For Helen: Nancy Mathers W.E. Book

I ordered (on World Cat through the library) and received Mathers, Nancy. (1995). “Informal assessment and instruction in written language: A practitioner’s guide for students with learning disabilities.” New York: Wiley & Sons.

First let me say that I am blown away! (And expected to be, frankly, by someone of her dimensions.) This is the book I’ve been looking for because it gives ideas for lessons as well as the supporting researchers for the techniques. She goes all the way back to 1919 Horn, for heavens’ sake. The woman is an awesome researcher. I have greater respect for anyone whose name appears next to hers! (There you go Sam Goldstein!)

The book is organized into sections 1. Introduction; 2. Components of Written Language; 3. Writing Process Approach; 4. Accommodations and Modifications; 5. Handwriting; 6. Basic Skills; 7. Written Expression; 8. Analysis of writing samples; 9. Additional writing samples. Then there are appendices and indices.

Knowing how diverse is spelling to teach, I turned there first. She has lesson ideas back to factory model introduction (Horn methods 1 and 2) and continuing to modern day ideas like “making words (Cunningham). There are graded word lists from Pro-Ed and Frye. The lessons are step-by-step.

There is nice information on assessment of writing samples—which I feel is done in as hit and miss a way as the instruction itself. I read Graham/Harris, Deschler, and others to try to get a handle on the w/e instruction—and still feel a little a drift sometimes. Not many teachers do the reading that I do. This book fills in many holes for me!

I wonder how expensive it might be…