ERIC ED603945: Language, Literacy, Attentional Behaviors, and Instructional Quality Predictors of Written Composition for First Graders

2013·0.43 MB·English

by  ERIC

EarlyChildhoodResearchQuarterly28 (2013) 461–469

ContentslistsavailableatSciVerseScienceDirect

Early Childhood Research Quarterly

Language, literacy, attentional behaviors, and instructional quality predictors of

written composition for first graders

Young-SukKima, ,StephanieAlOtaibab,JessicaFolsomSidlerc,LuanaGruelichd
∗

aFloridaStateUniversityandFloridaCenterforReadingResearch,UnitedStates
bSouther nMe thodistUni vers ity,Unit edStat es
cFloridaCe nterforRe adingResea rch,Un itedStates
dAndrew sUniv ersi ty,Unite dStates

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Articlehistory: Wehadtwoprimarypurposesinthepresentstudy:(1)toexamineuniquechild-levelpredictorsofwritten
Receiv ed3November2011 com pos ition whichi ncludedl an gua geskills ,literac ys ki lls(e.g.,re adinga ndspelling ),andatte nt iveness
AReccceepivteedd i2n 7 rJeavnisueadry fo2 r0m1 38 January 2013 and (2) to ex amine whether instructio nal qu ality (qu ality in re sponsive nes s and indi vidu alization, and
qualityinspellingandwritinginstruction)isuniquelyrelatedtowrittencompositionforfirst-grade

children(N=527).Children’swrittencompositionwasevaluatedonsubstantivequality(ideas,organi-
Keywords: zation,w ord choice ,andsente nceflow )andwriting con ventions(s pe lling,mechan ics,and handw riting).
Attentiveness
Resultsrevealedthatforthesubstantivequalityofwriting,children’sgrammaticalknowledge,reading
Firstgrade
comprehension,letterwritingautomaticity,andattentivenesswereuniquelyrelated.Teachers’respon-
Instructionalquality
Language siveness was also uniquely related to the substantive quality of written composition after accounting
Reading forchildpredictorsandotherinstructionalqualityvariables.Forthewritingconventionsoutcome,chil-

Writing dren’sspellingandattentivenesswereuniquelyrelated,butinstructionalqualitywasnot.Theseresults

suggesttheimportanceofpayingattentiontomultiplecomponentskillssuchaslanguage,literacy,and

behavioralfactorsaswellasteachers’responsivenessforwritingdevelopment.

© 2013 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
AccordingtoNAEPdata,only35%ofstudentsineighthgradecan approaches;Graham,2006;Graham,Harris,&Mason,2005;Moats,

writeproficientlyandthisproportionhasnotchangedsince2002 Foorman,&Taylor,2006;Pritchard&Honeycutt,2006)inrelation

(NationalCenterforEducationStatistics,2003,2012).Themajority tochildren’swritingachievement.However,aschildrenexperience

ofUSstudentswriteatabasiclevelorbelowthebasiclevel,which writinginstructionmostlyinformalschooling(Shanahan,2006),it

makesitdifficultforthemtocommunicateinwritingatschooland isimportanttoexaminebothchildandinstructionalfactorsintan-

limitsfutureemploymentopportunities.Writingconnectedtext, demforchildren’swritingachievement,andtounderstandthese

includingsentences,paragraphs,andessays(i.e.,writtencomposi- factorsearlyintheiracademiccareers.Infact,thenewlyreleased

tion),isahighlycomplextaskdrawingonmultipleprocessessuch Common Core Standards indicate that by the end of first grade,

asorallanguageskills,transcriptionskills,andmemory(bothlong- studentsshouldbeabletowriteopinion,narrative,andinforma-

termandworkingmemory;Berninger,Abbott,Graham,&Richards, tive/explanatorytexts(NationalGovernorsAssociationCenterfor

2002; Berninger & Swanson, 1994; McCutchen, 2006; Shanahan, BestPractices,CouncilofChiefStateSchoolOfficers,2010).

2006).Whileitiswell-knownthatsomeofthesechild-levelskills In the present study, we examined multilevel predictors –

(e.g.,spelling)aremediatedbyinstructionalinfluences,themajor- child-levelpredictorssuchaslanguage,literacy(e.g.,readingand

ity of previous studies have focused on either child (Abbott & spelling),andattentiveness,andclassroom-levelpredictorssuchas

Berninger, 1993; Berninger & Abbott, 2010; Graham, Berninger, instructionalquality–forwrittencompositionforchildreningrade

Abbott, Abbott, & Whitaker, 1997; Kim, Al Otaiba, et al., 2011; one.Specifically,wehadtwoprimarypurposesinthepresentstudy.

McMaster, Du, & Petursdottir, 2009; Olinghouse, 2008; Wagner The first purpose was to examine unique child-level component

et al., 2011) or instructional factors (i.e., particular instructional skillsofwrittencomposition,whichincludedlanguageskills,liter-

acyskills,andattentionaldifficulties,afteraccountingforinstruc-

tionalquality.Thesecondpurposewastoexaminewhetherinstruc-

tionalqualitymakesauniquecontributiontowrittencomposition

in∗g RCeosrereasrcpho,n Gd1in2g9 ,a Cuotlhleogr ea ot:f FEldourcidaati oSnta, tFel oUrindiav eSrtsaittey U&n iFvleorrsiditay ,C 1e1n0t7er W fo. rC aRlel aSdt.-, afonrd filritset-rgacraydsek iclhlsi.ldCrheinld areftne’rs awcrciottuennticnogm fporo scihtiioldn-lwevaesle lxaanmguinaegde
Tallahassee,FL32306,UnitedStates.Tel.:[phone];fax:[phone].
in two dimensions, substantive quality and writing conventions.
E-mail address: [email protected](Y.-S. Kim).
0885-2006/$–seefrontmatter© 2013 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ecresq.2013.01.001
462 Y.-S.Kimetal./EarlyChildhoodResearchQuarterly28 (2013) 461–469

Instructionalqualitywasobservedandratedbaseduponarating children’swritingproductivityattheendofkindergarten(Kim,Al

scaleusedinpriorstudiestoexaminereadingoutcomes(AlOtaiba, Otaiba,etal.,2011).YetBerningerandAbbott(2010)showedthat

Folsom,etal.,2011)anddescriptionofspellingandwritinginstruc- children’sreadingcomprehensionwasuniquelyrelatedtowriting

tionatkindergarten(Puranik,AlOtaiba,Folsom,&Greulich,2010). qualityafteraccountingforreceptiveandexpressiveorallanguage

skills for children in beginning (grade one) and more advanced

1. Child-levelpredictorsofwrittencomposition stagesofwritingdevelopment(gradeseven).Ithasalsobeensug-

gestedthatreadingandwritingmayhaveabidirectionalrelation,

Accordingtoadevelopmentalmodelofwriting,multiplecogni- developingintandem(Shanahan,2006;Shanahan&Lomax,1986,

tiveandlinguisticfactorsarenecessaryforwritingdevelopment, 1988).

includinglowerleveltranscriptionskills(spellingandhandwrit- Another potential factor that might influence children’s writ-

ing) and high-level language and cognitive processes (Berninger ingskillisstudentbehaviorssuchasinattentionandhyperactivity.

