Review Teaching students with intellectual or developmental disabilities to write: A review of the literature Laurice M. Joseph * , Moira Konrad The Ohio State University, United States Received 14 December 2007; accepted 15 January 2008 Abstract The purpose of this review was to identify effective methods for teaching writing to students with intellectual disabilities. After criteria were established, database searches and hand searches of selected peer-reviewed journals were conducted. Findings revealed a relatively small number of studies that met the criteria for inclusion. Participants, settings, research designs, independent variables, dependent variables, and results are synthesized across studies. Writing instruction effects on various written expression outcomes were aggregated by averaging percentage of non-overlapping data (PND) across studies. Findings revealed that strategy instruction was investigated more frequently than other types of approaches. Strategy instruction was consistently found to be very effective for teaching writing skills to students with intellectual disabilities. Limitations, directions for future research, and implications for practice are discussed. # 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Keywords: Written expression; Intellectual disabilities; Instruction Contents 1. Method ............................................................. 3 1.1. Procedures for descriptive review ...................................... 4 1.2. Calculation of intervention effects ..................................... 4 2. Results ............................................................. 5 2.1. Content findings .................................................. 5 2.1.1. Participants ............................................... 5 2.1.2. Settings .................................................. 5 Available online at www.sciencedirect.com Research in Developmental Disabilities 30 (2009) 1–19 * Corresponding author at: 305 West 17th Avenue, PAES Building A 460, Columbus, OH 43210, United States. Tel.: +1 614 688 4992. E-mail address: joseph.21@osu.edu (L.M. Joseph). 0891-4222/$ – see front matter # 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.ridd.2008.01.001