Do Students Who Are Weaker Readers Experience Difficulty Learning to Write?

• In Event: Moscone Center North Roundtable Session 7
  In Roundtable Session: Reading-Writing Relations: Theory, Evidence, Identification, and Intervention

Abstract

Objectives: This meta-analysis examined if students in kindergarten to grade 12 who experience difficulty learning to read also experience difficulty learning to write. We also examined if variations in writing differences between students who experienced difficulty with reading and those who did not were related to study features.

Theory: Reading is central to writing as writers read to gather information for a paper, read as they revise, and draw on common knowledge sources from long-term memory to read and write (Shanahan, 2016). Previous reviews examined correlations between reading and writing and whether reading and reading instruction enhance writing (Graham et al., 2018). This review addressed reading and writing relations by examining if students who differed in their reading competence also differed in their writing capabilities.

Methods: We conducted a comprehensive search of the literature (electronic searches, hand searches of journals, reference searchers of articles and prior reviews, and contacting authors) to identify studies that compared the writing of students with an identified reading difficulty and students who had not experienced difficulty learning to read. Each identified study was coded for grade, sample size, location, measures, study quality indicators, publication type, language, type of writing.
Data Sources: We located 85 studies that compared students with and with reading difficulties in kindergarten to grade 12 that included one or more writing measures. None of these studies identified students as having a reading difficulty based on a writing measure (e.g., one of the indicators used to identify children as dyslexic is spelling).
Results: Students with reading difficulties experienced statistical differences in their writing capabilities when compared to typically developing readers. Students with reading difficulties had lower scores than peers without reading problems on writing quality (ES = -0.73), writing output (ES = -0.70), organization of writing (ES = -0.71), sentence skills (SE = -0.66), writing vocabulary diversity (ES = -1.02), grammar (ES = -0.72), handwriting (SE = -0.42), and spelling (ES = -1.37). The only moderator analysis that was statistically significant was language for the writing measure for spelling. Studies involving languages other than English resulted in an ES of -1.45, whereas studies involving English resulted in a -0.46 effect.
Scholarly Significance: Both reading and writing is essential to success in school, at work, and at home. Students who have difficulties with reading appear to face a double threat, as they scored lower than peers without reading difficulties on all measures assessed in the studies included in this meta-analysis. The findings from this meta-analysis also provide support for theoretical position that reading and writing are related, as they draw on common knowledge sources and skills (Shanahan, 2016).
References
Shanahan, T. (2016). Relationships between reading and writing development. In C. MacArthur, S. Graham, & J. Fitzgerald (Eds.), Handbook of Writing Research (2nd Ed., pp. 194-207). New York: Guilford.
Graham, S. et al. (2018). Reading for writing: A meta-analysis of the impact of reading and
reading instruction on writing. Review of Educational Research, 88, 243-284.

Authors

• Steve Graham, Arizona State University, Editor Journal of Educational Psychology

• Angelique Aitken, University of Nebraska - Lincoln

• April Camping, Texas A&M University - College Station

• Karen R. Harris, Arizona State University