Abstract
Twelve seventh- and eighth-grade students with emotional disturbance participated in a multiple probe, multiple baseline design two-phase intervention study to improve persuasive writing skills. The first phase after baseline taught students to plan and write persuasive essays including counterarguments. In the second phase, students were taught to plan and write fluently in 10 min. Students were assessed on their essay writing, the Woodcock–Johnson Fluency subtest, writing probes, and were interviewed post instruction. Findings revealed that all students mastered the components of effective persuasive essay writing, included counterarguments, and improved from baseline to postinstruction and postfluency phases in length and essay quality. Although students’ performance decreased slightly on surprise maintenance and generalization measures, results remained substantially higher than baseline. Strategy reports revealed all students enjoyed using and seeing the benefits of instruction. Findings are discussed for future research and practice for students with emotional disturbance.
Keywords
Ongoing challenges exist for meeting instructional needs of students with serious emotional disturbance (ED) who are served under Individuals With Disabilities Education Act and represent approximately 1% of the students aged 6 to 17 years (U.S. Department of Education, 2010). These may be especially acute when teaching academic content and skills, because many students fall far behind their more typical peers on academic standards (e.g., Nelson, Benner, Lane, & Smith, 2004), have difficulties with high stakes tests (e.g., Katsiyannis, Zhang, Ryan, & Jones, 2007), and exhibit challenging behaviors. Teachers must meet not only behavioral and emotional needs of students but also address serious academic needs. One important academic area that has been relatively neglected in intervention research is expressive writing (e.g., Lane, 2004). Although research has been conducted using effective writing strategies for students with learning disabilities or those at risk for ED, until recently very little evidence existed to demonstrate efficacious strategies for students with ED. This shortcoming is of particular concern because of the observed needs of students with ED to think systematically, to express their viewpoints coherently and thoughtfully, to consider their audience, and to use discussion and persuasion effectively as an important social interaction strategy (Mastropieri et al., 2010).
Self-regulated strategy development (SRSD), developed by Graham, Harris, and colleagues (e.g., Harris, Graham, Mason, & Friedlander, 2008), provides an important method for addressing diverse learning needs and providing systematic instruction. SRSD provides supports in self-regulation such as goal setting, self-monitoring, and self-instruction while explicitly teaching strategies to facilitate writing performance. This approach has been shown to be very effective with students with learning disabilities (e.g., Graham & Perrin, 2007; Rogers & Graham, 2008). However, until recently, little was known whether such instruction could affect students with ED. Several investigations have investigated the potential effectiveness of SRSD instruction with students with emotional and behavior disabilities (EBD), which includes a broader sample, including frequently those students who may be at risk for but are not classified as having ED. Those studies and a smaller number that have been conducted with students served under the ED classification provide preliminary findings.
In 2005, Adkins successfully taught a story-writing strategy using a multiple baseline design with 3 second and third graders with ED. Students were taught using the planning strategy of POW (plan, organize, and write) followed by the story narrative strategy: WWW, What = 2, and H = 2 (who, when, where, what do the characters do, what happens, how do they feel, how does story end). After individual instructional sessions ranging from 19 to 25 days, students demonstrated growth on a number of writing outcomes, including overall writing quality. More recently, Lane et al. (2008) reported similar findings with six elementary-aged students at risk for EBD. Following a range of 10 to 15 SRSD instructional sessions for story writing, all students improved from baseline to post intervention and maintenance testing on several writing outcomes, including number of story elements, story quality, and total number of words written.
Mason and Shriner (2008) taught six elementary-grade students with ED, or at risk for ED, to use the POW + TREE strategy to write persuasive essays (P = pick my idea; O = organize my notes; W = write and say more; T = topic sentence—tell what you believe; R = reasons and write three or more—why do I believe this and will my readers believe this?; E = ending—wrap it up; and E = examine—do I have all my parts?). After 11 to 13 individual, 30-min sessions, Mason and Shriner reported that five of the students increased in total number of words, number of persuasive essay parts, number of transition words, and overall essay quality. Maintenance and generalization performance varied across students.
More recently, Mastropieri et al. (2010) applied those basic strategies and instructional principles to teach persuasive essay writing to eighth graders with more significant ED who attended a special public middle school for students classified as having ED. All students had serious internalizing (depression, anxiety) and externalizing (aggression) behaviors, in conjunction with learning disabilities, autism, or language impairments. Because of the severity of behavioral problems, procedures were continually modified to ensure student progress and to provide information for future research. Instruction in this investigation occurred during 30-min remediation periods throughout much of the school year, for a total of 55 instructional sessions. Very substantial improvement was observed for all students on number of words written, essay parts included, transition words used, and essay quality, in addition to improvement on a standardized test of writing fluency. These results were very promising; however, the total amount of instructional time required to teach the strategy was significantly longer and more intense than anticipated and greater than that reported in previous investigations. In addition and due to the exploratory nature of the research design, more experimental investigation was warranted.
Those findings were recently confirmed using an experimental, multiple baseline probe study with eighth-grade students who attended a special public school for students with severe ED (Mastropieri et al., 2009). Following mastery of the SRSD strategy, students were taught to apply the learned strategy to write fluently in 10 min. After approximately 4 months of instruction, all students had mastered the components of effective persuasive essay writing, and increased from baseline to post instruction and fluency phases in length of words and number of paragraph, number of essay parts and transition words, and quality of essays. Positive outcomes were also observed on maintenance and generalization probes administered nearly 3 months after fluency testing. It was also reported that on-task behavior was significantly correlated with a number of writing outcomes.
