Quick writing is a form of note taking that helps students to remember what they know and understand. It can also be used to help explore and clarify ideas. Students are given a short amount of time to give quick reactions, feelings, and ideas in response to prompts. The writing is for personal use and can be brief, informal, and incomplete. After writing, students can share ideas and new learning in pairs and/or groups. Quick writing benefits students who are not confident orally as they have time to think and writing enables them to share more easily in pair and group work. Students can also be encouraged to write in their first language.
An alternative form of quick writing is for students to choose their own topic to write about, and then they write as much as possible on the topic within a fixed time period (e.g. 10 minutes). This activity is repeated daily. Students add up the number of words they wrote and try to increase the number over words over time. This activity helps to improve writing fluency.
Watch this video to see a year 11 geography class using quick writing
Teaching and learning sequence planning examples:
Secondary level:
Published on: 19 Jan 2018
