Writing Teaching Resources
Teaching writing strategies and the writing process this school year? Explore a comprehensive collection of teacher resources for elementary and middle school ELA teachers — all created by teachers!
Stocked with graphic organizers, writing prompts, templates, worksheets and so much more, this collection of printable and digital activities is designed to help you as you help your students become more effective communicators and unleash their creativity and imagination.
Save time on lesson planning with resources that have been through a careful review process by an expert member of our teacher team to ensure they're ready for your classroom and your students!
Are you looking for tips and tricks to add to your teacher toolkit this school year? Read on for a primer from our teacher team, including engaging activities for teaching writing in elementary and middle school and a look at some of the different writing strategies your students will need to learn.
11 Writing Strategies Kids Should Know by the End of Middle School
We can't talk about teaching kids to write without talking about the different writing strategies that can help them do just that!
When it comes to teaching our students to become confident writers who articulate their ideas effectively, here are some of the strategies our teacher team prioritizes:
1. Brainstorming
Brainstorming is something we often do in the classroom, and it's a crucial part of learning to generate the ideas that will drive students' writing as they progress through their educational journey. Kids should know how to create a list of potential topics or points related to a particular writing assignment.
With younger students, this is often done as a whole group by writing ideas and points on chart paper. In upper grades, students transition over to using text-based materials to generate ideas and talking points.
2. Outlining
Before diving directly into any assignment, our students should be able to create a structured framework or outline. Teaching students how to create this outline will help them organize their thoughts and arguments for penning their essays, reports and research papers.
3. Using Graphic Organizers
Technically graphic organizers are classroom tools, so you may not think of their use as a writing strategy per se. However, learning to use these tools is another means of providing kids with the tools they need to organize their ideas and information before they sit down to write.
These organizers are particularly useful for expository writing — students can use them to outline main ideas, supporting details, and transitions.
Students can also take advantage of story maps when they are working on narrative writing to plot the key elements of a story, such as characters, setting, conflict, rising action, climax and resolution.
Graphic organizers such as the OREO strategy and hamburger paragraph are also great tools for students to use when working with opinion and persuasive texts.
4. Freewriting
Writer's block is the enemy of creativity, and it can easily frustrate young students who don't know where to begin.
When students freewrite, they write continuously without worrying about grammar or punctuation. This writing strategy can be extremely freeing — hence the name! — and helps frustrated writers move past that writer's block, generating fresh ideas.
5. Peer Editing
Learning to review and provide constructive feedback on each other's work is a great writing strategy to employ in your classroom to help students improve their writing quality and enhance their editing skills.
The strategy allows your students to learn from one another, and it arms them with an important tool they can use well into the future — calling on peers to provide a critical eye to a piece of writing.
6. Using Sensory Language
Working on descriptive writing? With this writing strategy, students engage the reader's senses through vivid and sensory language to create a more immersive experience.
7. Including Transitions and Connectives
As students become more proficient in the writing process, learning to use transitional words and phrases allows them to create smooth transitions between sentences and paragraphs. This strategy makes their writing more coherent and polished.
8. Incorporating Evidence
In persuasive, opinion, and expository writing, students are taught to support their claims with evidence and examples to strengthen their arguments.
It takes some practice to train your students to use evidence in their writing, so it's often a good idea to start with something simple, like the R.A.C.E.S. strategy.
9. Crafting a Thesis Statement
In expository, opinion, and persuasive writing, crafting clear and concise thesis statements that summarize the main point or argument of their essay helps students be more focused and organized in their writing. This strategy can also have the effect of empowering students to express their ideas confidently and persuasively.
10. Incorporating Introductions and Conclusions
With this strategy, students practice crafting effective introductions and conclusions that grab the reader's attention and leave a lasting impression.
11. Following a Revision Checklist
Teaching your students to use a revision checklist is a strategy that will help them be more self-reflective, evaluating their own writing against the checklist criteria and becoming more aware of their strengths and weaknesses.
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Common Adjectives for Kids - Printable Adjective List
Print your students a list of adjectives to keep at hand when writing to help them use descriptive language.
- Free Plan
Grammar Practice Worksheets - Vocabulary Cut and Sort
Review parts of speech and word usage skills with a pack of cut-and-paste Grammar Sorting Worksheets.
