How to help DS write faster

[sunshinechaser]

My DS has just turned 14 and gets on well at school. At the end of last year the school had tests in most subjects and he did well in most of them. He scraped an A in English (70%) where he had to write, learn and rewrite an essay (under exam conditions) on The Merchant of Venice. He learned 7 paragraphs but he said he writes too slow to rewrite these in the time he had in the test so therefore just wrote 5 paragraphs which was a shame as it was a good essay and he obv missed out a lot of points by dropping 2 paragraphs.
Does anyone know he could improve his speed of writing? Is it just a question of trying to go faster? Trying not to lean as hard on the paper?
Thanks-I know this sounds like a stupid question!

My son experienced a similar problem when he did his mock GCSEs. Except where he was trying to write quickly and this caused his handwriting to become illegible.
When it came up at parents evening I expected his teachers to suggest he practiced his writing more or something. I was surprised when they said that he would probably be able to request a laptop for his GCSEs. He did, and his request was accepted. This took loads of pressure off him, worrying about his writing, and he passed all his exams, including English, which had been the biggest concern.
So, I would say speak to the school. It may not be that he needs to speed up his writing, they might be able to make adjustments.
Good luck.

Ok thanks @StationManager. I'll do that. We have parents evening at the start of November so I can discuss with the English teacher at this point. I'm thinking though that his typing speed might actually be slower than his handwriting as he doesn't really type much as far as I'm aware.

Hello,
Writing faster can be a solution be it by hand or typing, whichever will be improved more by the time of the exam.
Another thing that can be done is to learn how to make essays shorter without losing to much content when faced with a time limit, by cutting out bits that won't affect the logic of the essay nor the structure ( introduction/ body paragraphs/ conclusion). Is always better to shorten the body paragraphs than not write the conclusion at all.
Hope it helps.

Get a good typing programme so that he can learn to type well. Typing is better than writing! ( doesn't take very long if you work at it and can be enjoyable/affirming as you make solid progress.)

-Write the introduction and most paragraphs of the essay in full.

-As time gets tight, write the remaining points (and explained evidence in support of these) in shorter note-form
-Then write the conclusion in full.

This way you can get the credit for writing well where you did so in the essay but also the credit for points you wanted to make and support and lacked time to write out in full.

Speak to the SENCO. They can do tests to see if typing or extra time helps in exams. But you need to do it asap because they need to have it as their normal working method by the time they apply for exams.

Thanks all. These are great suggestions. I've chatted to my DS about them. I think he's wary of asking for a laptop. He doesn't think he'll be allowed as he has no other educational issues aside from this that I'm aware of.
He needs to think of strategies like you've suggested @LiesDoNotBecomeUs. I hadn't thought about this at all. Instead I just thought he had to 'write much faster' than he usually does but I'm not sure his he does that!

Speak to the Senco at school. They will be familiar with this. He can use a laptop for GCSEs snd beyond if his writing is below a certain speed but using his laptop needs to be his 'usual' way of working.

In addition to the suggestions about typing etc, I'd also try to move away slightly from the idea that for the exams, he should be trying to reproduce a previously written and memorised essay, as that's not what he's going to need in the GCSE. He's going to get a question that is new - and while much of what he's prepared in advance will be helpful, especially if it's on a theme he's written about before, he needs to write a new essay that will actually answer the question that is set. And year 9 tests and mocks are quite a good time to practice this skill! (Year 9 homework essays and so on are also a good time to practice writing well and writing a good essay, so that part will still serve him in good stead, but I wouldn't focus on trying to memorise that to do in an exam). He needs to use the skills he's learned from the prepared essay, about how to make points and use quotes to support them and so on, and then create something new in the exam appropriate to the time limit, which will undoubtedly be shorter than he could do if he had more time. He needs to be able to do a topic sentence/intro that is quite brief and answers the question, then come up with a few supporting points and explain them, and then conclude. It will mean taking 5-10 minutes at the begnning to plan out what he's going to say and work out the best order etc., and work out how much detail it's possible to go into in the time allowed. It would be a shame if he missed all the practice on this in the earlier years, and then had to learn how to do all that just before GCSEs.

I would get him to learn how to touch type anyway. Most courses/ jobs require typing so it is a skill he will use in the future. Then if he finds it better ask the SENCO for him to be assessed. My dc have not looked back since they started touch typing.

He needs to be able to plan an essay structure in the exam not learn paragraphs. He needs to answer the exact question set not the one he's prepped for. Maybe speak to the teacher about the expected length.

I actually agree with @LauraOT with editing down content to make the same point and also @BlossomToLeaves that he won't be able to memorise and write an essay in English or History etc because he won't know the question.

As a parent who has had both children go through GCSE and helped one of them a lot with English Lit the first thing I would do is get that 5 paragraph essay and sit with him to edit down the essay. I would actually use a computer to type up the new one so you have a word count etc.

Ds did well in both English Lit and History (8, 9 respectively) because he had outline essay content and bullet points. Most importantly say for any of the books he studies how well does he know it? I have never read Merchant but one of the themes is justice, could he now work his way mentally through that book and pick out all the scenes with justice in? That is how it works in the exam. Look at the mark scheme for any of the past papers (all online) and it bullet point lists the things he can mention. AO2 (assessment objective 2) is language, he needs to be able to talk about a phrase or word and the meaning too, again this is in the mark scheme.

Essay practise is hitting the 4 AOs, he should be taught this and they are in the mark schemes and knowing what to write and how to write it concisely. Ds basically had bullet points and then just needed to add some connectives to make it into a sentence.

School should be able to provide a WAGOLL (what a good one looks like) as an example for the children, they usually get the children to highlight the AOs so they can see how the essay is structured.

Thanks everyone. Reading these replies is stressing me out a little as I realise I have no idea about the English curriculum and therefore how to support him.
We're in Scotland and he's just started in S3 which is the start of the two years of National 5s so I'm not sure how this compares with the rest of the UK.
I'll need to really think about how to support him with the school's help.