Writing for My Future: Transition-Focused Self-Advocacy of Secondary Students With Emotional/Behavioral Disorders

Abstract

Nine high school students with emotional and behavioral disorders received instruction on how to write argumentative essays to self-advocate for their transition-focused needs. A special education teacher and paraprofessional received training on the self-regulated strategy development (SRSD) model of writing instruction. They provided instruction to students 3 days a week, 40 min each session, for 12 to 14 days of strategy instruction. The teacher and the paraprofessional provided instruction with high fidelity. Using a single-subject multiple-probe-across-groups design, findings indicated a functional relation between SRSD instruction and all students’ writing skills. Students’ essays increased for organizational quality and self-advocacy in writing. Furthermore, students’ writing self-efficacy increased as a result of instruction. Teacher and student interviews revealed an overall satisfaction with SRSD procedures and results.

Enhancing Self-Determination Skills for Students With Emotional and Behavioral Disorders

“…These findings indicate that transition planning for students with EBD would be an ideal time to incorporate instruction related to self-determination. Two specific areas that can enhance self-determination for students with disabilities include goal-setting and youth autonomy (e.g., self-advocacy; Cuenca-Carlino, Mustian, Allen, & Whitley, 2019; Lind, Poppen, & Murray, 2017; Lingo, Williams-Diehm, Martin, & McConnell, 2018; Mazzotti et al, 2016). Both goal-setting and youth autonomy have been found to be promising predictors of post-secondary success for students with disabilities (Mazzotti et al, 2016; Royer, Lane, Cantwell, & Messenger, 2017), as they empower students to make choices about the direction of their future and create clear and specific plans for how they can achieve those goals.…”

“…Both goal-setting and youth autonomy have been found to be promising predictors of post-secondary success for students with disabilities (Mazzotti et al, 2016; Royer, Lane, Cantwell, & Messenger, 2017), as they empower students to make choices about the direction of their future and create clear and specific plans for how they can achieve those goals. In addition, goal-setting and youth autonomy interventions have been found to improve measures of self-determination (Cuenca-Carlino et al, 2018), behavior (Royer et al, 2017), and teacher–student relationships (Lind et al, 2017).…”

The Flexibility of Self Regulated Strategy Development for Teaching Argumentative Text

“…It is important to note that the SRSD framework is flexible; thus the teacher can focus the discussion on the application of argumentative writing as it relates to the content area targeted. Table 1 illustrates the first stage of SRSD instruction across different content areas (Cuenca-Carlino, Mustian, & Allen, 2017; Hauth, Mastropieri, Scruggs, & Regan, 2013; Kiuhara, O’Neill, Hawken & Graham, 2012; Leins, 2014).…”

“…During this stage, the teacher also introduces the concepts of self-monitoring, goal setting, and graphing progress, and models these behaviors for students while working through the strategies. Table 2 provides examples of essay prompts that can be used to discuss and model argumentative writing across different areas (Cuenca-Carlino et al, 2017; Hauth et al, 2013; Kiuhara et al, 2012; Leins, 2014).…”

“…These strategies can be used to teach argumentative writing in a variety of content areas, such as language arts classes (Jacobson & Reid, 2010; Kiuhara et al, 2012), science, social studies (Leins, 2014), civics and mathematics (Hauth et al, 2013), and to understand the magnitude of fractions (Kiuhara, Witzel, Dai, & Rouse, 2017). Additionally, argumentative writing can be used to teach students to self-advocate for needs and wants (Cuenca-Carlino et al, 2017; Cuenca-Carlino, Mustian, Allen, & Gilbert, 2015).…”