Can we just write on paper today?

Finding the balance: Early writing in the first year of school

When I started teaching play-based Prep in 2007 I tried to teach my class how to write using anything but paper. I’m not sure why I had it in my mind that paper was inappropriate for 5-year-olds!?

We wrote in the dirt using sticks, painted sight words onto wooden fences using water and paint brushes, carved letters into playdough with toothpicks, practiced our letter formation in sand trays and wrote stories in chalk on the concrete paths. Anything but paper.

One day I remember a little girl coming up to me and saying “Miss Vos, pleeeease can we JUST WRITE ON PAPER today?!”

At the time, writing was supposed to be ‘incidental learning only’ and I was worried I would be pushing the class too hard, but they were excited to write ‘like the big kids’ and they were ready. I designed some scaffolded lined writing sheets for my class and they became a very popular addition to the writing centre. (I have since updated these sheets. They are available for free here.)

My writing program is still learner-focused, playful and active. We still write using a range of writing materials (pencils, chalk, whiteboard markers, oil pastels, felt pens, paint, our fingers), still use many writing surfaces (paper, whiteboards, blackboards, paths and sand trays) and writing environments (desks, floor, vertical surfaces, home corner, outside). My program is just more balanced now. I developed rigour in my early writing pedagogy through the addition of the Age-appropriate Pedagogies (AAP) characteristics – ‘explicit’, ‘responsive’ and ‘scaffolded’.

Range and Balance

In the first few years of learning to embed AAP into the classroom I used to think “Oh my gosh, if I hear my DP say ‘range and balance’ one more time!” but then I became a total convert. Those two words sum it up perfectly. A RANGE and BALANCE of characteristics and approaches really is key. You don’t have to only have this OR that (in this situation play-based OR explicit/structured). I think it is important to have a balance of BOTH. This has become my professional opinion after witnessing the pendulum swing both ways over the last two decades. AAP has married the best of both frameworks and I think that is great for our students.

The origin of the writing sheets I am sharing today brings back a lot of memories. The little girl in the story would be 20 years old now!

If you would like a free copy of our Celebrating Childhood Early Writing Sheets, they are available to download in our TPT Store. The free PDF contains 4 simple lined writing pages that include a handwriting guide and sentence structure prompts (capital letters, full stops, finger spaces and writing on the lines.)

{ DOWNLOAD HERE }