The quality of the written text is vital to academic performance, so much so that the 2012 Key Stage 2 (8-11 years) English tests awarded 37 out of 40 points for writing ability and reserved only 3 points for handwriting quality (legibility) (DfE, 2012). This suggests that the majority of the assessment relates to writing ability with much less emphasis placed on the skill of handwriting (see Table 6.1 for English Test Scoring Criteria.). However, there is substantial evidence to support the relationship between transcription skills (handwriting and spelling) and the quality of the written composition (Berninger et al, 1994; Berninger et al, 1996). If a child has difficulties with handwriting, it can impact on the quality of the written text, which in turn may influence academic performance. However, despite the emphasis on writing ability within the educational system, very few studies have examined the quality of writing in children with DCD and its relationship with handwriting difficulties. This is an important area to investigate, as it would shed light on the wider implications of their motor difficulties.
Based on the above premise, the purpose of this chapter was to examine the written ability of children with DCD in order to ascertain whether their difficulties with handwriting constrain compositional quality. To examine the quality of the written composition the Wechsler Objective Language
Dimensions (WOLD; Rust, 1996) scoring criteria was implemented on the DASH (Barnett et al, 2007) free-writing compositions. The areas assessed on the WOLD included ideas and development,
organisation, vocabulary, sentence structure, grammar, and capitalisation and punctuation all of which are assessed on the Key Stage 2 English tests (see Table 6.1) (DfE, 2012). In addition,
performance in spelling and vocabulary were examined, as spelling is not only assessed in the English curriculum (DfE, 2012), but is also a transcription skill at the same level as handwriting, while vocabulary is an important higher level skill of writing. While the overall theoretical framework to support this chapter was presented in Chapter 2, a literature review specifically focusing on the previous studies on writing quality in DCD will follow.
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Table 6.12012 Key Stage 2 English Test Scoring Criteria: 37/40 points available
The Aspects of Writing Assessed 1 Write imaginative, interesting and thoughtful texts
2 Produce texts which are appropriate to task, reader and purpose
3 Organise and present whole texts effectively, sequencing and structuring information, ideas and events 4 Construct paragraphs and use cohesion within and between paragraphs
5 Vary sentences for clarity, purpose and effect
6 Write with technical accuracy of syntax and punctuation in phrases, clauses and sentences 7 Select appropriate and effective vocabulary
8 Use of correct spelling
6.2 Literature Review
6.2.1 Writing Quality in Children with DCD
In one of the only studies to examine writing quality in the English language in children with DCD, Dewey, Kaplan, Crawford and Wilson (2002) examined writing within the context of investigating difficulties in attention, learning and psychosocial adjustment. In their Canadian study a battery of assessments were implemented to quantify performance and compare the abilities of children with DCD to typically developing controls. To address writing ability, the subtests of the Woodcock± Johnson Psycho-educational Battery-Revised (WJ-R) (Woodcock & Johnson 1989 cited in Dewey et al, 2002) were used and included tasks involving dictation, writing samples (unspecified by authors), proofreading, writing fluency, punctuation and capitalization, spelling and word usage. One of the barriers to interpreting the results of Dewey et al (2002) was the lack of information provided with regards to the exact nature of the writing tasks/samples and in particular, how the variables were specifically measured and scored. In addition, the sample of 45 children with DCD used in Dewey et al (2002) were not screened for dyslexia but scored lower as a group on a measure of spelling. This poses
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issues in terms of applying the findings to the current study, as it is unclear whether the children in 'HZH\¶VJURXSZHUHWKRVHZLWKGLDJQRVHGFR-occurring disorders. For example, in this thesis, the DCD group scored below the TD group on the BAS-II measure of spelling, however as a group they were ZLWKLQWKHDYHUDJHUDQJHDQGQRQHKDGDGLDJQRVLVRIG\VOH[LD7KHUHIRUHZKLOH'HZH\HWDO¶V findings indicated that the children with DCD performed below their TD peers on punctuation, capitalisation and word usage (vocabulary) this may have been attributed to formally recognised co- occurring disorders such as dyslexia or ADHD. As a result, in order to understand in greater detail the impact of motor difficulties on writing quality without the limitations of literacy or attentional deficits, it is important to control for confounding factors which may impact writing performance.
The only other study to examine writing in children with DCD was conducted in Taiwanese (Cheng, Chen, Tsai, Shen & Cherng, 2011). 6LQFH&KHQJHWDO¶V study was based on a writing system outside of the Latin base, applying the findings to English is challenging given the differences in the linguistic makeup of sentences. Nevertheless, Cheng et al (2011) examined spelling, orthography, vocabulary, grammar and reading using the Chinese Reading Achievement Test (CRAT) (Chou & Yeh 2007 cited in Cheng et al, 2011) and the Basic Reading and Writing Comprehensive Test (BRWCT) (Hung et al 2003 cited in Cheng et al, 2011). The DCD group included 37 children with DCD aged between 7-8.5 years and they were compared to a group of 93 typically developing children. The results indicated that the DCD group scored below their TD peers on the writing composite score, character writing and dictation, while there was no difference in reading, phrase making or character pronunciation. However, beyond these findings, there was no information given about performance on specific areas of writing such as spelling, vocabulary and grammar.
&KHQJHWDO¶V GLVFXVVLRQFHQWHUHGRQWKHGLIIHUHQFHVEHWZHHQH[DPLQLQJZULWLQJZLWKLQD logographic writing system such as the Chinese script compared to the Latin base. They suggested that difficulties with reading and spelling manifested in different ways. For example, in the English
language grapheme to phoneme mapping can pose difficulties in children who have difficulties with reading, whereas this concept does not exist within the Chinese script. Moreover, according to Cheng et al (2011) reading Chinese involves mapping the orthographic form of the character to the syllable. According to Cheng et al (2011) this difference may have contributed to the absence of reading difficulties found in their sample, as the Chinese writing system by nature does not demand the same processes as the Latin base.