ABSTRACT
We shall begin by looking at three pieces of non-fiction writing. Danny is a year 7 pupil who has been asked to write in a science lesson on how
the solar system was made. Here is his explanation:
Adam (year 6) has been asked to write an account of the Spanish Armada. Here is the first half page (of three pages altogether) of what he wrote:
Finally Edward (year 5) has written a discussion paper about life in Tudor times. Here are some extracts from his piece:
Most teachers would agree that, while each of these three pieces of writing may be interesting and ‘creative’, the first two are inadequate responses to the task the children were set. They are both written in ways which owe more to imaginative stories than to the structures expected of writing in science and history respectively. A large number of children appear to have similar problems in writing and their difficulty is one of matching the way that you write, the style that you choose and the structure that you use to the particular purposes for writing that you encounter in various curriculum subjects.
