Making a Mark on Early Writing

Literacy learning is a complex undertaking for all students. Building fundamental skills in the early years is shown to be essential for later development, as issues in the first few years of school can have long ranging consequences for later literacy growth. Thus, the growing number of young learners in Alberta who fail to achieve standards in written literacy in provincial tests marked a particular concern for Dr. Hetty Roessingh. According to her research over the past 5 years, there is a growing and concerning gap between reading and writing achievement; while many students are achieving ‘excellence’ in reading outcomes, far fewer are reaching the same levels in writing.

Teaching teams

Working with ‘early years’ teams in three Calgary schools, Dr. Roessingh began an ongoing professional development program which prompted these teachers to consider their practice, and how they could support each other in working towards improved early literacy outcomes.

The teachers worked with various resources to develop foundational literacy skills in their students, particularly writing fluency. Building a community of practice guided the teachers through their development, with Dr. Roessingh providing research input and supporting the analysis of student work.

For students in these schools, significant changes were shown in the number of children achieving and surpassing early literacy benchmarks. Following a group of students from grades 2 to 4, the number of students falling below standards dropped from 46% to 7%, with the number of ‘excellent’ results increasing from 9% to 25%. The teachers in these studies are now hosting their own workshops on early literacy learning, passing on their knowledge and support to other local educators.

Dr. Roessingh’s work has been taken up by various government committees, including Alberta Education’s recent initiatives to restructure how early literacy is assessed. This includes involvement with developing, validating, and standard setting of the Student Learning Assessment for English Language Arts (SLAs).

For Teachers

Building a solid understanding of early literacy skills and pedagogies, especially in writing, is critical in the K-3 period. Working with students to develop their fluency and capacity for writing at this stage precludes the need for the more difficult work of remediation later in school. Dr. Roessingh’s work also highlights the potential for researchers to bring knowledge into communities of practice, and to help inform and support change in schools.

Connected Citations

Roessingh, H. (2013). A look at Grade 2 Writing: Successes and challenges in early literacy development. Learning Landscapes, 7(1), 269-281. Available Online.

Roessingh, H., Elgie, S., & Kover, P. (2015). Using lexical profiling tools to investigate children’s written vocabulary development in Grade 3: An exploratory study. Language Assessment Quarterly, 12 (1), 67-86. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15434303.2014.936603

Roessingh, H., & Elgie, S. (2015). From thought, to words, to print: Early literacy development in Grade 2. Alberta Journal of Educational Research, 60 (3), 576 – 597. Available Online.

Roessingh, H., & Bence, M. (2016). Intervening in early written literacy development for gifted children in Grade 2: Insights from an action research project. Journal for the Education of the Gifted. Accepted. August, 2016.

Roessingh, H., Douglas, S., & Wojtalewicz, B. (2016). Lexical standards for expository writing at Grade 3: The transition from early literacy to academic literacy. Language and Literacy, 18(3), 123-144. Available Online.

Roessingh, H. (2016). Academic language in K – 12: What is it, how is it learned, and how can we measure it? BC TEAL Journal, 1(1), 67 – 81. Available Online.