What is RAFT? – Definition from Reading Rockets

RAFT is a writing strategy that helps students understand their role as a writer, the audience they will address, the varied formats for writing, and the topic they’ll be writing about. The four elements of RAFT are:

• Role of the Writer: Who are you as the writer? A pilgrim? A soldier? The President?
• Audience: To whom are you writing? A friend? Your teacher? Readers of a newspaper? 
• Format: In what format are you writing? A letter? An advertisement? A speech?
• Topic: What are you writing about?

How to use RAFT:

1. Display a completed RAFT example on the overhead.
2. Describe each of these using simple examples: role, audience, format, and topic. (It may be helpful to write the elements on chart paper or a bulletin board for future reference).
3. Model how to write responses to the prompts, and discuss the key elements as a class. Teachers should keep this as simple and concise as possible for younger students.
4. Have students practice responding to prompts individually, or in small groups. At first, it may be best to have all students react to the same prompt so the class can learn from varied responses

Class Example:

Here is a picture of the prompts we created for another group for the writing activity. We all made spinners divided into 3 sections to pick our role, format, and topic.

Here is my groups finished written component. We spun “Boat” for our role, “song” for our format, and “writing about our expedition” for topic. We created a rhyming rap with a backing track that we performed for our classmates.

How Does RAFT Relate To The UVIC Teacher Competencies?

The RAFT writing strategy relates best to UVIC Teacher Competency number 5, which is “practice effective communication appropriate to the context and audience, enabling responsiveness to diversities of learners.” This Competency lets writers/students to change their voice and tone based on their role, consider their audience, choosing the format that best communicates theirs or their peers ideas, and it can clearly express their understanding of a topic.

Reflection:

I really enjoyed learning and doing this strategy in class. I think it is a great way for students to learn more than just creative writing but also perspective taking and thinking of how others would feel for certain situations. This allows deeper thinking and understanding and could bring your class closer together. I am going to try this writing strategy in my practicum as I am planning a social studies unit that I think will connect students to the past and understand history that much more. In the classroom, having students create topics for each other or having pre made selections/starters, this fits in great with the Universal Design for Learning (UDL) so every student would be able to participate at their level of learning to set them up for success.