Teaching Secondary Students to Write Effectively

Non-writing outcomes. Measures of 

achievement in areas other than writing do 

not contribute to the level of evidence for 

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Table D.1. Description of outcome domains

Outcome Domain

Description

Sample Outcomes

Audience

The use of appropriate style, complexity, and 

vocabulary for the intended audience or purpose 

of the composition

• Rating of the agency, identity, or rhetorical stance 

in a student’s writing

• Rating of patterns of word use, such as use of first-

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

person sentences

Genre elements

The presence or quality of specific features typical 

of a particular genre (e.g., the elements of a story 

might include setting, characters, actions, and an 

ending) 

• Core of six organizational elements of writing in a 

writing sample (e.g., presence of an introductory 

paragraph, presence of topic sentences, and so on)

Ideation

The development and quality of ideas included in 

writing. Qualitative measures include the overall 

richness of ideas in a composition. Quantitative 

measures include the number of different ideas.

• Rating of elaboration of ideas in a persuasive essay 

written for the National Assessment of Educational 

Progress

Organization

The structure of a composition. This might 

include the connection between ideas in the text, 

as well as how well individual ideas are organized 

or connected to meet a writer’s purpose (often 

referred to as “cohesiveness”).

• Rating of the logic and coherence of the structure 

in an expository essay