Writing places heavy demands on students' cognitive capacity. Existing research suggests that planning before writing can help to alleviate this cognitive burden; thus improving the quality of student writing. In this explanatory sequential mixed-methods study, the researcher examined the efficacy of specific pre-planning tools on students'…

Written expression can be a critical skill for academic, vocational, and social pursuits. Unfortunately, research suggests that students with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) struggle to develop writing skills. Paragraph text-writing is a component of written expression and refers to constructing multiple sentences about a…

The new Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education (ACRL, 2016) highlights the ability to synthesize ideas from multiple sources of information as one of the key knowledge practices as students navigate an increasingly complex information landscape. With the introduction of this new document, there is a strong need for evidence-based…

Writing is a difficult task for most students. Only 27% of all students in America can write proficiently at or above grade level (U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences, 2012). With the recent adoption of rigorous standards (i.e., Common Core State Standards, Next Generation Science Standards), secondary students are…

Young adolescents should be able to write organized multi-paragraph compositions that develop a central idea and unfold in logical and sequential order, unified through the use of transitional words and phrases. In other words, the compositions should not just consist of a string of related sentences, but represent a dynamic text that has…

The present study used a multiple-baseline, single-case experimental design to investigate effects of three sequential experimental conditions on frequency of correct word sequences (CWS) and construction of simple sentences per 1-minute. Sentence Instruction, Frequency Building to a Performance Criteria (FBPC), and Paragraph Instruction comprised…