These recent investigations have provided important preliminary information regarding the appropriateness of SRSD writing strategies with elementary and secondary students with and at risk for ED enrolled in general educational settings as well as special schools. Furthermore, positive effects have been observed across writing genres of narrative story writing and persuasive essays, and for maintenance and generalization outcomes. However, a number of issues relevant to writing instruction of students with ED remain to be explored.
Although many components of effective persuasive writing have been successfully implemented with students with ED and EBD, to date use of counterargument has not been implemented. Counterargument is an important element of persuasive writing, emphasized in many texts (e.g., Caine, 2008; DiPrince, 2005; Graff & Birkenstein, 2007) and college materials (Harvey, 1999) on persuasive writing. Using counterargument, the writer must consider a meaningful argument against the writer’s own position and then refute that argument. There are several reasons why this is an effective technique in persuasive writing. It requires the writer to anticipate doubts and address objections that a skeptical reader might hold. In addition, it presents the writer as the kind of person who considers alternatives before making an argument, who faces objections rather than ignoring them, and who is more interested in solving a problem than winning an argument (Harvey, 1999).
In addition, there are reasons to believe that developing counterarguments would be particularly beneficial for students with ED. One common characteristic of this population is a lessened ability to appreciate, or sometimes even to consider, the opinions of others (Kauffman & Landrum, 2009). Thus, the inclusion of a writing element within essays that requires students to take the perspective of another could prove valuable. Also, learning the effective use of persuasion, including understanding of counterargument, may help develop more socially appropriate means for achieving a personal goal for students with ED.
In addition to counterargument instruction, we were interested in determining whether the instructional time required to master the strategy could be reduced from 50 to 55 days when working with students with ED in inclusive settings. We had the following research questions followed by our hypotheses:
Our hypotheses included the following:
Method
Students
Fifteen seventh- and eighth-grade students who were classified as having serious EBD were participants. All students were currently performing below their respective grade levels in writing, according to teacher reports and school records. Three students were dropped from the study. One student withdrew because he was scheduled to be absent from school for an extended period of time due to family issues. Two students withdrew after initially agreeing to participate. One of these students withdrew because he decided he did not want to participate in anything in school anymore; the school was meeting to discuss placement options for that student. The other student simply changed his mind about wanting to participate in a research study after originally signing his assent and his parents signing the consent forms. The final sample consisted of 12 males (6 eighth and 6 seventh graders) who were racially and ethnically diverse (8 White, 3 African American, and 1 Asian American) with a mean age of 12.4 (range = 11.9–13.0). Demographic data on the final sample is in Table 1. Students were assigned to small groups (N = 2–3) based on class period and writing performance, which resulted in five legs of replication of the instructional procedures in a multiple baseline multiple probe design.
Student Characteristics.
Note. OHI = other health impairments; AUT = autism spectrum disorder; ED Serv = receiving emotional disabilities services; SBIS = Stanford–Binet Intelligence Scale, Fourth Edition (Thorndike, Hagen, & Sattler, 1986); VR = verbal reasoning; QR = quantitative reasoning; STM = short-term memory; VABS = Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scale (Sparrow, Balla, & Cicchetti, 1984); ED = emotional disabilities; WISC-IV = Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children–Fourth Edition (Wechsler, 2003); VCI = Verbal Comprehension Index; PRI = Perceptual Reasoning Index; WMI = Working Memory Index; PSI = Processing Speed Index; Full Scale = Full Scale IQ; WJ BWL = Woodcock–Johnson Broad Written Language; Full Scale GAI = Full Scale IQ for General Ability Index; TOWL-3 = Test of Oral Written Language (Hammill & Larsen, 1996); UNIT = Universal Nonverbal Intelligence Test (Bracken & McCallum, 1998); LD = learning disabilities; WRM = Woodcock Reading Mastery tests; Composite = composite score.
Setting
The study took place at a large suburban school district of more than 170,000 students on the east coast. This middle school housed approximately 1,000 seventh and eighth graders who represented a range of racial, ethnic, and linguistic diversity. Approximately 48% were female, 10.4% were limited English proficient, 7.5% received free or reduced meals, 65% were White, 22% Asian or Pacific Islander, 5% Hispanic, 4% Black, and 4% other racial or ethnic groups. Thirteen percent of the students received special education services. All traditional academic programs were included in the school’s programming, which also included programs for English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) and special education. All students who were classified as special education students had met the local, state, and federal criteria for the respective disability area. The school implemented a positive behavioral support system and assigned instructional teams of teachers, counselors, and administrators for groups of approximately 140 students. This team approach provided additional student support within a larger middle school context.
Teachers and Project Staff
Project staff included 10 individuals from a local university and the school who collaborated extensively for the entire project. Two faculty (White, one female and one male) and seven teachers and/or advanced graduate students, all female (five White, two Hispanic) who had an average of 10 years teaching experience working with individuals with disabilities, were an average of 38 years of age. In addition, one female Caucasian was an observer. Project staff had extensive training in the SRSD model of writing instruction. All except two team members had worked previously implementing extensive SRSD writing interventions with students with EBD for more than 50 days of instruction. Three members had worked for the past 2 years implementing SRSD interventions with students with EBD.
