The role of ideation for text writing in Chinese children

Abstract

This study investigated how different linguistic skills contributed to Chinese text writing quality among Hong Kong elementary students. 68 Grade 2 (mean age 110.06 months, 63.2% male) and 77 Grade 4 (mean age 134.88 months, 73.2% male) students were recruited to complete a text writing task, various linguistics tasks and a non-verbal IQ test. Results of path analysis suggested that ideation predicted text writing quality, fully mediated by compositional fluency (the amount of characters produced within the writing task time limit). Word spelling skill also predicted text writing quality and was partially mediated by compositional fluency. Topic knowledge, previously found to be predictive in other studies, did not predict writing quality in the current study. Comparison between grades suggested that compositional fluency and word spelling predicted Grade 2 writing quality but only compositional fluency predicted Grade 4 writing quality. The current study clarified the role of ideations and word spelling in predicting text writing quality through compositional fluency. These findings implied importance of teaching ideation in writing instruction and difference in emphasis of linguistic skills for younger and older writers.