the importance of creative writing to students

Greater Good Science Center • Magazine • In Action • In Education

How Creative Writing Can Increase Students’ Resilience

Many of my seventh-grade students do not arrive at school ready to learn. Their families often face financial hardship and live in cramped quarters, which makes it difficult to focus on homework. The responsibility for cooking and taking care of younger siblings while parents work often falls on these twelve year olds’ small shoulders. Domestic violence and abuse are also not uncommon.

To help traumatized students overcome their personal and academic challenges, one of our first jobs as teachers is to build a sense of community. We need to communicate that we care and that we welcome them into the classroom just as they are. One of the best ways I’ve found to connect with my students, while also nurturing their reading and writing skills, is through creative writing.

For the past three years, I’ve invited students in my English Language Development (ELD) classes to observe their thoughts, sit with their emotions, and offer themselves and each other compassion through writing and sharing about their struggles. Creating a safe, respectful environment in which students’ stories matter invites the disengaged, the hopeless, and the numb to open up. Students realize that nobody is perfect and nobody’s life is perfect. In this kind of classroom community, they can take the necessary risks in order to learn, and they become more resilient when they stumble.

Fostering a growth mindset

the importance of creative writing to students

One of the ways students can boost their academic performance and develop resilience is by building a growth mindset. Carol Dweck, Stanford University professor of psychology and author of the book Mindset , explains that people with a growth mindset focus on learning from mistakes and welcoming challenges rather than thinking they’re doomed to be dumb or unskillful. A growth mindset goes hand in hand with self-compassion: recognizing that everyone struggles and treating ourselves with kindness when we trip up.

One exercise I find very useful is to have students write a story about a time when they persevered when faced with a challenge—in class, sports, or a relationship. Some of the themes students explore include finally solving math problems, learning how to defend themselves, or having difficult conversations with parents.

I primed the pump by telling my students about something I struggled with—feeling left behind in staff meetings as my colleagues clicked their way through various computer applications. I confided that PowerPoint and Google Slides—tools (one might assume) that any teacher worth a paperweight has mastered—still eluded me. By admitting my deficiency to my students, asking for their help, and choosing to see the opportunity to remedy it every day in the classroom, I aimed to level the playing field with them. They may have been reading three or four grade levels behind, but they could slap a PowerPoint presentation together in their sleep.

For students, sharing their own stories of bravery, resilience, and determination brings these qualities to the forefront of their minds and helps solidify the belief that underlies a growth mindset: I can improve and grow . We know from research in neuroplasticity that when students take baby steps to achieve a goal and take pride in their accomplishments, they change their brains, growing new neural networks and fortifying existing ones. Neurons in the brain release the feel-good chemical dopamine, which plays a major role in motivating behavior toward rewards.

After writing about a few different personal topics, students choose one they want to publish on the bulletin boards at the back of the classroom. They learn to include the juicy details of their stories (who, what, when, where, why, and how), and they get help from their peers, who ask follow-up questions to prompt them to include more information. This peer editing builds their resilience in more ways than one—they make connections with each other by learning about each other’s lives, and they feel empowered by lending a hand.

In my experience, students are motivated to do this assignment because it helps them feel that their personal stories and emotions truly matter, despite how their other academics are going. One student named Alejandro chose to reflect on basketball and the persistence and time it took him to learn:

Hoops By Alejandro Gonzalez Being good takes time. One time my sister took me to a park and I saw people playing basketball. I noticed how good they were and decided I wanted to be like them. Still I told my sister that basketball looked hard and that I thought I couldn’t do it. She said,“You could do it if you tried. You’ll get the hang of it.” My dad bought me a backboard and hoop to play with. I was really happy, but the ball wasn’t making it in. Every time I got home from school, I would go straight to the backyard to play. I did that almost every day until little by little I was getting the hang of it. I also played with my friends. Every day after lunch we would meet at the basketball court to have a game. … I learned that you need to be patient and to practice a lot to get the hang of things. With a little bit of practice, patience, and hard work, anything is possible.

Originally, Alejandro wasn’t sure why he was in school and often lacked the motivation to learn. But writing about something he was passionate about and recalling the steps that led to his success reminded him of the determination and perseverance he had demonstrated in the past, nurturing a positive view of himself. It gave him a renewed sense of investment in learning English and eventually helped him succeed in his ELD class, as well.

Maintaining a hopeful outlook

Another way to build resilience in the face of external challenges is to shore up our inner reserves of hope —and I’ve found that poetry can serve as inspiration for this.

For the writing portion of the lesson, I invite students to “get inside” poems by replicating the underlying structure and trying their hand at writing their own verses. I create poem templates, where students fill in relevant blanks with their own ideas.

One poem I like to share is “So Much Happiness” by Naomi Shihab Nye. Its lines “Even the fact that you once lived in a peaceful tree house / and now live over a quarry of noise and dust / cannot make you unhappy” remind us that, despite the unpleasant events that occur in our lives, it’s our choice whether to allow them to interfere with our happiness. The speaker, who “love[s] even the floor which needs to be swept, the soiled linens, and scratched records,” has a persistently sunny outlook.

It’s unrealistic for students who hear gunshots at night to be bubbling over with happiness the next morning. Still, the routine of the school day and the sense of community—jokes with friends, a shared bag of hot chips for breakfast, and a creative outlet—do bolster these kids. They have an unmistakable drive to keep going, a life force that may even burn brighter because they take nothing for granted—not even the breath in their bodies, life itself.

Itzayana was one of those students who, due to the adversity in her life, seemed too old for her years. She rarely smiled and started the school year with a defiant approach to me and school in general, cursing frequently in the classroom. Itzayana’s version of “So Much Happiness” hinted at some of the challenges I had suspected she had in her home life:

It is difficult to know what to do with so much happiness. Even the fact that you once heard your family laughing and now hear them yelling at each other cannot make you unhappy. Everything has a life of its own, it too could wake up filled with possibilities of tamales and horchata and love even scrubbing the floor, washing dishes, and cleaning your room. Since there is no place large enough to contain so much happiness, help people in need, help your family, and take care of yourself. —Itzayana C.

Her ending lines, “Since there is no place large enough to contain so much happiness, / help people in need, help your family, and take care of yourself,” showed her growing awareness of the need for self-care as she continued to support her family and others around her. This is a clear sign of her developing resilience.

Poetry is packed with emotion, and writing their own poems allows students to grapple with their own often-turbulent inner lives. One student commented on the process, saying, “By writing poems, I’ve learned to be calm and patient, especially when I get mad about something dumb.” Another student showed pride in having her writing published; she reflected, “I feel good because other kids can use it for calming down when they’re angry.”

To ease students into the creative process, sometimes we also write poems together as a class. We brainstorm lines to include, inviting the silly as well as the poignant and creating something that represents our community.

Practicing kindness

Besides offering my students new ways of thinking about themselves, I also invite them to take kind actions toward themselves and others.

In the music video for “Give a Little Love” by Noah and the Whale, one young African American boy—who witnesses bullying at school and neglect in his neighborhood —decides to take positive action and whitewash a wall of graffiti. Throughout the video, people witness others’ random acts of kindness, and then go on to do their own bit.

“My love is my whole being / And I’ve shared what I could,” the lyrics say—a reminder that our actions speak louder than our words and do have an incredible impact. The final refrain in the song—“Well if you are (what you love) / And you do (what you love) /...What you share with the world is what it keeps of you”—urges the students to contribute in a positive way to the classroom, the school campus, and their larger community.

After watching the video, I ask students to reflect upon what kind of community they would like to be part of and what makes them feel safe at school. They write their answers—for example, not being laughed at by their peers and being listened to—on Post-it notes. These notes are used to create classroom rules. This activity sends a message early on that we are co-creating our communal experience together. Students also write their own versions of the lyrics, reflecting on different things you can give and receive—like kindness, peace, love, and ice cream.

Reaping the benefits

To see how creative writing impacts students, I invite them to rate their resilience through a self-compassion survey at the start of the school year and again in the spring. Last year, two-thirds of students surveyed increased in self-compassion; Alejandro grew his self-compassion by 20 percent. The program seems to work at developing their reading and writing skills, as well: At the middle of the school year, 40 percent of my students moved up to the next level of ELD, compared to 20 percent the previous year.

As a teacher, my goal is to meet students where they’re at and learn about their whole lives. Through creative writing activities, we create a community of compassionate and expressive learners who bear witness to the impact of trauma in each others’ experiences and together build resilience.

As a symbol of community and strength, I had a poster in my classroom of a boat at sea with hundreds of refugees standing shoulder to shoulder looking skyward. It’s a hauntingly beautiful image of our ability to risk it all for a better life, as many of my ELD students do. Recognizing our common humanity and being able to share about our struggles not only leads to some beautiful writing, but also some brave hearts.

About the Author

Laura Bean, M.F.A. , executive director of Mindful Literacy, consults with school communities to implement mindfulness and creative writing programs. She has an M.F.A. in Creative Writing and presented a mindful writing workshop at Bridging the Hearts and Minds of Youth Conference in San Diego in 2016.

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Creative Writing: What It Is and Why It Matters

By: Author Paul Jenkins

Posted on Published: January 13, 2023 - Last updated: January 15, 2023

Categories Writing

Writing can be intimidating for many people, but creative writing doesn’t have to be. Creative writing is a form of self-expression that allows writers to create stories, characters, and unique settings. But what exactly is creative writing? And why is it important in today’s society? Let’s explore this further.

How We Define Creative Writing

Creative writing is any form where writers can express their thoughts and feelings imaginatively. This type of writing allows authors to draw on their imagination when creating stories and characters and play with language and structure. While there are no boundaries in creative writing, most pieces will contain dialogue, description, and narrative elements.

The Importance of Creative Writing

Creative writing is important because:

It helps us express ourselves in ways we may not be able to do with other forms of communication.
It allows us to explore our creativity and think outside the box.
It can help us better understand our emotions by exploring them through storytelling or poetry.
Writing creatively can also provide much-needed escapism from everyday life, allowing us to escape into a world of our creation.
Creative writing helps us connect with others by sharing our experiences through stories or poems they can relate to. This way, we can gain insight into other people’s lives while giving them insight into ours.

Creative Writing: A Path to Mental and Emotional Wellness

Writing is more than just a way to express your thoughts on paper. It’s a powerful tool that can be used as a form of therapy. Creative writing has been shown to improve emotional and mental well-being.

Through creative writing, we can gain insight into our emotions, develop self-expression and communication skills, cultivate empathy and understanding of others, and boost our imagination and creativity.

Let’s examine how creative writing can relieve stress and emotional catharsis.

Stress Relief and Emotional Catharsis

Writing has the power to reduce stress levels significantly. Writing about our experiences or about things that are causing us anxiety or distress helps us to release those complicated feelings constructively. By expressing ourselves through creative writing, we can work through the emotions associated with stressful situations without having to confront them directly.

This is especially helpful for people who struggle to share their emotions verbally or in person.