& Swanson, 1994; also see Berninger et al., 2002). Because chil- Although correlated, inattention and hyperactivity are distinct

dren are still developing in their literacy, cognitive, and motor constructs (e.g., Barkley, 1990; Goodyear & Hynd, 1992; Lahey

skills,transcriptionskillsareessentiallycriticalforthetaskofwrit- & Carlson, 1991). Inattention has been hypothesized to reflect

ing. However, children’s ability to translate ideas into language problemsinself-regulationofinternalcognitiveprocesseswhile

at the word, sentence, and discourse level is also hypothesized hyperactivitymayreflectproblemsinself-regulationofbehavior

to be important for developing writers. When children further (Barkley, 1996). Classrooms are complex learning environments

developintojuniorhighgrades,cognitiveskillssuchasplanning where teacher and child characteristics interact and influence

andrevisionareexpectedtoplayamoreconstrainingroleinwrit- children’s learning (Connor, Morrison, et al., 2009; Cunningham,

tencomposition. Zibulsky,Stanovich,&Stanovich,2009;Saez,Folsom,AlOtaiba,&

Transcription skills, including spelling and letter writing flu- Schatschneider,2012;Verhoeven,Schnotz,&Paas,2009).Further-

ency, are hypothesized to be important for written composition more,literacyacquisition(i.e.,readingandwriting)isacomplex

as they free cognitive resources for higher-level composition task with multiple cognitive demands competing for children’s

processes such as generating ideas and content during writing attention. Thus, the extent of children’s attentiveness or lack

(Graham, 1990; Graham et al., 1997; Graham & Harris, 2000; thereof is likely to influence their literacy acquisition (Posner &

McCutchen,1988,2006;Scardamalia,Bereiter,&Goleman,1982).It McCandliss,1999).Studieshaveshowntheinfluenceofattentional

appearsthatchildren’sspellingabilityisimportantparticularlyfor difficultiesonone’sprereadingskills(Willcuttetal.,2007),reading,

beginningwritersasspellingskillsmaysupportorconstraingen- andoverallacademicachievementafteraccountingforintelligence

eration of text (Berninger, Nielsen, Abbott, Wijsman, & Raskind, in longitudinal studies following students from kindergarten to

2008; Ehri, 2000; Graham, Harris, & Chorzempa, 2002; Kim, Al second grade (Dally, 2006) and from adolescence to adulthood

Otaiba,etal.,2011;Puranik&AlOtaiba,2012;Treiman&Bourassa, (Fergusson,Lynskey,&Horwood,1997).

2000).Inadditiontospelling,letterwritingautomaticity(typically Giventhatattentioncontributestoreadingoutcomesofyoung

referredtoashandwritingfluency;Berninger,1999;Grahametal., children,itisreasonabletohypothesizethatattentionaldifficulties

1997)–i.e.,theaccuracyandrateatwhichchildrenretrieveand are also likely to contribute to their writing skills because writ-

produceletters–isalsoconsistentlyrelatedtochildren’swriting ingrequiresthejugglingofmultipleprocesses,perhapstoaneven

qualityandproductivitynotonlyforyoungwriters(Grahametal., greaterextentthaninreading(Moats,2005).Indeed,arecentstudy

1997;Kim,AlOtaiba,etal.,2011;Puranik&AlOtaiba,2012;Wagner showedthatchildren’sinattentiveness,butnothyperactivity,was

etal.,2011),butalsoevenintoadolescence(Grahametal.,1997). related to their writing skills (measured by Woodcock Johnson-

Empiricalevidenceoftheimportanceoflanguageinbeginning RevisedWritingSamplesandWritingFluencytasks)indirectlyvia

writingisaccumulatingbutfindingsaresomewhatinconsistent.On an orthographic factor (e.g., orthographic choice task and letter

theonehand,PuranikandAlOtaiba(2012)didnotfindthatoral cluster coding task) and a rapid naming factor for children with

languageskillswererelatedtothenumberofwordsorideaspro- dyslexia (Thomson et al., 2005). In other words, children’s inat-

ducedbykindergarteners(i.e.,writingproductivity)oncespelling tentivenesswasdirectlyrelatedtoorthographicandrapidnaming

andhandwritingwereenteredintoaregressionmodel.However, factorswhichwere,inturn,directlyrelatedtowrittencomposition

usingstructuralequationmodelingwithlatentvariables,Kim,Al measuredbytheWoodcockJohnson-RevisedWritingSamplesand

Otaiba,etal.(2011)showedthatchildren’sorallanguageskill,cap- WritingFluencytasks.However,ourunderstandingoftherelation

tured by vocabulary and grammatical knowledge, was uniquely of attentional difficulties to writing skill is still very limited. For

related to writing productivity (how much children wrote) for instance,itisnotclearwhetherattentivenessisuniquelyrelated

children at the end of kindergarten. Similarly, third-grade stu- towritingafteraccountingforotherimportantlanguageandlit-

dents’grammaticalunderstandingwasuniquelyrelatedtowriting eracyskills.Onehypothesisisthattheinfluenceofattentiveness

quality (ideation, organization, grammar, sentence structure and onwrittencompositionisviaotherlexical-andtext-levelliteracy

vocabulary choice), after accounting for word reading, IQ, writ- skillssuchasreadingcomprehensionandspelling,suchthatatten-

ing productivity, and spelling (Olinghouse, 2008). In addition, tivenessisnotuniquelyrelatedtowrittencompositionoverand

oral language skill composed of verbal reasoning, phonological above reading comprehension and spelling. This is a reasonable

awareness,andsentencememorywasuniquelyrelatedtowriting hypothesisgiventhatorthographicawarenessandrapidnaming

productivity(totalnumberofwordswritten)amongsecond-and aresublexicalskillsthatcontributetolexical-andtext-levelliteracy

third-gradestudentsandtowritingqualityamongfirst-andsixth- skills(Compton,2003;deJong&vanderLeij,1999;Savage,Pillay,&

gradestudents,afteraccountingforreading(Abbott&Berninger, Melidona,2008;Thomsonetal.,2005;Wolf&Bowers,1999;Wolf

1993). &Katzir-Cohen,2001),andthus,oncespellingandreadingcom-

In addition to transcription and language skills, converging prehension are taken into consideration in the statistical model,

findingsfrompreviousstudiessuggestthatreadingskill,reading attentivenessmightnotbeuniquelyrelatedtowriting.Analter-

comprehensioninparticular,mightbeauniquecorrelateofwriting nativehypothesisisthatattentivenessrelatestochildren’swritten

skillforchildreningradesoneandabove(Abbott&Berninger,1993; compositionbeyondlanguageandliteracyskillsbecausewriting

Berninger&Abbott,2010;Berningeretal.,2002;Olinghouse,2008). demandscoordinationofmultipleprocessessuchthatcontrolled

Neitherwordreadingskillsnorchildren’sreadingskillcomposedof attentionisneededforwrittencompositionoverandabovelan-

wordreadingandreadingcomprehensionwereuniquelyrelatedto guageandliteracyskills.
Y.-S.Kimetal./EarlyChildhoodResearchQuarterly28 (2013) 461–469 463

2. Instructionalqualityandwriting these two dimensions of written composition were used as the

outcomesintheanalysis.

