Chapter 10: Assessing and Teaching Handwriting and Written Expression

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Chapter 10 Assessing and Teaching Handwriting
and Written Expression

• SPED 562 LD Methods

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Issues with writing

• Incorrect letter and number formation, also
  called dysgraphia
• Difficulty or inability to write words fluently
  from dictation
• Difficulty with organization of words into
  meaningful thoughts
• Poorly formed or organized passages

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Handwriting

• Teach positioning
• Back, head, wrist, elbow, and finger placement on
  writing utensil
• Tape paper to desk use clipboards to assist
  position
• Fade lines on paper to help develop size,
  proportion and alignment
• Start with capitals for ease of line development
• Line quality

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Handwriting Skills

• Use close pins to work on a pincer grasp
• Exercise to work on wrist, elbow, shoulder, and
  trunk strength
• Copying geometric forms and lines
• Copying previously formed letters from one
  specific point to the next
• Faded instruction from copying to freehand
• Faded use of adaptive paper

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Written Expression Issues

• Ones inability to communicate in writing or a
  significantly lower level of written
  communication
• Characteristics of difficulty with WE
• poor or illegible handwriting
• poorly formed letters or numbers
• excessive spelling errors
• excessive punctuation errors
• excessive grammar errors
• sentences that lack logical cohesion
• paragraphs and stories that are missing elements
  and that do not make sense or lack logical
  transitions
• deficient writing skills that significantly
  impact academic achievement or daily life.

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Teaching Writing

• Know the stages of writing and teach each one
  explicitly and even directly one at a time.
• Start with subject verb agreement
• Build in multiple nouns and verbs
• Teach conjunctions to combine sentences
• Vocabulary development improves sentence
  readability
• Teach outlining to combine ideas across sentences
• Teach organization using graphic organizers and
  outlining techniques.

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Supporting Writing (Block, 2003)

• Prewriting
• Make a list
• Create a semantic map (make a list of thoughts)
• Revise previous writings through reading work
  aloud
• Ramble and write for 10 minutes or focus writing
  one idea for 10 minutes
• Peer reading (also read to the peer)
• Create sentence starters
• First Draft
• Dictating
• Choose your own adventure books
• Dialog journals
• Storytelling first then write second

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Supporting writing continued(Block, 2003)

• Revising Process
• Adding to the end keep going with afterthoughts
• Making insertions into a draft
• Highlight the main ideas
• Delete and rewrite ugh
• Self-Question
• Assessment Ideas
• Feedback should be plentiful, positive and
  specific
• Teach self-assessment about how the writer felt,
  what he liked the best, the least, and why he
  chose certain verbs or ideas

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Questions

• Connect handwriting and written expression.
• How do we build handwriting ability?
• What is written expression and how do we assess
  it?
• Name techniques to support writing.