Improved Communication and Self-Expression

Creative writing is also beneficial for improving communication skills. Through creative writing, we can explore our thoughts and feelings more intensely than by speaking them aloud. This allows us to think more clearly about what we want to say before actually saying it out loud or in written form, which leads to improved self-expression overall.

Additionally, writing out our thoughts before speaking aloud allows us to articulate ourselves better when communicating with others—which is essential for healthy personal and professional relationships.

Increased Empathy and Understanding of Others

Through creative writing, we can also increase our empathy towards others by exploring different perspectives on various topics that may be unfamiliar or uncomfortable for us—such as racism, homophobia, sexism, etc.—and allowing ourselves the opportunity to see the situation from someone else’s point of view without judgment or bias. This helps us become better communicators and more understanding individuals overall.

The Professional Benefits of Creative Writing

Creative writing is a powerful tool that can help you communicate better and more effectively in the professional world. It can also help you develop various skills that prove invaluable in many industries. Whether you’re looking to build your résumé or improve your communication, creative writing can effectively achieve both.

Let’s take a closer look at how creative writing can benefit your career.

Preparing Students for Careers in Writing, Editing, and Publishing

Creative writing is the perfect foundation for anyone interested in pursuing a career in writing, editing, or publishing. It teaches students the basics of grammar and composition while allowing them to express their ideas in imaginative ways.

Creative writing classes also allow students to learn from professionals who have experience as editors, agents, and publishers. They can use this knowledge to learn creative writing, refine their craft and gain valuable experience before entering the job market.

Improving Skills in Storytelling and Marketing for Various Careers

Creative writing teaches students to think critically about stories and craft compelling narratives that draw readers in. This skill is precious for those who wish to pursue careers outside traditional writing roles—such as marketing or advertising—where storytelling is key.

People who understand the fundamentals of creative writing will be able to create persuasive copy that resonates with readers and effectively conveys a message.

Enhancing Team Collaboration and Leadership Skills

Creative writing isn’t just about expressing yourself through words; it also provides an opportunity to practice working collaboratively with others on projects. Many creative writing classes require students to work together on group projects, which helps them develop essential teamwork skills such as communication, critical thinking, problem-solving, and creativity.

As they work together on these projects, they will also gain confidence in their ability to lead teams effectively—an invaluable asset no matter what industry they pursue after graduation.

Uncovering the Power of Creative Writing

Creative writing has become an increasingly powerful force in shaping our society. Creative writing has many uses, from preserving cultural heritage to promoting social change.

Preserving Cultural Heritage with Creative Writing

Creative writing has long been used to preserve and share cultural heritage stories. This is done through fictional stories or poetry that explore a particular culture or group’s history, values, and beliefs. By weaving these stories in an engaging way, writers can bring a culture’s history and traditions to life for readers worldwide. This helps bridge cultural gaps by providing insight into what makes each culture unique.

Promoting Social Change & Activism with Creative Writing

Creative writing can also be used for activism and social change. Writers can craft stories that help promote awareness about important issues such as poverty, race relations, gender equality, climate change, and more.

With the power of words, writers can inspire readers to take action on these issues and work towards creating positive change in their communities.

Through creative writing, writers can raise awareness about important topics while fostering empathy toward individuals who may be facing difficult or challenging situations.

Fostering Creativity & Innovation with Creative Writing

Finally, creative writing can foster creativity and innovation in various fields. For example, businesses can use creative copywriting techniques to create compelling content that captures the attention of customers or potential investors.

Aspiring entrepreneurs can use storytelling techniques when pitching their ideas or products to potential partners or investors to make their cases more persuasive and memorable.

By harnessing the power of words through creative writing techniques, businesses can create content that resonates with their target audience while inspiring them to take action on whatever message they’re trying to convey. It often aids the overall creative process.

Frequently Asked Questions

What are the benefits of creative writing.

Creative writing has many benefits, both for the writer and the reader. For the writer, it can be therapeutic, helping them to explore their emotions and better understand themselves. It can also be used as entertainment or communication, allowing them to share their ideas with the world. For the reader, creative writing can provide enjoyment, escapism, and insights into the human condition.

How can I improve my creative writing skills?

There are several ways you can improve your creative writing skills. Firstly, make sure you allow yourself time to write regularly. Use a writing prompt to inspire a short story. Secondly, read as much as you can; great writers are also great readers. Thirdly, experiment with different styles and genres to find one that suits you best. Fourthly, join a writers’ group, writing workshop, or creative writing program to get feedback from other writers. Finally, keep a journal to track your progress and reflect on your work as a creative writer.

What is the importance of imagery in creative writing?

Imagery is an important element of creative writing, as it helps to create a more vivid picture for the reader. By using sensory and descriptive language, writers can transport readers into their stories and help them relate to their characters or themes. Imagery can bring a scene alive with detail and evoke emotion by helping readers create strong visual images in their minds. Furthermore, imagery can help make stories more memorable by giving readers a deeper connection with the characters or setting.

What are the elements of creative writing?

The elements of creative writing include plot, character, dialogue, setting, theme, and point of view. The plot is the structure or main storyline, while the character is the personage involved in this story. Dialogue includes conversations between characters to give insight into their emotions and relationships. Setting refers to the place or time in which a story takes place, while theme explores deeper meanings behind a story’s narrative. Finally, point of view defines how readers experience a story through first-person or third-person omniscient narration.

What’s the difference between creative writing and other types of writing?

The main difference between creative writing and other types of writing is that it allows the writer to create their own story, characters, settings, and themes. Creative writing also encourages writers to be inventive with their style and use descriptive language to evoke emotion or bring stories alive in readers’ minds. Other academic or technical writing types typically involve more research-based information and are usually more objective in their presentation. Additionally, most forms of non-creative writing will have stricter rules regarding grammar, structure, and syntax.

What is the golden rule of creative writing?

The golden rule of creative writing is to show, not tell. It’s the core creative writing skill. When it comes to creative writing, it’s essential to use descriptive language that immerses readers in the story and allows them to experience the events through their emotions and imaginations. This can be done through metaphors, similes, sensory language, and vivid imagery.

How important is creativity in writing?

Creativity is essential in writing as it allows writers to craft a unique story and evoke emotion from the reader. Creativity can bring stories alive with fresh perspectives and exciting plot lines while creating an escape for readers and giving them more profound insights into the human condition. Writers who combine creativity with technical aspects such as grammar, structure, language usage, and flow will create pieces that capture their audience’s attention and provide an enjoyable reading experience.

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Objectives of Creative Writing

Delve into the "Objectives of Creative Writing" and explore the multifaceted aims of this expressive art form. Uncover the diverse purposes, entertainment, education, and social commentary, that creative writing serves. Gain a deeper understanding of how creative writing transcends mere words, providing insight into the human experience.

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In this blog, we delve into the Objectives of Creative Writing and its purposes, shedding light on its significance in our lives. From the art of storytelling to the therapeutic release of emotions, Creative Writing is a dynamic and versatile discipline that has enchanted both writers and readers for generations.

Table of C ontents

1) Objectives of Creative Writing

a) Self-expression

b) Entertainment

c) Education

d) Social commentary

2) Purpose of Creative Writing

3) Conclusion

Objectives of Creative Writing

Creative Writing serves as a versatile and dynamic form of expression, encompassing a range of objectives that go beyond mere storytelling. Here, we delve into the fundamental objectives that drive creative writers to craft their narratives and explore the depths of human creativity:

Self-expression

Creative Writing is, at its core, a powerful means of self-expression. It provides writers with a unique canvas upon which they can paint the colours of their innermost thoughts, emotions, and experiences. This objective of Creative Writing is deeply personal and cathartic, as it allows individuals to articulate their inner worlds in ways that spoken language often cannot.

Through the act of writing, authors can explore the complexities of their own psyche, giving shape and substance to feelings that might otherwise remain elusive. Whether it's capturing the euphoria of love, the depths of sorrow, or the intricacies of human relationships, Creative Writing serves as a conduit for unfiltered self-expression.

Moreover, Creative Writing grants the freedom to experiment with different writing styles, tones, and literary devices, enabling writers to find their unique voices. In the process, it cultivates self-awareness, self-discovery, and a deeper understanding of one's own experiences. For many, the act of putting pen to paper or fingers to keyboard is a therapeutic release, a way to make sense of the chaos within, and an avenue for personal growth and reflection. In essence, Creative Writing empowers individuals to share their inner narratives with the world, fostering connection and empathy among fellow readers who may find solace, resonance, or inspiration in the tales of others.

Entertainment

One of the primary and most recognisable objectives of Creative Writing is to entertain. Creative writers craft stories, poems, and essays that are designed to captivate readers, transporting them to different worlds, evoking emotions, and engaging their imaginations.

At its heart, Creative Writing is the art of storytelling, and storytelling has been an integral part of human culture since time immemorial. Whether it's a thrilling mystery, a heartwarming romance, or a thought-provoking science fiction narrative, Creative Writing offers an escape from the ordinary into realms of fantasy, intrigue, and wonder. It weaves narratives with vivid imagery, compelling characters, and gripping plots, all working together to hold the reader's attention.

Through Creative Writing, authors create emotional connections between the reader and the characters, fostering a sense of empathy and identification. As readers immerse themselves in a well-crafted story, they experience a wide range of emotions, from laughter to tears, joy to sorrow. It is this emotional journey that makes Creative Writing such a potent form of entertainment, offering readers a pleasurable escape from reality, a chance to explore new perspectives and a memorable experience that lingers long after the last page is turned.

Education

Creative Writing is not only a source of entertainment but also a powerful educational tool. It engages writers in a process that goes beyond storytelling; it encourages research, critical thinking, and the development of effective communication skills.

Writers often embark on extensive research journeys to create authentic settings, characters, and plots. This quest for accuracy and depth enriches their knowledge in various fields, ranging from history and science to culture and psychology. As they delve into their chosen topics, writers gain valuable insights and expand their intellectual horizons.

Furthermore, Creative Writing teaches readers important life lessons and imparts knowledge. It introduces them to diverse perspectives, cultures, and experiences, fostering empathy and understanding. Reading well-crafted works can be an enlightening experience, challenging preconceptions and encouraging critical thinking. It also enhances vocabulary, language skills, and the ability to express thoughts and emotions effectively.

In educational settings, Creative Writing nurtures creativity, encourages self-expression, and helps students develop essential communication and analytical skills. This educational objective of Creative Writing underscores its value as a holistic tool for personal and intellectual growth, making it an integral part of both formal and informal learning processes.

Social commentary

Creative Writing often serves as a potent medium for social commentary, embodying a powerful objective that transcends mere storytelling. Through the art of narrative, poets, novelists, and essayists alike can engage in meaningful discourse about society's values, issues, and challenges.

Writers use their creative works to shine a light on important societal concerns, question norms, and provoke thought. They employ allegory, satire, symbolism, and other literary techniques to critique, challenge, or explore various aspects of the human condition and the world we inhabit. Whether addressing issues such as inequality, injustice, environmental crises, or political corruption, Creative Writing can be a catalyst for change.

