Composition Writing)

3 Common Weaknesses: 1. Ideas not fully developed:

Contrary to popular belief, pupils, especially the weak ones, do not perish in composition for the lack of ideas. Pupils do not seem to lack ideas for writing; they do, however, lack the ability to edit their ideas.

2. Poor narrative structure

By this, I refer to the gaps in the story. If we have the privilege of reading several primary composition pieces, we would notice how easily ,and frequently, the young writer is easily distracted and forgets to provide follow-through on introduced ideas e.g. Alvin was walking home after school when he witnessed a snatch-theifthief. In the excitement of describing his own act of heroism of chasing and capturing the theif thief, the writer then ends the composition by saying, I arrived at school two hours late for my examinations. A solid composition structure has to have the basic Beginning-Middle-End (for the younger primary pupil, the Head-Body-Feet). Older pupils can, and should, be taught about the all-important Plot (series of problems and resolutions). More on this later.

3. Spelling, punctuation and grammar

This component often causes the pupil to bleed marks, and often, a unnecessary loss of points. High frequency words are often spelled wrongly. Careless punctuation. Common ones include: Lack of proper capitalisation, missing full stops, improper punctuation used for direct speech (the ending quotation mark is the most often forgotten). Grammar mishaps occur most often in the form of inconsistent tenses e.g. tense switching that affects narrative structure, singular-plural, gender pronoun mix-ups.

3 Composition Exam Strategies to Help Your Child Improve Grades Here are three effective writing strategies that can help every student avoid the common errors and weaknesses I mentioned above. 1. Story planning

The very basic of this is the Beginning-Middle-End plan. But in my experience, even the Primary 2s can manage a more complex plan. Using the 5 W1H of Who-What-When-Where-Why-How, pupils can plan a decent story map to help them keep focused on the basic story elements. They should keep referring back to the map as they write to ensure their stories are headed towards the right destination. This also serves as a good ideas editing guide. The older, and more fluent, writer can use a story plot. You can download one here for free from Scholastics. I prefer this as it gives the writer a visual of the progression in which he should introduce the events and ideas. The WH questions can still be used to help the writer map out his ideas on the organizer. One extra I would recommend is that your child jots down the character names in one corner.

2. Develop ideas There is a wealth of great suggestions on writing techniques to be found out there. But Im going to only focus on a very manageable three which I believe will help boost your childs performance significantly.

Show, not tell, your reader what is happening. Pupils often state what is obvious. That becomes boring for the reader because his imagination is not being engaged. Example: Instead of just writing Tim was tired, describe his tired appearance Tim could barely keep his eyes open. He tried to stop his yawn from escaping, but failed. Mrs Neo glared at him for the third time. Use strong and specific verbs. For starters, dont just use said. Choose a specific verb to show how something is said. Shouted and whispered carry different emotive qualities that help lend colour to the narrative. Heres a handy synonym chart for all the words you can use instead of simple said. Use dialogue effectively. Some pupils love to write their compositions almost like a tv drama script. Such excessive use is to be discouraged. However, dialogue that is used suitably lends believability and interest to the written piece.Even in dialogue, the rule of Show not tell still applies. Dialogue is great for developing the personality of your story characters, fleshing out events and building the plot. I found a great sample piece for how to write great dialogue (again from Scholastic, one of my favourite educational publishers). It is from Anton Chekhov, a little sophisticated and mature for our primary pupils, but I thought it would

give us parents a very good insight to learn from a master writer how effective dialogue looks. 3. Teach self-editing skills Every good writer also needs editing skills especially in the areas of spelling, punctuation and grammar. Common errors to be alert to:

Spelling: Get high frequency words spelled right e.g. because, tomorrow. The prevalent use of mobile devices amongst pupils now have lead to SMS-language appearing in compos too e.g. bcos, ltr. Be aware of your own spelling weaknesses like those words that often trip you up, and be extra careful when using them. My problems often are with words that have repeated letters in them such as accomodation, occasion. Punctuation: Especially common errors include missing full stops, names not being properly capitalised, wrong punctuation for dialogue. Working on these can help greatly reduce the number of errors and loss of points. (Most of these errors seem to be due more to careless and messy handwriting than a poor grasp of the language). Grammar: Check for common errors like using the wrong spelling for the plural form, wrong pronouns and switching between present and past tense. A note about tenses: Compositions are often written in the past tense. However, when pupils use the flashback technique, there is the potential that they forget that they have stepped back in time to narrate the story and still use the present tense.