Young English Learners As Writers: an Exploration of Teacher-Student Dialogic Relationships in Two Mainstream Classrooms

Young English Learners as Writers: An Exploration of Teacher-Student Dialogic Relationships

in Two Mainstream Classrooms

A dissertation submitted to the

Graduate School

of the University of Cincinnati

in partial fulfillment of

Doctor of Philosophy

In the Department of Educational Studies

of the College of Education, Criminal Justice, and Human Services

Elizabeth Lowrance-Faulhaber

M.A.T. University of Southern California

August 2013

Committee Co-Chair: Dong-shin Shin, Ed.D.

Committee Co-Chair: Susan Watts-Taffe, Ph.D.

Committee Member: Holly Johnson, Ph.D.

Abstract

Children in U.S. schools who receive instruction in English yet speak a primary language

other than English at home, English learners (ELs), have historically experienced a lack of

achievement compared to their monolingual peers. Early literacy instruction has been shown to

predict later academic success, although a lack of research exists surrounding young EL children’s writing. The purpose of this study was to explore the dialogic relationships between

two mainstream teachers and two young EL children in relation to literacy practices and writing

outcomes. Grounding the study in a sociocultural framework, I conducted a multiple-case study

of two first-grade classrooms. Participant observations and stimulated-recall interviews provided

insight into the classroom literacy practices, the teachers’ decision-making processes, and how

the teacher-student dialogic relationships may have influenced student writing outcomes.

Findings revealed three related dialogic patterns across cases: a) integrating modes of meaning-

making; b) using scaffolding, tools, and strategies; and c) engaging in social activities. A cross-

case synthesis led to insights regarding a) the students’ use of voice in writing, b) assessing

young EL children who rarely speak, c) valuing teachers’ roles in teacher-student dialogic

relationships, d) using graphic organizers as instructional tools, and e) emphasizing the value of

asset-based pedagogies. Implications for educators, policymakers, and educational researchers

are discussed. Finally, I call for a change in curricular foci to include asset-based pedagogies

incorporating the cultural and linguistic resources young children carry with them to school.

iii

Acknowledgments

This project could not have been accomplished alone. I credit the guidance I received

from parents, teachers, friends, and mentors over a lifetime, who led me to discover the beauty and possibility of language. I thank the children who invited me into their magical spaces of discovery and gave me a glimpse into their minds. I thank the teacher-participants in this study for allowing me access to their classrooms and thoughts. I hold a special affection for my own early teachers, who made me want to be them.

I wish to thank Dr. Hye Pae, Dr. Tina Stanton-Chapman, and Dr. Ying Guo, who all served as advisors, committee members, and mentors. A special thanks to Dr. Cheri Williams, who devoted countless hours preparing me to begin the dissertation journey.

I wish to thank my dissertation committee. Thanks to Dr. Holly Johnson for lending her expertise and for introducing me to Vygotsky and Bakhtin, whose work has come to pervade my world view. Special thanks to Dr. Dong-shin Shin for her dedication, hard work, profound intellect, and generosity. Dr. Susan Watts-Taffe has been a gift to me and to the world.

Expressing my gratitude to and for her is one of the rare moments in my life when the beauty and possibility of language, with which I am so fascinated, are exhausted. Those who know her understand.

I was privileged to be born to Ron and Joy Lowrance. Thank you, Mom, for reading me books and gifting me with gab! Thank you, Dad, for the parables and for teaching me to dive deep and keep swimming. I hope I have made you proud. Thanks to the rest of the Lowrances and Faulhabers—my dearest friends and biggest fans. I love you all!

