Teaching Writing School children through Tekster: Evidence from Strategy-Focused Program

Abstract

We test the effects of Tekster on writing capabilities in large-scale experiments involving 14,400 students and 600 teachers from 172 elementary and secondary schools, a comprehensive strategy-focused writing instruction program, using a ‎switching replication design with three measurement occasions. The researchers formed two groups; Group 1 involved 6900 secondary school children and 310 high school teachers and Group 2 continued with 7500 elementary school children and 290 junior school teachers. The first experiment carried out during initial 18 weeks (between the ‎first and second measurement occasions) in Group 1; while, the ‎second experiment continued during the last 18-week period (between the second and third measurement occasions) in Group 2 implementing Tekster. The results confirm the writing quality of the students shows statistically significant ‎improvements. Current both studies have shown a positive effect on the writing performance of students i.e., ES = 0.63 (Group 1), and ES = 0.75 (Group 2). Finally, the effect size of students completing all 72 Tekster lessons is 0.75. After two phases of ‎eighteen weeks, students in both groups maintained their performance because three genres of writing were evaluated, ‎allowing for generalization across students, classes, and writing assignments. We conclude that an effective way to ‎develop secondary and elementary students' writing capabilities is through a strategy-based writing education tool like Tekster.‎