Education Endowment Foundation:Grammar for Writing (re-grant)

Grammar for Writing (re-grant)

Exeter University
Implementation costThe cost estimates in the Toolkits are based on the average cost of delivering the intervention.
Evidence strengthThis rating provides an overall estimate of the robustness of the evidence, to help support professional decision-making in schools.
Impact (months)The impact measure shows the number of additional months of progress made, on average, by children and young people who received the intervention, compared to similar children and young people who did not.
0
months
Project info

Independent Evaluator

The Institute for Effective Education logo
The Institute for Effective Education
Testing a programme of CPD and materials for primary teachers to improve pupils’ writing by increasing their effective use of grammar.
Pupils: 7239 Schools: 155 Grant: £173,000
Key Stage: 2 Duration: 10 month(s) Type of Trial: Effectiveness Trial
Completed July 2017

This page covers the second (effectiveness) trial of Grammar for Writing, testing a scalable model under everyday conditions in a large number of schools. To read about the first (efficacy) trial – testing whether it could work in schools under best possible conditions – click here.

Grammar for Writing (GfW) is a way of teaching writing that is designed to help pupils understand how linguistic structures convey meaning, as an alternative to teaching grammatical rules in the abstract.

In 2012, the EEF funded a number of programmes, designed to improve literacy outcomes for pupils at the transition from primary to secondary school. Grammar for Writing was chosen for this because previous evaluations have found that grammar interventions can have a positive impact on writing skills.

The first evaluation found some evidence of promise. Despite its short duration (4 weeks), it had a small positive impact when delivered to the whole class, and a larger impact when delivered to small groups – although this second result may have been due to the small group work rather than the intervention itself.

Following these results, the EEF funded a larger evaluation of a scalable version of GfW. This second evaluation focused solely on the whole-class version of GfW and on Year 6 pupils rather than pupils at the transition. It was also delivered over 6 weeks rather than 4. It found no evidence of an impact on pupils’ writing outcomes.

The difference in results between the two evaluations might be the result of the differences in delivery described above. It might also be partly due to implementation problems during the second trial: while teachers were generally satisfied with the programme, many adapted or left out key components such as using classroom discussions to explore the effects of grammatical choices.

Given uncertainty around the impact in the first evaluation and the lack of impact in the second, the EEF will be removing Grammar for Writing from the list of promising projects. We continue to be interested in grammar-based approaches to writing

  1. The project found no evidence that Grammar for Writing improves writing attainment for children in Year 6, as measured by the bespoke test.
  2. The project found no evidence that Grammar for Writing improves reading, writing or grammar, punctuation and spelling (GPS) as measured by KS2 SATS. Indeed, it found a small, negative effect size (equivalent to one month less progress) for the GPS outcome.
  3. Pupils that have ever been eligible for free school meals made a small amount of additional progress compared to similar pupils in control schools. This result is not statistically significant. This means that the statistical evidence does not meet the threshold set by the evaluator to conclude that the true impact was not zero.
  4. Grammar knowledge as measured using a teacher quiz did not improve for teachers who had done Grammar for Writing, although there was some evidence that this quiz was not a reliable measure. In contrast, more than 90% of surveyed teachers agreed that they found the programme, training and materials useful in their teaching.
  5. Nearly three-quarters of intervention teachers indicated that they had adapted the programme for delivery.In addition,fidelity to two of the key programme principles, connections made between grammar and effect/​purpose in writing’ and discussion used to tease out thinking and choice-making’ was regarded by the evaluator to be compromised in a number of the schools observed.
Outcome/​Group
ImpactThe size of the difference between pupils in this trial and other pupils
SecurityHow confident are we in this result?
Writing
0
Months' progress
Writing (everFSM)
+1
Months' progress
N/A