Finally, thank you to my husband Rob, the best-kept secret in Cincinnati! I am profoundly blessed to have a partner whose superpower is supporting me and whose motto is,

“Happy wife, happy life!” This achievement is ours to share. iv

Table of Contents Abstract ...... ii

Acknowledgments ...... iv

List of Tables and Figures...... viii

Tables ...... viii

Figures ...... viii

Chapter 1: Introduction ...... 1

Young English Learners in U.S. Schools ...... 1

Instructional Strategies That Support Young EL Children’s Writing Development ...... 3

Teacher Decision-Making and Writing Instruction ...... 7

Purpose Statement and Research Questions ...... 8

Conceptual Foundations ...... 9

Limitations ...... 14

Unique Contributions of this Study ...... 14

Summary ...... 15

Chapter 2: Theoretical Framework and Literature Review ...... 17

Theoretical Framework ...... 17

Literature Review ...... 28

Summary of Theoretical Framework and Literature Review ...... 59

Chapter 3: Methodology ...... 61

Study Purpose ...... 61

Study Design ...... 61

Recruiting Participants and Obtaining Consent ...... 62

Setting ...... 66

Participants ...... 68

Curriculum ...... 76

Data Collection ...... 82

Data Analysis ...... 91

Trustworthiness ...... 109

Summary of Methodology ...... 113

Chapter 4: Findings-Case 1 ...... 115

Snapshot: Ms. Hawkins and Mario ...... 116

Ms. Hawkins and Mario’s Dialogic Relationship ...... 116

Ms. Hawkins’ Rationales for Instruction ...... 163

Mario's Writing Outcomes ...... 175

Chapter 5: Findings-Case 2 ...... 203

Snapshot: Ms. Maddox and Rudy ...... 203

Ms. Maddox and Rudy’s Dialogic Relationship ...... 204

Ms. Maddox’s Rationales for Instruction ...... 252

Rudy’s Writing Outcomes...... 267

Chapter 6: Cross-Case Synthesis and Discussion ...... 290

Voice ...... 291

Children on the Periphery ...... 294

Teacher Knowledge of Literacy Pedagogy, English learners, and Individual Students.. 295

Graphic Organizers ...... 298

Asset-Based Pedagogies ...... 300

Chapter 7: Conclusion ...... 303

Overview ...... 304 vi

Study Limitations ...... 307

Methodological and Theoretical Insights ...... 308

Implications for Educators ...... 309

Recommendations for Future Research ...... 312

References...... 315

Appendix A ...... 337

Appendix B ...... 345

Appendix C ...... 346

Appendix D ...... 353

Appendix E ...... 356

Appendix F ...... 358

vii

List of Tables and Figures

Tables

Table 3.1: Data Collection Schedule ...... 89

Table 4.1: Mario’s OELPA Achievement Levels ...... 177

Table 5.4: Rudy’s OELPA Achievement Levels ...... 268

Figures

Figure 2.1: Sociocultural Theoretical Framework ...... 18

Figure 4.1: Representation of Money Illustration and Mario’s Illustration of Money ...... 121

Figure 4.2: Mario’s Illustration of Himself Picking out Toys and Saying, “Yay” ...... 122

Figure 4.3: Mario’s “How-To” About Riding a Bike and Environmental Print Resources ...... 123

Figure 4.4: Co-Created Venn Diagram Comparing The Three Wishes (Rice, 2003d) and Sausages

(Souhami, 2006) ...... 128

Figure 4.5: Mario’s Pre-Writing and Final Product for Leprechaun on the Loose (Jones, 2008)

...... 131

Figure 4.6: Mario’s Comprehension Questions for Planting Seeds in May (Rice, 2003c) ...... 132

Figure 4.7: Ms. Hawkins Graphic Organizer for “My Three Wishes” Model ...... 135

Figure 4.8: Ms. Hawkins’ Model and Mario’s Subsequent Product for How to Brush Teeth .... 139

Figure 4.9: Mario’s Graphic Organizers ...... 148

Figure 4.10: Ms. Hawkins’ Model of a “How-To” ...... 156

Figure 5.1: Rudy’s Drawing of Two Tigers on a Mountain and the Illustration he Used as a

Resource ...... 209

Figure 5.2: Rudy’s Favorite Part of Trosclair and the Alligator (Huggins, 2013) ...... 215

Figure 5.3: Ms. Maddox’s Model and Rudy’s List of Topics to Write “All About”...... 217

Figure 5.4: The First Three Pages of Rudy’s Book, “All About School” ...... 224 viii