Materials
All materials were based on previous SRSD research materials developed by Harris et al. (2008) and as previously implemented by Mastropieri et al. (2009) and Mastropieri et al. (2010). A persuasive essay writing strategy was taught, using the acronym POW + TREE, in which P = pick my idea; O = organize my notes; W = write and say more; T = topic sentence—tell what you believe; R = reasons (write three or more and at least one counterreason)—why do I believe this and will my readers believe this?; E = explain each reason with details, and ending—wrap it up. Students were also encouraged to examine—do I have all my parts? However, lessons also included teaching students to develop and include counterarguments.
Student materials
Student folders contained all student materials used throughout the project, including a student contract for learning; a POW + TREE chart, which displayed all the steps in the strategy; a transition word chart; a graphic organizer of the POW + TREE strategy; a self-statement sheet designed to help students reflect on positive thoughts while working and checking their work; and self-evaluation essay charts. Completed student essays were also kept in the folders.
Teacher materials and training
Teacher materials included all student materials, but in addition included all lesson plans, essay probes, essay prompts, large laminated charts displaying sample essays, and graphic organizers used during the study. Materials emphasized the recommended SRSD stages of instruction: developing background knowledge and discussing it, modeling the strategy, memorizing the strategy, supporting the strategy with guided practice, and independent practice. The experienced senior project staff implemented training for remaining staff on all materials and procedures, including intensive practice with the materials over 3 days. The following components were included: videotapes of previous SRSD instruction were observed; lesson plans, and student and teacher materials were reviewed; practice teaching all lessons; and discussions of handling behavior issues. Mastery performance was awarded after instructors received 100% on the project’s fidelity measures during implementation of practice lessons.
Procedure
After relevant human subject review approvals were received from the university, school district, school, parent, and students, students were assigned to small groups based on scheduling and writing ability. Students with similar writing abilities and schedules were grouped together. This resulted in five groups of two to three students. Baseline was implemented next. During baseline, students were asked to write an essay in response to one of two writing prompts a minimum of three times. Students were also administered the Woodcock–Johnson Writing Fluency (WJF) subtest and essay elements probes. Following stable baselines, instructional lessons were started staggered across time in instructional groups, followed by postinstruction testing, the fluency phase (plan and write in 10 min), postfluency testing, and maintenance and generalization testing.
The study was implemented approximately 5 days a week in 45-min personal development periods from October through December. Students were instructed during a two-phase intervention consisting of the SRSD instruction for multiple paragraph essays, including writing three or more reasons and counterarguments, followed by a fluency phase requiring students to plan and write in 10 min. Phase one resulted in a mean of 15.4 sessions of instruction that ranged from 12 to 19 days, whereas phase two resulted in a mean of 3 days of instruction, ranging from 2 to 6 sessions. Following instruction, students were interviewed regarding their perceptions of the instructional strategy. Approximately 2 weeks following the completion of fluency post testing, students were administered surprise maintenance and generalization essay probes, under unlimited and timed conditions over 4 days.
During the study’s intervention, there was no primary schoolwide writing prevention program. However, the adopted English curriculum for students in seventh grade and eighth grade was covered during regularly assigned English classes. For seventh graders, the focus was on fiction literature, reading comprehension, and elements of fiction vocabulary. The written language component taught students to write a friendly letter to their English teachers while emphasizing correct capitalization, sentence structure, and puncture. For eighth graders, English classes emphasized review of plots and fictional story elements, continued practice with analogies, and some narrative story writing with specialized lessons on punctuation, capitalization, paragraphing dialogues, writing in past tense, and sequencing events in chronological order with sequence charts.
SRSD instructional phase procedures
The first day teachers introduced the study, explained the sequence, and had students sign learning contracts. SRSD instruction was taught to mastery and included six stages of instruction: develop background knowledge, discuss it, model it, memorize it, support it, and independent performance. The instructional goal was to have students internalize the self-regulation strategy to write persuasive essays independently. Students were taught that an essay includes a topic sentence, at least three reasons, with at least one counterargument, explanations for reasons, transition words, and an ending. Then students were taught to examine their essays. Lessons were initially teacher directed, but gradually shifted to students writing independently.
During the first stage of instruction, develop background knowledge, students discussed what it means to persuade and were introduced to the mnemonic strategy to write persuasive essays, POW + TREE. The first component is a planning and organizing strategy: POW (pick your idea, organizing your notes, and writing and say more). The second component is a genre-specific (persuasive essay) strategy: TREE (topic sentences, reasons three or more with at least one counterreason, explanations, ending and examine).
During the second stage of instruction, discuss it, students continued to practice the mnemonic strategy and used example essays to discuss elements included in good persuasive essays. Counterarguments were introduced in this stage. Students were shown how inserting and refuting counterarguments strengthen persuasive essays.