Childrenaretypicallyexposedtowritinginstructionwithfor- Instructionalqualitywasratedonaratingscaleontwooverall

malschoolingalthoughsomenascentformofwriting(e.g.,letter aspects:overallinstructionalprocedureandspecificliteracycon-

strings) starts before children enter school (Bissex, 1980; Harst, tent areas. Instructional procedure included the extent to which

Woordward,&Burke,1984).Itissuggestedthatteachersplayan teachers were responsive to children (responsiveness hereafter),

essentialroleinchildren’slearningtowrite,andthushigh-quality theextenttowhichteachersprovidedindividualizedinstruction

instruction is critical for children’s writing development (New (individualizationhereafter),andtheextenttowhichinstruction

StandardsPrimaryLiteracyCommittee,1999).However,asurpris- wasorganized(organizationhereafter).Teachers’responsiveness

ingly limited number of studies has investigated the relation of to students’ inquiries has shown to be positively related to chil-

instructionalqualitytochildren’swrittencomposition.Whilestud- dren’sreadingskills(Connor,Guiliani,Rotolo,Spencer,&Morrison,

iesontheeffectivenessofwritinginstructionhavedemonstrated under review). In addition, individualized instruction has been

that instruction on writing is important for the development of showntohaveacausalandpositiveimpactonkindergartenand

children’swritingskills(e.g.,strategyinstruction,Graham,2006; firstgradestudents’readingdevelopment(AlOtaiba,Connor,etal.,

processapproach,Pritchard&Honeycutt,2006),thesestudiesare 2011;Connor,Morrison,etal.,2009).Thus,wehypothesizedthat

limited to the particular writing instructional approach. What is theextenttowhichteachers’instructionisorganizedandprepared

lackingintheliteratureistheanswertowhetheroverallinstruc- mightberelatedtochildren’swrittencomposition.Inadditionto

tional quality (e.g., how organized classroom instruction is, how qualityinoverallinstruction,wealsoincludedinstructionalqual-

responsivetheteacheris)isrelatedtochildren’swritingachieve- ityinspecificliteracyareassuchasspelling,writing,andreading

ment. comprehension.
In addition, given that children’s reading skills appear to be

related to their writing skills (Berninger et al., 2002; Shanahan, 4. Method

2006),variationinteachers’instructionalqualityinliteracyareas

suchasreadingmightbeimportanttochildren’swritingskills.To 4.1. Participants

date,fewstudiesconductedobservationalresearchwithafocuson

writingdevelopment,andthosefewexistingobservationalstud- Data were collected from 531 first-grade students (mean

iesweremostlyconductedinthe1980s(Applebee,1981;Bridge& age=6.21,SD=39)insevenpublicschoolsand34classroomsina

Hiebert,1985;Florio&Clark,1982).AnexceptionisaMoatsand northernFloridacommunity.Fourstudentsdidnotwriteanything

hercolleagues’(2006)studywhichshowedthatchildreninhigh- andtherefore,theirwrittencompositionswerenotcoded.Thefinal

quality writing instruction in grade three and four wrote longer samplesizeinthepresentstudywas527.Theparticipantsincluded

compositionswithcorrectlyspelledwordsthanchildrenwithpoor 45% girls, 47% Black, 41% White, 2% Asian, and 10% Other (e.g.,

qualityinstruction(Moatsetal.,2006).Althoughinformative,this Hispanic,Multiracial,unknown/notreported).Fifty-sixpercentof

studyincludedasmallnumberofclassrooms(N=10)andchildren thesechildrenwereeligibleforfreeorreducedlunch.Thestudents

(N=40), and did not include important child predictors such as wereparticipatinginalargerstudyinvestigatingtheefficacyofcore

language,literacy,orattentionalbehaviors. readinginstructionwithinaresponsetotreatment(RTI)framework

(AlOtaiba,Folsom,etal.,2011).Fiftypercentofchildrenwereinthe

treatmentcondition.Childrenwererandomlyassignedwithintheir

3. Presentstudy classroomstooneoftworesearcher-administeredRTIconditions.

IntheDynamiccondition,studentswiththeweakestinitialskills

Insummary,weinvestigatedtherelationsofchild-levelvari- receivedintervention(Tier2orTier3immediately).IntheTypical

ablessuchaslanguage,literacy,andattention,andclassroom-level condition,studentsbeganinTier1andprogresstoTier2ifthey

variablessuchasinstructionalqualitytofirstgradestudents’writ- didnotrespondtoTier1andtoTier3iftheydidnotrespondto

ten composition. The two primary research questions were as Tier2.Well-trainedresearchstaffconductedallinterventions;Tier

follows:(1)Whatareuniquechild-levelpredictors(i.e.,orallan- 2wasprovidedin30minbi-weeklysessions(groupsof5–7chil-

guage,literacy,andattentionalbehaviors)ofwrittencomposition dren)andTier3wasprovidedin45minsessionsfourdaysperweek

forfirst-gradestudentsafteraccountingforinstructionalquality? (groupsof1–3children).Thecode-focusedactivitiesforTier2were

(2) What are unique instructional quality predictors of written drawnfromthefirstgradeOpenCourtImagineIt!seriesandthe

compositionforfirst-gradestudentsafteraccountingforchild-level FCRRK-3CenterActivitiesandTier3involvedEarlyInterventions

language, literacy, and attentional behaviors? Children’s written inReading(EIR;Mathes&Torgesen,2005).Themeaning-focused

composition was evaluated for multiple aspects, using an ana- componentsforbothtierschangedeach8weeks,beginningwith

lyticortraitapproach(NorthwestRegionalEducationalLaboratory, dialogicsharedbookreading(Lonigan,Anthony,Bloomfield,Dyer,

2011), which is the most widely used evaluation scale for writ- &Samwel,1999;Lonigan&Whitehurst,1998;Valdez-Menchaca&

ingacrossschoolsintheUnitedStates(Gransle,VanDerHeyden, Whitehurst,1992).Then,asstudentswereabletoreaddecodable

Noell,Resetar,&Williams,2006).Thetraitapproachincludesseven books,theypracticedreadingfluentlyandansweredsentence-level

aspects such as ideas (richness, clarity, development, and rele- comprehensionquestions.Finally,studentsreaddecodablebooks

vancetotopicandpurpose),organization(internalstructureand thatincludedelementsofsequencingtextstructure.Tutorsused

thelogicalpatternofpresentationofideas),wordchoice(phrasing, graphicorganizerstomodelandguidestudentsinretellingstories.

