Writing%20Tips%20for%20Students%20with%20Disabilities

1
Writing Tips for Students with Disabilities

• Information adapted from an article by Regina G.
  Richards, reproduced with permission

2
Issues students may run into with writing

• Working memory - challenges with multi-tasking
• Story Size - in writing a story, trying to hold
  an idea in your mind while elaborating on it
• Sloppiness - unable to both write neatly and
  think about the content of your words
• Understanding - students are able to perform
  better if they have an understanding of the
  issues and their parents and teachers understand
  them

3
What to do about these issues

• Writing is a juggling act. You must keep all
  of the strategies in your mind while you are
  writing. Switch your attention between the
  ideas, elaborations, descriptions, sentence
  structure, spelling, capitalizations,
  punctuation, and more.

4
Strategy of Writing - Chunking

• Break the information or task into smaller parts
• We store smaller bits of information easier
• Everything begins with a small step that leads to
  a larger accomplishment

5
POWER

• Mnemonic device - each letter stands for a step
  the student needs to perform, easy for the
  students to remember
• P for PLAN. The student plans the focus of the
  task, whether it is the format of the paper or
  type of writing.
• O for ORGANIZE. Identify and organize the parts
  of the task.

6
POWER

• W is for WRITE. Write your story or paper, can
  include pictures if it is easier.
• E is for EDIT. Proofread the paper many times,
  concentrating on every single word. This step is
  difficult because it is hard to edit what you
  wrote.
• R is for REVISE. Make whatever changes needed to
  improve the paper.

7
Obstacles

• Vocabulary - have the student make a list of new
  vocabulary words he/she wants to use and refer to
  it while writing
• Spelling - work on sounding out the words as they
  spell. Also keep and study a list of key words
  to work on.

8
Strategies for students who are stuck

• Frame format - think within the context of three
  parts - beginning, middle, and end
• Go step by step - identify a writing topic, then
  go from the beginning to the end, using one
  strategy at a time