Writing for all – Developing Literacy for Learners with Complex Needs

Writing has long been tangled up with handwriting, so learners who can't hold a pencil or form letters often get few chances to write at all. But writing is about getting ideas out of your head so someone else can share them, and that's open to everyone.

The Developmental Writing Scale helps you see where each learner is, from first marks to strings of words, and plan the next step. Alternative pencils give access to all 26 letters through eye gaze, switches, e-tran frames or a communication partner. And tools your school may already own, like Clicker, let learners become authors of their own stories.

Much of it comes down to what you model and how you respond, treating every mark a learner makes as meaningful. The ideas come from an independent literacy consultant whose PhD looked at teaching reading to learners with severe learning difficulties.