During the third stage of instruction, model it, the teacher modeled the entire writing process from planning to completing an essay while using self-statements and self-monitoring. Two essay prompts, similar to those used throughout the intervention, were provided. Teachers selected the prompt to be answered and decided whether the group agreed or disagreed with the question. Next, a graphic organizer was introduced to assist with planning and brainstorming ideas before writing. In addition, a transition word list was introduced to assist in providing key transition words. After the model essay was completed, it was examined for all essay elements. Finally, positive self-statements were reviewed that the teacher had used while writing, and each student was asked to generate his or her own self-statement lists.
During stage four, memorize it, teachers reinforced the strategy steps and verified that all students learned what POW + TREE represented. During the fifth stage, support it, teachers instructed and guided students to write their own essays. Students were provided multiple opportunities to write essays. As the students became more proficient writers, they did not rely on the supportive materials (e.g., graphic organizers). Once students appeared to have mastered all writing components, the sixth stage of instruction, independent performance, was initiated. During this phase, all supportive materials were removed while students wrote essays independently. After students successfully wrote two essays containing all components, they proceeded to the testing phase.
Fluency instruction phase procedures
During the fluency phase, students were taught to apply what they just learned to plan and write a one-paragraph persuasive response containing relevant elements in 10 min. Previous lessons were reviewed using a one-paragraph response. For example, teachers modeled how to use the graphic organizer in fewer minutes to organize ideas. Discussion took place after this lesson regarding the similarities and differences between the multiple paragraph and one-paragraph responses. During the support it stage, students were provided time prompts indicating 5 and 1 min remaining. During the independent performance stage, students were required to demonstrate planning and writing for responses within 10 min. When two responses containing all components were produced, students went to the testing phase.
Schoolwide positive behavioral support procedures
The school implemented several schoolwide behavior systems including (a) a schoolwide positive behavior system, (b) a behavioral zone system, and (c) a point system with tangible rewards. All of these systems, which were ongoing in the school, were integrated within the SRSD instruction throughout the study. However, the point system was used more frequently. During this system, students were awarded points for good behavior, including completing work. Points were then exchanged for small items in the “treasure chest” on a regular basis. The school did not collect formal fidelity of implementation on this system. However, the schoolwide system was discussed at every staff meeting. If teachers identified any issues, solutions for those problems were generated and implemented. The system was implemented systematically with the students with ED during the study as evidenced by teachers awarding points daily for work completion and good behavior and students having weekly times for exchanging points with small items in the treasure chest.
Treatment fidelity
This intervention was implemented by instructors with SRSD instructional expertise and working with students with EBD. Instructor training included intensive teacher practice using the lesson plans and appropriate materials to teach each lesson. Detailed lesson plans with sample scripts were provided to the instructors for the entire intervention. More than 75% of the lessons were videotaped. One third of the lessons were observed for treatment integrity by two observers. In addition, one observer viewed all remaining videotaped lessons. Observational guides containing open-ended items, checklists, and spaces for anecdotal field notes were completed while lessons were observed. All observed lessons and notes were compared with the lesson plans to identify whether all instructional components were presented and implemented as intended to assess fidelity.
Data Sources, Administration, and Scoring Procedures
WJF
The Writing Fluency subtest of the Woodcock–Johnson III (WJ III; Woodcock, McGrew, & Mather, 2001) was administered to all students at baseline and post intervention. The directions and guidelines in the WJ III manual were used for administration and scoring procedures. The Writing Fluency subtest has a reported median test reliability of .88 (Schrank, McGrew, & Woodcock, 2001.)
Writing prompts and essay elements
All students were administered essay probes at baseline, post intervention, post fluency, maintenance, and generalization. Students received a minimum of three essay probes during baseline, post intervention, and post fluency. Beginning 2 weeks following postfluency testing, two maintenance and two generalization essay probes were administered. Students were always provided two essay prompts and asked to respond to one. The majority of the writing prompts were used in the Mastropieri et al. (2009) and Mastropieri et al. (2010) studies. A few additional writing prompts were developed for this sample of students based on teacher input. All prompts were reviewed for interest and readability for this sample. Because these writing prompts had been used successfully during two extensive studies, we considered them to be reliable and valid indicators of written essay performance (see also reliability of scoring). During baseline, intervention, and post intervention, students were also asked to name the elements of a persuasive essay. During baseline, post intervention, and one maintenance and generalization probes, students were provided unlimited time to work on their essays. During post fluency and one maintenance and generalization probe, students were provided only 10 min to plan and write their essays.
Essay scoring
All essays were scored several ways including the total number of words, transition words, sentences, paragraphs, elements of the essay, and for overall quality based on a scoring rubric (see Mastropieri et al., 2009, for procedures and examples). Essays representing all possible points were used as guides for scoring quality and elements along with a scoring rubric with a scale of 0 to 10. For essays to obtain high-quality scores of 10, they had to include (a) topic sentence; (b) more than three reasons with explanations; (c) ending sentence; (d) a logical sequence of writing, including more than one counterargument; and (e) overall essay coherence. Points were deducted for missing elements. Essays were scored several times for reliability of scoring. Each scorer rated the overall quality and tallied the other components. When discrepancies existed, two independent scores met and resolved differences. The final interrater reliability of scoring across all writing probes was 98%.