By portraying the complexities of real-life situations and characters, writers encourage readers to reflect on their own lives and the world around them. This introspection can lead to increased awareness and, ideally, inspire action to address pressing societal issues.

In essence, the social commentary objective of Creative Writing underscores its role as a mirror reflecting the world's triumphs and flaws. It empowers writers to be advocates for change, storytellers with a purpose, and champions of social justice, ensuring that Creative Writing continues to be a powerful force for positive transformation in society.

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Purpose of Creative Writing

Creative Writing serves a multitude of purposes, making it a dynamic and invaluable art form. Beyond its objectives, Creative Writing plays a crucial role in our lives and society, contributing to personal growth, cultural preservation, inspiration, and connection.

Catharsis

One of the profound and therapeutic purposes of Creative Writing is catharsis. This aspect of Creative Writing is deeply personal, as it offers writers a means to release pent-up emotions, confront inner turmoil, and find a sense of closure.

Through the act of writing, individuals can explore their innermost thoughts and feelings in a safe and controlled environment. Whether it's grappling with grief, heartbreak, trauma, or any other emotional burden, Creative Writing provides an outlet to give shape and voice to those complex emotions. It allows writers to dissect their experiences, providing a space for self-reflection and healing.

The process of transforming raw emotions into words can be both liberating and transformative. It can provide a sense of relief, allowing writers to gain insight into their emotional landscapes. Moreover, sharing these emotions through writing can foster connection and empathy among readers who may have experienced similar feelings or situations, creating a sense of community and understanding.

Ultimately, catharsis through Creative Writing is a journey of self-discovery and emotional release, offering solace, healing, and a path towards personal growth and resilience. It highlights the profound impact of the written word in helping individuals navigate the complexities of their own inner worlds.

Cultural preservation

Creative Writing serves a noble purpose beyond personal expression and entertainment—it plays a vital role in cultural preservation. This objective of Creative Writing involves safeguarding the rich tapestry of human heritage, traditions, and stories for future generations.

Cultures are defined by their narratives, folklore, and historical accounts. Creative writers, whether chroniclers of oral traditions or authors of historical fiction are the custodians of these invaluable cultural treasures. They document the stories passed down through generations, ensuring they are not lost to time.

Through Creative Writing, cultures are celebrated, languages are preserved, and unique identities are immortalised. Folktales, myths, and legends are retold, keeping them relevant and alive. These narratives provide insights into the beliefs, values, and wisdom of a society, fostering a deeper understanding of its roots.

Moreover, Creative Writing bridges cultural divides by sharing stories from diverse backgrounds, fostering empathy and appreciation for the richness of human experience. In this way, Creative Writing becomes a bridge across generations, connecting the past with the present and preserving the collective memory of humanity for a brighter future.

Inspiration

One of the transformative purposes of Creative Writing is to inspire others. It is a beacon that shines brightly, guiding aspiring writers and kindling the creative flames within them. Through the power of storytelling and the written word, Creative Writing has the remarkable ability to ignite the spark of imagination and motivation.

Exceptional works of literature often leave an indelible mark on readers. They can evoke a sense of wonder, curiosity, and passion, motivating individuals to embark on their own creative journeys. Many renowned authors found their calling through the inspiration they drew from the words of others, perpetuating a beautiful cycle of creativity.

Creative Writing serves as a testament to human potential, showcasing the boundless depths of imagination and the infinite possibilities of language. It encourages individuals to explore their unique perspectives, cultivate their voices, and craft stories that resonate with the human experience.

For writers and readers alike, Creative Writing is a wellspring of inspiration, a reminder that the world of imagination is boundless and that the written word has the power to shape minds, hearts, and the course of history. Through the act of creation and the sharing of stories, Creative Writing continues to inspire generations to dream, create, and connect with the world in profound ways.

Connection

Creative Writing holds a remarkable purpose - it fosters connections. It serves as a bridge between authors and readers, offering a means of understanding, empathy, and human connection that transcends time, space, and cultural boundaries.

When readers immerse themselves in a well-crafted story, they embark on an emotional journey alongside the characters. This shared experience creates a bond between the author and the reader as both parties navigate the complexities of the human condition together. Readers can see the world through the eyes of characters from diverse backgrounds and cultures, fostering empathy and understanding.

Furthermore, Creative Writing connects individuals across generations. Literary classics, for example, allow us to connect with the thoughts and emotions of people who lived centuries ago. These timeless works offer insights into the universal aspects of the human experience, reminding us of our shared humanity.

Creative Writing also has the power to connect people in the present. Through reading and discussion, individuals can form communities, share their interpretations, and engage in meaningful dialogue. Book clubs, literary events, and online forums all provide platforms for people to connect over their love for literature.

Conclusion

In conclusion, Creative Writing is a multifaceted art form with diverse objectives and purposes. From self-expression and entertainment to education, social commentary, catharsis, cultural preservation, inspiration, and connection, it enriches our lives in myriad ways. This timeless craft continues to captivate, inspire, and connect us, shaping our world through the power of words.

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Why learn creative writing? Truthfully, creative writing is one of the most misunderstood disciplines in the 21st century. When people think of a creative writing course, they often imagine a group of lofty, out-of-touch people who wear argyle sweater vests and have unproductive conversations about abstract concepts.

In reality, nothing could be further from the truth: the best writing classes remain engaged with the real world, and the skills gained in a creative writing course apply to nearly every facet of daily life.

If you’re wondering whether it’s worth picking up a course in fiction, nonfiction, or poetry, we have five reasons to learn creative writing. But first, let’s talk about what actually happens in a creative writing course.

The Basics of a Writing Workshop

Whether you’re enrolled in a poetry, fiction, or nonfiction writing class, you can expect the following writing process – at least in a quality writing course like the ones at Writers.com.

Weekly prompts and writing exercises to sharpen the precision and necessity of each word you use.
Constructive critiques from a community of writers who are each growing their writing skills alongside you.
A creative space to explore new ideas, experiment with language, and arrange words in new and exciting ways.
Focused writing instruction from a master of the craft.

The benefits of creative writing come from engaging with the course material, the writing prompts, and the other class members. These elements help you become a better writer, both in creative realms and in everyday life. How? No matter what form of writing, a creative writing class pushes you to connect ideas and create effective narratives using the best words – and that skill translates into real world success.

The Benefits of Creative Writing

1. why learn creative writing: improved self-expression.

Improving your writing skills leads to stronger communication. When you practice finding the right word in a story or poem, you engage the same parts of your brain that are active in everyday writing and speaking. A creative writing course subconsciously turns you into a more effective communicator.

The importance of precise language and self-advocacy translates well into both interpersonal relationships and working environments. Take it from this expert on how writing and self-advocacy results in career and leadership success.

2. Why Learn Creative Writing: Job Success

This brings us to our next point: great writing leads to job success. Of course, your boss probably isn’t expecting you to write emails in the form of a short story or a sonnet – though if they are expecting this, you have a pretty cool boss.

In reality, almost every job requires some sort of written work, whether that’s simple written communication or something more elaborate, like publishing data or marketing materials. In a creative writing class, you practice the style and grammar rules necessary for effective writing, both within the realms of literature and in career-related writing. Sharpening your writing and creativity skills might just land you your next promotion.

3. Why Learn Creative Writing: Improved Thinking Skills

Strong writing leads to strong thinking. No matter what type of writing you pursue, learning how to write is another form of learning how to think.

That might seem like a bold claim, so think about it this way. Without language, our thoughts wouldn’t have form. We might not need language to think “I’m hungry” or “I like cats,” but when it comes to more abstract concepts, language is key. How would you think about things like justice, revenge, or equality without the words to express them?

When you hone in on your ability to find choice, specific words, and when you work on the skills of effective storytelling and rhetoric , you improve your ability to think in general. Good writing yields great thinking!

4. Why Learn Creative Writing: Empathy

Reading and writing both rely on empathy, especially when it comes to being an effective workshop participant. When we read and write stories, we situate ourselves in the shoes of other people; when we read and write poetry, we let language navigate us through emotion.

The importance of creative writing relies on empathy. We practice empathy whenever we listen to another person’s life story, when someone tells us about their day, and when we sit down with a client or work partner. When we write, we practice the ability to listen as well as to speak, making us more effective communicators and more compassionate human beings.

5. Why Learn Creative Writing: It’s Fun!

In case you’re not convinced that a writing course is right for you, let’s clarify one more fact: creative writing is fun. Whether you’re in a fiction writing course, starting a memoir, crafting a poem, or writing for the silver screen, you’re creating new worlds and characters. In the sandbox of literature, you’re in control, and when you invest yourself into the craft of writing, something beautiful emerges.

The Importance of Creative Writing

Simply put, creative writing helps us preserve our humanity. What better medium to explore the human experience?

To learn creative writing, like any art form, requires compassion, contemplation, and curiosity. Writers preserve the world as they observe it in stories and poetry, and they imagine a better world by creating it in their works.

Through the decades, literature has explored society’s profound changes. Literary eons like the Naturalist movement and the Beat poets responded to the increase in Western Industrialization. Confessional poets like Virginia Woolf helped transform poetry into a medium for emotional exploration and excavation. And, genre movements like the cyberpunk writers of science fiction helped popularize the idea of an “information economy.”

Thus, the importance of creative writing lies in its ability to describe the world through an honest and unfiltered lens. Anyone who engages in creative writing, no matter the genre or style, helps us explore the human experience, share new ideas, and advocate for a better society. Whether you write your stories for yourself or share them with a wide audience, creative writing makes the world a better place.

Jobs for Creative Writers

Because creative writing isn’t a STEM discipline, many people don’t think that learning it will help their job prospects. Why learn creative writing if it doesn’t make any money?

In fact, nothing could be further from the truth. Creative writing skills are much sought after on resumes, since both creativity and the ability to write are soft skills in decline. Additionally, if you’re considering a career change—or ready to start one!—these are some popular jobs for creative writers.

Average Starting Salary: $51,000
Demand: High
Skills needed: creativity, grammar, timeliness

Copywriters help companies put their branding into words. A copywriter might write emails, blogs, website content, or ad copy that encompasses the company’s voice and purpose. Copywriting requires you to write in a mix of styles and forms, flexing your writing muscles in new and exciting ways.

Grant Writer

Average Starting Salary: $50,000
Skills needed: storytelling, research, argumentation

Nonprofits and research facilities rely on local and national grants to fund their projects. Grant writers help secure that funding, writing engaging grants that tell the organization’s story in an engaging, tailored, and convincing way. Creative writers will enjoy the opportunity to tell a meaningful story and create positive community change through this career.

Communications/Public Relations Specialist

Skills needed: creativity, communications, social media

A communications specialist helps drive a company’s image through various social channels. They may help create a positive narrative for their company through blogs, journalist outreach, social media, and other public-facing avenues. Much like copywriting, a PR specialist helps weave an effective story for a company.

