Writing Tips for Students with Disabilities Information adapted

Writing Tips for Students with Disabilities Information adapted from an article by Regina G. Richards, reproduced with permission

Issues students may run into with writing • Working memory - challenges with multitasking • 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

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.

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

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.

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.

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.

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