Writing Difficulty-Dysgraphia

“Prompt & Write:” Frustration in Kidland

by | Dec 5, 2013 |

Here’s a little interaction using an approach to writing that I call the “Prompt and Write approach” to teaching writing:

Writing Prompt:

 “What is something you really wanted,  but an adult would not let you have?”

Response: 

Wons I whanted a lego set but my mom said it was to match money so I get mad so I was sad I threw a tamper tantrum tis is when I was 3 so I relly  wanet it I saved and saved for about 5 weeks until we went back to the Lego store bat my mom still did not get it my birthday was coming so I wanted to show the kids then my mom got it for me.

So, this was written by a fourth grader, George, age 9.  George is not classified and is on no one’s radar at school. In fact, according to the school he is meeting his “standards” with on-line, multiple choice only assessments. (George scored in the 71st %ile in reading.)

Let’s assume for argument sake that George does not have some type of learning disability. (I think he does.)  Even if he does not have a “disability,” I think we would all agree that at a very basic level George does not have a clue what is involved in the writing of a sentence.   

If that is the case, shouldn’t the focus of the instruction with George be on the sentence level?  How is more and more open-ended "Prompt and Write" going to help George internalize the components of a good sentence?  (Keep in mind that George is now five school months away from fifth grade.)  

From where I sit, George needs a  lot of practice (perhaps even through the whole year) writing simple sentences.  Once George has mastered the ability to write a simple sentence, the next step would be for George to practice writing more complex sentences.  Following the mastering of writing these sentences, George can learn how to put together one solid paragraph.  (The writing of one paragraph would probably need to be practiced repeatedly for a fair amount of time for the skill to be internalized and mastered.)

I know what I am proposing goes against the grain in terms of the way writing is popularly being taught, but I simply can’t understand how someone like George will ever learn how to write even a solid sentence using the “Prompt and Write” method.

Writing – Throwing the Child in the Deep End of the Pool

by | Apr 24, 2013 |

Let’s say you have a little child, perhaps five or six years of age.  He doesn’t know how to swim, so you decide it’s time to give him lessons.  What if the swim instructor said something like, “You know we have strict standards for six year olds and we have determined that they need to start swimming in the six foot water instead of the shallow end of the pool.”  You would probably be heading for the exit as fast as you possibly can.

Let’s switch to a different activity – writing.  Take young Franklin, age six, a firs grade student who is showing signs of early struggling.  Franklin knows a small number of sight words and he can write his name.  In a somewhat discernible scribble, Frankin can write letters from A – Z.   (Well, maybe he misses a couple of letters.)

On a recent report card, here’s what Franklin’s teacher stated about his writing:

Franklin requires adult assistance completing various writing tasks including writing narratives and informational texts.”

Narratives?  Informational text?

Franklin could no sooner write, “I got a new puppy” or “We went to the zoo,” then put together a narrative.

What am I missing here?  Why talk about narrative text when the child is in the equivalent of the three foot water of the pool?  Wouldn’t a better point on the report card say something like, “We are targeting Franklin’s awareness of simple sentences.”

To borrow another image, before playing pieces of music you need to learn how to play simple notes and simple chords.  The same is true of writing.  Before asking a child to write narratives or journals asking for connected information, he needs to master very simple sentences.

Increasingly,  I am seeing  children (especially the boys)  who haven’t the foggiest idea how to  express themselves in writing.   They have no sense of sentence awareness or paragraph structure.  The simple fact is that asking them to write a paragraph and to perform open-ended writing tasks such as “Write about your weekend,” may simply be too much.  Asking them to do so is misguided, placing them in situations of sheer frustration.

Takeaway Point:

Keep talking to the teacher.  Let her know that your child can’t do what he is being asked.  Help to get him out of the deep end as quickly as possible.

Boy Disconnection to the Writing Process

by | Feb 15, 2012 |

I’m not sure what’s going on out there, but more and more I hear parents say that when their child (typically a boy) is resistant to school, the resistance is linked to anguish (hatred) of performing any type of writing.   

Writing is painstaking. Trying to find the right words, revising your product, thinking about how your words sound, takes time. There is almost never instant gratification. That pencil in the hand thing can really make your hand ache.
 