Average Starting Salary: $55,000
Demand: Medium/High
Skills needed: creativity, storytelling, organization, self-reliance

The dream job for many writers is to write and sell books. Being a novelist is an admirable career choice—and also requires the most work. Not only do you have to write your stories, but you also have to market yourself in the literary industry and maintain a social presence so that publishers and readers actually read your work. It’s a tough business, but also incredibly rewarding!

Reasons to Learn Creative Writing: Finding a Writing Community

Finally, creative writing communities make the writing struggle worth it. The relationships you foster with other creative writers can last a lifetime, as no other group of people has the same appreciation for the written word. Creative writing communities create transformative experiences and encourage growth in your writing; if there’s one reason to study creative writing craft, it’s the friendships you make in the process.

You don’t need a class to start writing, but it’s never a waste of time to learn the tools of the trade. Creative writing requires the skills that can help you in everyday life, and a creative writing course can help.

At Writers.com, we believe that creative writing can transform both individual lives and the world at large. See the importance of creative writing for yourself: check out what makes our creative writing courses different , then take a look at our upcoming course calendar today.

Sean Glatch

Would like to apply for a course to write a novel.

I’d be happy to help! Please email [email protected] with any questions, and we’ll find the right course for your writing.

[…] Sean. “Why Learn Creative Writing.” writers.com. June 7, 2020. https://writers.com/why-learn-creative-writing . Accessed November 7, […]

[…] And last of all it’s fun! I hope to live my life doing the things I love, with like-minded creative people who I love. I have many exciting things upcoming as I continue with the process of completing my first novel, Les Année Folles, such as publishing to my first magazine, journal, and working on the millions of short story ideas I have stored in my head. Stay tuned! References: Glatch, S. (2020, June 7). WHY LEARN CREATIVE WRITING? Retrieved from Writers.com: https://writers.com/why-learn-creative-writing […]

Why Students Should Write in All Subjects

Writing improves learning by consolidating information in long-term memory, researchers explain. Plus, five engaging writing activities to use in all subjects.

An illustration of the inside of a mind while writing

For Kyle Pahigian, a 10th-grade math teacher at University Park Campus School in Massachusetts, a lesson on congruent triangles doesn’t start with calculators and protractors. Instead, she hands her students a treasure map and asks them to write detailed directions—using landmarks as a guide—to the buried treasure.

“I won’t tell the kids right away, ‘Today we’re going to learn about triangle congruence theorems,’” said Pahigian. “I want them to instead view it as them experimenting with something and doing something that they feel like they’re really good at.” Students often feel intimidated by math, and transforming the activity into a writing exercise eases some of the anxiety of introducing difficult concepts, she said.

In Pahigian’s math class, writing is regularly used as a learning strategy, one that gives her a window into her students’ thinking. “I like to do low-stakes writing when we’re coming up with definitions,” said Pahigian. Instead of telling her students what a polygon is, for example, she’ll show them a set of polygons and a set of non-polygons, and ask them, “What do you notice? What differences do you see?” Students spend a few minutes writing down their answers, and then join groups to compare responses.

“It’s really interesting and fun for me to read what they’ve written, because I can see all the questions. I can see the process,” said Pahigian.

A recent study sheds light on why writing is such a beneficial activity—not just in subjects typically associated with writing, like history and English, but across all subjects. Professor Steve Graham and his colleagues at Arizona State University’s Teachers College analyzed 56 studies looking at the benefits of writing in science, social studies, and math and found that writing “reliably enhanced learning” across all grade levels. While teachers commonly ask students to write about a topic in order to assess how well they understand the material, the process of writing also improves a student’s ability to recall information, make connections between different concepts, and synthesize information in new ways. In effect, writing isn’t just a tool to assess learning, it also promotes it.

Strengthening Memories

Why is writing effective? “Writing about content material facilitates learning by consolidating information in long-term memory,” explain Graham and his colleagues, describing a process known as the retrieval effect . As previous research has shown , information is quickly forgotten if it’s not reinforced, and writing helps to strengthen a student’s memories of the material they’re learning.

It’s the same cognitive mechanism that explains why practice tests are effective : In a 2014 study, students who took low-stakes practice tests in science and history classes scored 16 percentage points higher on their final exams than students who simply studied the material. “Practicing retrieval of recently studied information enhances the likelihood of the learner retrieving that information in the future,” the researchers of the 2014 study said.

Writing about a topic also encourages students to process information at a deeper level. Answering multiple-choice or short-answer questions may help with factual recall, but putting thoughts on paper encourages students to evaluate different ideas, weighing the importance of each one and considering the order they should be presented in, Graham and his colleagues write. By doing so, students may make new connections between ideas, ones they may not have made when initially learning the information.

A Metacognitive Tool

Students often believe that they understand a topic, but if they’re asked to write it down—and explain it—gaps in their understanding may be revealed. One of the most effective writing strategies that Graham and his colleagues found was metacognitive prompting, in which students are asked not only to recall information but also to apply what they’ve learned to different contexts by thinking about multiple sides of a position or making predictions based on what they currently know. For example, instead of simply reading about ecosystems in a textbook, students can write about their own impact by examining how much trash their household produces or the environmental impact of producing the food they eat.

5 Writing Strategies to Use in Any Subject

Here are a variety of ideas teachers have shared with Edutopia in recent years on incorporating writing into a variety of subjects.

“I wonder” journals: At Crellin Elementary School in Oakland, Maryland, teachers encouraged students to ask “I wonder” questions to push their learning beyond the classroom. After visiting a local barn and garden, for example, Dave Miller realized his fifth-grade students had more questions about animals and plants than he had time to answer, so he had them write down anything they were confused or curious about, which helped him plan future lessons and experiments.

“If they don’t wonder, ‘How would we ever survive on the moon?’ then that’s never going to be explored,” said Dana McCauley, Crellin’s principal. “But that doesn’t mean they should stop wondering, because wonderings lead to thinking outside the box, which makes them critical thinkers. As they try to figure it out, and reflect on what they’re doing, that’s where it all ties together for them. That’s where all that learning occurs—where all the connections start being made.”

Travel journals: Every student at Normal Park Museum Magnet, a K–8 school in Chattanooga, Tennessee, created a travel journal to chart their learning. These journals included not only charts, drawings, and graphic organizers, but also writing and reflection pieces that capture students’ learning about a topic.

When fifth-grade teacher Denver Huffstutler began a unit on earth science, he asked his students to imagine they were explorers looking for a new world that could sustain life. In their travel journal, they kept track of everything they were learning, from the impact of man-made disasters to their designs and calculations for a manned rocket that could reach distant planets.

Low-stakes writing: Writing can be daunting, so teachers at University Park Campus School used daily low-stakes writing activities to foster student voice, self-confidence, and critical thinking skills—a school-wide strategy used in every subject.

“The most important thing about it for me is that it’s not censored, and it’s not too highly structured,” said seventh-grade science teacher James Kobialka. “It’s about them getting their own ideas down, and then being able to interact with those ideas, change them, and revise them if they’re not correct.”

For example, when Kobialka’s students were learning about the conservation of mass, he didn’t start by defining it—he showed them a picture and asked, “What do you notice about the atoms on both sides? How can you explain that?” Students wrote down their observations, and the entire class came up with a definition. “From there,” he said, “once that consensus is formed, I’ll ask somebody to write it on the board, and we’ll talk about the key concepts.”

Student-created magazines: In Alessandra King’s algebra class, students created a magazine with dozens of articles about real world applications of math. For each article, they selected a primary source—an article from Scientific American , for example—read it closely, and then wrote a summary. Students wrote about a range of topics, from gerrymandering to fractals in Jackson Pollock’s paintings to invisibility cloaks.

“Effective writing clarifies and organizes a student’s thoughts, and the slow pace of writing is conducive to student learning because it allows them to reason carefully to make sure they’re correct before they state their thoughts,” King wrote. “Studies have shown that writing is valuable specifically for the math classroom—for example, it seems that a student’s ability to explain concepts in writing is related to the ability to comprehend and apply them.”

Creative writing: Former teachers Ed Kang and Amy Schwartzbach-Kang incorporated storytelling and creative writing into their after-school program’s science lessons. For example, they asked students to imagine a creature that could survive in a local habitat —the Chicago River, in their case. What color would it be? What features would help it to survive and defend itself? How would it hunt its prey? Students then wrote a story about their creature that combined science concepts with creative storytelling.

“There’s brain science to support using stories to help kids engage with content and create personal meaning,” explained Kang, who has a Ph.D. in neuroscience. “Listening to facts mainly stimulates the two language-processing areas of the brain. However, when we listen to a story, additional parts of the brain are also activated—regions involved with our senses and motor movements help listeners actually ‘feel’ the descriptions.”

Creativity and Innovation in the Writing Classroom

Learn more about how to teach creativity and innovation along with, and as an important part of, traditional writing and research skills.

“You can’t use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have.” —Maya Angelou

Creativity is fundamental to the teaching of writing. Although WR 153 focuses specifically on creativity and innovation, all WR courses ask students to approach their reading, viewing, writing, and research in creative ways. One important approach to creativity is “design thinking,” which emphasizes that creativity is a non-linear, iterative process. Design thinking is based on two foundational assumptions:

Everyone can be creative.
Creativity can be taught.

The principles of design thinking can be used in any WR course to teach students that creativity is a process of asking questions, using multiple strategies and approaches in answering those questions, taking risks in conceiving and executing original work, developing and refining ideas in response to feedback, and learning from productive failure. The metacognitive aspects of design thinking invite students to think about their own creative processes and identify factors that promote creativity.

Although WR 153 is structured by the steps of the design process (understand, empathize, define, ideate, prototype, test, assess/reflect), all WR courses can benefit from incorporating elements of design thinking and an emphasis on creativity and innovation. Approaching writing instruction in this way can:

Increase student engagement by focusing on creative responses to problems that students care about;
Give students a sense of agency as a result of greater choice in what to write and how to write about it;
Encourage taking intellectual risks and reward productive failure as a means of learning;
Help students develop skills that are transferrable to other academic situations and their professional lives; and
Enhance students’ personal lives by allowing them to learn about themselves and their own creative potential.

Principles of Design Thinking

Design thinking is a non-linear, iterative approach to creativity that involves between three and seven steps. Although it is based on theories of design practice that go back to the early twentieth century, it has most recently been popularized by the design firm IDEO and the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford, commonly known as the d.school. The process involves understanding the issues involved in a design project, empathizing with the audience for an end product, defining the scope of the project, generating ideas for and creating prototypes of the product, testing and assessing those ideas and prototypes, and revisiting the steps of the design process until a final product is created.

The complete set of seven steps can be applied to the writing process in a WR course:

Understand: Students develop a foundation for their work by exploring issues and approaches relevant to the course topic, as well as previous work in the field.

Empathize: Students practice empathy by demonstrating their awareness and understanding of the audience for whom they write or create.

Define: Based on their observations and insights, students articulate a problem or question that will motivate their work over the course of the semester.

Ideate: Students generate new ideas and possible solutions by challenging assumptions and engaging in a variety of creative activities.

Prototype: Students start to create solutions and implement their ideas into written, digital or other forms in order to capture ideas, but also redefine choices.

