Page 9 - Ontario Curriculum, Grades 11 and 12 Native Languages

8 THE ONTARIO CURRICULUM, GRADES 11 AND 12: NATIVE LANGUAGES
Writing. The Native language curriculum emphasizes the basic skills related to the conventions of written language – grammar, spelling, and vocabulary – that must be acquired if students are to produce clear writing. Writing activities serve to support and reinforce the language components introduced orally. Pre-writing activities promote vocabulary expansion, set the context for the topic, and draw on the students’ experience or prior knowledge of a topic.
As students read a variety of written texts, they increase their vocabulary and learn to vary sentence structure, organizational approach, and voice. To become good writers who are able to communicate ideas with ease and clarity, students need frequent opportunities to write for a variety of purposes and audiences.
Writing activities that students see as meaningful and that challenge them to think creatively will also help them achieve a fuller and more lasting mastery of the basic skills.Teachers will find it necessary and even desirable at times to focus on a particular aspect of grammar, vocab- ulary, or spelling.
Writing is a complex process that involves a range of skills and tasks. Students need frequent opportunities to write and to apply the stages of the writing process, each of which focuses on specific tasks. The main stages of the writing process are as follows: generating ideas through discussion and brainstorming; choosing a topic and determining the purpose for writing and the audience to be addressed; developing a plan for writing; writing a first draft; reviewing and revising the draft to ensure ideas are presented clearly and coherently; editing to improve writing style and to correct errors in grammar, spelling, and punctuation; and producing a final copy using knowledge of the visual elements of published texts to enhance the presentation.
Throughout the writing process, teachers should demonstrate specific aspects of writing, and guide, facilitate, monitor, and evaluate students’ development in writing.
The Native language program should give students opportunities to use information technol- ogy to create media works and videos; to publish (using desktop publishing) newsletters, draw- ings, cartoons, posters, and skits; and to communicate with other students learning a Native language elsewhere in the province or in another province or country.
This document provides a framework in English that each Native community can use to teach vocabulary and language patterns in the local dialect and writing system. Since various Native languages are used in Ontario and some have several dialects and different writing systems, it is the responsibility of each community to choose a dialect and an orthography for the local Native language program.