Tips for good assessment and report writing – 10

This is the tenth tip written by the assessment  team at the Jerusalem municipality educational psychology services.

  The members of the team are:  Rita   Baumgarten, Hanna Brimer, Nadine Caplan , Eynat  Cohen Rahman , Etti Daniel Simon , Uri Dar ,  Michelle Lisses Topaz, Betty Netzer, Ruth Oman Shaked , Adina Sacknovitz , Smadar Sapir Yogev, Anan Srour   and  Dahlia Zayit.

The five sentence method:

Before writing, ask yourselves:  What do I really want to say? What is my main message?

Phrase your picture of the child in "five sentences": one sentence referring to the referral question and the child's background, three sentences describing your explanation of the child's difficulties (the answer you found to the referral question) and one sentence referring to the child's strengths and coping strategies.

Now begin writing the report.  The "five sentences" can be the report's backbone.  This is the kernel of the arguments that you're trying to elaborate in the report.  The "five sentences" can appear in bold at the beginning of the "results" section of the report and also in the "summary" section.  While writing, ask yourselves: "Are  the five sentences manifest throughout the report?  

After you've finished writing, re-read the report and ask yourselves: "Will a person reading the report be able to phrase five similar sentences about this child?"  If you answer in the affirmative, you've been able to get your message through.