Written production and composition: complete guide for speech therapists
Written production is a complex skill that simultaneously mobilizes numerous abilities: finding ideas, organizing them, formulating them into correct sentences, spelling them, and managing the writing gesture. Written production difficulties are common in children with DYS disorders. This guide presents writing processes and support strategies.
✍️ Resources for written production
Planning supports, writing aids, graphic organizers
Access tools →Written production process
According to the Hayes and Flower model, written production involves three main processes:
- Planning: generate ideas, organize them, define an objective
- Text production: formulate sentences, choose words, spell
- Revision: reread, detect errors, improve
These processes heavily rely on working memory and executive functions. A beginning or struggling writer quickly becomes overloaded.
Types of difficulties
- Ideation: "I don't know what to write"
- Organization: scattered ideas, no structure
- Formulation: poorly constructed sentences, poor vocabulary
- Spelling: numerous errors (dysorthographia)
- Writing gesture: slow and costly writing (dysgraphia)
- Revision: doesn't detect their errors
Assessment
- Spontaneous production: narrative, description, free text
- Guided production: from images, instructions
- Multi-level analysis: content, organization, syntax, spelling, handwriting
- Assessment of underlying skills: oral language, spelling, handwriting
Intervention strategies
💡 Principle: reduce cognitive overload
The objective is to relieve the writer so they can focus on one aspect at a time. Planning tools, dictation to an adult, spell checker, computer are all means of compensation.
Work areas
- Planning: use graphic organizers, diagrams, plans
- Idea generation: brainstorming, word banks
- Formulation: work on syntax orally first
- Spelling: work specifically (see dysorthographia)
- Revision: proofreading grids, targeted proofreading
- Compensatory tools: computer, spell checker, voice dictation
Our downloadable tools
Frequently asked questions
Yes, for children whose handwriting gesture is costly (dysgraphia) or spelling is very poor (dysorthographia). The computer frees cognitive resources for idea generation and formulation. With a spell checker and possibly voice dictation, written production becomes more accessible.
Both can be worked on in parallel. For composition, spelling requirements can temporarily be "suspended" to free creativity and idea structuring. Spelling is then reworked during revision, or compensated by tools.