choice and arrangement of words), sentence flow (flow of lan- Inbothtreatmentandcontrolconditions,teachersreceivedpro-

guage),spelling,mechanics,andhandwriting.Arecentstudyfound fessionaldevelopmentaboutRTIandtheirschooldistrictprovided

thatwhenusingconfirmatoryfactoryanalysis,thesesevenaspects themwithdata.TheinterventionwasconductedfromOctoberto

are best described as two related (r=.65) but dissociable latent Aprilandthedatausedinthepresentstudywerecollectedinthe

variables:ideas,organization,wordchoice,andsentenceflowcap- spring after the intervention was completed (April and May). In

turing a ‘substantive quality’ dimension of written composition, thedataanalysis,treatmentconditionswereincludedasacontrol

andspelling,mechanics,andhandwritingcapturinga‘writingcon- variable.

ventions’dimensionofwrittencomposition(Kim,AlOtaiba,Sidler, Schools were recruited with the help of the District Reading

Gruelich,&Puranik,2011,underreview).Thus,inthepresentstudy, Coordinator to represent a diverse sample and to overrepresent
464 Y.-S.Kimetal./EarlyChildhoodResearchQuarterly28 (2013) 461–469

schools serving students from low-SES backgrounds. All seven 4.2.2. Child-levelpredictors

nominatedschoolsandallfirst-gradeteachersintheschoolsagreed 4.2.2.1. Oral language skills. Students’ word- and syntax-level

toparticipate.Allstudentsintheclassroomwererecruitedtopar- oral language skills were assessed by expressive vocabulary and

ticipate. Teachers in all but one school used Open Court as their grammatical knowledge. Expressive vocabulary was assessed by

corereadingprogramfor90minperday;intheremainingschool, the Picture Vocabulary subtest of Woodcock Johnson-III (WJ-III;

teachersusedReadingMastery.Teacherinterviewsindicatedthat Woodcock,McGrew,&Mather,2001),whichrequiresstudentsto

noadditionalwritingcurriculumwasinplaceintheseschoolsand identify pictured objects. Reliability (Cronbach’s alpha) was .71

ourobservationsindicatedthatwritingwasnotapredominantpart forthesample.Children’sgrammaticalknowledgewasmeasured

oftheliteracyprogram. by the Grammatic Completion subtest of the Test of Language

Development-Intermediate, third edition (TOLD-I: 3; Hamill &

4.2. Measures Newcomer,1997).Inthistask,thechildlistenstoasentence,which

hasawordmissing,andisaskedtoprovidegrammaticallycorrect

4.2.1. Outcome:writtencomposition responsesforthemissingpart.The28itemsincludevarioussyn-

Astorypromptwhichwasusedinpreviousstudieswasused tacticfeaturessuchasnoun-verbagreement,pronounuse,plurals,

to ask students to compose a text (McMaster et al., 2009). Pairs andnegatives(e.g.,Joelikestocookeveryday;yesterdayhecooked).

of trained graduate students administered this task to students Eachitemwasscoreddichotomouslyfollowingtheprotocols.Cron-

whiletheirclassroomteacherswerepresentinclassrooms.Test- bach’salphawas.83forthesample.

ingoccurredinlateAprilandMay.Similarbrief,timedpromptsare

widelyusedinwritingresearchasglobalindicatorsofwritingper- 4.2.2.2. Readingskills. Students’readingskillswereassessedbythe

formance(Lembke,Deno,&Hall,2003;McMasteretal.,2009)and PassageComprehensionsubtestofWJ-III(Woodcocketal.,2001).

thistaskwasdesignedtobesimilartostate-widecurriculum-based Passage Comprehension is an oral cloze task in which the child

writingassessments.Thewritingpromptwas“Oneday,whenIgot readssentencesandpassagesandisaskedtofillinblanks.Students’

homefromschool,...”andchildrenweregiventhefollowingdirec- performanceoneachitemwasscoreddichotomously.Cronbach’s

tion.TodayI’mgoingtoaskyoutowriteastory.Beforeyouwrite,I alphawas.88forthesample.

wantyoutothinkaboutthestory.Firstyouwillthink,thenyouwill

write.Youwillhave30secondstothinkand5minutestowrite.Ifyou 4.2.2.3. Spelling. Students’ spelling skill was assessed by the

donotknowhowtospellaword,youshouldguess....Yourstorywill spellingsubtestofWJ-III(Woodcocketal.,2001).Thiswasadicta-

beginwith‘Oneday,whenIgothomefromschool.’Thinkofastory tiontaskinwhichstudentswereaskedtospellwordsthatareof

you are going to write that starts like that. Students had 5min to increasingdifficulty.Theresearchassistantreadeachword,read

completethetask(McMasteretal.,2009). thesentencewiththeword,andthenrepeatedthespellingword

Students’writtencompositionwascodedbyanadapted6+1 (e.g.,“dog.”“Itookmydogtothepark.”“dog.”).Students’perfor-

TraitsofWritingRubricforPrimaryGrades(NorthwestRegional manceoneachitemwasscoreddichotomously.Cronbach’salpha

Educational Laboratory, 2011). The adapted rubric had the fol- was.86forthesample.

lowingsevenaspects:ideas,organization/structure,wordchoice,

sentencefluency,spelling,mechanics(capitalizationandpunctu- 4.2.2.4. Letter writing automaticity. Students’ letter writing auto-

ation), and handwriting. The voice aspect is in the original 6+1 maticitywasassessedbyaskingchildrentowriteasmanyalphabet

traitsrubric,butwasnotincludedinthepresentstudybecauseof letters as possible in 1min with accuracy (Jones & Christensen,

aflooreffectforthechildreninthepresentstudyinourprelim- 1999; Kim, Al Otaiba, et al., 2011; Wagner et al., 2011, but see

inarywork.Theideasaspectevaluatedtheextenttowhichmain Berningeretal.,1992inwhichasimilartaskwasusedfora15-

ideasweredevelopedandrepresented;theorganization/structure speriod).Thistaskassessedhowwellchildrenaccess,retrieve,and

aspect was evaluated for text structure (e.g., beginning, middle, writeletterformsautomatically.Researchassistantsaskedchildren

andend);thewordchoiceaspectforuseofinterestingandspe- towriteallthelettersinthealphabetinorder,usinglowercase

cific words; the sentence fluency aspect for grammatical use of letters.Thedirectionswere:We’regoingtoplayagametoshowme

sentencesandflowofsentences;thespellingaspectforaccuracy howwellandquicklyyoucanwriteyourabc’s.First,youwillwrite

andforthedevelopmentalphaseofspelledwords;themechan- thelowercaseofsmallabc’sasfastandcarefullyasyoucan.Don’ttry

ics aspect for capitalization and punctuation accuracy; and the toeraseanyofyourmistakes,justcrossthemoutandgoon.WhenI

handwriting aspect for spacing, neatness, and letter formation. say“readybegin”,youwillwritetheletters.KeepwritinguntilIsay

