DeCoste Writing Protocol (DWP)

The DeCoste Writing Protocol (DWP) is a school-based tool for working out why a student struggles to get words onto a page — and whether the problem is the hand, the spelling, the composing, or the tool.

Its central move is comparing the same student's handwriting against their keyboarding across parallel tasks: writing the alphabet, copying a sentence carefully, copying one fast, writing a dictated sentence, and composing original text. If a student produces far more by keyboard than by hand, that comparison makes the case for assistive technology in a way a single writing sample cannot. A spelling word list examines phonological, orthographic, and morphological knowledge, and an extended writing task is scored with the 6-Traits rubric.

• Manchester's Review of the Updated Protocol

Licensing Notes: Authored by Denise C. DeCoste, EdD, OTR, and published as an e-book that includes the research base, administration and scoring directions, assessment materials, and recording forms. Reproduction requires publisher permission.

Learn More: The DWP is explicitly an informal, formative tool. It is designed to compare a student against themselves across conditions, not against a normative sample. Two-day professional learning workshops are offered.