Learning Resources

New Platform Helps Teachers With Group Writing Assignments

• By Michael Hart
• 01/08/15

A new digital platform is designed to allow K-12 teachers to conduct nonfiction group-writing projects that can focus on specific content areas and skills.

BoomWriter Media just introduced ProjectWriter, which can be used in a number of ways in an effort to improve skills that are aligned with the Common Core State Standards. Teachers can go online to assign writing projects to their classes based on the subject areas being covered at the moment, like history, science or literature.

ProjectWriter allows the teacher to then break the subject down into even smaller units and give writing assignments based on the content covered in class with specific deadlines and word counts. The teacher can also give the students lists of vocabulary words that they must then incorporate into their writing assignments. Once the assignments are complete — and the teacher has the capacity to change the assignment during the process — students can share them via the platform with their classmates in order to comment on each other's work anonymously and to vote on which piece of writing may have most accurately described the content covered.

BoomWriter Founder and COO Ken Haynes said the immersive, personalized learning process provided by ProjectWriter gives students a deeper understanding of subject content and teachers a tool to assess the level of students' understanding.

"Today, students are not simply being asked to regurgitate facts and figures," Haynes said. "Rather, they are expected to be able to clearly convey in writing their understanding of the concepts and terms being taught."

BoomWriter is a Web site that helps students and teachers collaborate with each other to develop reading, writing and vocabulary skills.