Test: Students share drafts with others in order to gain feedback and insight into improving final versions.

Assess/Reflect: Students reflect on and evaluate their peers’ and their own processes and final outcomes.

The steps of the design thinking process are not meant to be followed in a rigid way. They should be flexible and customizable to the particular project: students may need to define, ideate, and prototype multiple times and in various modes/genres before they are ready to create a final draft. The skills students gain in going though these steps should be transferrable to other projects and courses.

Learn more about design thinking:

“What is Design Thinking and Why Is It So Popular?” by Rikke Friis Dam and Teo Yu Siang provides an overview of design thinking.
David Kelly of IDEO explains the history of design thinking in “How to Design Breakthrough Inventions,” an interview with 60 Minutes .
“How to Solve Problems Like a Designer,” which includes an interview with Tim Brown of IDEO, explains the basic principles of design thinking.

Understand and Empathize

The first step of the design process asks students to understand not only the course material, but also the resources necessary for their particular project. Since this usually involves additional reading/viewing, the “understand” step is part of the research and information literacy component of WR15X. Assignments that focus on this step may include conducting library or online research, categorizing research material using BEAM/BEAT, and creating annotated bibliographies.

Define, Ideate, and Prototype

Before they begin the process of generating ideas, it is often useful for students to define, at least in a preliminary way, what question or problem their paper/project is addressing. Assignments that help students define their projects may include questionnaires that ask students to state what they intend to work on and why, as well as more formal paper/project proposals.

In the IDEO design process, the goal of ideation is to generate a multitude of ideas without rejecting those that may seem impractical or even silly. Ideas can be rejected later, after a sufficient number of ideas have been generated. The most common ideation assignment involves various forms of brainstorming, often in teams. Ideas should be written down in some way, such as on sticky notes or index cards. To encourage divergent thinking in the brainstorming process, consider posting some fundamental principles in the classroom, such as these from IDEO:

Defer judgment.
Encourage wild ideas.
Stay focused on the topic.
Build on the ideas of others .

In the IDEO design process, prototypes are models that can be easily revised and even discarded if necessary. Prototypes for writing courses might include outlines, storyboards, slide decks, oral or video presentations, and preliminary drafts. Prototypes should be tested and assessed in some way that allows for reconsideration and revision before students turn in their final products.

Learn more about brainstorming and prototyping:

“What is Brainstorming?” by Rikke Friis Dam and Teo Yu Siang provides helpful information and ideas for the ideation step of the design process.
This example of “Brainstorming at IDEO” shows one popular way of brainstorming with sticky notes.

Test and Assess/Reflect

The final steps of the design process, testing and assessing/reflecting, are not meant to be the final steps in completing a student’s paper/project. After testing and assessing a prototype, students will likely need to reconsider and revise their papers/projects, which will take them back to earlier steps—they may need to conduct further research, generate additional ideas, or refine their prototypes. The design process is meant to be iterative, with students returning to steps in the process as needed until they have completed a final draft.

Just as designers test their prototypes, students should test drafts of their papers/projects by sharing them with others. Assignments that focus on this step usually involve workshopping with one or more peers, but testing may also include making an oral or video presentation to the class, meeting with the professor or a writing tutor, or sharing the student’s work with any other reader/viewer capable of providing feedback. Students may also test their papers/projects using techniques such as reverse outlining to assess the strength and clarity of their arguments.

The final step in the design process, assessing the student’s work, may lead back to any earlier step as students come to understand what they still need to work on to complete their papers/projects. This step may also involve the broader metacognitive task of reflecting on the student’s creative process. Assignments that focus on this step may include a variety of reflective exercises, including a final reflection for the course.

A Note on Assessment

“Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.” —Samuel Beckett

Because WR 153 courses can include such a wide range of papers and project, contract grading is recommended. Other WR courses that incorporate creativity and innovation may also wish to use contract grading, either for specific assignments or the course as a whole. More information on contract grading can be found here .

An important component of creativity and innovation is productive failure. We learn to create new things or develop new skills by failing and trying again until we succeed. Productive failure is failure that leads to new knowledge, insight, or innovation. Courses that focus on creativity can encourage productive failure by requiring prototypes that will be reconsidered and revised extensively, asking students to share examples of failure as valuable learning experiences, and assigning reflective work on how students have grown through failure over the course of the semester.

Learn more about productive failure:

Both readings below argue for the importance of productive failure. The Burger article contains specific examples of how to validate and reward productive failure in the classroom.

“Next Time, Fail Better” by Paula M. Krebs, The Chronicle of Higher Education , May 11, 2012.

Why the teaching of creative writing matters

Lecturer in Creative Writing, University of Bolton

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For the last 30 years or so the rise of creative writing programmes in universities has been met with seemingly unending howls of derision from all quarters. Hanif Kureishi, novelist, screenwriter – and professor of creative writing at Kingston University – described them as a “waste of time”. But universities around the world beg to differ, as the increasing number of courses and students testify.

The recent Sunday Times league tables for universities ranked the quality of teaching in creative writing at The University of Bolton as the best in the country. The programme there also boasts the highest ranking in terms of student experience.

Given that I am the only full-time lecturer in creative writing at Bolton – and also led the programme for two of the three years the recent figures cover – I should be able easily to explain our success, and why our students rate our teaching so highly. I say “should”, because I’m not sure of the answer.

There are easy ways to get students to rate teaching highly. We can tailor the classes to their personal needs and wants, and give them all high marks. Or we can teach them at a lower level than we should so that they feel a greater sense of achievement. But at Bolton we do none of these. So what’s the secret?

The measure of a mark

How you actually go about judging the quality of teaching – particularly with a subject like creative writing – is tricky. There are the normal ways that universities use: peer-assessment, student feedback, the evaluation of staff by professionals who specialise in methods of teaching and learning and staff development programmes. And as Bolton is a teaching intensive, research informed university we do a lot of these things, and I think we do them very well.

But I wonder whether what is being measured or evaluated in these assessments is more the style of the teacher, rather than the content. Most assessors are experts in teaching methods and practices – and it’s unreasonable to expect them to have detailed knowledge of every subject.

As non-specialists they are able to measure the levels of student engagement, of academic challenge, of whether the “learning outcomes” which plague university teaching in creative writing are being met. And if you measure it this way, then it’s quite possible that detractors such as Kureishi are right.

A place for play

Except that the teaching of creative writing, when done well, is about more than the skills and craft and technique, important as these things are. And as the writer and lecturer Liam Murray Bell describes, writers must find and use a consistency of tone, style and voice.

It’s also about encouraging students to play, to move beyond their normal styles and subjects of writing, beyond their use of traditional structural, narrative and poetic forms – and to ask them to see what happens. In this sense university is a place for play . Teacher and game designer Eric Zimmerman has defined play as:

The free space of movement within a more rigid structure. Play exists both because of and also despite the more rigid structures of a system.

If students are not actively encouraged to play then we are simply encouraging them to remain as static as they were when they entered higher education – even if they are more adept at using “writerly” skills and techniques.

The secret of success

To me it seems there is no “secret” to good teaching. You do the basics, and you do them as well as you possibly can. You limit class numbers. You give student-writers the individual attention they crave. You make sure that your teachers are good writers and that your writers are good teachers, so that expertise can be shared effectively.

And you make students read widely. They should read the classics, I suppose, but they should also read the “non-classics” – what many academics see as trash fiction. And they should read their peers and contemporaries too.

Importantly, they should read things such as advertising billboards and street signs, the shapes of buildings, the colour of the pavement, the weather, the look in people’s faces. Writers need to breathe in so that they can breathe out their own individual reactions and responses. At Bolton we spend time reading and breathing, and that helps students find voices and interactions which can blend with the craft of writing to produce work which means something to them.

Very few students will earn a living as a writer. But writing is about more than that, and the ability to communicate effectively is a rare and precious thing. Good teaching should not be measured in the texts which students produce, then, but in the knowledge gained through the actions of writing – knowledge which lasts forever.

In the end, if students enjoy their studies, and believe that they’re gaining skills which are transferable in the workplace and will last them well beyond university, then perhaps that is what they see as ‘good teaching’. And perhaps too they’re the best ones to judge.

Universities
Creative writing
Hanif Kureishi
Sunday Times University rankings

Stephen Knight Lecturer in Medieval Literature

Postdoctoral Research Fellowship

Social Media Producer

Dean (Head of School), Indigenous Knowledges

Senior Research Fellow - Curtin Institute for Energy Transition (CIET)

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The Importance of Creative Writing

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Looking for more in Learning or Creative writing for schools ?

Why is Creative Writing important?

Read our evidence review citing new and relevant research supporting the importance of creative writing in school

Why is creative writing important? And what is the research behind it? These are key questions when thinking about establishing creative writing in your class or school. Scottish Book Trust has pulled together this evidence review for you, citing all the relevant research to support creative writing in schools. This review will help you ensure your practice is research-informed and grounded in evidence.

The review explores evidence into the benefits of creative writing by splitting the research into four key areas:

Raising attainment through creativity.
Boosting confidence and imagination.
Nurturing and supporting wellbeing.
Improving skills.

All sources are listed at the end of the review, so you can go and read the original resources for yourself too.

Download the evidence review

Creative writing evidence review (DOC) (this link will open in a new window) 714.2 kb
Creative writing evidence review (PDF) (this link will open in a new window) 459.8 kb

The Benefits of Creative Writing

Nanowrimo , blog.

To some, creative writing is a fun hobby that has little benefit, and can in fact serve as a time sink wherein nothing is accomplished other than words being spewed onto a page. To others, creative writing is a vital way of expressing oneself. It can be difficult to say which group is correct, but there are some definitive benefits to engaging in creative writing.

One of the first benefits is that it helps to develop creative problem solving skills. Creative writing is an exercise in solving problems, either for the characters within the story or for the author themselves. Characters within stories need to be navigated through a series of difficulties, and if the problems take place in the real world, then the solutions must also be real-world solutions. If the problem is a literal dragon that needs slaying, there’s somewhat less need for it to mimic a real-world solution, since that’s not typically a problem that we have. By navigating fictional characters through difficult times in their lives, either emotionally or financially, writers can learn how to handle those problems in the real world as well, without the stress of trying to figure it out when they’re already in the middle of the situation.

Another benefit of creative writing, particularly if the writer is involved in a formal class or writing group, is that it gives the writer experience in both taking and giving constructive criticism. The first time someone hears that there’s something wrong with their writing can be difficult, but over time, it does get easier. Trust me. I’ve had my fair share of critical remarks, and I’d like to think I’ve gotten better about responding to them. I no longer cry and throw things, so that’s a definite bonus. Taking criticism well is a vital skill, especially in the workplace, because employers often have feedback for their employees that might not necessarily be what the employee wants to hear. Giving criticism that is also constructive is another incredibly valuable skill. If someone believes they are just being torn down, they will not listen to a piece of criticism that might genuinely be designed to help. For this reason, it is important to understand that there are ways to provide tips for improvement without ripping someone’s work apart. Working in a workshop or a creative writing class will help improve these skills.

