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Full-Text Articles in Education

Specialized Writing Instruction For Deaf Students: A Randomized Controlled Trial, Kimberly A. Wolbers, Hannah Dostal, Steve Graham, Lee Branum-Martin, Leala Holcomb Jan 2022

Specialized Writing Instruction For Deaf Students: A Randomized Controlled Trial, Kimberly A. Wolbers, Hannah Dostal, Steve Graham, Lee Branum-Martin, Leala Holcomb

Theory and Practice in Teacher Education Publications and Other Works

Strategic and Interactive Writing Instruction (SIWI) involves teaching cognitive writing strategies and apprenticing novices within collaborative writing communities. It is responsive to deaf students' diverse language experiences through embedded metalinguistic/linguistic components. A randomized controlled trial of SIWI was conducted with 15 teachers and 79 students in grades 3-5. Recount, information report, and persuasive genres were taught across three 9-week periods. Writing samples analyzed for writing traits, language clarity, and language complexity were collected prior to instruction for the genre, immediately following, and 9 weeks after withdrawal of instruction for the genre. Standardized writing measures and motivation surveys were collected at …


Teaching Writing To Middle School Students With Disabilities: A Merc Research Brief, David Naff, Jennifer Askue-Collins, Julie S. Dauksys Jan 2022

Teaching Writing To Middle School Students With Disabilities: A Merc Research Brief, David Naff, Jennifer Askue-Collins, Julie S. Dauksys

MERC Publications

This research brief by the Metropolitan Educational Research Consortium explores peer reviewed literature about effective strategies for teaching writing to middle school students with disabilities. It answers the following questions: 1) Why is it important to teach writing? 2) What is the nature of the challenge in teaching writing to middle school students with disabilities? 3) What interventions help with teaching writing to middle school students with disabilities? and 4) What strategies are utilized in the MERC region for teaching writing to middle school students with disabilities?


Scoring Measures Of Word Dictation Curriculum-Based Measurement In Writing: Effects Of Incremental Administration, Apryl L. Poch, Abigail A. Allen, Erica S. Lembke Dec 2021

Scoring Measures Of Word Dictation Curriculum-Based Measurement In Writing: Effects Of Incremental Administration, Apryl L. Poch, Abigail A. Allen, Erica S. Lembke

Special Education and Communication Disorders Faculty Publications

Spelling has been identified as a key transcription skill that emerges during the elementary years as students learn how to write and subsequently develop fluency with writing, making the assessment of spelling a critical component of evaluation systems within schools. This includes the use of curriculum-based measures of writing (CBM-W). This study examined the extent to which word dictation CBM-W administered during the Fall, Winter, and Spring of an academic year maintained technical adequacy across 1-min time intervals in grades 1–3. Results revealed moderate predictive and concurrent validity estimates with the Spelling subtest of the Weschler Individual Achievement Test-III. Statistically …


The Effects Of Self-Regulated Strategy Development On Students With Emotional/Behavioral Disorders: A Literature Review, Danika Lang Oct 2021

The Effects Of Self-Regulated Strategy Development On Students With Emotional/Behavioral Disorders: A Literature Review, Danika Lang

The Nebraska Educator: A Student-Led Journal

Students identified with or at risk for emotional/behavioral disorders (EBD) face a number of challenges, both academic and behavioral (Trout et al., 2003). Individuals in this disability category especially struggle due to their challenges with self-regulation skills. These difficulties make it strenuous for students with EBD to regulate their thoughts, feelings, actions, and environments that may serve as distractions when attempting to attend to key learning tasks, including written expression. Self-regulated strategy development (SRSD) is a general framework of intervention designed to guide students through the complex process of writing while embedding necessary strategy instruction in self-monitoring, self-instruction, goal setting, …


Examining The Effects Of The Write Sounds Intervention With First Grade Students, Brittany Wambold Jul 2021

Examining The Effects Of The Write Sounds Intervention With First Grade Students, Brittany Wambold

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Students who have difficulty with reading and writing are at risk to continue having difficulty throughout their schooling. Lack of time and resources may be a contributing factor for students not receiving additional instruction for both skills. However, there is evidence that balanced reading and writing programs can be effective. The purpose of this study was to examine the effectiveness of the Write Sounds intervention for students who had deficits in reading and writing. This study was a multiple baseline across participants design with three first-grade students who showed difficulty with reading, spelling, and phonemic awareness. Students received 40 minutes …


