Disorders of Written Communication: An Instructional Priority for LD Students

Abstract

The decline in the written communications skills of students has been addressed both in the professional literature and in public forums. A particular concern is the lack of attention that deficits in the area of written expression have received in special education. The remedial frame-work and applied interventions of many LD teachers reflect a mechanistic conceptualization of the process of written expression. This article examines how current instructional practices prelude the development of meaningful written expression in LD children.

Identifying an Indicator of Growth in Early Writing Proficiency for Elementary School Students

“…The empirical validity of these measures as overall indicators of written expression has been relatively well established for elementary students in grades 2-6 (Marston, 1989) and, to a lesser extent, for secondary students (Espin, sized as much as reading or math ( BradleyJohnson & Lesiak, 1989;Parker, Tindal, & Hasbrouck, 1991;Roit & McKenzie, 1985).…”

Effective Instruction in Written Language

“…MacArthur and Graham's (1986) findings were different for sixth grade LD students: Dictated stories were significantly longer, were of higher quality, and had fewer grammatical errors than handwritten stories or those composed on a word processor. A reasonable approach, therefore, seems to be the one proposed by Roit and McKenzie ( 1985), who advocated the development of parallel skills-<;oncept development and basic writing skills-taught concurrently rather than sequentially.…”

“…The metacognitive skills required in writing-self-monitoring oftaskrelated behavior, detection of contextual inconsistencies, and examination of alternatives-are aspects of being a writer that are routinely ignored by special educators (Roit & McKenzie, 1985). Few researchers have explored the teaching of metacognitive strategies as a means of increasing writing quality.…”

“…Several authors (Dagenais & Beadle, 1984;Roit & McKenzie, 1985) have stressed the importance of motivating students to write. Although motivation alone will not lead to good writing skills, teachers must be sensitive to negative attitudes that mildly handicapped students bring to the act of writing.…”

“…Many learning disabled (LD) students are deficient in written language skills, as measured both by norm-referenced tests of written language (Poplin, Gray, Larsen, Banikowski, & Mehring, 1980) and by criterion-based analyses of their writing products (Anderson, 1982;Deno, Marston, & Mirkin, 1982;Morris & Crump, 1982;Nodine, Barenbaum, & Newcomer, 1985). Although reading, math, and spelling skills are emphasized in remedial programs, written-expression has been given insufficient attention both in the curriculum and in educational literature (Roit & McKenzie, 1985).As in regular education, special education has a need to identify and apply methods for effectively teaching written expression. In keeping with that aim, this article sets out to (a) identify current problems with existing instructional practices, (b) recommend a thorough model of written language on which curriculum should be based, and (c) discuss approaches and techniques that have been shown to be effective with both handicapped and nonhandicapped students.…”