| Students at a culturally diverse urban high school were placed in three treatment groups. During instruction on an informative/classificatory composition, three sections of Practical Writing Skills were divided into one class that would complete the unit in self-selected writing groups, another class in assigned writing groups, and another without participating in writing groups. Pretest and posttest measures were both holistically scored informative/classificatory compositions modeled after the written composition section of the Texas Assessment of Academic Skill. In addition, the students responded to a Writing Apprehension Measure. Significant gains in composition scores were observed among all three treatment groups. There was no significant difference observed in gains between the classes. On the writing apprehension measure, students scored well above the mean indicating a positive attitude toward writing. Gain scores and positive attitudes were attributed to the role of teacher as facilitator and a classroom environment conducive to collaboration. |
