Web Writers

I. Briefly review the project form. Discuss the project theme, outline and time line; review the project and curriculum objectives.

One of our school improvement goals is student writing and literacy. We want to be able to showcase our students' writing while giving them an audience to write for. We have a school homepage and we are highlighting our student writing in and around our school. We would like to broaden their audience for display as well as for inviting responses to it. It is our plan to use technology to enhance our students' writing by giving them a real purpose to write for.

In Language Arts, students are expected to write in the 3 modes - Expressive, Transactional and Poetic. It is the Poetic mode that we want to focus on, namely story writing and poetry. A lot of this takes place in the classes throughout the school. We would like to take samples of these forms and post them regularly on our school's homepage. Students will be encouraged to submit pieces of their writing to share with others. Samples will be chosen from all grade levels for publication.

Writing will be completed using word processing. These writings will then be saved as html files. A web page will be developed to host the various writings throughout the year.

II. Show the audience the outcome of the project proposal.

Results and a tour of the project can be seen at: http://www.stmatthews.k12.nf.ca/WWRITERS.HTM

III. Briefly comment on any successes or problems that were encountered throughout the life of the project.

This project took some time to get up and running. Although people thought that it was a worthwhile project, it was not realized how easy it would be to participate and contribute to this. Samples of writing simply had to be submitted at each grade level and then uploaded to the Webwriters page by our computer club. Now that the site is up and running, it is easier to demonstrate the value of participation in this project. Students enjoyed seeing their writings on the Internet and had great pride in what they did.

IV. Comment on any aspects of the project that you would do differently.

This would receive a higher promotion with the students to get more excitement about the project. Initially, it was a promotion to the staff and the students got involved after the writings were online and displayed for them. It has to be more student-driven to get more involvement on their behalf. If there is a real excitement created by this, then the desire to write more and concentrate on producing higher quality writing will be the end result.

V. Comment on if and how the project can be expanded next year.

Now that the site is up and running, writings can be rotated on a regular basis so that all students can get the opportunity to display their writing on the internet. It is relatively easy to get these writings displayed now that all of the ground work has been laid. Some other writing links for students have been put on this page and it is hoped to get students involved in using these links to help improve their writing.