Using Data-Based Instruction To Support Struggling Elementary Writers, Apryl L. Poch, Abigail A. Allen, Pyung-Gang Jung, Erica S. Lembke, Kristen L. Mcmaster Jun 2021

Using Data-Based Instruction To Support Struggling Elementary Writers, Apryl L. Poch, Abigail A. Allen, Pyung-Gang Jung, Erica S. Lembke, Kristen L. Mcmaster

Special Education and Communication Disorders Faculty Publications

Writing is a critical academic and life skill, but many school-age children struggle with the complexity of written expression. Given the importance of writing, there is a clear need for a systematic approach to identifying and supporting struggling writers, including writers with learning and emotional disabilities. One such approach is known as data-based instruction (DBI). This article presents an overview of DBI and guidance on how educators can use the DBI steps with assessment data to inform their classroom writing instruction. Additional resources are shared to support teachers in using DBI with their struggling writers and writers with learning and …


Academic Literacy For Deaf Postsecondary Students Through Integrated Reading And Writing Instruction, Sue Livingston May 2021

Academic Literacy For Deaf Postsecondary Students Through Integrated Reading And Writing Instruction, Sue Livingston

Publications and Research

Based on theoretical findings from the literature on the integration of reading and writing pedagogies used with hearing postsecondary students to advance academic literacy, this article offers a model of instruction for achieving academic literacy in developmental and freshman composition courses composed of deaf students. Academic literacy is viewed as the product of acts of composing in reading and writing which best transpire through reciprocal rather than separate reading and writing activities. Pedagogical practices based on theoretical findings and teacher experience are presented as a model of instruction, exemplified as artifacts in online supplementary materials and juxtaposed with practices used …


Empower: An Adaptable Writing Intervention, Carly Dinnes Oct 2020

Empower: An Adaptable Writing Intervention, Carly Dinnes

The Nebraska Educator: A Student-Led Journal

EmPOWER is a six-stage writing intervention designed by speech-language pathologists to improve the expository writings of school-aged children with language learning and executive function disabilities. The intervention uses scaffolded instruction to transform struggling students into independent and self-regulating writers by training the students to use a variety of supports (e.g., graphic organizers, checklists) and strategies (e.g., referring back to the writing prompt) throughout the writing process. Many key features of the EmPOWER approach to writing instruction directly support components described in cognitive models of writing, which indicates that EmPOWER is a theory-guided writing intervention that may benefit a wide range …


Enhancing Self-Monitoring With Differential Negative Reinforcement Of Alternative Behavior For Increasing Students’ Writing Production, Meghann Torchia Aug 2019

Enhancing Self-Monitoring With Differential Negative Reinforcement Of Alternative Behavior For Increasing Students’ Writing Production, Meghann Torchia

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Writing is a difficult task for many students who find it aversive, and who attempt to escape the task. Self-monitoring and differential negative reinforcement of alternative behavior (DNRA) are two approaches that have been shown to improve quantity of performance, but no studies were found that combined the two methods to determine whether they are more effective in combination than in isolation. The purpose of the present study was to evaluate the effectiveness of using DNRA to enhance self-monitoring for increasing writing productivity using a multiple probe, across participants, design. Number of words and number of sentences were measured. For …


A Sentence Construction Intervention For Elementary-Aged Spanish-Speaking Language-Minority Students With Writing Difficulties, Tim Andress Jul 2018

A Sentence Construction Intervention For Elementary-Aged Spanish-Speaking Language-Minority Students With Writing Difficulties, Tim Andress

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The present replication study used a multiple probe across participant single-case experimental design to measure the effect of a sentence construction intervention on Spanish-speaking language-minority students with writing difficulties. Participants were two males and one female, aged eight to ten. Dependent variables tracked were frequency of correct word sequences, incorrect word sequences, complete sentences, and incomplete sentences written in one-minute sentence construction probes. A pre-and post-test five-minute paragraph probe served as a secondary measure to determine whether sentence-level instruction improved paragraph-level writing. Results were an increase in frequency of correct word sequence and complete sentences for all participants, as well …


An Exploration Of Alternative Scoring Methods Using Curriculum-Based Measurement In Early Writing, Abigail A. Allen, Apryl L. Poch, Erica S. Lembke Aug 2017