These aspects were rated on a scale of 1–5, each corresponding stop.Ready,begin.After1min,tellthestudents:“Stopandputdown

toexperimenting,emerging,developing,capable,andexperienced, yourpencils.”Childrenreceivedascoreforthenumberofcorrectly

respectively.Ascoreof0wasassignedtounscorableonesineach writtenletters,adaptingBerningeretal.’s(1992)study.Onepoint

aspect,butthiswasveryrare(i.e.,4children). wasawardedforeachcorrectlyformedandsequencedletter.Given

Two graduate student coders were rigorously trained and thatstudentswereinfirstgrade,a0.5wasusedforeachimprecisely

double-codedindependentlyapproximately15percentofthewrit- formedletter(e.g.,“n”mustnotbeconfusedwithan“h”).Thefol-

ingsamples(i.e.,78piecesofwrittencomposition).Theinter-rater lowingresponseswerescoredasincorrectandearnedascoreof

percent agreement rates were as follows: .84 for ideas, .92 for zero:(a)letterswrittenincursive;(b)letterswrittenoutoforder;

organization,.84forwordchoice,.88forsentencefluency,.92for or(c)uppercaseletters.Inter-raterpercentagreementwasgreater

spelling,.92formechanics,and.80forhandwriting.Thepercent than.90.

agreementrateswereallexactpercentagreementinthepresent

study.Asnotedabove,thesesevenaspectswerefoundtocapture 4.2.2.5. Inattentivenessandhyperactivity. TheSWANisabehavioral

two related but dissociable dimensions, substantive quality and checklist(Swansonetal.,2006)thatincludes30itemsthatarerated

writingconventions(Kimetal.,underreview).Thus,inthemul- onaseven-pointscalerangingfromascoreofone(farbelowaver-

tilevel models addressing our main research questions, we used age) to seven (far above average) to allow for ratings of relative

a sum score of ideas, organization, word choice, and sentence strengths(aboveaverage)aswellasweaknesses(belowaverage).

fluency as the ‘substantive quality’ outcome and a sum score of ThefirstnineitemsrelatetotheAttentionDeficitscale(e.g.,Sustain

spelling,mechanics,andhandwritingasthe‘writingconventions’ attentionontasksorplayactivities;Listenwhenspokentodirectly)

outcome. andthenextnineitemstotheHyperactivity/Impulsivityscale(e.g.,
Y.-S.Kimetal./EarlyChildhoodResearchQuarterly28 (2013) 461–469 465

Modulateverbalactivity[controlexcesstalking]).Thelasttwelve 4.3. Procedures

itemsarerelatedtoindicatorsofoperationaldefiantdisorderand

werenotusedinourpresentstudy.Thus,inourpresentstudy,the Allthechildmeasureswereadministeredinthespring(April

maximumscoreonaSWANscaleis63inattentivenessandhyper- andMay)whileclassroomobservationwasconductedinthewin-

activity,respectively(9itemsxamaximumscoreof7ineachitem). ter.Thechildmeasureswereindividuallyassessedinaquietroom

Moreattentionorhyperactivityproblemsyieldlowerscoresonthe atschoolexceptforspelling,letterwritingautomaticity,andwrit-

SWANratingscales,andtherefore,higherscoresindicateattentive- ingwhichweregroupadministeredtoallconsentedstudentsin

nessandlesshyperactivebehaviors.SubscalescoresontheSWAN theirclassrooms.

arecalculatedbysummingthescoresontheitemsinthespecific

sSuWbAseNt c(eh.egc.,k Ilnisatttinentthieonsp orri nHgy.pIneroaucrtidvaittya)s. eTte,aCcrhoenrbsa ccohm’spalleptheadw thaes 5. Results

.98acrossthe18itemsusedinthepresentstudy. 5.1. Descriptivestatisticsandpreliminaryanalyses

4.2.3. Classroom-levelpredictors
4Wwodfcr1oraaecoeaoa nf.vf.ui20if rnsremnedtero .e0ehg3“ irsc vnnff.pnaFet. tou 1eargtleiaodullv aru. rbm t atqtenme tfrrIielrh.uddnevula”of eeaa s eifaimInntwet lnn rnoirci9tdyts u int o tytn0w)0uescigfr vp-t rote au h.emti-pe9r fnoocrir i,rt8scn”atnd i oopnit h,3ta go 2 coeaew , l hen e rnlcdfqwbasiva o idguup(sfiensarig h rae t d Clcg“ilrauh lr nouuoimar sca tebrghrat0tyeteeioaag aee.n nw ldddklfensitg Toa eie ih’tu nersanwbasrhi asgga rslckcehiectt trthanao eser heiep nntcg usleeifiyhpbtdn tfcmmraiee lat ssnetwo ncieths’ecfog tcr itf nrehri.nnuekf ivaytotetcacs C ehni rctttwrlinon niragikacvqogdueetel nlei n uecsrawdisgw,nest ars”t emif si s l satoorndaib tratsofnanrpt oyyu fmeuyi dano r)wmgrt c ro mo nhr(attaampat3(iiost s o lclil ) oatto one in wvo .ptfbbmw9ebi.oe adecssd2Te r eetoeleo h Jlen“rcrmatao fedvhova otsnt. aa 6pse i sadug1ri ttcd4lpenetaiihe.a,oo 0herp r ttllsnnd10oyyeeea-. iswcfdivtffbgy(nnrrrsocoarsyeoooei o aerrn ttmmmeetSrimrhshteahe ae.tse Txbsaclem s’T=1 au2 aptlha mh ep.ti1ba.fv6ar si3sfieetea0oolevt1.0ei rcis ltn1rec Aoclf ishaiar.os1eav(nil3tgea lvlrrnlo)e a7 eg rm.te=ki t rsm ) hen Trani3( v.a ge2adpalhvoo.anlr3nsnn2sio enrwavec 5migdi< cgnbfiei as leva d .egsetecas0w cabuia detaapmoh0rouwsan ingeini1t nlalpclwecslheai )dlb oizel ,eri nree i-tlanm ynneseabl wltege ulsa ssiup.vav tot dk(afTtw(auhcomfienssi mhrhdncel tce e es(hea teigelirdmeevaoabn ene amtn nan cu s nte 2strmot tsgael aoti r.a’msuts6oaa nu var ttontau5tt ycagaapirhhgs sstnrnniraiati etneeinedaoidlwain, t sch n naat.uldlntr0ariaeirdrardeoitol5dndhnutlaleaner yi g ayscrrndmlss idtusaepss cgioaipccvn ioa eoo nrgsoyeegsfgornorcn ,raaclee u u(aor eictcma miefitl=rn. osntn =celTq cikdp1mea o dv 1aau=ai lt0ami lneb0ip latltna98ol.sylth0lr e t ..enil t)36et.estTysa 3hes2yh77tt hs 3nraeor e))mssvveean) tenhfaaa wwlindeasaosonrsragasiatieeniitwranoeeeeenurrrlalndddddddyeess--l
nritnoeizss ctpeOrldoauv;nsec asstrrniiaovoldelno (n.mq3eTu) se matsahl;ica ethn(y e2ea x)rog tsfeet mhwninethe stnootert xwu atarcehnetniidcote h nfift n teoeisc nattwrcciuvlhhueceidtcriaeshotd np si,r netonhlsvearticermduteeice ndtalgyi sion pan(den1 icd)wvt istidae nsurac eacoolhlarirzeptgeeroasdd--’ slditrtreeoIrnnna’ sgco y (wr rd sr=eki t.r i7i lnl6ts og ,b , eeamtxtwta uemelnteiitlnniev evre eentalhe desm is n,ro geda lceanoltd imoa nnpinasrs ely tohrsfeu enccshts iiwiooldnnerar eael nn qc’dsou snlapadlneiutlgylciu tn aetgogd) e .w cahinitlhd-

