Most children have learnt how to write satisfactorily through home support and/or high-quality classroom teaching by KS2, but 29% of Year 6 pupils did not reach the expected standard for writing in 2022/23 (gov.uk). So, how can we support those children in KS2 who still struggle with writing? This blog post provides an overview of three intervention schemes which have been used in the UK to boost the overall writing attainment of lower-achieving pupils in KS2, and have been quantitatively evaluated. The three intervention schemes are Write Away Together, Improving Writing Quality, and Paired Writing.
This blog post uses information from the What Works for Literacy website which reviews intervention schemes for children and young people who struggle with reading, spelling, and/or writing. It aims to inform schools’ and other providers’ choices among such schemes and supports the need for clear information in order to make decisions about which approach to adopt for children who experience difficulties in literacy.
Choices should be guided not only by the evidence assembled and analysed here, but also by careful matching of the needs of an individual school, class or child to the specifics of particular schemes.
So, according to the data, what works for KS2 writing difficulties?
Write Away Together
Write Away Together involves a dialogue between a child and a trained partner about a piece of independent writing. The programme aims to develop writing skills through discussions about independent writing. It links strongly into, and reinforces, Quality First Teaching. Some key aims of the Write Away Together programme are:
- To help children see themselves as writers
- To help children see editing as a positive part of the writing/learning process
- To provide the adult partners with a clear structure for writing support
- To improve writing at text, sentence and word level
- To embed strategies that will improve children’s independent writing
The logistics:
- Children work with a trained adult for 2 x 20-minute sessions per week for a minimum of 10 weeks.
- The two day training helps adults to use the PRAISE, IMPROVE, PLAN model which underpins the scheme.
- The adult makes a positive response to children’s writing, using specific praise to highlight what the child does well.
- The adult helps the pupil to understand which text, sentence and word choices will be appropriate for a particular writing task in order to make the writing more interesting/exciting/clear to the reader.
- The final part of the lesson looks at specific text features in order to help the child with planning and with continuing the writing independently.
- The programme has also been developed for use with small groups.
- The independent writing can come from any curriculum area.
Data provided on 249 children (1:1) showed a remarkable gain:
For more information on effect sizes and ratio gains, please see the What Works for Literacy guidance.
Improving Writing Quality
This project aims to use memorable experiences and an approach called ‘Self-Regulated Strategy Development’ (SRSD) to help struggling writers in Years 6 (and 7). SRSD provides a clear structure to help pupils plan, monitor and evaluate their writing. It aims to encourage pupils to take ownership of their work and can be used to teach most genres of writing. Memorable experiences, such as trips or visits from special guests, can be used as a focus for writing lessons.
The logistics:
- SRSD is a writing process model in which students are encouraged to plan, draft, edit and revise their writing.
- It has been designed, and is suitable, for children who are aged between 8 and 14.
- The intervention includes professional development for primary and secondary school teachers in key elements of the writing intervention SRSD, including discussion, modelling and planning.
- The memorable experiences were used as the focus for pupils’ writing.
In 2012, the Education Endowment Foundation commissioned an independent evaluation. It was one of three programmes with a particular focus on writing. The result showed a useful benefit for the intervention group’s extended writing.
For more information on effect sizes and ratio gains, please see the What Works for Literacy guidance.
Paired Writing
Paired Writing involves pairs working together to generate a piece of writing for a purpose. It gives a supportive structure to scaffold interactive collaborative behaviours through all stages of the writing process including ideas, drafting and editing. On each occasion in each pair, one child has the task of writing (‘the writer’), while the other supports (‘the helper’).
The logistics:
- Paired writing is aimed at all children.
- Children follow a set of steps including generating ideas, mapping ideas, drafting, reading, editing, a ‘best copy’, and evaluating.
- The intervention is a collaborative approach.
- In Paired Writing, children are provided with a flowchart as an aide-mémoire – this is downloadable from the website.
- It is practical and robust, and adaptable to different classroom contexts.
Data analysed from Sutherland and Topping (1999), and from Yarrow and Topping (2001) demonstrated modest gains for the Year 4 group and useful gains for the Year 6 pupils.
For more information on effect sizes and ratio gains, please see the What Works for Literacy guidance.
To note, the What Works for Literacy website lists Grammar for Writing as a potential intervention for writing difficulties in KS2. However, given the uncertainty around the impact in the first evaluation and the lack of impact in the second evaluation, the Education Endowment Foundation will be removing Grammar for Writing from their list of promising projects.
