Handwriting versus keyboarding: Does writing modality affect quality of narratives written by beginning writers?

Abstract

To date, there is no clear evidence to support choosing handwriting over keyboarding or vice versa as the modality children should use when they first learn to write. 102 Norwegian first-grade children from classrooms that used both electronic touchscreen keyboard on a digital tablet and pencil-and-paper for writing instruction wrote narratives in both modalities three months after starting school and were assessed on several literacy-related skills. The students’ texts were then analysed for a range of text features, and were rated holistically. Data were analysed using Bayesian methods. These permitted evaluation both of evidence in favour of a difference between modalities and of evidence in favour of there being no difference. We found moderate to strong evidence in favour of no difference between modalities. We also found moderate to strong evidence against modality effects being moderated by students’ literacy ability. Findings may be specific to students who are just starting to write, but suggest that for children at this stage of development writing performance is independent of modality.