This is Jennifer Gonzalez, welcoming you to episode 270 of the Cult of Pedagogy podcast.

In this episode, we'll look at eight ways you can squeeze writing instruction into just a few minutes.

Literacy has always been a hot topic in education, and the intensity surrounding it has really ramped up in the last few years.

But in most of these conversations, we rarely bring up writing.

There's no shortage of debate about phonics, fluency, and reading comprehension, but writing instruction is almost never mentioned, even though reading and writing

are so deeply intertwined. This glaring omission was something today's guests wanted to address.

Melanie Meehan is a former curriculum coordinator who

recently opened her own in-person writing center. She was also a guest on episode 192 of this

podcast when we talked about a strategy called Backward Chaining. Maggie Roberts is a literacy

consultant and former middle school teacher who spent nearly two decades supporting teachers in classrooms.

Earlier this month, they published a new book together called Foundational Skills for Writing, a Brain-Based Guide to Strengthen Executive Functions, Language, and Other Cornerstones for Writers.

In the book, they explore what the

brain actually has to do when we ask kids to write and what gets in the way. The book breaks the

larger task of writing into smaller skill categories, including transcription skills like handwriting,

keyboarding, spelling, and large and small motor development,

oral language, the speaking and listening skills that are a precursor to writing, and executive

functioning, which includes working memory, cognitive flexibility, and inhibitory control.

To be a proficient writer, a person needs to develop and practice all of these

skills, and in the book, Mian and Roberts show teachers how to develop them in students. In today's

episode, they'll share eight of the strategies from the book. Each are from a collection they call

minute moves, quick lessons and exercises that can be done

in just a few minutes to build different kinds of writing muscles. They're fun and engaging,

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