On-task behavior
A time sampling procedure was used to record students’ on-task behaviors. Fifteen-minute segments using 30-s intervals were used for one third of the instructional sessions (Alberto & Troutman, 2008). Operational definitions of time on task included (a) engaged with appropriate materials; (b) reading, planning, or writing appropriately (e.g., responding to the writing prompts); (c) seated in designated area of room; (d) responding to or asking relevant question(s); and (f) may appear to be thinking and planning for the essays by quietly looking away from material for very brief periods of time (up to 3 s) and then looking back at relevant materials. On- and off-tasks behaviors were recorded on graph paper that was subdivided into 30 segments for each day of observation. Each student’s name was listed on the left column. Observers were trained to use headsets with audio recordings of beeps that were emitted every 30 s and then to record on- or off-task student behavior. Observer training was completed using videotaped and live-practice teaching sessions. Once 100% agreement between observers was obtained for three consecutive observation sessions, individuals were considered competent for observing. Reliability of observation was collected on one third of all observations by having two raters observe simultaneously.
Strategy interviews
Post all written expression testing, students were interviewed about their strategy knowledge and impressions of instruction. This was also done to determine whether students learned strategy information, generalized strategies, and valued the instruction.
Experimental Design
A multiple baseline design across participants with multiple probes was implemented to assess the instructional effects across five small groups of students (Kennedy, 2005). Participants included 12 male, seventh- and eighth-grade students with serious emotional disabilities with writing challenges. Students were assigned to small groups (N = 2–3) based on class period and writing performance, which resulted in five legs of replication of the instructional procedures. Three groups met during morning periods, whereas two groups met during afternoon periods. The first and second morning groups were paired with the first and second afternoon groups, respectively, for initiation of baseline and intervention to help ensure intervention completion prior to longer school vacation breaks.
Baseline observations were recorded during typical instruction for the seventh and eighth graders during that scheduled remediation period, which included instruction in basic skills, emphasizing math, homework assistance, with no explicit instruction in writing essays. Teachers implemented the school’s behavior plan during which students were awarded points, which could be exchanged at the end of the week for small trinkets such as stickers. During the baseline phase, each student received a minimum of three baseline essay prompt probes. During the intervention phase, students received three essay elements probes. After criterion performance was obtained by demonstration of writing two complete essays containing all required components, three postinstruction essay probes were administered. Then the instructional fluency phase followed. After students successfully wrote two responses containing all elements, three postfluency phase probes were administered. Maintenance and generalization probes were administered approximately 2 weeks after the fluency testing. Students were also interviewed regarding their perceptions of the usefulness of the writing strategy instruction. Finally, all students were administered the fluency subtest of the Woodcock–Johnson pre- and post intervention. Twelve replications were obtained between baseline and post intervention, and baseline and post fluency, and 11 replications between baseline and maintenance and generalization. One student was unavailable for the final maintenance and generalization testing.
Data Analyses
Visual inspection of the data for level, stability, variability, and trends using traditional multiple baseline analysis procedures were used (e.g., Kennedy, 2005). Percentage of non-overlapping data points (PND; Scruggs, Mastropieri, & Casto, 1987) between baseline and intervention phases was calculated to determine the PND outcome effect. Mean changes were also calculated, and statistical tests were computed between baseline and other phases using nonparametric tests. Mean time on task was also calculated across students.
Results
Fidelity of treatment results are reported first. Then, results are reported by research question.
Treatment Fidelity
Fidelity checks during intervention indicated that the instruction had been delivered with a high degree of fidelity (M = 98; range = 95%–100%). Because class periods were approximately 45 min in length, it was noted that teachers were able to cover more content in depth daily than in previous investigations conducted in 30-min classes (e.g. Mastropieri et al., 2009).
Essay Writing Performance
Baseline
During baseline, no student appeared to plan prior to writing, and students wrote an average of five sentences using a mean of 66 words (range = 25 to 163). Their essays averaged three relevant elements (range = 1 to 11), contained an average of less than one transition word (range = 0 to 4), in less than one cohesive paragraph (range = 0 to 3), with generally low overall mean quality of 3 (range = 1 to 6). Table 2 presents aggregated baseline and intervention data across all phases of the study. Individual student and group performance at baseline revealed similar patterns. Data by instructional group are presented in Figures 1 and 2 for baseline, including overall essay quality and elements.
Essay Results.
Significantly greater than baseline, p < .05, according to the Wilcoxon matched-pairs, signed-ranks test.
Mean quality scoring of essays by instructional group by phase: baseline, post intervention, post fluency, maintenance, and generalization.
Mean number of essay elements by instructional group by phase: baseline, post intervention, post fluency, maintenance, and generalization.
Knowledge of essay elements
Students were asked to name the elements of a persuasive essay (e.g., topic sentence, reasons three or more, explanations and ending) at baseline and during the intervention phase to monitor how well they were mastering the essay element knowledge. At baseline, students reported an average of less than one essay elements (range = 0 to 4). Probes were administered periodically throughout training to assess student learning. As can be seen in Figure 1, all students steadily improved throughout training as indicated by the mean number of elements reported at the first training probe of 6.75, second probe of 9.17 to 10.33 at the third training probes, respectively. All students mastered the essay elements as treatment progressed.
