Children live in the world of revision. While watching children at work, whether through building with Legos, painting a picture, or playing in the social dramatic play area, teachers see evidence of enthusiastic revision. Children can revise their writing with equal enthusiasm—as long as we don’t expect their revisions to look like those an adult would make. A commitment to revise is also a commitment to teach the writing process.
Teachers can start this unit with an informal assessment by asking, “What do you know about revision?” This will probably give the most insight about what children know about materials and tools of revision (tape, post-its, paper strips, etc.). In this revision unit, it is important to take the lead from students. It may be appropriate to combine/condense the tools of revision lessons based on your students’ prior knowledge and experience.
Materials, tools, knowledge, and accessibility are important in revising. Some teachers give students a special revision folder in addition to a colored pen (usually all students receive the same color – this unit uses purple pens, but any color will do). The special revision folder contains work the child plans to revise from the previous unit. Teachers may also clean out the writing folder from the last unit and only leave these select pieces inside it. Using a colored pen helps the young writer and teacher to readily see the thinking and changes the child did. Learning to do the physical work of revision is an important step as we move students toward making their pieces better. Ultimately, we want writing that speaks to readers---that’s why we revise!
Identifying the heart of their piece and taking smaller steps through events are important strategies to improve their writing. One of the easiest places to start is with character action. Actions are the building blocks for show, not tell. Children can bring action alive by sharing what their hands, legs/feet and/or face were doing. This strategy helps children envision the actions specific to each event. In the last unit, we stressed the importance of rereading. Teach children not only to reread an entire piece, but to also reread small sections looking to revise something specifically.
Taking revision work into partnerships makes both the writer and, more importantly, the writing stronger. It is important to have students engage in conversation around the revisions they have made. These revision conversations help students hold onto what they have done as writers and the steps they have taken to improve their pieces.
