This article describes a strategy to support students' development of creative writing and construction of text in a sequential manner. The goal of the Suggest-Choose-Plan-Compose (SCPC) strategy is to improve students' ability to create a story by helping them clarify their thoughts as they generate and organize ideas and basic story elements. SCPC implements various grouping patterns and a careful approach to the removal of teacher support. By deliberately planning and engaging students in the stages within SCPC, they can produce well crafted-writing. (Contains 5 figures.)