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Improving the Paragraph Text-Writing Skills of Students with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities: A Single-Case Design Study

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Abstract

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 the composition of connected text into multiple, related sentences of appropriate semantics, spelling, syntax, and usage (e.g., capitalization and punctuation). In the present study, we investigated the effects of a multicomponent intervention of explicit instruction and fluency practice on the paragraph text-writing skills of four secondary-aged individuals with IDD. We used a multiple-probe across participants design and measured paragraph text-writing with correct and incorrect writing sequences. Visual analysis and effect sizes revealed mixed results: Three participants showed improvement in the accuracy and/or speed of their paragraph text-writing, but one participant showed no improvement. We discuss the results of the study within the context of the writing intervention literature and instructional procedures for developing writing fluency.

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Correspondence to Derek B. Rodgers.

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This research project was approved by the Institutional Review Board of the University of Iowa.

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Rodgers, D.B., Datchuk, S.M. Improving the Paragraph Text-Writing Skills of Students with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities: A Single-Case Design Study. Educ. Treat. Child. 43, 347–360 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s43494-020-00029-9

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