Overall postintervention essay performance
All students improved substantially in writing as evidenced by written essays that were longer, more cohesive, and higher quality, which contained counterarguments and essay elements (see Figures 1 and 2). These results are supported by the 100% PND scores by all students and instructional groups for overall quality of essay and number of essay elements of students’ performance. Students’ postintervention essays also revealed substantial improvements over baseline measures on length, number of sentences, paragraphs, and transition words with all 100% PNDs. All student-level changes across phases were high with less variability in writing performance. The mean phase scores across all students were large and statistically significant as listed in Table 2 (all ps < .05) according to Wilcoxon matched-pairs, signed-ranks tests, from baseline to post intervention for all writing measures. Performance data by individual student paralleled group data; all students wrote more; included more sentences, paragraphs, transition words, essay elements; and produced higher quality essays at post intervention than at baseline. Although all students improved, some demonstrated larger gains than others.
Number of words
All students, however, made impressive gains in the number of words written. At baseline, students wrote from 43 to 133 words per essay. By post intervention, students’ written essays increased significantly with ranges from 152 to 334 words per essay. For example, from baseline to post intervention, individual students improved in number of words: Walter (43 to 157), Eddy (50 to 152), Levie (50 to 180), Adam (57 to 194), Rick (43 to 247), Carl (54 to 318), Ahmed (45 to 190), Nick (133 to 334), Danny (82 to 201), Lenny (77 to 204), Wally (198 to 297). These percentage increases ranged from a low of 143% to a high of 474%. Danny, Nick, and Lenny, who wrote the most at baseline, increased by 143%, 151%, and 164%, respectively, which were among the lowest percentage increases.
Number of sentences
Students all made impressive gains in the number of sentences written. For instance, at baseline, students wrote an average of only five sentences; however, at post intervention, students wrote an average of 18.67 sentences. Students who wrote the fewest number of sentences at baseline (Rick, Ahmed, and Eddy) increased from 2, 1.7, and 3.7 to post intervention number of sentences of 14.7, 18, and 17.3. However, even students who wrote relatively more sentences at baseline also improved by post intervention. For example, Nick improved from 11 to 21 sentences, Carl increased from 4.7 to 22.3 sentences, and Adam increased from 6 to 21 sentences.
Transition words
Students included significantly more transition words in their essays at post intervention. On average, students included less than one transition word at baseline but increased to an average of 8.9 transition words at post intervention. Again individual student performance was similar in that impressive improvement was observed across all student writing levels. Ahmed, Lenny, Carl, and Eddy included the fewest number of transition words at baseline (0.33, 0.33, 0.67, and 0.67, respectively) but increased to 12.3, 8.7, 7.7, and 2.7 transition words, respectively, at post intervention. The remaining students included 9 to 11 transition words during the postintervention essays.
Paragraphs
Individual students also made significant improvements by including more paragraphs in the postintervention essays. At baseline, students wrote an average of less than one paragraph but included from 2 to 6.7 paragraphs in their postintervention essays. For example, Rick, Ahmed, and Lenny all wrote less than one paragraph at baseline but included 4, 4, and 5 paragraphs, respectively, at post intervention. Three students include more than 5 paragraphs at post intervention (Walter, Lenny, Danny, Eddy, and Nick) while three students included 6 paragraphs at post intervention (Adam, Levie, and Carl).
Essay elements
Students all improved substantially on the number of persuasive essay elements included in written essays from baseline to post intervention. Wally, Ahmed, and Rick, who were the lowest performers at baseline, increased from 1.3, 2.0, and 2.3 essay elements at baseline to 10, 10, and 9.7 elements, respectively, at post intervention. Other students also demonstrated higher post intervention by including a minimum of 9 elements at post intervention across all students. For example, Rick improved from 2.3 to 9.7 essays elements, Walter increased from 3 to 10.7 elements, and Levie improved from 3.3 to 9.7 elements.
Essay quality
Finally, all students improved on the overall essay quality scores at post intervention. The largest gains were obtained by Danny and Wally who gained 7 quality points. Five students gained 6 quality points (Rick, Walter, Ahmed, Adam, and Levie). The lowest gains scores of 4 or 5 quality points were observed for the remaining students.
Standardized tests
The WJF subtest (Woodcock et al., 2001), which was administered during baseline, yielded a mean standard score of 86.87 (SD = 14.87). Mean scores at posttest were 103.33 (SD = 14.87). These differences were statistically different according to the Wilcoxon signed ranks, Z = 2.76, p = .006, resulting in a strong effect size of 1.11, indicating students’ writing fluency significantly improved.
Postfluency Instruction Essay Performance
All students improved substantially from baseline to post fluency during which they were required to plan and compose a single-paragraph response containing all persuasive essays elements within 10 min. Response patterns observed on fluency testing were similar to those at post intervention with the exceptions of the fluency measures for number of paragraphs. This was expected because during fluency instruction, students were taught to write a single-paragraph response. All fluency data, except number of paragraphs, were statistically higher than baseline measures according to Wilcoxon matched-pairs, signed-ranks tests (all ps < .05).
Number of words
All students wrote more words with the 10-min planning and composing time limits. The largest gains were observed for Rick (43 to 154), Levie (50 to 115), Carl (54 to 116), and Kevin (58 to 101). Even the lower performers (Ahmed: 45 to 85; Eddy: 50 to 152) demonstrated substantial improvement over baseline levels.