At home, the average boy spends hours a day pressing buttons playing video games. Virtually nothing they are doing in the course of their day lends itself to being competent with writing. They have a very hard time tolerating frustration.
Last week there were two boys that I interacted with who stood out in my mind as typical of the legions of those who are writing resistant.
 
The first one, Holden, is 7 years old. Holden spends large chunks of his day on his iPad, playing Angry Birds or something.  As his mother had told me, whenever Holden is asked to write, he has melt downs. When I greeted him and his mother in the waiting room, Holden could not bother to look up from his iPad. His mother was a bit sheepish when he didn’t look up, but said nothing to him. 
 
In the second scenario, Alex, a 15 year old, tenth grader is a major video game player who has little interest in anything else. Writing (and reading) seem like activities from a distant century to him. Similar to Holden but in a much larger body, he has a teen version of a tantrum whenever he has to perform difficult academic tasks.
 
From where I sit, the boys are having a very hard time facing a reality that is not instantly gratifying.  I know it’s their world, and iPads certainly trump pens and pencils (or even typing on the keyboard), but you need to carve out time to get them off their screens.   
 
They need to start coping better with frustration. Make it positive, not a punishment. Find ways to reinforce good effort and not melting down. 
 

 

Writing With LD & ADHD: Countering the Perfect Storm

by | Sep 7, 2011 |

In a recent post,  we discussed the perfect storm of ADHD/LD and writing.  I noted that at the heart of ADHD and LD issues are deficits in active working memory.

Open-ended writing can be dreadfully difficult to school-struggling children because of these issues with active working memory. They find the task  of writing to be overwhelming on all levels. Typically, schools will recommend occupational therapy to address the issue.   While OT is a valid approach to start with, it really addresses the lowest level of the process—the fine-motor/motor-planning aspects of writing.

Highly structured methods that target the mastery of one skill at a time would be recommended.  With structured approaches you start at the smallest possible sentence level, such as two-word sentences. Children are trained to see that every sentence has at least a triangle  (noun) and a  square (verb).

Dogs run

Kids would practice mastering two-word sentences such as this. When they have this skill down, they would move on to other skills, adding other elements to the sentence, such as an article (circle) and adjective (diamond):

The lively dogs run.

These visual anchors help children who are not intuitive with their writing. This level of sentence would be practiced in many different ways and with some variation. From there, more complex sentences would be introduced.

Once sentences are mastered, then the child is to work on the concept of a paragraph, with a topic sentence and four or five supporting sentences.

This is a highly sequential, skill-mastery approach to writing development. Such an approach is contrary to the more popular “open-ended” approaches that are the  norm in  many classrooms. It may not be quite as glitzy or as much fun, but it is an approach that  the struggling school population can understand.

Practicing such simple sentences as “Dogs run” or “People walk,” and building on them in a scaffold-like approach, gives struggling children with  ADHD, LD  or dyslexia a greater sense of  confidence and skill mastery.

ADHD, LD & Writing: A Perfect Storm

by | Aug 26, 2011 | ,

To stimulate me out of the late summer doldrums, I looked to this news of the day feature that came across my e-mail inbox:

“Writing problems common in kids with ADHD,” said the news header. As the start of the article noted, ‘Kids with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder are more likely to have writing problems such as poor spelling and grammar than their peers, suggests a new study.”    (reut.rs/oLagaR)

Very often the only treatment that I hear being suggested to address these issues is for the child to receive occupational therapy. While OT’s do very nice work with kids, writing is a complex process, with the occupational therapy  only scratching the surface, working primarily at the fine-motor level of functioning.

There is much more underlying the writing problems than fine-motor difficulty. Children with ADHD and related learning disabilities almost always have trouble with active working memory.   Often, there are related issues with usage of language.

Open-ended writing (e.g., write about your weekend), the favored approach to writing in most classrooms, places a great “load” on active working memory. Think about how much you have to hold in your mind when doing a simple writing activity such as “write about your weekend.”

