This project focuses on laying the foundations for automated analysis of argumentation schemes, supporting identification and classification of the arguments being made in a text, for the purpose of scoring the quality of written analyses of arguments. We developed annotation protocols for 20 argument prompts from a college-level test under the…

Since the 1970s, legacy Basic Writing systems have survived despite growing resistance grounded in an increasing awareness of their troubling roots and harmful effects. In this article, two 2017 basic writing students and their teacher conduct a mixed-method "postmortem" examination of the now eliminated zero-credit course and writing…

Developing a sufficient level of writing proficiency takes time. It is also a complex skill difficult to measure. The history of writing assessments reveals changing views of construct validity, reliability and interpretation of results. This study used a binary logistic regression model with seven years of grades 3 to 12 annual direct writing…

This study aimed to investigate Thai high school students' reported use of SRL strategies and their self-efficacy and to explore the effects of two psychological determinants in writing performance. Data were gathered from 768 Thai high school students in six high schools located in Southern Thailand. Convenience sampling was used in this study.…

This study examines and compares L2 grammatical accuracy in digital multimodal writing (DMW) and monomodal text-based writing (TBW). Utilizing a mixed-methods design, the research incorporates a dataset comprising 180 written texts, a questionnaire, and text-based interviews. Sixty EFL learners were assigned to two groups (TBW and DMW) and…

High school students with high-incidence disabilities and struggling writers face considerable challenges when taking writing assessments designed for college entrance. This study examined the effectiveness of a writing intervention for improving students' performance on a college entrance exam, the writing assessment for the ACT. Students were…

The present study was conducted to find out the effect of reconstruction activities on grade XI students' English writing skills which included mechanical accuracy I (punctuations) and mechanical accuracy II (spellings). The study was carried out employing a pre-test post-test experimental control group design. A government degree college for boys…

This article is a critique of current approaches to the teaching and assessment of writing in schools in the UK. Successive government initiatives, most particularly the latest (impoverished) version of the English curriculum, are seen as having led to a situation in which pupils are taught in a way that does not improve the quality of their…

Grade 4 represents a critical juncture in the literacy development of young students. This article explores the role of handwriting in unlocking the higher order psycholinguistic and metacognitive resources needed to compose quality text. In particular, we investigate the threshold of control over handwriting needed to unlock vocabulary that…

This study attempts to investigate the relationship between students' weakness in listening skill and its effect on their performance in the TOEFL IBT integrated task of writing. It also investigates the balance among the students' four language skills. The participants of the study are senior students of Rada'a Education College of Albaydaa…

The optional ACT® writing test is designed to measure students' writing skills -- specifically, those skills emphasized and acquired in high school English classes and important for success in entry-level college composition courses. The test was first introduced in 2005, and in fall 2015, a number of enhancements to the former version were…

This study examined developmental differences in written expression of intermediate-grade children across planning, writing, and revising products. This work is the first step in a programmatic line of research examining the utility of the assessment procedures toward formative writing assessment protocols. Eighty children in fourth and sixth…

Literature has indicated conflicting results regarding the relationship between grasp patterns and legible handwriting. Historically, the dynamic tripod grasp was viewed as the gold standard, but more recent literature indicates that grasp may not have as much of an effect on handwriting legibility as once thought. The purpose of this study is to…

There is limited research of observed writing instruction in inclusive, secondary diverse urban contexts. This study contributes to the field by investigating four urban secondary English teachers' perceptions of ideal writing instruction as compared with their actual instruction, which is primarily driven by high-stakes accountability measures.…

In many states, writing is tested only in selected grades causing writing instruction often to be over-emphasized some years and neglected in others. The present study examines how students' motivation for writing differs during the middle school years. We administered the "Self-Beliefs, Writing Beliefs, and Attitude Survey" (SWAS) to a…