Creative writing helps to build vocabulary. Do you know how many types of swords there are? I don’t either, actually, but I know many of them. Do you know how many ways there are to say mean? Well, there’s mean, of course, but there are also words like malevolent and malicious and cruel, which all help to paint a more accurate picture of whatever it is that the writer is trying to portray. Once the writer knows these words, they aren’t likely to ever be forgotten. At the very least, the next time the writer is trying to describe someone as mean, they might remember that there are two other, more impressive sounding words that start with ‘m’ that might be used to describe said person.

Creative writing helps to improve outlining skills, which are vital for any kind of large project. Without an outline, creative writers might find themselves bogged down in details they didn’t intend to get lost in, or might lose track of vital plot threads that they’ll need to remember for later in this story. This is also true for any kind of large project, whether it be academic or professional. Presentations made without an outline in place can meander and get lost in themselves, making them difficult to understand or follow. For this reason, outlining is a good skill to pursue, and can be learned or improved upon through the use of creative writing.

One of the most subjective benefits to pursuing creative writing is the way that it can benefit the writer’s emotional well-being. I was skeptical about this one for a long time, because I love writing, but found it to be more stressful than anything else when I did indulge in writing. However, I have found that as I’ve adopted a regular writing schedule and have stuck to it, my mood has begun to improve greatly. I have had friends tell me that I’m happier now, and I do genuinely feel it. But I’m definitely willing to acknowledge that the same might not be true for other people

Creative writing is incredibly beneficial to burgeoning writers, and to students of all kinds. It requires effort, yes, but the more effort someone puts into it, the more likely they are to reap the benefits of it.

27 March, 2017 by McDaniel College Writing Center

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To improve literacy, focus on writing

Bita Nazarian

Jaime Balboa

Laura Brief

October 20, 2021.

We have all been reading the news about disappointing literacy rates in California, which have been exacerbated by the pandemic and online learning. Last month, State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond announced a plan to improve literacy rates aimed at having all third graders in the state at reading level by 2026.

While this issue has made the news, it isn’t new. In fact, low literacy rates have been persistent and prevalent for decades, especially for students from low-income communities and students of color. Policymakers often exclusively focus on reading when addressing literacy gaps. However, research shows that writing skills help students become better readers and ultimately understand all subjects better.

On a national policy level, the critical importance of writing was underscored with the adoption of Common Core standards in 2010, which emphasize how writing must be taught and addressed across every subject area. Despite the focus on writing in the state standards, results from the National Assessment of Educational Progress ( NAEP ) in 2011 found that nationwide, only 27% of high school seniors and 10% of Black and Hispanic students are proficient in writing. In 2016, a national survey found that half of teachers felt that they did not have sufficient professional development to successfully implement the current writing standards. We know a focus on effective writing instruction is essential to any effort to improve literacy rates.

Whereas reading is knowledge, writing is agency, power and influence.

Writing not only helps students master new material, but it also serves as a tool for self-expression, reflection and community building. Writing can create new worlds and bring imagination to life. In a society that has historically devalued the voices of young people of color, writing empowers them to tell their own stories, succeed in school and career, engage in our national dialogue and become leaders in a global information economy. Writing skills are essential to building a just, equitable and democratic society where every voice matters.

In our research report, The Truth About Writing in America , we interviewed 19 experts in literacy education, including leading researchers, educators and writers, on the current state of writing education — its benefits as well as challenges. While the field has moved forward in some ways, many of the challenges remain. And while the data is daunting, we know that our students are capable of achieving so much more with the right support.

Let’s bring writing instruction front and center. From our conversations with the expert panel, we put forward four recommendations that policymakers and practitioners can follow to strengthen writing education:

Redefine the classroom: Encourage and support students to continue writing anywhere, anytime, and on anything, and with any platform.
Reunite reading and writing: Make the relationship between reading and writing explicit through discussion, examples and publishing student work. And start early.
Identify teachers as writers: Establish communities of practice for teachers to learn, share and grow as writers.
Level the playing field. Invest in responsive writing programming that meets the needs of students from low-income communities, students of color and English Learners.

As Hattie Bellino, a former 826 Valencia student, says, “My voice is important because my perspective and experiences have the power to shift my reality and my community’s reality towards equity.”

It is time to improve literacy WRITE NOW.

Bita Nazarian and Jaime Balboa are the executive directors of 826 Valencia and 826LA , nonprofit organizations dedicated to supporting under-resourced students ages 6 to 18 with their creative and expository writing skills and to helping teachers inspire their students to write. Laura Brief is the CEO of 826 National .

The opinions in this commentary are those of the authors. If you would like to submit a commentary, please review our guidelines and contact us .

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Lori Gregg-Hammer 3 years ago 3 years ago

As a 20-year veteran teacher now doing a year of service with 826 Valencia through AmeriCorps, I cannot agree with this article more. I always struggled to teach writing to my students because I just didn't feel equipped to do the task. I love writing but I never really received strategic training on how to teach students how to write. "Identify teachers as writers: Establish communities of practice for teachers to learn, share and grow … Read More

As a 20-year veteran teacher now doing a year of service with 826 Valencia through AmeriCorps, I cannot agree with this article more. I always struggled to teach writing to my students because I just didn’t feel equipped to do the task. I love writing but I never really received strategic training on how to teach students how to write.

“Identify teachers as writers: Establish communities of practice for teachers to learn, share and grow as writers.”

This recommendation especially resonated with me as a writer, a teacher, a woman of color, and as one who hopes to help other people (young and old) own their identity as writers so they can amplify their own voices.

John Seethoff 3 years ago 3 years ago

Ralph mckay 3 years ago 3 years ago.

Congratulations on an excellent commentary. I loved this sentence: “Whereas reading is knowledge, writing is agency, power, and influence.”

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The Science of Writing

research-based best practices for writing instruction

The role of creativity in the writing process

Creativity plays a crucial role in the writing process. It is the driving force behind originality, imagination, and the ability to produce engaging and impactful written work.

Students and creativity in writing go hand in hand. Writing is not only a fundamental skill but also a means of self-expression and exploration of ideas. Nurturing creativity in writing can significantly enhance a student’s ability to communicate effectively and develop their unique voice. Here are some ways to encourage creativity in student writing:

Provide freedom and choice: Allow students to choose their topics or writing prompts. When given the freedom to explore their interests, students are more likely to tap into their creativity and produce unique and engaging pieces.
Foster a supportive environment: Create a classroom atmosphere that encourages risk-taking and values creativity. Establish an open dialogue where students feel comfortable sharing their ideas without fear of judgment. Encourage peer feedback and constructive criticism to help students refine their work.
Incorporate different writing styles and genres: Introduce students to various writing styles and genres, such as poetry, short stories, persuasive essays, and creative nonfiction. Exposing them to different forms of writing expands their horizons and allows them to experiment with different techniques.
Use visual aids and prompts: Visual aids, such as images, paintings, or videos, can serve as excellent prompts for writing. Encourage students to observe and reflect on visual stimuli and let their imagination take over as they create narratives or descriptions inspired by the visuals.
Emphasize the revision process: Teach students that writing is an iterative process. Encourage them to revise and refine their work, focusing on aspects like structure, word choice, and clarity. Emphasize that creativity can be nurtured through revisiting and reimagining their initial ideas.
Encourage reading: Reading is an essential component of developing strong writing skills. Encourage students to read widely and expose them to different literary styles and voices. Reading can inspire their creativity and provide them with a broader understanding of storytelling techniques.
Incorporate collaborative writing activities: Collaborative writing activities, such as group storytelling or shared writing exercises, can foster creativity by encouraging students to build on each other’s ideas. Collaboration helps students see different perspectives and learn from their peers’ creativity.
Provide time for unstructured writing: Dedicate class time for free writing sessions where students can explore their thoughts and ideas without constraints. This unstructured writing time allows them to tap into their creativity and develop a habit of expressing themselves freely.
Celebrate and showcase student work: Recognize and celebrate students’ creative writing achievements. Share their work with the class, display it on bulletin boards, or create a class anthology. Public recognition and validation of their creativity can inspire students to continue exploring their writing talents.

Remember, each student is unique, and their creative processes may differ. Encourage individuality and personal expression while providing guidance and support along the way. By fostering creativity in writing, you empower students to develop their voices, think critically, and communicate effectively in a variety of contexts.

Pressto helps students write across a range of subjects and interests and produce their own digital essays or pages, or printable zines.

Learn more: https://www.joinpressto.com/

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Latest posts, the importance of creative writing in the ib curriculum: enhancing academic success and personal growth.

Creative writing is often viewed as a form of self-expression, a means to explore one’s imagination, and a way to communicate emotions and ideas. However, its significance goes beyond the realm of personal enjoyment and artistic expression. In the International Baccalaureate (IB) curriculum, creative writing plays a crucial role in fostering academic success and personal growth in students. This blog post will delve into the reasons why creative writing is a vital component of the IB curriculum, how it supports academic achievements, and the role it plays in promoting personal development.

Developing Language Skills:

Creative writing nurtures the language proficiency of students in the IB curriculum. Through crafting narratives, poems, or essays, students improve their vocabulary, grammar, and syntax. They learn to express complex ideas concisely and develop a keen eye for detail. These skills transcend the boundaries of creative writing and become valuable assets in various academic disciplines, such as English literature, history, and social sciences.

Cultivating Critical Thinking:

Writing creatively demands the ability to think critically and analyze situations from different perspectives. By creating characters, constructing plots, and solving narrative problems, students enhance their analytical skills and develop a deeper understanding of cause and effect relationships. These critical thinking abilities are indispensable across subjects in the IB curriculum, empowering students to excel in research, essay writing, and problem-solving tasks.

Encouraging Emotional Intelligence:

Creative writing provides a platform for students to explore their emotions, experiences, and empathy. By delving into the minds and emotions of their characters, students develop a greater understanding of human nature. This heightened emotional intelligence enables them to engage more deeply with literature, history, and social issues. It fosters compassion, tolerance, and open-mindedness, which are essential qualities for global citizens that the IB curriculum aims to cultivate.

Enhancing Communication Skills:

Effective communication is a fundamental aspect of academic success and personal growth. Creative writing hones students’ ability to convey ideas and emotions in a coherent and engaging manner. It helps them become proficient in articulating their thoughts, presenting arguments, and structuring their ideas logically. These skills are transferable to various academic assignments, presentations, and debates, setting students up for success not only in the IB curriculum but also in their future endeavors.

Boosting Confidence and Self-Expression:

Creative writing empowers students to find their unique voice and express themselves freely. As they receive feedback and recognition for their creative endeavors, students gain confidence in their abilities. This newfound self-assurance transcends the realm of writing and spills over into other aspects of their academic journey. Students become more willing to participate in class discussions, share their ideas, and pursue independent research projects, leading to personal growth and a greater sense of self-worth.

