Recent articles have put the spotlight back on a sobering reality: more than one in three Australian students are not meeting national writing benchmarks. For many educators, this comes as no surprise.
What’s more concerning, however, is the tendency to reduce writing success to grammar accuracy or sentence-level skills – missing the true purpose of great writing, which is to entertain, persuade or inform an audience.
“Across Australian classrooms, teachers are finding that when students are taught to write with purpose and creativity, the results go far beyond correct punctuation,” Kathleen Killick, CEO of Seven Steps to Writing Success, told The Educator.
“They start to enjoy writing. They share their work with pride. They experiment with voice, style and language devices. And their results improve – not just on paper, but in how they see themselves as communicators.”
Allie Downie, a Primary Teacher from Orange Anglican Grammar School, uses the Seven Steps to Writing Success program in her Year 4 literacy classroom.
“Students genuinely want to write. Their writing is interesting and engaging. They are seeking ways to incorporate their Seven Steps skills into other learning areas,” Downie told The Educator.
“Students write at home over the holidays, they write stories for their parents, they enter competitions, they have found their voice.”
Killick pointed out that while grammar and sentence structure matter, they can’t be the sole focus.
“For students to succeed, they need a clear, supportive framework that focuses first on meaning: crafting a great opening, organising ideas and building a compelling narrative or argument,” she said. “Grammar comes later, in context – once the ideas are on the page.”
This approach also brings joy back into the writing classroom, Killick explains.
“Rather than staring at a blank page, students are guided through creative, collaborative tasks that build confidence, writing skills and creativity,” she said. “Teachers are equipped with strategies that help every student – including those learning English as an additional language – find their voice.”
And in a world where communication is increasingly shaped by generative AI, these skills are more important than ever, Killick says.
“Students need more than correctness – they need to think critically and creatively about how to express ideas and opinions clearly and authentically. These are the skills that will help them use AI effectively and ethically,” she said.
“As schools and systems reflect on the latest NAPLAN data, one thing is clear: we need to do more than just fix sentence structure. We need to help students see writing as an essential life skill that helps them express who they are and what they think.”