Heres What I Have to Say About the 6-traits of Writing

The only way that we can assess students on writing is by being very specific about what we expect of them. The 6-trait writing tool is the perfect way to attack those specifics. Many teachers I learned from assessed my writing on grammar and punctuation more than on what I was trying to say. Sometimes I would just ramble on to achieve the length of requirement but not really say much at all. As long as I wrote in complete sentences, had the correct spelling, grammar and punctuation, then I was set for an A in the class. The entire reason many of us can relate to this same experience is because grammar and punctuation are the rules to writing and are easier to assess without a rubric. Many teachers assume that the ideas will come through the correct grammatical use. Yet, when students get a paper back with red ink all over it they feel defeated. There were very few times when I was told that I had something important to say or that I should expand on a wonderful idea I came up with. How can a student get empowered to write if they are not praised about what they have to say? We need to consider other things besides writing conventions like ideas and voice. According to Vicki Spandel, students write to find their voice so that is the most important trait in writing that we as teachers need to focus on developing in our writing assignments.

When Spandel discusses the idea of prompt writing I can’t help but think back to my years of pre-developed ideas. I had a teacher that was the master of prompt writing and used it frequently. In class she would start the ideas to write about in our journals and we would expand and develop the details. It was very informal writing and she told us not to worry about the conventions, just the ideas. That helped my mind get more creative and worry more about the voice and ideas than the boring conventions. I have read many students’ papers that follow all of the conventions but do not have a creative voice or anything important to say. Unfortunately though, these kids sore through school because they can follow the rules. We need to use this theory of the 6-traits to create rules for the most important aspects of writing; the ideas behind it all.