At The Kite Academy Trust, we teach writing through the Talk for Writing programme.  The aim of Talk for Writing is to develop imaginative, creative and effective writers and this approach enables pupils to write independently for a variety of audiences and purposes.  A key feature of Talk for Writing is that pupils internalise the language structures needed to write through ‘talking the text’ or learning a text by heart.  Throughout one writing sequence, pupils move through three key phases: the imitation phase, the innovation phase and finally, the independent phase.

The imitation phase involves pupils learning and internalising a model text by ‘talking the text’ and creating a story map of simple images to aid them in learning the text by heart.  Pupils then analyse the model text, exploring the text structure, language and key grammatical features.

Once pupils are familiar with the model text, the teacher then leads them into creating their own versions of the text in the innovation phase.  This involves changing just one or several aspects of the internalised text, using their knowledge of the text structure.  While younger pupils will only change one aspect of the text, older pupils will further embellish, alter and manipulate the original text structure.

Finally, in the independent application and invention phase, pupils have an opportunity to apply the knowledge which has been taught and practised in an independent piece of writing.  In this phase, pupils will be supported in planning, drafting and revising their work independently.

For more information on the Talk for Writing aims and strategies, please click here.