P2 Composition: 3 Writing skills that students should start developing

With weekly compositions to help them practice the techniques taught, the P2 students are developing into confident writers!

1. What should P2 students look out for when writing a composition

1.1 Paragraphs

Many P2 students do not understand the concept of paragraphs. Most have been taught to write only in sentences for their P1 compositions.

They get confused about where to start a paragraph, how long each paragraph should be and what they should write about in each paragraph.

Having a name for each paragraph (Introduction, Rising Action, Falling Action, and Conclusion) is a good way for students to understand what each paragraph is all about.

1.2 Planning

With paragraphing comes planning. To be able to know what to write about for each paragraph, the student must be able to plan out a story based on the pictures.

This is easier said than done. Planning is a technique that requires practice. I do still meet students in upper primary who had never learnt how to plan out a composition. They are resistant to jotting down their plan. Even after 5 minutes of planning time given, they remain confused about what to write about, or when they launch into the composition, the ideas are usually disorganised or irrelevant to the theme. Thus, in our P2 and P3 classes, planning out a composition may be more time-consuming but is necessary if the students are to develop good writing habits.

1.3 Descriptions

To be able to fill up those paragraphs, students need to know the writing techniques to use. An idiom? A metaphor? Feelings? Characterisation? There are many ways that students can create good compositions.

For every composition, our lower primary students are given a vocabulary list with words and phrases that they can use in their stories. They will also need to memorise the meaning of these words to be tested the following week.

As students plan out their stories, they are guided to reflect on the development of their settings and characters through certain questions.

I hope that this post has given you some ideas on how to P2s can develop their writing skills. Below is a model from one of our P2 students. Tr Pauline recently worked on the theme of ‘a blackout’ with her class.

2. Primary 2 compo model on the theme of a blackout

A Blackout

It was dinner time. Nathan, my brother, and I sat down at the dining table, ravenous. Our mother had cooked our favourite meal, chicken rice. Just as we were about to tuck into our favourite food, all the lights suddenly went out.

Our house was pitch black and we could not see a thing. Immediately, I burst into tears as I was petrified of the dark. My mother came over to me and hugged me. She reassured me that everything would be fine. Then, she went to look for some candles while my father held my hand.

“I have a great idea!” Nathan suddenly exclaimed.

Nathan went to the drawer in the kitchen and found a torchlight.

“Let’s play shadow puppets!” Nathan exclaimed excitedly.

Drying my tears, I started playing with my brother and having fun. I forgot about my fear of the dark. When my mother came back with the candles, she lit them and placed them around the house, with one on the dining table.

She said, “Stop playing and continue eating dinner by the candlelight.”

While we were having dinner, the lights suddenly came back on. Everyone heaved a sigh of relief.

All’s well that ends well. From this experience, I became less afraid of the dark but I hoped that there would not be a blackout in the future.