This report presents the results of the 1998 NAEP (National Assessment of Educational Progress) writing assessment of fourth-, eighth-, and twelfth-grade students for the nation and for participating states or jurisdictions. It provides results for subgroups of students defined by various background and contextual characteristics. The Introduction frames the results by describing the objectives of the assessment and the kinds of questions it contained. Chapter 1 presents national results, including achievement level definitions and results, and exemplars of student writing from the assessment at each of the three achievement levels: Basic, Proficient, and Advanced. This is the first time NAEP has set achievement levels for writing. Chapters 2 and 3 present results for regions of the country and for subgroups of students (for example, male and female students), by average scale scores and achievement levels, respectively. Chapter 4 provides information about some instructional practices. In that chapter, students' answers to such questions as "how often does your teacher talk to you about your writing" are reported, along with student performance data. Chapter 5 presents results of the state-by-state assessment done at grade 8, which was the first NAEP state-by-state assessment in writing. That chapter also reports results by subgroups of the population in each participating state or jurisdiction. Chapter 6 explores in greater depth how student writing on the assessment was evaluated. It shows the scoring guides that were used and reports on student performance in narrative, informative, and persuasive writing. Chapter 6 also provides additional samples of student writing. Contains numerous tables and figures of data. Appendixes contain: information about procedures for the administration and evaluation of the assessment, as well as about how subgroups (such as race/ethnicity) were defined; standard errors for tables included in the body of the report; the percentage of students in each subgroup by state or jurisdiction; other contextual information, such as expenditures on education, from nonNAEP sources such as the census; more detailed achievement level results for subgroups of students; and results for students in nonpublic schools. (RS)