The answer that I have seen work best with struggling children is to teach them in highly structured ways, one baby step mastered at a time. These approaches are very similar to the way reading is taught with the Orton-Gillingham methods work with reading and are in direct contrast to the popular approaches of open-ended writing.

 (For a good example of structured approaches to writing, see Landmark College’s writing program, From Talking to Writing: Strategies for Scaffolding Expository Expression, bit.ly/nKots7.)

Screeching on the Violin

by | May 6, 2011 |

Once a pon a time their was a boy who had no friends so he was always alon But then one day  every thing change His mom gave him a violin to play it sounded horabel so he said he said I am never playing this agin so then one Day he went in the store and heard a guy play the vialin it sonded awesome so he said to his mom that’s how I want to play well then you need to pratis and then he did and he was so good at it.

This is a story written by a 10 year old boy named Grant. It is written to a psychological test card that shows a boy looking at a violin. How the character manages the violin and resolves playing the violin in the story created by the child, often reveals the child’s underlying feelings about achievement and self-worth. This story is written exactly as Grant wrote it.
 
After working with the Grant, I was struck how much the story was a true x-ray of how he was feeling. While Grant intuitively understands he is not measuring up, he is still optimistic, as the story suggests. In reality, others around Grant are easily reading chapter books, while he is struggling at much lower reading levels. Grant is also struggling with writing, and he is starting to feel the pressure of teachers and parents talking about meeting "The Common Core State Standards," something that Grant has no idea what that means, but is nonetheless increasing his anxiety.
 
Grant is also starting to sense that others are snickering at him and he is feeling increasingly embarrassed.
 
Grant needs to learn how to write in structured, systematic ways, so that he can begin to understand how to write a sentence and use basic punctuation. Insisting that Grant respond to open-ended writing prompts will likely leave him feeling frustrated and unable to know how to proceed. 
 
The appropriate work for Grant will take a great deal of time and focused practice at the sentence level.  Once Grant can master the writing of simple sentences, he can move on to sentences that are more complex. Perhaps, then, he can start to work on a simple paragraph and practice writing paragraphs for while, before moving on to more involved essays.
 
Grant also is in need of connection and to believe in himself more.
 
So, if your child is metaphorically screeching on the violin, try and find people who understand the nature of the remedial work needed and who can reach the child at both the skill level and the emotional level.  This is what happens with good learning therapy. 
 
After a while there may be less screeching and better sounds coming from the "violin."
 
(Adapted from "School Struggles," Richard Selznick, Ph.D.  Sentient Publications 2012)

First Grade Writing Demands Overwhelming

by | Jul 13, 2009 |

This week I met James, age 7 and a half.   In my assessment of James, I found him to be extremely bright, with excellent higher level reasoning skills and a lively spontaneous personality.  His reading skills were developing nicely, matching his strong cognitive abilities.  Yet, James had a very rough first grade year.  Openly stating how much he disliked school, James was becoming discouraged.  What was the problem?

In a nutshell, James found writing to be an excruciating process and one that he had to face every morning.

For many kids (often the boys) there is a mismatch between their cognitive abilities and their ability to get the words out of their pencil and on to the page.

Open ended writing (e.g., “write about your weekend”) is particularly challenging for these kids.   Getting started on the writing is particularly challenging.

This was indeed the case for James.

Dr. Mel Levine in his many books on learning issues points out how demanding the writing process is for kids (and adults).  I have heard Dr. Levine say in conferences that writing is the single most difficult process of schooling.  Think about it. If you were asked to write about your weekend, consider the many things that would occur for you to complete the task. Some of these would include:

· Visualizing your weekend
· Deciding what aspect of the weekend to discuss (major vs. minor detail)
· Word retrieval
· Word choice
· Spelling
· Fine motor
· Active working memory (concurrently holding information in your mind to act on it)

For young James it was all too much.   James would like school much more if could approach writing in more digestible bites.  He wouldn’t feel so overwhelmed.

Practicing simple sentences (e.g., “Dogs run.”  “People walk) and building on these sentences in a scaffold-like approach would give James a sense of confidence. 

I recommend that you get a hold of Diana Hanbury King’s,  Writing Skills to learn more about the structured, step-by-step approach to writing development.
 

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