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Our goal is to increase the quality of our students' writing skills by sharing knowledge among experts and practitioners. We plan to share theory, practice, and research through our articles, feedback from our readers, and a numbers of web events in the planning as we launch. We will have teachers, writing assessment experts, academics, and others write about what they've tried, what works, how to implement ideas, and current theories on the subject of writing. We also plan to include lots of ideas regarding ways to get students writing more, since that's the surest way to improve writing.

Command of the written word is a vital 21st-century skill, even if we are using keys, buttons, and tablets instead of pens and pencils. In fact, in our digital world, communication is now more instantaneous than ever. How do we prepare our students to meet the challenge? Blogging can offer opportunities for students to develop their communications skills through meaningful writing experiences. Such projects not only motivate students to write, but motivate them to write well. Furthermore, student-blogging projects can be designed to address the Common Core State Standards for writing. For example, see anchor standard six, which calls upon students to use technology to "produce and publish writing and to interact and collaborate with others." Score!

The basic principle of The Flat Stanley Project is to connect your child, student or classroom with other children or classrooms participating in the Project by sending out "flat" visitors, created by the children, through the mail (or digitally, with The Flat Stanley app). Kids then talk about, track, and write about their flat character's journey and adventures. Although similar to a pen-pal activity, Flat Stanley is actually much more enriching-students don't have to wonder where to begin or what to write about. The sender and the recipient already have a mutual friend, Flat Stanley. Writing and learning becomes easier, flows naturally, and tends to be more creative. This is what teachers call an "authentic" literacy project, in that kids are inspired to write of their own passion and excitement about the project, and given the freedom to write about many things through the rubric of the Flat Stanley character.

AN 8th grade teacher asked his students: "How has writing for a world wide audience changed the way you write?" This blog post contains the list of responses.

"Use the following lessons to learn how to write a check. Also, see our other money categories for our comprehensive check lesson material, tutorials, and to practice check writing including writing dollars and cents."

"Since 2001, the Northern Nevada Writing Project has proudly sponsored this free-to-use website, which aims to "fix" those teachers who don't believe that the teaching of writing can be both fun and rewarding. If you explore our website's pages, you will find prompts, lessons, and resources that were created and shared--and then posted here--during workshops and in-service classes sponsored by the NNWP. The Nevada teachers who participate in these professional development opportunities discover ways to be passionate about teaching writing, and here we share the very best, hoping that our passion is contagious to the teachers across the globe who have discovered what we've proudly posted here."

Is technology ruining students' writing skills? Here's a interview with Stanford professor Andrea Lundsford describing her assessment of her students' writing practices.

Is technology ruining students' writing (or reading) skills? Au contraire, mes ames (Ann - apologies if I've blown the French for y'all). See this analysis of her student writing from Stanford professor Andrea Lundsford.

Great Source iwrite is a collection of writing resources and support for educators, students in grades 5-12, and parents. For Educators - Quick access to powerful writing lessons and assessments For Students - Step-by-step support for completing writing assignments For Parents - Tips for helping your child become a better writer, thinker, and learner

"A research by The National Literacy Trust on 3,001 children from England and Scotland showed that schoolchildren who blog or own social networking profiles on Facebook have higher literacy levels and greater confidence in writing."

"A research by The National Literacy Trust on 3,001 children from England and Scotland showed that schoolchildren who blog or own social networking profiles on Facebook have higher literacy levels and greater confidence in writing."

Ficly is about creativity. When I was originally thinking about this idea, I was looking for something creative I could do for the last fifteen minutes of my lunch break before I jumped back into coding and writing documentation. I'd originally had an idea for a much larger site for serious fiction, but realized that most people don't have the time to write serious fiction. But, everyone can carve out fifteen minutes to either continue a story someone else has started, or start something of their own - something simple - two, maybe three paragraphs of a character, a plot or even just a place. That's the premise. We impose a limit of 1,024 characters because we think constraints are good. They make you choose your words more carefully. They also make it less daunting than starting at a never-ending blank screen in a word processor. All you have to do is write one kilobyte of something - something fictional. That's all.

reeeeeeally simple comic creator

Shmoop wants to make you a better lover (of literature, history, poetry and writing). See many sides to the argument. Find your writing groove. Understand how lit and history are relevant today. We want to show your brain a good time. Our mission: To make learning and writing more fun and relevant for students in the digital age.

"Check which famous writer you write like with this statistical analysis tool, which analyzes your word choice and writing style and compares them with those of the famous writers."

'Here we aim to give you solid tips on advice to improve your writing from a wide range of different Irish authors. Whether you write fiction or non-fiction, scripts or poetry we hope that you will find articles here that guide and inspire you and take you a step closer to publication. If you have queries on a topic we haven't covered here, visit our forum where you can ask the experts or discuss your thoughts with other writers in your field.'

Great use of Twitter as a tool to teach writing / literacy skills

Write Well is a web-based application with interactive templates that help students organize their thoughts and ideas, while writing more effectively. When students are finished with a project, it can be exported to Microsoft Word, Google Drive, or as a PDF.

"The report found that the use of Web 2.0 tools such as blogs, podcasts, wikis, and comics-creating software can heighten students' engagement and enhance their writing and thinking skills in all grade levels and across all subjects."

"The NWP Digital Is website is a collection of ideas, reflections, and stories about what it means to teach writing in our digital, interconnected world. Read, discuss, and share ideas about teaching writing today."

"sim­ple. you'll see one word at the top of the fol­low­ing screen. you have sixty sec­onds to write about it. click 'go' and the page will load with the cur­sor in place. don't think. just write."

Make Beliefs is a free comic strip creation tool that provides students with a variety of templates, characters, and prompts for building their own comic strips. Make Beliefs provides students with a pre-drawn characters and dialogue boxes which they can insert into each box of their comic strip. The editing options allow users the flexibility to alter the size of each character and dialogue bubble, bring elements forward within each box, and alter the sequence of each box in the comic strip. Students that have trouble starting a story can access writing prompts through make beliefs. Most impressively, Make Beliefs allows users to write their comic strip's dialogue in English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portugese, or Latin.