The inclusion of creative writing in the IB curriculum is a testament to its undeniable value in promoting academic success and personal growth. Beyond being an outlet for self-expression, creative writing develops language skills, cultivates critical thinking, nurtures emotional intelligence, enhances communication abilities, and boosts confidence. These attributes are vital for students in the IB curriculum as they strive for academic excellence and prepare for their future endeavors. By recognizing the importance of creative writing, top IB schools empower their students to become well-rounded individuals capable of making a positive impact on the world.

Education resources › Blog › Why students should write on paper more

Why students should write on paper more

Study skills & exam prep
The science of learning

Written by the InnerDrive team | Edited by Bradley Busch

Recent results from Ofsted inspections have highlighted the detrimental impact the Covid-19 pandemic has had on students’ proficiency and stamina to write. Many teachers reported that students had fallen back on spelling, grammar, handwriting, punctuation, and presentation.

But why is writing so important? In this new digital age where students are completing the majority of their work online, is the old-fashioned skill of pen to paper still necessary?

The short answer is a big yes. Effective writing skills are essential for a student’s overall cognitive development. And even nowadays, students should actually be writing more. So, let’s take a look at why and how…

Why is writing proficiency so important?

Many in education no longer consider students developing their written proficiency as a skill they need to learn, but rather a skill they need for learning. This is because the power of proficient writing skills is not only evident in English classes, but are linked to better academic performance in a variety of different subject areas such as Maths and Science.

Writing is also important because it allows students to:

Improve their understanding of class material and seek clarification
Develop their critical thinking skills and make connections
Communicate ideas, opinions, persuade others, and express feelings
Effectively record, manipulate and analyse information
Develop their reading skills by providing insight

If a student has weak writing skills, the negative implications can be long-lasting. This is because writing is also a necessary skill for future success as applications for university and jobs all have written components: personal statements or cover letters are essential to the recruitment process.

How to get students to write more

For students to maximise their full academic potential, we can encourage them to write more. Research shows that in order to effectively teach students good writing skills, teachers can:

Support students as they write.
Provide students with opportunities to write frequently using different writing styles.
Ensure their classroom is a motivational and supporting environment for writing.
Teach the necessary writing processes, knowledge, and skills.
Combine writing with other skills such as learning and reading.

Based on this information, here are five effective strategies that you can use to get your students to write more:

Set regular homework assignments that require writing

Consider setting your students regular homework assignments that include tasks such as essays, making flashcards to summarise their learning for the week, completing past papers, writing summaries and self-reflections, or making information posters by hand.

By regularly setting homework tasks that require them to use different writing skills, your students will be able to enhance their writing proficiency and stamina by the time exam season rolls around.

However, as a teacher, it is also important that you provide your students with timely feedback when addressing fundamental writing skills such as handwriting, spelling or sentence structure to support their learning .

Set creative writing assignments

Although writing instruction should focus on realistic tasks such as analysing source material, engaging in critical thinking or identifying information, the benefit of creative writing should not be overlooked.

Research shows that creative writing can improve students’ focus, dedication to learning, and keeps them motivated. By allowing students to be creative, they also develop their problem-solving skills, creative thinking ability , logical skills, and a personal voice. Not only are these skills beneficial for overall written comprehension, but other areas of learning such as Maths and science too.

Favour handwritten notes

When typing on a laptop or tablet, students tend to take verbatim notes – resulting in shallow processing of the material, due to less engagement with the content they’re trying to learn.

Concurrently, taking notes by hand can lead to more in-depth understanding and better memory recall as students give more thought to what information they should be writing down, and what information is irrelevant. By successfully summarising this lesson material, students’ cognitive load doesn’t become overwhelmed.

One useful note-taking strategy is the Cornell Note Taking Method : students divide their sheet into sections dedicated to notes, key terms, and summary on the topic. Students can refer back to their note sheet throughout the semester and ask themselves specific questions about the course content or attempt to learn each key word through retrieval (i.e. recall the definition of the key word from memory).

Encourage journaling

Research shows that keeping a diary can improve well-being and metacognition, but for many, it is too time-consuming. A quicker solution for students is to grab a pen and paper to jot down their feelings whenever their thoughts and emotions become overwhelming. Through writing, mind mapping, or even doodling – whatever suits them.

As student life can be quite stressful can be quite stressful, encouraging your students to jot down their emotions can help to:

Alleviate their stress
Improve their concentration and memory
Process their emotion
Prevent overreaction

But it also allows students to further develop their writing skills in a way that is beneficial to their mental well-being.

Dedicate enough time to writing

Writing is an extremely complex skill for students to develop effectively and therefore requires good instructional teaching and time. It isn’t a skill that should be rushed . A report by the National Commission on Writing (NCOW) found that “ in today’s schools, writing is a prisoner of time ”. Although published in 2003, the findings have been consistently replicated.

Research shows that teachers who are confident in their ability to teach writing effectively are more likely to devote more time to teaching it and apply written work tasks in their classroom. As a result, it is important that teachers also improve their knowledge of what good writing, vocabulary, evaluation, and sentence structure is to maximise students’ written development.

Final thoughts

The importance of writing should not be ignored. Not only can it benefit your students’ academic approach, but the way they engage with class content. Teachers play a vital role in developing writing proficiency in students, so it is important that the tasks you set reflect this. However, make sure to not overdo it to keep students engaged in the task.

If you feel your class or an individual student isn’t displaying adequate writing skills, then make sure you take the time to teach the skill and support them with their development. Reiterate the importance of knowing how to write and practise what you teach.

For more tips on how to improve student learning, consider why students should ask why and how you can keep them focused on the lesson at hand .

About the editor

Bradley Busch

Bradley Busch is a Chartered Psychologist and a leading expert on illuminating Cognitive Science research in education. As Director at InnerDrive, his work focuses on translating complex psychological research in a way that is accessible and helpful. He has delivered thousands of workshops for educators and students, helping improve how they think, learn and perform. Bradley is also a prolific writer: he co-authored four books including Teaching & Learning Illuminated and The Science of Learning , as well as regularly featuring in publications such as The Guardian and The Telegraph.

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Why Schools Should Teach Handwriting in a Digital World

Brain imaging shows surprising benefits of handwriting for both kids and adults..

Posted June 18, 2024 | Reviewed by Abigail Fagan

Why Education Is Important
Find a Child Therapist
Writing by hand is a cognitive benefit for both children and adults.
There are important grade-school advantages for writing by hand over keyboarding.
Both handwriting and keyboarding are essential for literacy in the computer age.

Should you be concerned about the current rage for keyboards in kindergarten to replace crayons, pencils, and paper? Are you worried if your third grader can’t write or read their name in cursive? What about your own habits? Do you write letters frequently or mostly tap out emails? Is your grocery list on your phone or handwritten on a piece of paper? For longer pieces—a job report, memo, letter to the editor, journal article or restaurant review—would the piece be more creative and invoke deeper thought had you written it out first by hand rather than dictated it by phone or typed it on a computer? Here are revelations from neuroscience for both children and adults regarding the benefits of writing by hand along with warning signs for scrapping the paper and pen.

For preschoolers, kindergarteners, and first graders, the complexity and time spent learning how to grip a pencil, position the paper, write their name by hand, and match written letters to sounds for spelling is worth the extra time and effort, according to the latest findings in neuroscience and cognition . Brain research shows that teaching handwriting has positive effects on letter learning, word reading, spelling and composing (James & Berninger, 2019).

These findings may not be appealing to many educators who now champion digital learning and electric keyboards. Surprisingly, handwriting benefits not only apply to children developing the foundations of literacy in their preschool and early grade years but also throughout elementary, middle, high school and beyond. Handwriting benefits also apply to whatever writing you do as an adult.

In an enlightening article on bringing back pencil gripping and shorthand entitled “Why Writing by Hand Beats Typing for Thinking and Learning,” journalist Jonathan Lambert lays out what he calls surprising benefits for pen and paper for both children and adults backed by the latest neuroscience and cognitive psychology even while considering the practical benefits of keyboarding for saving time, effort, and boosting productivity .

The Benefits of Writing By Hand and Warning Signs for Scrapping It

1. The benefits for handwriting start early.

Name writing in preschool kickstarts and strengthens neural circuitry in the brain used for developing reading and spelling and helps build essential foundational literacy knowledge. A child who scribbles but is unable to write their first name when entering kindergarten is likely already behind. There are numerous benefits to name writing in preschool. The child learns the concept that a written word is a visual representation of a spoken word, in this case, a visual representation of their name. Learning to write one's own name is not only a milestone but motivational for literacy learning. Beginners learn that English letters represent sounds, and in English the letters have both a name and a sound—the system is complex. They conceptualize that English writing goes from left to right (Reutzel, 2015). This is a lot of new information to process the first week of kindergarten if these essential foundations have not been taught or learned at home. Beyond that, research shows that learning consonant letter names and sounds is easier when they are mastered in preschool early in the child’s oral language development (Justice et al., 2006).

2. Can your child write the ABCs quickly and legibly from memory?

Remarkably, studies show that the ability to automatically write the alphabet in A-to-Z order legibly and from memory predicts spelling and composing skills up through grade six (Berninger, 1999)! Ask your first through sixth grader to write the alphabet in their best handwriting as quickly as they can. Here’s a sample of one child’s attempt following these instructions.

If you see ABC samples like this from first graders or older kids, it’s a tip-off that handwriting is not being properly modeled and explicitly taught. Red flags in this sample include the fact that some letters aren’t legible plus you see a confounding mix of upper and lowercase. From a cognitive perspective, the problem is that the child likely doesn’t have knowledge in long-term memory of how to form letters due to lack of instruction and practice. Using short-term memory to think about how to form letters and match them to sounds slows the writing process down and distracts later on when the child is retrieving letter knowledge for reading, spelling, or composing. Orthographic coding, storing single letters, letter groups, and syllable patterns for automatic retrieval in working memory along with sequential finger movements integrate circuitry for reading, spelling, and writing. Many teachers have not been trained to teach handwriting and spelling which are reciprocal (James & Beringer, 2009). In both cases, teachers and students need a grade-by-grade curriculum as provided in resources such as handwriting practice manuals and spelling books.

3. Lined paper and sequenced arrows are a boon for first grade instruction.

First graders should have advanced to writing on lined paper and at the end of composing a piece to be published there should be evidence of explicit teacher modeling and student handwriting practice. Students are taught where to start a letter in manuscript with sequenced letter arrow cues, such as in this Manuscript Alphabet sample.

Zaner-Bloser Handwriting, Used with permission.

4. Handwriting improves thinking

In “Why Writing by Hand Beats Typing for Thinking and Learning” Jonathan Lambert reports, “A slew of recent brain imaging research suggests handwriting's power stems from the relative complexity of the process and how it forces different brain systems to work together to reproduce the shapes of letters in our heads onto the page.” While further imaging research will be forthcoming, contrasting what happens when children engage in handwriting and the letter recognition/reading network in adults has been highly beneficial to researchers and holds promise for future research.

