Essay-Writing Skills for C/D borderline students

Richard Lindo

C/D borderline students often struggle to ‘get their heads’ around essay-writing.

This is often because of two things:

(i) Their understanding of the content (e.g. Shakespeare/poetry) is weak(ii) They don’t intuitively know how to write essays and so, often, give-up

It is, of course, essential that C/D borderline students’ understanding of content is secure before asking them to articulate this understanding in an essay.

‘The 5 Thinking Steps’ (included in a separate strategy) helps to make analysis easy for C/D borderline students.

When understanding is secure, step (ii) – providing a simple system for essay-writing is necessary.

Essay-plans have often been used by teachers as a way of scaffolding the essay-writing process. However, this creates a dependence on the teacher rather than a system which leads to independence.

What follows are two simple systems which help C/D borderline students to develop their essay-writing skills.

System 1 is the ‘steps’ system.

System 2 is the ‘colour-key’ system.

Both systems are designed to develop independence in students. Both systems also help with AFL (Assessment for Learning) so you’re killing two birds with one stone!

System 1 – The ‘Steps’ System

Example

GCSE – Shakespeare

Romeo & Juliet

The ‘steps’ system is a step-by-guide on how to write sentences in an essay.

Students include the steps (i.e. 1,2,3, etc.) in their sentences.

See the second slide for an example of the steps ‘in action’.

System 1 – The ‘Steps’ System ‘in action’

Example

GCSE – Shakespeare

Romeo & Juliet

The example (below) shows the beginning of an essay.

You will see numbers in the answer.

The number is used each time a ‘step’ (i.e. 1,2,3 etc.) is used.

This provides clear visual modelling for C/D borderline students.

System 2 – The ‘Colour-Key’ System

The ‘colour-key’ system follows a similar format to the ‘steps’.

Instead of ‘steps’ (i.e. 1,2,3 etc.), colours are used (see below).

Colours help students to see what they’ve used and what they’ve missed.

Students can then write *NEXT* for the colours to used next lesson.

Example

GCSE – Shakespeare

Romeo & Juliet

System 2 – The ‘Colour-Key’ System ‘in action’

Example

GCSE – Shakespeare

Romeo & Juliet

This type of visual modelling is very effective for C/D borderline students.

They can clearly see what to do and, critically, HOW to do it.

By colour-coding their work, they automatically used AFL.

Students can then write *NEXT* for the colours to used next lesson.

The ‘steps’ and ‘colour-key’ system work with C/D borderline students.

Offering the choice of both allows you to personalise for your students.

Both systems work for all types of essay-writing.

It’s just a case of adapting the ‘steps’ / ‘colour key’ based on the content.