Writing requires careful consideration of the elements underlying the organization of the text, which must be carried out simultaneously with the management of the other components of a written production, in particular syntax and spelling.

This is a major challenge for young elementary students, who are thus in need of support delivered in a reflexive pedagogical framework.

Students demonstrated a great sense of competence and strong motivation for writing.

This longitudinal research was conducted in response to the need to develop pedagogical practices for assessing students’ level of development for each component of written production in order to provide support that is constantly adjusted to each student’s needs.

A developmental pedagogical approach, centred mainly on story writing, was deployed over a period of three successive years with students who were in Grade 3 at the beginning of the study, as part of ongoing collaboration between schools and the research community.  

The analysis of the data collected at different times during the study reveled the undeniable contribution of teachers to the implementation of the approach, made it possible to observe the students’ progress in the various components under evaluation, and highlighted their ability, without being provided with a predefined story structure, to develop their own logical structure while managing all the components of written production. Moreover, the stories produced in this writing context were longer and more literary than those written according to a predefined story plan. 

In addition, the students demonstrated, at different times during the study, a great sense of competence and strong motivation for writing. Finally, it should be noted that these results were observed for both boys and girls, and for students identified as having difficulties, as well as those without difficulties. 

Main researcher

Pauline Sirois, Université Laval

Summary

Research report

Call for proposals

Deposit of the research report: August 2019