Cierra

Chapter 25: Development of Writing Abilities in Childhood by Deborah Wells Rowe, Vanderbilt University.

Theoretical Perspectives on Writing in Early Childhood: Convention, Intention, and Participation

Scribbles carry meaning. Convention has been replaced with intention.
 * Reading Readiness Perspective - 1920s-1980s The beginning of writing starts off from the point when children begin to write words conventionally.
 * Emergent Literacy Perspective- 1960s-Present. Literacy development begins long before school and children simultaneously learn about reading and writing in their everyday experiences.

Yetta Goldman's (1986) definition for reading and writing: "human interaction with print when the reader and writer believe that they are making sense of and through written language"

Preschooler literacy is now more constructive and mulitmodal. There is also now more a plethora of research on children's cognitve hypotheses during writing. Research has also taken a more sociocognitive turn.

Sociocultural theories are being explored now too. Once children are aware of their discourse communities they learn the kind of writing valued for specific literary events.

Sociocognitive Perspectives on Childhood Writing:Young Children's Purpose for Writing.

Bombshell: Preschooler's writing is purposeful!


 * Lancaster (2001) & Baghban (1984): 1 and 2 year olds use writing to explore materials and engage in positive interactions with their parents and teachers.
 * Scribbles are often intentional and reflect the desire to communicate.

In literacy rich houses and classrooms, children form friendships with their peers by writing, continue to explore and investigate literary tools, and begin to write for communicative purposes.

In elmentary school writing is influenced by the task.


 * Students learn what they are taught, so it is important to teach writing to have a functional purpose.

Forms Used by Beginning Writers


 * Lancaster (2001) analyzed a 23 month old child's writing. It was concluded that they focus more on the process of their writing & interactions with others.

When it comes to older preschoolers, there is a larger research base. Hildreth's (1936) study in regards to 3-6 year olds name writing has been justified multiple times in the work of others.

Children go from scribbles to "personal cursive" (zig zags), scribble units, mock letters, and then conventional letters.


 * Clay (1975): Young writers may purposefully experiment with altering forms of known letters.

Debate: Do children move sequentially or there variabilabity in the forms children produce?


 * Children produce different forms of writing based on the context, genre, etc.

Form-Meaning Links

Marks represent language and understanding.


 * Ferreiro & Teberosky (1982): described sequenced progression hypotheses and constructed the alphabetic hypotheses.

Name writing is an important context for exploration because of children's personal interest.

When it comes to spelling, development level is an agreement that is predictable because children form different hypotheses about how speech is reflected in print.

Connections Between Writing & Other Communication Systems

By age 3 preschoolers can usually distinguish writing from drawing.


 * Kress (1997): "multimodality" is an absolute fact of children's semiotic process and authority practices are also influenced by the materials available in their environment.

Transmediation is an important part of mulitmodal authority.

Does multimodality lead to "decontextualized" text later?

Genre Knowledge


 * Kress (1997): argued that learning to write is not a generic process and that the demands and potentials for different genres should be learned.

Genre knowledge becomes more complex as children grow.

Children show more growth form K-2 in story and informational writing.

Individual Writing Process

Young children's writing occurs in the moment with little planning or revising.


 * Graves (1983): more experienced writers had difficulty choosing topics because they wanted to please their audience.

Rehearsal and revision are utilized to please their audience once they begin to interact with peers and writing.

Most research focuses on revision, because during revision students are more concerned with mechancis than changing up the structure.

Social Interaction and Writing


 * Dyson (1989): dialectal relationship between cognitive and social aspects of authoring.
 * Heath (1991): Literacy strategies are developed to accomplish social purposes, which shape the strategies children construct.

Social interaction plays an important role in children's writing.

Social relatioships with adults motivate children to participate in writing.

Social interaction offers information about writing, opportunities to seek help, and a reminder to consider audience perspectives for the ones writing.

Sociocultural Perspectives on Childhood Writing

Researchers have suggested that writing is a process that occurs between people.


 * __Culture and Class-Based Writing Practices__


 * Heath (1983): studied the variation in literacy practices of 3 communities. Discovered a close match between house and school literary experiences, they provide a smooth transition to school.
 * Purcell-Gates (1996): Found that low SES children who observed and had opportunities to participate in many uses of written language were likely to understand that print is symbolic and can be used for multiple purposes.


 * __Participation in Classroom Writing Practices__

Some literary experiences work best when teachers and students can switch off roles between experts and novices.


 * __Writing and Identity__

Writing is seen as an act of self-definition.


 * Lemke (2005): Classrooms are intellectual sites for the construction of knowledge.

"Who I am in relation to you" is one the important functions of writing.

*__Writing as Gendered Practice__
 * Solsken (1993): explored ways children's orientations toward literacy were framed by gender and class relations in their families and the larger society.

There are gender differences in writing. Boys have a tendency to write about action, adventure, and violence. The are few female characters, but have a passive role when included in their stories.

Girls usually write about home and school. Their stories are less likely to have violence but feature characters working together. However, girls may also use writing to challenge gender practices.

Conclusions

Basically, children learn about writing through their experiences at home and school. Culture, class, and beliefs about what is appropriate for children at their age, and gender influence their writing.


 * 3 Conclusions for Educatiors
 * 1) Preschoolers experiences with writing matter.
 * 2) In supportive instructional environments, elementary writers can go far and beyond traditional expectations that they will learn conventions such as punctuation and spelling.
 * 3) Writing is a local process.