About the Authors:  Deb Jarmer is a district and Kansas state trainer for Six Trait Writing and a Curriculum Specialist for the Garden City, Kansas, Public Schools.  Her e-mail address is djarmer@gckschools.com.  Maurine Kozol is the principal of Jennie Wilson Elementary School, a preschool through fourth grade building, in Garden City.  Her e-mail address is mkozol@gckschools.com.  Sheri Nelson is a kindergarten teacher at Jennie Wilson Elementary School.  Her e-mail address is shnelson@gckschools.com.  Trudy Salsberry is an Associate Professor at Kansas State University in the Department of Educational Administration and Leadership, Manhattan.  She teaches and researches in the areas of strategic leadership, change, leadership for diverse populations, and qualitative methods.  Her e-mail address is tas@ksu.edu. 

About the School:  Jennie Wilson Elementary School is located in Garden City, a community in western Kansas experiencing a rapid shift in demographics.  It is one of the fastest growing towns in Kansas and there has been a large increase in the number of minority families.  Asian and Hispanic families now comprise nearly 50% of the total population of Garden City, and at Jennie Wilson the Caucasian student population is in the minority.  In the last school improvement cycle, the faculty at Jennie Wilson observed that scores on the state writing assessment, the California Test of Basic Skills, and teacher observation data pointed to a need for improving student writing skills.  At that time they adopted the Six-Trait Writing Model as an intervention for all grade levels.  Teachers agreed to use the model for both instruction and assessment.

What is the Six-Trait Writing Model?

The Six-Trait Writing Model was developed in the 1980s by teachers based on their beliefs about what they valued in student writing and their analysis of hundreds of student writing samples from grades K-12 for strengths and weaknesses.  (To read more about the Model, go to the Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory web site at www.nwrel.org/eval/writing/.)  The analysis yielded six traits that indicate qualities of good writing: 

• Ideas (details, development, focus)
• Organization (internal structure)
• Voice (tone, style, purpose, and audience)
• Word choice (precise language and phrasing)
• Sentence fluency (correctness, rhythm, and cadence)
• Conventions (mechanical correctness)
• And another has now been added. . .presentation (handwriting, formatting, layout)

The traits are interrelated yet the criteria of each are distinct enough to allow for individual scoring of each trait. 

Once the six traits had been identified and implemented in teaching and assessment, revisions followed.  More than 50 versions of the model now exist and can be found in schools in virtually every state in the United States as well as Great Britain, France, South American, China, Australia, and the Middle East. 

How Is Student Writing Scored?

Each piece of writing receives six scores, one for each trait.  They are not weighted, summed, or averaged (to do so would undermine the intent of the model, i.e., to show that a piece of writing may be very strong in one area while needing improvement in another).  Students and teachers learn how to use a scoring rubric and can see where strengths are.  The scoring is based on a five-point scale and viewed somewhat as a balance system (where a score of 3 represents the point where strengths and weaknesses are in balance with respect to a given trait.)  A score of 1 indicates a predominance of weaknesses and a score of 5 indicates a predominance of strengths.  The following descriptions are often used to determine the score for each of the traits:

1. Beginning (searching, exploring, struggling, looking for a sense of purpose or way to begin).
2. Emerging (moments that trigger reader's/writer's questions--stories/ideas buried within the text).
3. Developing (writer begins to take control, begins to shape ideas, writing gaining definite direction, coherence, momentum, sense of purpose).
4. Maturing (more control, writer has confidence to experiment, about a draft away from a strong/skilled version).
5. Strong (writer in control, skillfully shaping and directing the writing, evidence of fine tuning).

How Can Teachers Get Started?

Teachers should begin by teaching students the language or vocabulary they need to speak and think like writers.  Reading, scoring, and discussing anonymous sample papers are important.  Once the scoring system is understood, teachers will need to practice and rehearse focused revision strategies and read all types of printed material to illustrate strengths and weaknesses in writing.  With a teacher written paper, students can engage in revision discussions as well.  Finally, writing activities for students can be implemented.  Throughout this process, the curriculum should be linked to the traits in as many ways as possible.

It is important that students learn there are many different reasons for writing and that teachers help them clarify their purpose for writing.  This can be accomplished by using key phrases (modes) to direct writing exercises.  The descriptive mode asks students to paint a picture with words (describe in such detail that . . .) while the narrative mode emphasizes telling a story (tell about a time when . . .).  The imaginative mode helps develop creative thought (pretend that . . .) and the expository mode emphasizes observing and reporting (explain the steps . . .).  Finally, the persuasive mode is used to develop the construction of an argument (defend your position that . . .).

What Does the Research Say?

Anecdotal data speak to the excitement and commitment of teachers to this type of writing instruction. When a district in Oregon offered a workshop on the Six-Trait Analytical Writing Assessment, so many teachers expressed interest that teachers had to apply for a spot.  “We've never had to do that before” (Steineger, 1996 as cited in NWREL website documents).  A research associate at the Northwest Regional Education Lab noted the six-trait model captures teachers' imaginations.  It doesn't ask you to discard what works; it gives you a structure to build on those successful techniques. 

