Daily writing prompt is exercise
Build strength, speed, flexibility, & more

A daily writing prompt is the writing class equivalent of daily exercise. Just as a good physical exercise routine incorporates activities that work various muscle groups, in the course of a week a good daily writing routine should work various writing skills.

Like a physical exercise program, daily informal writing can combine activities done for their own sake with activities that support other writing students must do.

Smart writing teachers like yourself deliberately design informal writing assignments to provide students with opportunities to build writing strength, speed, endurance, and flexibility with exercises that are done in one to five minutes.

Writer-builder exercises for speed

Despite widespread use of computers, office supply stores still sell "while you were out" pads because many times a short, handwritten note is all that's needed.

It is useful to have students simply put words on paper quickly to accustom them to the physical task of speedy but legible handwriting. Informal writing on a regular basis will get students comfortable with timed writing, the kind they may run into on essay tests.

Appropriate topics for a daily writing prompt to build speed are those that ask about something students have already experienced. For example, such prompts might ask students to:

• Reflect on something they read as homework

• Summarize the main point of the day's class

• Describe the most difficult part of an assignment.

Such prompts also act as formative assessment, letting you and the student know where more study and/or more teaching is needed.

Exercises to build writing endurance

Few average students are willing spend time rewriting or revising their drafts, and their writing typically shows it. Students need to build what the sports world calls endurance; you and I probably call it perseverance.

One area where training using a daily writing prompt can build students' endurance is the crucial planning stage. Planning can produce major improvements in a paper with a minimal investment of time.

Suitable informal writing prompts for building endurance are those that ask students to:

• Identify a suitable topic for a research paper related to something they are studying

• Create a writing skeleton on a thesis related to class work

• Explain a way of developing a body paragraph that does not use the standard "expository essay format."

Another area where a daily writing prompt can build endurance is in editing. Try giving 2-minute writing prompt (on any topic for any purpose), specifically reserving the last 30 seconds devoted to a search-and-destroy mission for one single error.

Time spent at either the planning or the editing stage is likely to pay off in a better grade. Thus, the writing activity becomes a positive reinforcer.

Writer-builder exercises for strength

Writing strength comes from presenting solid content clearly. Many students' writing is weak because they have not spent time thinking about what they are going to use to support their papers before they start writing.

A daily writing prompt that encourages students to think about their evidence options before writing promotes writing strength.

Likely candidates for such prompts might ask students to:

• Discuss how they would go about finding sources to support a particular thesis.

• Write about what makes one of their sources an expert on their paper's topic.

• Explain how they would design a survey to get opinions on their writing topic.

Note, please, that finding sources and evidence is not just a library or Internet search activity. Students need to be trained to examine their own experience and look for people with unpublished expertise.

Writer-builder exercises for flexibility

Students who think there is just one way to write are going to be in for a shock when they get their first taste of college or workplace writing.

Student writers need to be flexible. They need to develop the ability to adapt to different audiences, different subject matter, different writing genres, and different style guides.

As a writing teacher, you can help students become flexible by giving them opportunities to think in writing about various ways of presenting a single message.

You can use a daily writing prompt to have students do such flexibility exercises as:

• Predicting how a message would be different if presented in a different format.

• Changing a short piece of writing from active to passive voice.

• Describing the changes that would be needed in a given piece of persuasive writing if it were addressed to a different audience.

Don't let your daily prompt become a writer's treadmill. As you think about using a daily writing prompt, keep in mind the various purposes to which you can put that prompt. Then vary your students' exercise routine to develop all-around writing skills and keep boredom at bay.