Introduction
Self-Regulated Strategy Development (SRSD) is an evidence-based teaching approach that provides students with support to become more efficient writers and learners through self-regulation. SRSD applies to a variety of educational contexts, including different subject areas, classroom environments, and grade levels, making it applicable and accessible (Mason, Reid, Hagaman, 2012). SRSD is taught across multiple stages, which don’t align necessarily to lessons or days (more about this in a future blog post). Our lab’s current project (R305R220020) focuses on the implementation of SRSD in 6th grade ELA classrooms during their argumentative writing unit using the STOP & DARE writing strategies (De La Paz & Graham, 1997a & b).
| STOP | DARE |
| Suspend judgment | Develop your topic sentence |
| Take a side | Add supporting ideas |
| Organize your ideas | Reject arguments for the other side |
| Plan more as you write | End with a conclusion |
These two strategies work in conjunction to help students plan (STOP) their essay and include all of the necessary essay parts (DARE). Using STOP & DARE as an example, this blog post will walk through how to teach a writing strategy using SRSD.
NOTE: SRSD is a nonlinear, recursive approach. Stages often overlap and can be revisited as often as necessary. Stages do not need to be taught on the same day or in the same lesson. We will discuss this more in a future blog post.
Develop and Activate Background Knowledge
Within SRSD, developing and activating background knowledge focuses on leveraging what students already know about a text genre or writing strategy, and then finding entry points to build their knowledge as needed. For STOP & DARE, this could mean checking your students’ understanding of:
- What is an argument (outside of writing or genre, specifically)
- Argumentative writing as a genre
- The “parts” of an essay (e.g., the purpose of a thesis or counterclaims)
- How to find credible resources
This can also be a time to review other aspects of writing as well as activate or build students’ content knowledge (e.g., science, current events) as it relates to their argument.
Discuss It
Discuss it is when teachers present the individual steps of a writing strategy and provide opportunities for students to engage in class conversations about each step. The teacher can provide an example essay and the teacher and students can work together to identify the STOP and DARE components within it.
| STOP | |
| Suspend judgment | Consider each side of your topic before taking a position. Brainstorm evidence for and against the topic. |
| Take a side | Read through the list of points for both sides. Select which side you would like to support in your writing. |
| Organize evidence | Choose evidence and decide how to organize them |
| Plan as you write | Continue to plan as you write. |
| DARE | |
| Develop a topic sentence and claim | Begin with a clear statement of your main argument. |
| Add supporting ideas | Add evidence to support your main argument. |
| Reject the other side | Address counterarguments and refute. |
| End with a conclusion | Summarize your argument. |
After discussing what happens at each step, students have the opportunity to look over previously written essays or writing assignments, analyze the response based on what they now know about the strategy, and then set goals. One way to do this would be through the usage of a graphic organizer, as seen below:
Students can then use these initial scores to set a goal (Goal Setting) for their next writing assignment (e.g., I will write two counterclaims or I will write at least 600 words).
Memorize It
This stage begins from day one and continues throughout the stages. Once students have had a chance to learn the steps of the strategy, they can memorize the acronym. Memorizing is a great opportunity to engage your class through games, call and response activities, or quick quizzes. One memorization task might involve pointing to a poster of the STOP & DARE strategies, as seen below, and having your students call out each step as you point to the corresponding letter.
Model It
Modeling involves walking through the steps of the strategy visually and verbally, which can look different depending on your students’ knowledge and experiences. One way to model STOP & DARE could be to write with your students while verbally narrating your steps:
“Okay, so I have my prompt here, but I can’t remember how to get started! Ugh, I’m confused. Oh, wait! I just need to STOP and DARE. Well, let’s see, the first step of STOP is to what? That’s right! Suspend my judgment. Okay, to do this I would need to consider both sides of my argument. My argument is: homework isn’t helpful for students. Okay, well some reasons to support this argument would be that it takes time in the evening away from other activities like sports or family time, students learn through many different ways aside from homework, and it can cause stress for students. Now, what would be an reasons not to support this argument? Hmm well, homework can help students practice what they learn in class, provide markers for how students are doing with the material for their teacher, and show progress over time. Those seem like some good points. Wow, I did it! Now that I’ve suspended my judgment, I can move onto the next step: to take a side. Now, what side should I take...”
This presentation of SRSD through modeling a writing strategy can be useful to your students as they learn self-regulation. Through the presentation of your self-statements (e.g., “Okay, I can do this!”), your students can then identify their own self-statements to assist them as they write.
Support It
Supporting your students happens throughout all steps of SRSD, but this specific portion relates to support during peer-led or independent writing. As your students begin to apply the writing strategy to their writing process, it is important to monitor their adherence to the steps but also their increasing usage of self-regulation. More generally during this stage, teachers model the planning process as well as the drafting process. After modeling this process, teachers and students will plan together, with students then moving to complete independent drafts. For STOP & DARE specifically, this could also involve consistent reminders to refer to their STOP & DARE sheet as they plan and write, or to remember their self-statements when discouragement arises.
Independent Performance
As the need for scaffolding continues to drop, students can begin writing independently. This is a key time to see what your students know with minimal interference.
Goal Setting
Goal setting allows your students to track their progress as they become more familiar with the writing strategy. Using the graphs shown above, such as essay parts graphs, word counters, etc., your students can easily identify areas of strengths and need for improvement as they write. For STOP & DARE, this could involve goals such as:
- Use two counterclaims instead of one.
- Write 650 words instead of 500 words.
Self-Regulation
Self-regulation is the center of SRSD, providing your students with the ability to support themselves in moments of frustration and freeze during writing. Self-regulation is split into two separate parts: self-instruction and self-monitoring. Using STOP & DARE, self-instruction could look like the following:
- Self-evaluation: error detection and correction
- Ex: “Oh, I forgot to develop a topic sentence! I need to go back and do that.”
- Self-reinforcement: rewarding oneself
- Ex: “Okay, I wrote my topic sentence! I’m going to celebrate and high five my friend!”
- Self-talk:
- Ex: “Wow, I did a great job writing my topic sentence! Now, what is the next step of the strategy?”
Self-monitoring similarly follows the structure of self-instruction but focuses on tracking behavior. This often involves referencing one’s goals, so for STOP & DARE this could look like:
- Assessing whether they wrote 650 words with their word count sheet
- Assessing whether they wrote two counterclaims with their essay parts graph.
- Assessing their own behavior, persistence through tasks, etc.
Conclusion
SRSD is a versatile teaching tool that can be applied to a variety of writing strategies. In our next posts, we will provide more examples of how SRSD can be applied to writing strategies and the recursive nature of its framework.
— The Writing Skills Development Program