rating students’ responses and experiences in their instruction

received a high score (e.g., 3) whereas those who do not and/or Table1
Descri ptivestatistics.
when they do, they are punitive in their responses to children’s

inquiriesreceivedalowscore(e.g.,0).Asforinstructionqualityin Mean SD Min–Max

individualization,ifateacherwasprovidingsmall-groupinstruc-
tion,butallofthe sm a llgroups did thesamet hing,shewou ldscore WIrditeinags outcomes 3.05 .71 0–4

aone(ineffectiveforindividualization).Ifateacherwasobserved Organization 2.83 .65 0–4
to hav eclearorga niza tionandallofthe st ud entsin herc lasswere Word choice 2.55 .72 0–4
Sentenceflow 2.86 .62 0–4
ontask,shewouldhavebeenratedathreefororganization.
Spelling 3.35 .83 0–5
The instructional quality in specific literacy components Mechani cs 2.30 1.02 0–5
include d quality of instructio n in spellin g, writin g, and read- Handwritin g 2.71 .87 0–5

ingcomprehension.Teacherswhoprovidedspecificinstructional Child-levelpredictors
stra tegiesandskills directlyr eceiv edhigher rating.S pecifically,a WJ-III Pi cture Vocabulary 20.17 3.30 11–29
WJ-IIIPictureVocabulary–SS 100.33 11.10 65–134
scoreofzerowasgivenwheninstructioninthetargetareawasnot
provid e data ll.As coreo fonew asgivenw he nth eteach erm ayh ave TTOOLLDD--33 GGrraammmmaattiicc CCoommpplleettiioonn –SS+ 197..3276 63..2098 10––2188

brieflyintroducedaconcept,butdidnotprovideopportunitiesfor WJ-IIIPassageComprehension 19.98 5.38 5–35
practic e.Ascoreof tw owasg iven wh enth eteach erintroduceda nd WJ-III Passage Comprehension – SS 101.37 13.005 62–132
WJ-IIISpelling 25.20 5.27 7–45
reviewedatargetareaandprovideopportunitytopractice.Ascore
WJ-IIISpelling–SS 108.67 15.57 46–151
ofthreewasassignedwhentheteacherintroducedorrevieweda Letter writinga u tom aticity 17.96 1 7.40 0–44
tar getar eae xplicitlyb yfollo win gmode ling,andpro vi dingmult i- SWAN attentiv eness 38.85 12.79 9–63

pleopportunitiestostudents’practice.Forexample,inthedomain SWANHyperactivity+ 40.40 12.03 9–63
ofw riting,modera te lyeffectiv einstruct ion (ascoreo f2) me antthat Classroom -level predictor s
TQResponsiveness 2.39 .55 1–3
theteacherintroducedawritingactivity,andsetchildrenfreeto
fini shwritin grathertha n providin gawriti ngm ode landthe nmo n- TTQQ IOnrdgiavnidizuaatliioznation 12..6513 1..5255 10––33

itoringwritingandgivingfeedback(whichwouldhavebeenscore TQSpelling 1.73 1.11 0–3
of 3 or very ef fecti ve). In effective instruct ion in writin g (a score TQ Writing 1.64 .83 1–3
TQComprehension 2.65 .71 1–3
of1)wouldhavebeenscorediftheobservationrevealedstudents

completing a writing assignment (e.g., journaling) with no feed- Note:WJ-III,WoodcockJohnson-ThirdEdition;SS,StandardScore;TOLD,TestofLan-
guage Devel opment-Int ermediate,thir dedition ;T Q,Teachi ngQua lity;Th esta n dard
backorsupportfromtheteacher.Cohen’skapparangedfrom.90
scoresfortheWJ-IIIsubtestshaveameanof100andstandarddeviationof15
to.93.Instructionalqualityusingasimilarapproachwasshownto
be uni quelyrelated tochild ren’s re adingc omprehen sion (Conn or wtiohneroefa3s. for the TOLD-3 Grammatic Completion a mean of 10 and standard devia-

etal.,underreview). +Higherscoresrepresentlesshyperactivity.
466 Y.-S.Kimetal./EarlyChildhoodResearchQuarterly28 (2013) 461–469

Table2

Correlationsamonglanguageandliteracypredictorsatthechildlevel.

1 2 3 4 5 6

1.WJ-IIIPictureVocabulary –

2.GrammaticalCompletion .59 –

3.WJ-IIIPassageComprehension .53 .58 –

4.WJ-IIISpelling .39 .46 .76 –

5.Letterwritingautomaticity .26 .31 .39 .37 –

6.Attentiveness .31 .39 .54 .54 .42 –

7.Hyperactivity+ .22 .29 .41 .42 .35 .85

Note.Allcorrelationcoefficientsarestatisticallysignificantat.001level.

+Higherscoresrepresentlesshyperactivity.

WJ-III,WoodcockJohnson-ThirdEdition.

the substantive quality and writing conventions as the written Table3
com positionout comes.M ulti levelmo delswereem plo yed because Multil evel models: writing quality and writing conventions predicted by students’
languageandliteracyskills,attention,andinstructionalqualityforstudentsinfirst
children were nested within classrooms, and multilevel models
grade.
correct for standard errors and associated p-values (Hox, 2002;
Rauden bus h & Bryk, 2002). Firs t, baseline models w ere fit ted to Substantive quality Writing conventions

examine total variance attributable to child and classroom lev- Fixedeffects
els.Intra classc orrelatio nsinchildren ’s writte nco mpositionw ere Inte rcept 5.79(1.55)*** .20(1.40)
Ageinmonths .07 (.21) −.48 (.19)*
.14 and .13 in the substantive quality and writing conventions
Treatmentconditions .04(.16) .06(.14)
tdoimtaelvnasrioiannsc, ereisnpcehcitlidvreelny.’ sInw ortithteern wcoomrdps,o aspitpioronxwimasaatettlyri 1b3u–ta1b4l%e toof FTrQeeR easnpdo rne sdivuecneeds lsunc h status −−..4410 ((..1185)) ** −..0338 ((..1156))*

differencesamongclassrooms.Insubsequentmodels,child-(lan- TQIndividualization .02(.08) .11(.07)
guage,liter acy,and attentivene ss –researchq uestion1 )andc lass- TQ Organization −−.03 (.16) −−.25 (.15)
TQSpelling .06(.08) .01(.08)
(instructionalquality–researchquestion2)levelpredictorswere
included simu ltaneou s ly to add ress the tw o rese arch ques tions. TTQQ WCormitpinrge hension −..1291 ((..1113)) −..1034 ((..1113))

