Color-Coded Graphic Organizers for Teaching Writing to Students With Learning Disabilities

The adoption of Common Core State Standards has placed a much greater emphasis on writing across all content areas. Students with Learning Disabilities (LD) struggle with various components of written expression, including developing ideas that adequately display their understanding of a variety of topics and planning and revising their information. Often their written expression is nothing more than a linear string of several ideas without adequate organization, which does not support them in mastering rigorous academic content standards. The strategy described in this paper uses a combination of graphic organizers, chaining steps in the writing process, and strategic use of color to guide students from prewriting to drafting a well-organized paragraph. Teachers will be able to guide their students from developing a graphic organizer of simple ideas into a robust paragraph.