CommonLit 360 5 Ways CommonLit 360’s Writing Instruction Helps Students' Confidence

Study Shows Students' Writing Self-Efficacy Increases with CommonLit

Teaching students how to write effectively is one of an English teacher’s most important and challenging tasks. Along with reading, writing is a foundational literacy skill, and many standardized state tests feature some type of writing component. 

How students see themselves as writers plays a key role in writing instruction, and a study from CommonLit showed that students who completed CommonLit 360 writing lessons saw growth in terms of their writing self-efficacy and confidence. The study measured students’ self-reported writing efficacy levels at the end of each CommonLit 360 writing lesson, and on average, students in grades 6-10 showed growth anywhere from .15 standard deviations to .36 standard deviations, depending on their grade level.

Writing Instruction from CommonLit

Here are five ways that the writing instruction found in the CommonLit 360 curriculum can help teachers with this difficult task while building students’ confidence:

1. With the CommonLit 360 curriculum, all reading and writing lessons are linked and allow students to read and write about the same topics and material. Research shows that students writing about what they’ve read does more to strengthen both reading and writing skills.
2. Each unit contains an arc of writing instruction that helps students acquire foundational skills before progressing to the next level of writing sophistication. Lessons are scaffolded to help students be successful before moving on to the next writing task.
3. Commonlit 360 lessons offer students access to a variety of digital tools like writing digital annotations, instructional videos, text-to-speech options as well as exemplary writing samples to help students visualize the end writing goal of each unit. 
4. Throughout each unit, there are multiple writing lessons that allow students to practice writing as they build towards the culminating task. These skills-based writing lessons are spiraled throughout 360 units and are designed to break down complex grade-level writing skills and aid in facilitating effective writing instruction.
5. Lastly, each unit features a high-interest Essential Question that all lessons revolve around. By capturing students’ interest and attention with engaging topics, they are more likely to stay invested in their learning.

With these features and more, CommonLit 360 helps educators create effective writing instruction while building students’ writing self-efficacy and confidence.