Rawscoreswereusedinthesemodels.Inaddition,children’sagein WJPictureVocabulary .02(.03) .01(.03)
mon ths,fre eand redu ce dlunc hstatus (1 =freean dreduced lun ch Gra mmatic Completion −.06 (.02) ** .005 (.02)
WJPassage Comprehen sion .07 (.03)** −.02( .02)
eligible; 0 = not eligible) and treatment conditions (1 = treatment; WJ Spelling .02 (.02) .16 (.02)***
0ti v=i ctyonwtraosl)c ownesries tiennctlluydnedon assi gcnonifitcroanl vtawrihaebnlelsa. nCghuiladgreena’nsd hylipteerraaccy- SLeWt tAeNr watrtietinn tgiv aeunteosmsaticity ..0023 ((..00108) *)** ..0024 ((..00107))***

skillswereinthemodel(includingamodelinwhichattentiveness Variancecomponents
was n ot in clu ded ), and thus, hype ra ctivity is not in cluded in the CChlaisldsrroe onm! 2!u2 30 .20 2..0527
twofinalmodelsreportedhere. ε
−2LL 2056.5 1947.8
Research question 1: What are unique child-level predictors AIC 2090.5 1983.8

(i.e.,orallanguage,literacy,andattentionalbehaviors)ofwrit- Note:TQ,TeachingQuality;WJ,WoodcockJohnson-III.
ten comp osition fo r first g rade students a fter accoun tin g for * p <.05 .
** p < .01.
instructional quality? *** p < .001.

ResultsofmultilevelmodelsarepresentedinTable3forthetwo

writing outcomes, substantive quality and writing conventions. composition (ps .06). For the writing conventions outcome,
≥
Forthesubstantivequalityofchildren’swrittencomposition,chil- noneoftheinstructionalqualityvariableswereuniquelyrelated
dre n’sg rammatical knowle dg e(p=.001 ),readin gcomprehen sion (ps .09 ) aft er accounting for ch ild-level p redic tors. Inter actions
(p=.00 8), letter wr iting autom ati ci ty (p= .02), an d attentiveness bet w≥ een child- andclassro om- levelpredic torswerete stedbutnot
(p = .003) werea llunique lyandpositiv ely r elate daft eraccounting reported inTab le3 becausenonew erestatisti cally signific ant for

forinstructionalqualityvariablesandotherchild-levelvariablesin eitherthesubstantivequalityorthewritingconventionoutcome.

themodel.Forthewritingconventionsoutcome,children’sspelling

(p<.001)andattentiveness(p<.001)wereuniquelyrelatedafter 6. Discussion
ac co untin gfor alltheotherv ari ab lesin them odel.Chil dren’svo cab-

ularywasnotuniquelyrelatedtoeitherofthewritingoutcomes Writing is a higher-order skill, demanding coordination of
aftera ccou ntin gforinst ructiona lq ualityv ar iabl esando therchild- multiplepr oce ss essimultaneo usly.In thepresent study,weexa m-
level variablesin th emodel(ps .54). ined how a comp rehensive set of c hild -level a nd ins tru ctional
≥
quality predictors were related to two dimensions of written
Researchquestion2:Whatareuniqueinstructionalqualitypre-
composition (substantive quality and writing conventions) for a
dictors of written composition for first grade students after
large sample of first-grade children. We included language and
accounting for children’s language, literacy, and attentional
literacy skills and attentional behavior as well as instructional
behavior?
quality, both in general and in specific literacy content areas.
As shown in Table 3, in the substantive quality of written The chil d-lev el p redictor s we re m easured in the spring w hereas
comp osition, chi ldren wh ose tea chers were m ore re spo nsive in clas sroom instr uction wa s obse rved in th e wint er. Ove rall, the
theirinstruct ionhadh ighers cores(p= .009) after accounting for resultssho wedthatch ildren ’slanguag e,l itera cy,anda ttentiven ess
theo therinstruc tion alquali tyvari abl es and child ren’slangua ge, wered ifferentia llyr elatedtot heirsubst antivew ritin gqualityand
read ing, a nd attention variable s. The ot her instruction al quality to th eir writing co nventio n outco mes. In add ition, in structio nal
variables , inc luding ins tructional qual ity in writing and s pelling, qu ality, teacher responsiven ess in par tic ular, matt ered for the
were not uniquely related to the substa nti ve quali ty o f written substan tivequal ityofwrittencom p osition.
Y.-S.Kimetal./EarlyChildhoodResearchQuarterly28 (2013) 461–469 467

Asforthechild-levelpredictors,thefindingsofthepresentstudy resultswouldvaryasafunctionofnatureoftasks(i.e.,timedvs.

confirmedandalsoextendedpreviousstudiesbyshowinghowlan- untimed).

guage and literacy skills and attentional behavior are related to Attentiveness, or lack thereof, was uniquely related to both

differentdimensionsofwrittencomposition.Children’sorallan- the substantive quality and writing conventions dimensions of

guage skill, grammatical knowledge in particular, was uniquely written composition over and above language and literacy skills

relatedtothesubstantivequalityofwrittencomposition.Thatis, andinstructionalquality.Inotherwords,attentivenessasjudged

childrenwhohadhighlydevelopedgrammaticalknowledgewrote by classroom teachers was directly related to the substantive

storiesofhighersubstantivequalityinwrittencompositionthan quality and the extent to which children used writing conven-

those who had low grammar knowledge – the main ideas were tionsaccuratelyintheirwrittencompositions,suchthatattentive

moregermanetothetopic,andmoredetailswereelaborated;ideas children had better developed ideas, better formed sentences or

werepresentedinanorganizedmanner;diverseandinteresting demonstrated a better flow of sentences, and their spelling and

wordswereused;andhadgreatersentenceflowandvariedsen- handwritingweremorehighlydevelopedthanlessattentivechil-

tences.Giventhatwritingrequiresrepresentationofideasthrough dren. These results suggest that children’s ability to attend to

language, the fact that children’s grammatical sophistication is instruction,forinstance,mattersforchildren’swritingskills,both

relatedtotheirsubstantivequalityaspectofwrittencomposition substantivequalityandwritingconventions,evenafteraccounting

isnotsurprising.Thisfindingsupportsadevelopmentaltheoryof forotherimportantlanguageandliteracyskillsandotheraspectsof

writing(Berningeretal.,1992;Berninger&Swanson,1994),and instructionalquality.ThesefindingsareconvergentwithThomson

isconsistentwithpreviousstudiesforyoungerandolderchildren et al.’s (2005) study which showed that attentiveness, but not

