paired-writing
Intervention
Paired Writing
Years/Age range
Y4, Y6
Type of children
Mixed-ability
Child/Adult ratio
2:1
Length of intervention
6-8
Brief description
Paired Writing is a framework and set of guidelines to be followed by pairs working together to generate a piece of writing for a purpose. It gives a supportive structure to scaffold interactive collaborative behaviours through all stages of the writing process. It consists of:
6 STEPS +
10 Questions (Ideas)
5 Stages (Drafting)
4 Levels (Editing)
The deviser, Prof. Keith Topping of Dundee University, stresses that Paired Writing ‘is a lot simpler than it looks’. Children are provided with a flowchart as an aide-mémoire – this is downloadable from the website. On each occasion in each pair, one child has the task of writing (‘the writer’), while the other supports (‘the helper’).
Effectiveness
For writing in Ya and Y6: useful