Public Writing/Writing for Tests & Assessments

April 16, 2013

Content Area Writing

Chapter 5: Public Writing

Chapter 10: Writing for Tests & Assessments

Chapter Five

Although much of the writing that may be done in your classroom may be writing to learn activities and not seen by anyone other than the students themselves and you as a teacher, we must also prepare students for works that will be seen by the public. These pieces of work must be highly edited, clear and concise with a main objective that outside readers will understand. Students should have worked hard and long on these products and be proud of themselves and what they've accomplished by the end work. As teachers, we must act as editors and guide the students through this process while teaching them strategies that they can use to help them along the way.

Public writing has certain characteristics that students must understand and follow in order to successfully reach an end goal. These traits include:

Substantial: These public works should be longer and more in depth than any quick journal entries or write to learn activities. The text should focus on a certain subject and then go into detail and description on the subject at hand in a way that the reader can fully comprehend.

Planned: Public work should be thought out in advance and organized in a way that is understandable to the reader. Often times these works will be written in more than one draft in order to ensure reader comprehension and organization.

Authoritative: When writing public works, the writer should be sure of what he or she is discussing and confident in the claims stated. Readers should understand what stance the writer has taken and the writer must have support and evidence for that stance.

Conventional: The goal of public writing is to inform your readers about something that you feel is important. Therefore, your public writing should not be informal or give an air of nonchalance. If the writer wants to convince the reader of his or her points, he or she must be formal.

Composed: As I stated earlier, public writing often is attempted in multiple drafts in order to ensure organization, conventional concepts and substantive evidence.

Edited: In order to ensure a positive reader response to ones public work, it must be edited and corrected by the author and teacher. As teachers, we must continuously have peer and self editing among our writers to enable students to create well polished material.

Graded: The most important grade a public work can receive is the intended response the author was looking for from his or her audience. As teachers, we can create opportunities for students to have their work looked at by others in order for the writers to gain knowledge in the craft of public writing.