- Free Plan
Narrative Plot Structure - Story Mountain Template
Use a story mountain template to help your students write narrative stories.
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Super Synonyms List
Boost your students’ vocabularies with a synonyms list to reference in their daily writing lessons.
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Persuasive Writing Planning Template
A planning template to use when writing a persuasive or opinion text.
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Nouns, Proper Nouns, Verbs, Adjectives, Adverbs and Conjunctions Posters
Enhance student understanding of the 8 parts of speech with these colorful, informative, and easily-referenced grammar wall posters for the classroom covering nouns, verbs and more!
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Free Printable Lined Paper Templates
Use this free printable lined paper pack to encourage students to write and publish their work in your classroom writing station.
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Capitalization Task Cards (Grades 2-3)
Reinforce capitalization for proper nouns, the pronoun ‘I,’ and the beginning of sentences in text with this set of 24 task cards (extension included).
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Better Verb Choice Words Pack
Help your students during their writing with this set of visually appealing verb posters and verb word mat.
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Fall Color By Part of Speech Worksheet - Nouns, Verbs, Adjectives, Adverbs
Use this color by part of speech worksheet as a fun fall activity with your students.
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Boston Tea Party - RACES Writing Strategy Worksheet
Integrate reading, writing, and American history with a worksheet about the Boston Tea Party using the RACES writing strategy for text evidence.
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Dressing Up A Sentence - Interactive or Printable Activity
Encourage students to add more descriptive language into their sentence writing with this activity.
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Grammar Worksheet Pack – Lower Elementary
Review different parts of speech with this worksheet pack.
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Compound Sentence Quiz
Assess your students ability to identify, write, and edit compound sentences with a printable Compound Sentence Quiz.
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Subject Verb Agreement Compound Subjects Worksheets
Enhance student understanding with subject-verb agreement compound subjects worksheets that provide various activities using compound subjects.
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Printable Wanted Poster Template Pack
Use a 'Wanted' poster template to encourage your students to research and write about historical figures and more!
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Complete and Incomplete Sentence Task Cards
These task cards are best used as independent practice or formative assessment assignments during sentence structure lessons.
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Has or Have? Subject Verb Agreement Task Cards
Download these has or have task cards, designed to help students confidently choose the correct verb form while improving their grammar skills.
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Is or Are? Subject Verb Agreement Task Cards
Download these is or are task cards, designed to help students confidently choose the correct verb form while improving their grammar skills.
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Cat Handwriting Paper - Dotted Middle Line
A set of handwriting lines to use when teaching your students how to sit their letters properly on a line.
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Combining Sentences Anchor Chart Pack (5-6)
Use our Combining Sentences Anchor Chart Pack to help your students learn new ways to combine simple sentences in their writing.
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Capitalization Review Worksheet Pack (1-3)
Use printable Capitalization Handouts to help your beginning writers learn to capitalize words in sentences.
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Letter Formation Worksheets - Uppercase, Lowercase, and Sentence Writing
A set of 26 letter formation worksheets that include uppercase and lowercase letters as well as sentence writing.
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Types of Sentences Flip Book
Create a helpful types of sentences flipbook with our Differentiated 4 Kinds of Sentences foldable graphic organizers.
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Dotted-Lined Handwriting Paper - Portrait
Use these printable dotted-lined handwriting paper templates to develop your students' letter formation skills in the kindergarten classroom.
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Contractions Bingo Game
Build vocabulary and have fun with contraction word games!
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Free Contractions Student Reference Sheet
Help students remember the different contractions with this contraction student reference sheet.
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Subordinating Conjunctions Task Cards
Use this set of 24 task cards to help students practice identifying and constructing sentences using subordinating conjunctions.
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Subordinating Conjunctions Board Game
Use this set of 24 task cards to help students practice identifying and constructing sentences using subordinating conjunctions.
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Coordinating Conjunctions Task Cards
Use this set of 24 task cards to reinforce students' understanding of coordinating conjunctions and building compound sentences.
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Adjective or Adverb? Task Cards
Use this set of 24 task cards to help students understand where an adverb or an adjective is the correct modifier in a sentence.
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Roll to Create a Creature - Drawing Game
Use a die and a chart to create a creature to include in a narrative text or a comic strip.