(Abbott & Berninger, 1993; Berninger & Swanson, 1994; Kim, Al hyperactivity,wasrelatedtoliteracyoutcomes.However,wefound

Otaiba,etal.,2011;Olinghouse,2008).Surprisingly,however,chil- thatattentivenesswasuniquelyrelatedtothetwodimensionsof

dren’s expressive vocabulary was not uniquely related to either writtencompositionevenafteraccountingfortheothervariables.

dimensionofchildren’swrittencompositionafteraccountingfor Incontrast,Thomsonetal.’sstudyshowedthatattentivenesswas

the other variables in the model. Previous intervention studies notdirectlyrelatedtowritingonceorthographicandrapidnam-

have shown that children incorporate taught topical vocabulary ingfactorswereincluded.Directcomparisonoftheseresultsisnot

wordsintheirwrittencomposition(Yonek,2009),suggestingthat possiblebecauseofdifferencesinthesampleand/orthevariables

vocabularywouldplayaroleinwrittencomposition.However,the includedinthestudies.Thomsonetal.’s(2005)studyincludedchil-

vocabulary words might have to be words that are targeted for drenwithdyslexiawhorangedfrom6to18yearsoldwhereasour

specifictopics,whereasindividualdifferencesinoverallvocabu- sample included typically developing sample of first-grade chil-

larysizeassessedinthepresentstudymaynothavebeensensitive dren. Assessments differed in these studies as well. The present

enoughtocaptureauniquecontributiontowrittencomposition, study included spelling and reading comprehension, but did not

once other language, literacy, and instructional quality variables include the letter naming tasks or orthographic awareness tasks

havebeenaccountedfor. that Thomson et al.’s did. Future research is needed to replicate

Children’sreadingcomprehensionwasuniquelyrelatedtothe thefindingsofthepresentstudyandclarifythedirectandindirect

substantivequalityaspectofwrittencomposition.Thesefindings relationofattentionaldifficultiestochildren’swritingskills.

confirmpreviousstudiesabouttherelationbetweenreadingand Another important finding in the present study is that

writing (Abbott & Berninger, 1993; Berninger & Abbott, 2010; instructional quality was uniquely related to children’s writ-

Shanahan&Lomax,1986,1988)andalsoextendthembyshow- tencompositionoverandaboveacomprehensivesetofchild-level

ing that it is the substantive quality of written composition that predictors.Childrenwhoseteachersweremoreresponsivehadbet-

readingcomprehensionpositivelyimpacts,notthewritingconven- terdevelopedideas,betterorganizedstories,andtheirstorieshad

tionsdimension.Theseresultssuggestthat,atleastinfirstgrade, morediverseandinterestingwordsthanchildrenwhoseteachers

children’s reading comprehension skills (and perhaps associated were less responsive. In conjunction with recent studies which

readingexperiences),facilitatetheirwritingevenafteraccounting showedtherelationofteacherresponsivenesstoreadingcompre-

fortheirorallanguageskills,suchasvocabularyandgrammatical hension(Connoretal.,underreview)andtherelationofemotional

knowledgeandotherchildandinstructionalfactors. and instructional support to children’s cognitive and academic

Althoughthetwotranscription-relatedvariables,spellingand achievement(Hamre&Pianta,2005),thepresentfindingsprovide

letter writing automaticity, are hypothesized to be related to further support about the link between classroom instruction

written composition by allowing attentional resources for non- and children’s literacy acquisition. Surprisingly, however, the

automatic,higher-orderprocessessuchasideation,thefindingsof extenttowhichteachersprovidedindividualizedinstructionand

thepresentstudysuggestthatspellingandletterwritingfluency instructionqualityinspellingorwritingwerenotuniquelyrelated

may impact somewhat different dimensions of children’s writ- tochildren’swrittencompositionoverandaboveothervariables

ing. Children’s performance on a standardized spelling task was includedinthepresentstudy.Itislikelythatinthepresentstudy,

uniquely related to the writing conventions dimension of writ- teachers’individualizedinstructionwasmoretargetedforreading

tencomposition(spelling,mechanics,andhandwriting)whereas outcomes because of the nature of reading-assessment guided

letterwritingautomaticitywasrelatedtothesubstantivequality instruction,andthusteachers’individualizedinstructiondidnot

dimensionofwrittencomposition(i.e.,ideas,organization,word specificallyprovideguidanceforwritinginstruction.Analternative

choice,andsentenceflow).Itappearsthattheextenttowhichchil- explanationisthatduringthebeginningwriting,overallinstruc-

drenareautomatedinletterwritingfreescognitiveresourcesfor tionalqualitysuchasteachers’responsivenessismoreimportant

ideageneration,representationofthoseideas,anduseofdiverse predictor of children’s writing skills whereas in later phases of

wordswhereaschildren’saccuracyinspellingcontributestomore writing,variationininstructionalqualityinwritingmightmatter

mechanicalaspectsofwrittencomposition,atleastinfirstgrade. for children’s writing skills. Low-average scores of instructional

However,thisinterpretationshouldbetakenwithcautionbecause qualityinspellingandwritingdonotappeartoexplainwhyinstruc-

thespellingandletterwritingautomaticityweremeasuredinadif- tionalqualityinspellingandwritingwasnotuniquelyrelatedto

ferentmanner–spellingwasnottimedbutletterwritingtaskwas. children’s writing skill because there were sufficient variations

Thus,theresultsmighthavebeenduetodifferencesinthetimed aroundthemeans.Effortsareunderwaytoexamineanddescribe

vs.untimednaturesofthetasks,ratherthantotheirspellingvs.let- closelythenatureofwritinginstruction(durationandcontent)in

terwritingabilities.Futurestudiesareneededtoexaminewhether theseclassroomsandinvestigateitsrelationtochildren’swriting
468 Y.-S.Kimetal./EarlyChildhoodResearchQuarterly28 (2013) 461–469

skills. Finally, it should be noted that classroom characteristics writingdevelopmentaswellasthenatureofclassroominstruction

includinginstructionalqualityandchildren’sperformancemight anditsrelationtochildren’swritingdevelopment.

haveareciprocalrelation,suchthatnotonlyinstructionalquality

influences children’s academic and behavioral aspects, but also
Acknowledgements
children’s academic an behaviors influence instructional quality.

Forinstance,drawingontheworkofBronfenbrenner(1979,1994),
ThisworkwassupportedbythegrantP50HD052120fromthe
thisbidirectionalrelationhasbeennotedinparentingbehaviors
NationalInstituteforChildHealthandHumanDevelopment.The
andchilddevelopment(Belsky,1984;Lugo-Gil&Tamis-LeMonda,
opinions expressed are ours and do not represent views of the
2008; Park, 2012; Smith, 2010). Although in the present study,
fundingagencies.
children’sindividualcharacteristics,suchaslanguageandliteracy

skillsaswellasbehavioralaspects,wereincludedinthemultilevel
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