You learn when you write

You learn when you write. Writing across the curriculum develops writing skills, but also retention and understanding of the topic that is the subject of the writing activity. Writing across the curriculum continues to be proven effective (see reference for newest meta-analysis of studies investigating the efficacy of this activity in K12 provided below). Why is it then that students do so little writing?

One of the findings from the study that might be considered was that while theoretical arguments might suggest that certain writing activities would be more beneficial than others the unique relative advantages of specific writing tasks did not result in strong statistical differences. I am interested in the cognitive demands of specific tasks, e.g., argumentation and persuasive writing, but at present the best advice for practitioners would probably be “students benefit from writing about what they are learning” – you come up with the task. As a guiding concept I would suggest that writing tasks that require more thinking should be more effective than writing tasks that require less. Summarization should require more thinking that take notes. Summarization and provide examples from personal thinking that illustrate key ideas should require more thinking than summarization. etc.

Graham, S., Kiuhara, S. A., & MacKay, M. (2020). The Effects of Writing on Learning in Science, Social Studies, and Mathematics: A Meta-Analysis. Review of Educational Research, 90(2), 179–226. https://doi.org/10.3102/0034654320914744