An Exploration Of Alternative Scoring Methods Using Curriculum-Based Measurement In Early Writing, Abigail A. Allen, Apryl L. Poch, Erica S. Lembke

Special Education and Communication Disorders Faculty Publications

This manuscript describes two empirical studies of alternative scoring procedures used with curriculum-based measurement in writing (CBM-W). Study 1 explored the technical adequacy of a trait-based rubric in first grade. Study 2 explored the technical adequacy of a trait-based rubric, production-dependent, and production-independent scores in third grade. Results of Study 1 suggest that the rubric holds promise as a valid measure of sentence writing ability in first grade and has utility as a supplemental scoring procedure when using CBM-W as a screening tool. Results of Study 2 show that correct word sequences maintained the highest correlation coefficients across time with …


Perceptions Of Eighth Grade State Writing Assessment At A Nationally Recognized Middle School, Jillian M. Quandt May 2016

Perceptions Of Eighth Grade State Writing Assessment At A Nationally Recognized Middle School, Jillian M. Quandt

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This study seeks to understand how one at-risk middle school in Nebraska is consistently beating eighth grade Nebraska State Writing Assessment (NESA-W) averages. The school has significant populations of Hispanic, special education, and low-income students. The study answers the following two research questions. What strategies does the at-risk school utilize to enable its students to exceed the Nebraska average on the NESA-W? What attitudes do the school’s writing teachers, administrators, students, and their parents hold about the NESA-W? Students and their parents answered a multiple-choice survey; teachers and administrators answered a longer, open-ended survey. The researcher used a combination of …


Assessing The Writing Achievement Of Young Struggling Writers: Application Of Generalizability Theory, Steve Graham, Michael Hebert, Michael Paige Sandbank, Karen R. Harris Jan 2016

Assessing The Writing Achievement Of Young Struggling Writers: Application Of Generalizability Theory, Steve Graham, Michael Hebert, Michael Paige Sandbank, Karen R. Harris

Department of Special Education and Communication Disorders: Faculty Publications

This study examined the number of writing samples needed to obtain a reliable estimate of young struggling writers’ capabilities. It further assessed if performance in one genre was reflective of performance in other genres for these children. Second- and third-grade students (81 boys, 56 girls), who were identified as struggling writers in need of special assistance by their teacher and scored at the 25th percentile or lower on a norm-referenced story-writing test, wrote four compositions: a story, personal narrative, opinion essay, and informative text. Applying generalizability theory (G-theory), students’ scores on three writing measures (total number of words [TNW], vocabulary …


The Use Of A Computer Graphic Organizer For Persuasive Composition Writing By Hispanic Students With Specific Learning Disabilities, Caridad H. Unzueta Sep 2009

The Use Of A Computer Graphic Organizer For Persuasive Composition Writing By Hispanic Students With Specific Learning Disabilities, Caridad H. Unzueta

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Many culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) students with specific learning disabilities (SLD) struggle with the writing process. Particularly, they have difficulties developing and expanding ideas, organizing and elaborating sentences, and revising and editing their compositions (Graham, Harris, & Larsen, 2001; Myles, 2002). Computer graphic organizers offer a possible solution to assist them in their writing. This study investigated the effects of a computer graphic organizer on the persuasive writing compositions of Hispanic middle school students with SLD. A multiple baseline design across subjects was used to examine its effects on six dependent variables: number of arguments and supporting details, number …


A Not-So-Simple View Of Adolescent Writing, Apryl L. Poch, Erica S. Lembke Oct 2007

A Not-So-Simple View Of Adolescent Writing, Apryl L. Poch, Erica S. Lembke

Special Education and Communication Disorders Faculty Publications

According to the Simple View of Writing, four primary skills are necessary for successful writing (Berninger & Amtmann, 2003; Berninger & Winn, 2006). Transcription skills (e.g., handwriting, spelling) represent lower-order cognitive tasks, whereas text generation skills (e.g., ideation, translation) represent higher-order writing/cognitive abilities. Self-regulatory executive functions include the attentional and regulatory abilities that help manage the writing process, and working memory represents the cognitive complexity of the writing process. Exploratory factor analysis was used to explore the relations amongst the components of the Simple View of Writing. A one-way ANOVA tested for differences between struggling and non-struggling writers on the …