Evaluating differentiated methods used during English creative writing lessons in Year Four classes

Abstract

The aim of this dissertation was to investigate and evaluate the differentiated English Creative Writing strategies teachers are adopting in the primary classrooms to tap into the diverse young writers' needs and achieve utmost excellence. In order to document the differentiated writing instruction, a State school and a Church school which uphold a mainstreamed approach were selected and a total of three Year Four classrooms participated in the study. A series of observations in the three classrooms was conducted to analyse how teachers are dealing with struggling and typical writers in mixed-ability classes. Subsequently, teachers were interviewed regarding the challenges children offer when engaging in Creative Writing. Questionnaires were also administered to the children to learn about their perspectives and experiences. From the data collected it was concluded that differentiated teaching during English Creative Writing, which could render the pupils better writers, is still lacking in these primary classrooms. Such lack of differentiated teaching epitomised individualised writing instruction, modelling and scaffolding as well as diverse writing arrangements. Ultimately, children expressed a mistaken perspective of Creative Writing as the communicative meaning and learning purpose of composition was hardly revealed.