Number of sentences
Improvements were also seen for all students on the number of sentences included in their responses. At baseline, students wrote an average of five sentences with unlimited time, whereas at post fluency, students wrote almost double that amount of sentences (M = 9.9) within 10 min. Individually, all students made similar impressive gains, although each student’s number of sentences was slightly lower than those at the untimed postintervention testing.
Transition words
Similar results were obtained for the number of transition words included in students’ essays at post fluency. All students made significant gains over baseline but decreased slightly from the untimed posttesting essays. Not surprisingly, these levels were slightly lower than those obtained during the untimed testing at post intervention.
Paragraphs
Because students were asked to write a single-paragraph essay response within 10 min, the number of paragraphs included in their essays decreased during the post fluency, postfluency maintenance, and postfluency generalization testing, but levels still exceeded those at baseline. This was expected because students were taught to write a single-paragraph response.
Essay elements
Students included more essay elements on all postfluency measures as indicated by essays containing more critical elements. Many students maintained their increases observed at post intervention during the fluency post testing. For example, Rick, Adam, Kevin, Nick, Wally, and Carl all maintained the identical large increases they had achieved at post intervention, even though they were provided only 10 min to plan and write. Levie not only obtained a large increase from baseline (3.3 to 10 at post fluency) but also obtained a slight increase from post intervention (9.7 to 10). All remaining students produced essays containing a minimum of nine elements.
Essay quality
Significant improvements were found for all students for overall quality of essay responses from a mean baseline level of 3.3 to a mean postfluency level of 8.1. All individual students demonstrated high levels of improvement in quality from baseline with Wally 2.3 to 9, Danny 2.7 to 8.7, Ahmed 1.7 to 6.7, and Rick 2.3 to 9. Seven students maintained their high gains in quality observed during the untimed postintervention testing (e.g., Rick, Walter, Kevin, Nick, Wally, Levie, and Carl). In addition to the overall quality score, some very obvious results can be seen in students’ written products demonstrating their understanding and application of the POW + TREE strategy. Table 3 presents an example of a student’s essays at baseline and post intervention. Substantial differences in students’ essay length, quality, organization, and application of the strategy can be observed.
Sample Essays.
Maintenance and Generalization Essay Performance
Approximately 2 weeks post fluency testing, maintenance and generalization probes were administered under both untimed and timed conditions to reflect the teaching at post intervention and that at post fluency. Students maintained higher performance levels than baseline during both untimed and timed maintenance and generalization probes, although levels were slightly lower from post intervention. All differences were statistically significant according to Wilcoxon matched-pairs, signed-ranks tests (all ps < .05), with the exception of the number of paragraphs written for the two 10-min timed probes (one maintenance and one generalization). Not surprisingly, slight descriptive performance advantages were noted for the untimed over the timed probes across all indicators of number of words, transition words, essay elements, and quality. Individual student performance overall was remarkably consistent during both timed and untimed maintenance and generalization probes with many students maintaining fairly consistent performance.
On-Task Data
Students were observed throughout the investigation for on-task behavior. Observations were implemented on 84% of the instructional days, and reliability of observation was assessed 30% of the time. Overall, it was noted that the percentage of on-task behavior was very high for students with ED (M = 94%; SD = 3.37%; range = 90%–99%) during the time students spent in this intervention. Reliability of the observations yielded 98% (SD = 2.15) agreement.
Strategy Reports and Social Validity
Students reported that the SRSD strategy had been effective in improving their writing. All students were able to name the strategy (POW + TREE) and identify all components in detail. When asked how the strategy had helped them, students most often noted that it helped them plan and organize their writing, whereas several others added that it assisted them with being more persuasive in their writing while helping them think of more ideas. One articulate student summarized his learning by stating, By teaching you how to write persuasive essays better. Before this I didn’t know how to write a persuasive essay. Now it gives me a strategy of how to do it if I really wanted to persuade someone. I know how to now. You should always organize first . . . you always have to show someone else’s point of view with a counterreason. So that the person you are writing [to] realizes that you acknowledge what they think.
Most students identified the graphic organizer as being the most helpful and what they liked best. Others talked about how the strategy helped them organize their thoughts before writing. For example, a student reported the planning and organizing component was extremely beneficial by stating, “Instead of just sitting down and thinking while you are writing you have all your ideas in front of you.” Another student reported how the strategy helped him, Because I liked the POW + TREE lesson . . . it improved my writing every step. It improved it because remember at first when I didn’t get what they meant but we did it every day over and over again and now I get it.
Several students reported the strategy was fun and made writing quicker and easier. When asked whether they preferred the timed or untimed writing situations, half of the students said they preferred the shorter 10-min fluency training, whereas half reported preferences for the untimed situation because they were provided more time to think prior to writing. One student indicated that having unlimited time made writing less stressful than having to plan and write within 10 min.
Students were asked about the use of counterarguments in their writing. Four indicated counterarguments did strengthen their persuasive essays, whereas five students indicated that the insertion of counterarguments helped convinced readers to understand their reasoning better and persuade them to their viewpoint. One student, for example, summarized his understanding of the use of counterarguments this way: It allows you to know that [you] let the other person know that you acknowledge what they think . . . but you can come back and say and give more facts why your reasons are better. . . . Because counterreasons let other person know that you know what they are thinking. It is not only a one sided point of view. You know what their thoughts are too. It gets you from keeping them from saying that your essay is biased because you acknowledge the other person’s point of view.