Anecdotal data are supported by more systematic research studies like the one conducted in 1992-1993 in Portland, Oregon (NWREL, 1992-1993).  Six fifth-grade classrooms were selected to study the effect of teaching the six analytic traits to students.  The classrooms represented diverse student populations (rural/urban, native/non-native English speakers, and a range of ethnicities).  Three of the classrooms received traditional instruction while the other three were taught the six-trait method.  The results from pre and post tests revealed large differences in writing performance between the two groups.  Traditional classrooms demonstrated gains of .07 (ideas), .30 (organization), .21 (voice), .20 (word choice) .02 (sentence fluency), and .10 (conventions) while the classrooms receiving instruction on the traits received gains (in the same order) of .84, .13, .87, .53, .27, and .19.

How Was the Model Implemented?

At Jennie Wilson Elementary School the model was taught by adding a trait at each grade level, beginning with ideas and content in kindergarten and first grade, adding organization in second grade, voice in third grade, word choice in fourth grade, and sentence fluency in fifth grade.  All grades taught conventions according to the requirements at each grade level.  However, when first graders wrote with voice or a story was read with great voice, teachers didn't ignore this.  They celebrated the writer's voice and talked about how it made the reader feel.  Using the language of the traits, beginning in kindergarten, gave students the opportunity to "talk" about writing.  This talk was extremely important, and eventually became a part of their writing vocabulary, just like hypothesis and data were important words in a science experiment.  It was a proud feeling to hear third graders talking about voice in their stories.

What Was the Instructional Process?

Teaching the traits was accomplished several ways.  First, we taught one trait at a time.  Each trait had specific criteria that were "bulleted" as far as strengths (a "5" score) and weaknesses (a "1" score).  The bullets were simply ways to describe the trait and could be used separately or together to teach a mini-lesson during a writer's workshop.  For example, one bullet under a "5" rubric for ideas was that the writer "shows instead of tells".  This actually involved word choice as well as ideas.  For example, strong action verbs "show"—the rabbit scampered across the field.  Weak linking verbs "tell"—the rabbit went across the field.  And the teacher would ask, "Can you picture one statement as better than the other?"  So, it was important to review the rubrics and focus on one bullet at a time.  We often spent several weeks teaching one bullet (like the one mentioned here). 

Second, it was important to assess student writing samples with the students.  The traits were best taught through assessment.  The students were asked to decide if a piece of writing was strong in the trait (4 or 5 score), weak (1 or 2 score), or a balance of strong and weak (3). Once students discussed their assessment using the language of the rubrics, they defended their score by showing how the specific criteria of the trait were seen in the piece of writing.  Scoring one's own writing was probably the most difficult for student writers.  They could see others' strengths and weaknesses before they could spot their own.  It took practice.   Students should write every day.  They should be able to make their own choices about what they write about.  After all, how can voice be strong if they care little about a pre-chosen topic, not to mention strong ideas about something they have not experienced?  Writing topics chosen by the teacher often limit students with few experiences.  Students with little or no resources and experiences need to be shown through teacher/student conferences that they have many topics to write about, or they can be given an opportunity to take part in new experiences (field trips, special activities, speakers, games, events, observations, etc.).

Sharing literature by different authors was important so students could compare authors, audiences, writing styles, voice, word choice, fluency, and organization. "Reading to write . . . writing to read"—it's all connected!  Every time someone picked up a book, we thought about the different ways we could use it to teach writing.  In fact, using an author's format was a good way to start.  For example, one year students read most of Jerry Pallotta's ABC books before he came to visit Jennie Wilson.  Then, each student in the class took a letter of the alphabet and wrote about a Kansas fact.  They presented their book to Jerry Pallotta.  He was thrilled!!  They did a wonderful job, and they knew all along that the audience would be Jerry Pallotta.  Writing can be fun, exciting, challenging, useful, and meaningful!  The Six Trait Model helped make this possible!  Adaptability is another strength of the Six Trait Writing Model.  It can be used in any curriculum from kindergarten to adult.  Teachers can modify it to fit their students' needs.  Finally, the student's ability to problem solve by applying his/her knowledge of the writing model to his/her own writing was really the ultimate goal.  When students became independent writers, they were independent thinkers!  That was powerful!

What Were the Results?

At Jenny Wilson Elementary, all students completed a local assessment and fifth graders participated in the Kansas Writing Assessment (both were narrative writing samples.)  The fourth graders completed the California Test of Basic Skills (CTBS), while student portfolio assessments were maintained in grades four and five.  The Kansas Writing Assessment scores reflected a weakness in the areas of fluency and conventions.  Overall, CTBS scores were lowest in language expression.  The NCA team chose to implement the Six Trait Writing Model as an intervention to address language expression (ideas, organization, voice, word choice, fluency) and mechanics (conventions).  Building level pre and post test writing assessments were administered K-5.  Fall to spring growth and spring to spring comparisons were made.  Growth percentages were determined between the beginning and end of the cycle.  Student mastery was noted on a rubric scale form 1-5.  Scores of 3, 4, and 5 were acceptable.

After three years, Jennie Wilson Elementary reported improvement occurred each year after the model was used.  The fifth grade scores were equal to, or higher than, district and state averages.  By grade level, the students increased their scores (moving from a 1 or 2, to a 3, 4, or 5) on the average of 54% for kindergarten when writing or dictating a story: 92% for first grade in narrative writing; 54% for second grade in narrative writing; 68% in third grade in narrative writing; 40% in the fourth grade in narrative writing; and 42% for the fifth grade in narrative writing.  State assessment scores and CTBS scores also increased in language expression and mechanics.

Where Can Teachers Find Out More

To find out about training opportunities and descriptions of the six-trait writing model write or call:

Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory
101 SW Main, Suite 500, Portland, OR 97204
503-275-9500
http://www.nwrel.org