Creativity in Children’s Writing
Abstract
In this master thesis the author tests three different story writing approaches to determine which best prompts students’ creativity. The three approaches include: tall tales, actual experiences, and suggested topics. Twenty 6th grade students wrote creative stories in one of the three approaches. The researcher made it clear that students’ stories not be graded, and would not impact their grade report in any way. Three different teachers independently scored each story for its creativity. The researcher found that writing about actual experiences seemed to stimulate the most creativity from students. Tall tales yielded the same level of creativity as suggested topics, however both yielded less than actual experiences. The study also suggests that lower-performing students tended to write the most creative stories, while high-performing students tended to write the least creative stories.Description
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A Comparison of the Perception which Third-Grade Students and Sixth-Grade Students have of Themselves as WritersChildren learn to write at an early age, however, many children do not enjoy writing as an activity. This masters’ thesis investigates students’ opinions about writing, and compares the opinions of elementary students to those of middle school students. The author surveyed seventy-nine students from two 3rd grade classrooms and two 6th grade classrooms in western New York. The survey consisted of seventeen questions about how students felt about writing in the classroom. These surveys were then collected and sorted into three categories: positive, ambivalent, and negative. The researcher found that about 64% of 3rd grade students had a positive writing attitude, with 0% displaying a negative attitude. Sixth graders, however, had less positive feelings. Only about 40% of the 6th grade students had a positive writing attitude, while 9% had negative attitudes. The author concludes that teachers should not only strive to improve each student’s writing ability, but also their self-concepts as writers.
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Unleashing the Storyteller Within: Using an Integrated Learning Theory and Multimedia Approach to Designing a Digital Online Genre Fiction Writing WorkshopThe purpose of this creative, professional capstone project is to design the first module of a digital online genre fiction writing workshop using an integrated learning theory and multimedia approach. The module will eventually be expanded to a four module creative writing workshop geared toward people who’ve always wanted to write a genre fiction novel, but didn’t know where to start. The digital age has changed the way information is exchanged, researched, and learned. Our busy lives have made learning at a distance especially appealing, and with the advent of free, low-cost, and subscription based online learning sites such as Coursera, Udemy, and Lynda.com, online learning has grown in popularity. This creative, professional capstone project is the first step in creating an online genre fiction writing workshop that is intuitive and easy to navigate for learners of all digital literacy levels.
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Boys' Writing Genre ChoicesTeaching students according to their learning styles has become one of the most accepted approaches for effective instruction. The purpose of this action research was to discover what elementary boys do when given the opportunity to choose the genre of their own writing within writing workshop. More and more boys have resisted writing instruction and have slowly opted not to view themselves as writers. Boys' and girls' brains are structured differently and need different methods of instruction. Choice has been a motivating factor when encouraging boys to engage in any task. This is certainly true of writing. Students should view themselves as writers, so this study sought to find which genres were most enjoyable for males to write and how the opportunity to choose the genre changed participation in writing tasks. Six third grade boys were given opportunities to choose their genres and were observed during pull-out writing instruction. The participants also completed questionnaires to express thoughts about boys' writing and aspects of writing related to genres. Each participant was also interviewed by the researcher in order to elaborate on actual writing choices. The researcher gathered qualitative information about each student's decision-making process as each participant chose a genre and crafted his writing.