When asked whether they had used the strategy in other classes, 5 students reported having used it during English classes and 2 students said they would use it in science and social studies classes. Ten of the 12 students said the POW + TREE strategy and graphic organizer would be helpful for other students. Overall, all students reported liking the strategy and seeing improved writing benefits, which they attributed to the strategy use.
Discussion
These findings reveal substantial improvement across 12 middle school–aged students with ED in writing persuasive essays with respect to inclusion of counterarguments, overall quality, number of words, sentences, essay elements, and transition words on post instruction, post fluency, and maintenance and generalization probes, and on a standardized measure of writing fluency. Although fluency measures were lower than postinstructional measures, they were still substantially and significantly higher than all baseline measures except for the number of paragraphs. This was anticipated because students were taught to write a single-paragraph response during fluency and were provided only 10 min to plan and write during fluency testing. Maintenance and generalization performance was somewhat lower than postinstructional levels; however, performance was still substantially and significantly higher overall than baseline levels. Students also included counterreasons within their persuasive essays. Moreover, students gained statistically on a standardized measure of writing fluency, and reports from all students related the observed performance to the strategy instruction.
Instruction was intensive for this group of diverse learners but significantly less than reported by Mastropieri et al. (2009) and Mastropieri et al. (2010). This may be due to the higher academic and behavioral functioning of the sample that was enrolled in an inclusive rather than separate setting school. For example, in the present study, students were also observed to have higher engagement rates during writing instruction, whereas the previous studies revealed substantially more off-task and out-of-classroom behaviors.
Once students mastered the multiparagraph essay, few lessons were required to master applying the same strategy to write a one-paragraph response that included the major elements of a persuasive essay. This is an important finding because findings were maintained and generalized in the present study, whereas previous investigations have reported more mixed results at maintenance and generalization. It may be important for students to demonstrate clear mastery of a writing strategy before consistent maintenance performance is observed (Mastropieri et al., 2012). In the present case, students were able to maintain both untimed and timed performance. Mason and Kubina (2011) provide an analysis of writing fluency, including quick writes research, which may help shed light on future instructional practice and needs.
This study provides further evidence of the challenges associated with teaching SRSD strategies to middle school students with significant ED, as well as the very substantial positive benefits that may result from these strategies, when appropriately taught (see Rogers & Graham, 2008). In this investigation, in spite of numerous affective and behavioral challenges, students learned the POW + TREE writing strategy and used it to significantly improve their writing of persuasive essays that included counterarguments. Given the scarcity of academic instructional research on this population, and the importance of reflective thinking and written communication, these findings are significant.
Limitations
There are several limitations associated with the results of the present investigation. First, the study findings are limited by the relatively small size, which limits generalization of the findings. Although the outcomes seem clear for this group of middle school students with ED, other students with similar characteristics may respond differently. For example, Mastropieri et al. (2010) found that training required substantially more time, even for a somewhat simpler strategy, with a group of students with ED in a self-contained setting.
All students improved significantly in their ability to write persuasive essays that included logical counterarguments. However, students’ written products were on overall lower than desirable quality for students in their respective grade levels. In other words, although students learned and applied the specific persuasive essay strategy to improve their writing, many aspects of writing instruction remain to be addressed. All students could benefit from additional written composition instruction and practice. For example, many students appeared to need additional instruction on the mechanics of writing and revising their written products.
Another limitation of the present investigation is that it addresses only one aspect of competent writing. Ultimately, students must learn to identify—from context, from a specific prompt, or from a situation —the purpose of a writing task, for example, to describe, to inform, to narrate a story, to persuade, or to justify. Then, strategies appropriate to the specific purpose must be recalled and used effectively. Although the procedures of the present investigation could be part of such an overall program, further research is needed to demonstrate how all aspects of writing can be combined in a comprehensive program that also includes elements of mechanics, such as spelling, grammar, and punctuation.
Implications and Future Research
This study offers some promising findings for teachers of students with ED because all students in this study and two previous studies (Mastropieri et al., 2009; Mastropieri et al., 2010) demonstrated significant improved writing performance after instruction using the POW + TREE strategy. Moreover, students reported seeing the benefits of learning the writing strategy, inserted counterarguments in this study, and appreciated improved writing skills. With some preparation, teachers can implement this strategy and expect to see improvements in planning and organizing persuasive essays.
Future research using experimental designs replicating the present study with larger samples of students with ED would provide additional evidence for the current findings. In addition, although students in the present study improved their writing, they fell short of what more typical middle school students can write. Future research addressing longer term written expression instruction including the mechanics of writing, more extensive revision components, and writing across genres to provide consistent, intensive written instruction and practice for students with ED is needed. Finally, future research can examine whether such interventions impact writing performance on high-stakes tests. Presently, SRSD instruction appears to show great potential for improving writing skills for students with ED (Mastropieri & Scruggs, 2010).
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: Partial support for this research was provided by Grant No. H325D070008 from the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education Programs to George Mason University, and Grant No. R324A070199-07 from the U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Educational Sciences awarded to Pennsylvania State University with a subcontract to George Mason University. This report does not represent an endorsement by the funding agencies.