5. Handwriting benefits you

An adult benefit from handwriting is that it slows us down. Lambert’s article summarizes psychologist Audrey van der Meer’s ideas: “For adults, one of the main benefits of writing by hand is that it simply forces us to slow down. During a meeting or lecture, it’s possible to type what you’re hearing verbatim. But often, you’re not actually processing that information—you’re just typing in the blind. If you take notes by hand, you can’t write everything down ... The relative slowness of the medium forces you to process the information, writing key words or phrases and using drawing or arrows to work through ideas. You make the information your own, which helps it stick in the brain.” (Lambert, 2024. page 1).

A tangible benefit of adult handwriting is that it personalizes a piece and makes it more intimate. Contrast a handwritten recipe from a great grandmother with one simply typed out, or a note commemorating a special occasion versus a digital version sent in one click.

Science Says Teach Kids to Be Hybrid Writers

All schools should be teaching handwriting in the computer age and keyboarding skills. Here’s how brain imaging scientists Karen James and Virginia Berninger say we should do it. Teach all students to be hybrid writers. Imaging studies imply it’s best to introduce manuscript in preschool through grade 1, cursive in third and fourth grades for better spelling and composing, and two-hand touch-typing on a keyboard (not hunt and peck with one hand) in upper elementary and middle grades (James & Berninger, 2019. page 28). This hybrid approach will better activate the reading, spelling, and composing brain circuitry in all students at all grade levels. With this kind of evidence, how could we possibly think it’s wise to scrap handwriting?

Berninger, V. W. (2009). Highlights of Programmatic, Interdisciplinary Research on Writing. Learning Disabilities Research & Practice , 24(2), 69-80. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-5826.2009.00281.x

James, K., & Berninger, V. (2019) Brain Research Shows Why Handwriting Should Be Taught in the Computer Age. Learning Difficulties Australia Bulletin , 51(1)25-30. https://thebehaviorrevolution.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/Brain-rese…

Justice , L.M., Pence , K., Bowles, R. B. & Wiggins, A. (2006). An Investigation of Four Hypotheses Concerning the Order by Which 4-Year-Old Children Learn the Alphabet Letters, Early Childhood Research Quarterly , 21( 3 ) 374 – 389.

Reutzel, R. (2015), The Reading Teacher, 69(1) 14–24. https://www.uwyo.edu/wsup/_files/docs/esl_conference/reutzel-2015-the_r…

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Navajo Technical University

NTU Student Recognized in Creative Writing Competition

by Navajo Technical University | Apr 1, 2022 | News

Ronnie Largo, Thoreau, NM – Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Creative Writing and New Media.

CROWNPOINT, NM – On March 16, 2022, Tribal College Journal (TCJ) notified our very own Navajo Technical University (NTU) creative writing student Ronnie Largo that his entry entitled “Poetry” was selected as a winner of the 2022 TCJ student Creative Writing competition. As a result, he will be featured in the 2022 spring edition of TCJ publication and on its website at www.tcjstudent.org.

“It was an unexpected surprise, I feel happy that my poem was selected,” said Ronnie Largo, NTU Student describing his experience. “I couldn’t have done this without the encouragement from my instructor, Anita Roastingear, and my poem took off.”

Ronnie Largo, a Marine Corps veteran, is from Thoreau, NM, and is currently enrolled as a full-time student in the Bachelor of Fine Arts degree program in Creative Writing and New Media at NTU.

Every year, the TCJ holds contests in student writing, art, and film. All tribal colleges and universities (TCUs) can enter their students in these various competitions and the winners then get the opportunity to be featured in the TCJ print and online publication.

Anita Roastingear, MFA, is the Associate Professor for the Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Creative Writing and New Media. According to Roastingear, “Our program is one of the many programs offered by Navajo Technical University, and the program provides the knowledge and skills needed to secure gainful employment in a digital environment, to publish and market creative works online, or simply to function as a full participant in this new digital age.”

For more information about the Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Creative Writing and New Media, contact Anita Roastingear, MFA, Associate Professor at [email protected]

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How Creative Writing Can Increase Students' Resilience
Reaping the benefits. To see how creative writing impacts students, I invite them to rate their resilience through a self-compassion survey at the start of the school year and again in the spring. Last year, two-thirds of students surveyed increased in self-compassion; Alejandro grew his self-compassion by 20 percent.
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The Importance of Creative Writing. Creative writing is important because: ... Creative writing classes also allow students to learn from professionals who have experience as editors, agents, and publishers. They can use this knowledge to learn creative writing, refine their craft and gain valuable experience before entering the job market. ...
The Purpose and Objectives of Creative Writing: Explained
In educational settings, Creative Writing nurtures creativity, encourages self-expression, and helps students develop essential communication and analytical skills. This educational objective of Creative Writing underscores its value as a holistic tool for personal and intellectual growth, making it an integral part of both formal and informal ...
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The Benefits of Creative Writing. 1. Why Learn Creative Writing: Improved Self-Expression. Improving your writing skills leads to stronger communication. When you practice finding the right word in a story or poem, you engage the same parts of your brain that are active in everyday writing and speaking.
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A recent study sheds light on why writing is such a beneficial activity—not just in subjects typically associated with writing, like history and English, but across all subjects. Professor Steve Graham and his colleagues at Arizona State University's Teachers College analyzed 56 studies looking at the benefits of writing in science, social studies, and math and found that writing ...
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Not every student will publish work or win prizes and very few will be able to earn a living putting pen to paper, but the teaching of creative writing is about more than that. Why the teaching of ...
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Vanessa Chan is a senior in Singapore American School that loves to write and speak. She is frequently found writing late into the night, playing the piano, or preparing for Model United Nations. Alternatively, you might find her geeking out with friends about anime, books, or professional figure skating. Creative writing has been the central puzzle piece in her high school experience and has ...
Why is Creative Writing important?
This review will help you ensure your practice is research-informed and grounded in evidence. The review explores evidence into the benefits of creative writing by splitting the research into four key areas: Raising attainment through creativity. Boosting confidence and imagination. Nurturing and supporting wellbeing. Improving skills.
(PDF) Creative Writing Skills in English: Developing Student's
To improve creative writing skills, students should read diverse literary works, practice regular writing, explore different language styles, use writing prompts, and accept feedback from friends ...
The Benefits of Creative Writing
Creative writing is an exercise in solving problems, either for the characters within the story or for the author themselves. Characters within stories need to be navigated through a series of difficulties, and if the problems take place in the real world, then the solutions must also be real-world solutions. If the problem is a literal dragon ...
To improve literacy, focus on writing
However, research shows that writing skills help students become better readers and ultimately understand all subjects better. On a national policy level, the critical importance of writing was underscored with the adoption of Common Core standards in 2010, which emphasize how writing must be taught and addressed across every subject area.
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By Pressto May 24, 2023. Creativity plays a crucial role in the writing process. It is the driving force behind originality, imagination, and the ability to produce engaging and impactful written work. Students and creativity in writing go hand in hand. Writing is not only a fundamental skill but also a means of self-expression and exploration ...
PDF Rethinking the Significance of Creative Writing: a Neglected Art Form
Creative Writing - an Art Form Defining Art To explore the relationship between creative writing and art, it is important to define these two concepts. The question "What is art?" can generate many controversial answers. Warburton (2003) lists several major philosophical attempts to answer the art question in the twentieth century.
PDF Approaches in teaching writing skills with Creative Writing: A TESOL
ts.Data analysis of question no 1: Feel comfortable and confident about the ability to write.Table 1, re. eals that a total of 33.5% of girls and b. ys students feel a little comfortable while writing. Among them 35% of girls and 35% are boys. In comparison, 22% feel much comfortable while writing and 30% rather.
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Kaufman, Gentile and Baer (2005) reported a strong degree of correlation between the ratings of gifted creative writing students and an 'expert' panel of teachers, writers, ... Which aspects of writing a story are considered more important in writing assessment? 10,585 assessment messages by 41 schoolteachers (19 secondary teachers and 22 ...
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Creative writing hones students' ability to convey ideas and emotions in a coherent and engaging manner. It helps them become proficient in articulating their thoughts, presenting arguments, and structuring their ideas logically. ... By recognizing the importance of creative writing, top IB schools empower their students to become well ...
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Recognizing and leveraging the broader educational benefits of creative writing can enhance the pedagogical approach, fostering a more comprehensive and enriching learning experience for EFL students.
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Creative writing gives opportunity to students to choose their own writing subjects and methods. The importance of creative writing is undeniable to improve the cognitive and communicative skills of children (Tompkins,1982; cited in Essex, 1996).Creative writing is a chance to free your imagination in which people get satisfaction.
Why students should write on paper more
Writing is also important because it allows students to: Improve their understanding of class material and seek clarification. Develop their critical thinking skills and make connections. Communicate ideas, opinions, persuade others, and express feelings. Effectively record, manipulate and analyse information.
PDF 4.Creative Writing as a Best Way to Improve Writing Skills of Students
The survey revealed that the most popular creative writing activity was writing detective, horror, and what-if stories (45% of the students agreed with that) whereas poetry writing scored 27%, fan ...
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Here are five reasons why you should develop your creative writing skills and let your imagination run wild. 1. Develops your storytelling. People care about stories, so knowing how to tell them in an engaging way is a valuable skill. When you study creative writing, you learn how to create written work that is persuasive, informative, and ...
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First graders should have advanced to writing on lined paper and at the end of composing a piece to be published there should be evidence of explicit teacher modeling and student handwriting practice.
(PDF) The Impact of Technology on Students' Creative Writing: A Case
The Impact of Technology on Students' Creative. Writing: A Case Study in Jordan. Ali Ata Alkhaldi. Liberal Arts Departme nt, American University of the Middle East, Kuwait. Abstract —Creative ...
NTU Student Recognized in Creative Writing Competition
Ronnie Largo, Thoreau, NM - Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Creative Writing and New Media. CROWNPOINT, NM - On March 16, 2022, Tribal College Journal (TCJ) notified our very own Navajo Technical University (NTU) creative writing student Ronnie Largo that his entry entitled "Poetry" was selected as a winner of the 2022 TCJ student Creative Writing competition.

How Creative Writing Can Increase Students’ Resilience

Fostering a growth mindset

Maintaining a hopeful outlook

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Reaping the benefits

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Objectives of Creative Writing

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Objectives of Creative Writing

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Purpose of Creative Writing

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The Basics of a Writing Workshop

The Benefits of Creative Writing

2. Why Learn Creative Writing: Job Success

3. Why Learn Creative Writing: Improved Thinking Skills

4. Why Learn Creative Writing: Empathy

5. Why Learn Creative Writing: It’s Fun!

The Importance of Creative Writing

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Reasons to Learn Creative Writing: Finding a Writing Community

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Why Students Should Write in All Subjects

Strengthening Memories

A Metacognitive Tool

5 Writing Strategies to Use in Any Subject

Creativity and Innovation in the Writing Classroom

Principles of Design Thinking

Understand and Empathize

Define, Ideate, and Prototype

Test and Assess/Reflect

A Note on Assessment

Further Reading

Why the teaching of creative writing matters

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The measure of a mark