posted on 2022-02-23, 18:17authored byAnthony D. Koutsoftas
Purpose: Difficulties with written expression are an important
consideration in the assessment and treatment of school-age children. This study evaluated how intermediate-grade
children with and without written language difficulties fared
on a writing task housed within the Hayes and Berninger
(2014) writing process framework.
Method: Sixty-four children completed a writing task
whereby they planned, wrote, and revised a narrative story
across 3 days. Children had extended time to produce an
outline, first draft, and final copy of their story. Language
transcription approaches were used to obtain measures
reflecting writing productivity, complexity, accuracy, and
mechanics, in addition to measures of planning and revision.
Results: Results indicated that children with writing
difficulties produced poorer quality stories compared with
their peers yet were not significantly different across all
measures. Children with typical development produced
longer stories with better spelling accuracy. Writing process
measures predicted significant amounts of variance in writing
quality across the sample.
Discussion: Writing should be considered as part of
language assessment and intervention, whether as the sole
language difficulty or alongside difficulties with speaking,
listening, or reading in children with language-based
learning difficulties. Implications for translation of research
to practice and service delivery are provided.
Funding
This work was funded by a New Investigators Grant from the American Speech-Language-Hearing Foundation.