Planning and validating a writing skill curriculum for hearing-impaired students in primary school system of Iran

Abstract

Background and Aim: Academic achievement, especially in hard-of-hearing students, is hinged on their writing skills, and writing skill deficiency can adversely affect their cross-disciplinary skills. The purpose of this study was to explore and delineate the writing skill curriculum for hearing-impaired students in primary school system of Iran and to develop an exploratory model. Methods: In the exploratory research, based on grounded theory, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 39 active members in the field of hearing loss with experience of working in special schools. The themes and sub-themes of the writing skill curriculum and the associa­tions between them were explored within three steps of open, axial, and selective coding. In order to generalize the results of the qualitative phase and validate the resulting model, a ques­tionnaire was designed and completed by 231 teachers of hearing-impaired students in special schools. Results: The analysis process in the qualitative phase included eight themes of attention to achi­eving an optimal situation, content determination, teacher’s actions, individual differences, organizational factors, time of teaching, place, and positive consequences. In the quantitative phase, the hypotheses derived from the qualitative analysis were confirmed. Conclusion: For hearing-impaired students who lack sufficient language skill, the mainstay of writing skill curriculum should be considering all aspects and factors affecting the improvement of this skill.

Keywords

• Validation
• curriculum
• writing skill
• primary school
• sample designing
• hearing impaired