title: Linguistic Feature Development Across Grades and Genre in Elementary Writing.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  As children develop skills in writing across academic contexts, clinicians and educators need to have a fundamental understanding of typical writing development as well as valid and reliable assessment methods. The purpose of this study was to examine the progression of linguistic elements in school-age children's narrative and expository writing development.
  
  
  METHODS
  Narrative and expository writing samples produced by 89 children in Grades 2 through 4 were analyzed at the microstructure and macrostructure levels. Measures of receptive vocabulary, word-level reading, and reading comprehension were obtained.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Exploratory factor analyses revealed 4 microstructure factors (e.g., productivity, grammatical complexity, grammatical accuracy, and lexical density) and 1 macrostructure factor (e.g., a combination of organization, text structure, and cohesion). Multivariate analyses of covariance with reading comprehension as a covariate showed that productivity and macrostructure were sensitive to grade-level and genre differences and that expository grammatical complexity was sensitive to grade-level differences.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Findings are discussed in light of grade-level standards for narrative and expository writing and current practices in writing assessment. Multiple suggestions are offered for clinical and educational implications, and specific directions are provided for future research.
authors: Shannon
authors: S
authors: Hall-Mills
authors: Kenn
authors: K
authors: Apel
mesh_terms: D000367:Age Factors; D002648:Child; D002663:Child Language; D032882:Comprehension; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008037:Linguistics; D008297:Male; D033262:Narration; D011932:Reading; D014825:Vocabulary; D014956:Writing