of exchanging personal information, a way of informing and learning about other peoples’ schools, environments, and cultures. The procedure is simple: the pupils receive a letter and then write one back. Communication through writing becomes as natural as communication through speech.

7. Electronic dictionaries for all levels of learners • Using forums, chat to communicate with other people through writing. • Writing programmes, such as Storybook Weaver and Writers Workshop, for the promotion of creative writing. These programmes allow pupils to create text with the help of background pictures. Some of them read aloud the text pupils have created, while others allow the pupil the opportunity to read out their text and listen to their own voice. • Making web pages with FrontPage Editor or DreamWeaver. • Many activities where computer work is combined with non-computer work, eg planning a tourist brochure by first discussing it in a group, writing the text on a word programme, finding supporting pictures to illustrate, letting others see the draft and give feedback before revising and editing the text.

8. Writing Tools on the Web There are programmes which help students create their own writing activities. Others generate sentences, poems, quotes, stories… • Playing with words, creating interactive writing games. You can choose the plot, the setting, the character…After you finish, you can print and e-mail your writings : http://writingfix.com • Publishing pupils’writings : poems, stories, journal writing… www.tooter4kids.com/classroom/writing4kids.htm

9. You can have fun and learn to write English sentence patterns with Random/ Automatic Sentence Generators : www.manythings.org (You can use it even when you’re disconnected.) • You can generate your poem or story by using some programs : (You can drag and drop words to create poems): www.desktoppoetry.com

10. You can download this free software on your PC or on a CD and use it to write sentences, quotes, stories : http://writesparks.com

11. Things to Remember • Simple activities at the word or sentence level are advisable in order to provide young learners with basic skills and the opportunity to build up their confidence in writing. • It is at all times important that the teacher shows willingness to write with and for pupils, thus acting as a model and inspirer of their written language. • With ICT, communication through writing becomes as natural as communication through speech.

12. Thanks a lot for your attendance and attention. Good Luck!