An experimental course, "Thinking about Writing," was started in 1999 at the University of Dundee and ran for three years across the first half of the B.Ed. Degree course for two consecutive years. The unit's focus was on a metacognitive approach to understanding writing, particularly knowledge about writing and monitoring of the writing process. Across the two years of involvement for each group of students there was a program of teaching and application. One of the earlier parts of the course examined how students' awareness and understanding of themselves as writers might relate to some of the theoretical writing models. To promote this, information was collected from the students which covered the areas: knowing what they were being asked to do; understanding their selection of the most appropriate way to write for the task; and how they established the content of their writing. These data were analyzed and categorized to produce a composite framework of students' perceptions of their own participation in writing. These views were compared with, and related to, the different theoretical models of writing. The Hayes (1996) model was selected for further examination, and evidence collected from students was shown to match well with its theoretical constructs. This paper discusses the development of a writer profile, after it was decided to link the Hayes writing model to students' personal writing experiences. The paper then discusses the comparison of the writer profile with writer competence and the creation of a student's writer profile. It explains that to compare the student's own profiles with those of the children they teach, an average writer profile for each was prepared. Findings suggest that the use of the framework of the Hayes model of writing as the basis for a writer profile is highly experimental and is in the very early stages of development as a research tool. (NKA)