Figure 5.5: The Cover and First Page of Rudy’s Story about Roblox ...... 229

Figure 5.6: Ms. Maddox’s List of Cupcake Ingredients and Materials and the Graphic Organizer

...... 232

Figure 5.7: Rudy’s “How-Tos” About Making PB&J and Cupcakes...... 236

Figure 5.8: Rudy’s Story Map of Is There an Alligator in the Pond? (Rice, 2003b) ...... 240

Figure 5.9: Rudy’s Story About Ice Skating ...... 251

Figure 5.10: The Cover and First Page of Rudy’s Story About Snow ...... 270

Figure 5.11: Rudy’s Answer to Comprehension Question for Is There an Alligator in the Pond?

(Rice, 2003b) ...... 286

Chapter 1: Introduction

Young English Learners in U.S. Schools

U.S. schools are educating a growing number of children whose primary home language

is one other than English, or English learners (ELs). The U.S. Department of Education (D.O.E.)

reported that the number of ELs grew from 3.8 million students (8.1%) in fall 2000 to 5 million in fall 2017 (10.1%). Furthermore, ELs have historically demonstrated a marked lack of achievement when compared to native English-speaking students. For example, the 2019

National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) showed a 33-point achievement gap in the

scaled reading scores between non-EL and EL fourth-graders and a 45-point achievement gap in

the scaled-reading scores between non-EL and EL eighth-graders. Little measurable change in

ELs’ scaled-reading scores occurred between 1998 and 2019, demonstrating that progress toward closing this gap has been slow (Hussar et al., 2020). Of the 5 million ELs in U.S. schools in

2017, more than 3 million (62.1%) were in kindergarten through third grade (Hussar et al.,

2020).

Finding appropriate terminology to discuss young children exposed to two languages

during early childhood is challenging due to inconsistent definitions of terms in the extant

literature. Some have used the term emergent bilingual (Gort, 2012; Reyes, 2006; Reyes &

Azuara, 2008; Sparrow, 2014) when referring to this population; however, the term has not been

limited to very young children (Daniel et al., 2016; Escamilla et al., 2007; Garcia, 2009; Stewart

& Hanson-Thomas, 2016). Garcia (2009) argues for using “emergent bilinguals” to underscore the positive, additive cognitive and social benefits of bilingualism, not to denote learners’ ages.

Although my views of bilingualism are consistent with Garcia’s definition, for this study, I use

the term young EL children to remain consistent with the context in which my study occurred

while simultaneously acknowledging their age. Although the U.S. population of young EL

children represents a wide variety of languages, cultures, and personal histories (Wagner, 2016),

this population of children represents a significant group of children in U.S. schools.

Young EL children may experience unique challenges when learning to read and write in

English, the language of school in the U.S. It is well-established that most children learn to speak and comprehend their first language (L1) before they learn to read and write (Clay, 1972; Sulzby

& Teale, 2003; Wells, 2009). However, young EL children are still in the process of learning to

speak and comprehend their L1 as they learn to read and write in their second language (L2;

Reyes, 2006). Also, the sociocultural aspects of young EL children’s out of school experiences

(e.g., immigrant families, non-dominant cultures) can compound challenges as they learn to differentiate between languages, leading to complex language practices (Wagner, 2016). Though young EL children who eventually develop proficiency in two languages often experience a host of cognitive advantages over their monolingual peers (Barac et al., 2014; Bialystok, 2001, 2010;

Hakuta, 2008; Reyes & Azuara, 2008), their initial progress may be slowed as they learn to read and write (Bialystok et al., 2000; Peregoy & Boyle, 2005).

Although learning to read and write in an L2 may present challenges for young EL children, research has demonstrated that early literacy instruction can lead to the development of

skills necessary for later academic success (Hall et al., 2015; Justice et al., 2003; Puranik &

Lonigan, 2011). With the adoption of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) by 42 states

(“Standards in Your State,” 2016), English writing proficiency significantly influences academic

achievement in the U.S. because schools are placing a greater emphasis on teaching students to

write (Graham & Harris, 2014). The focus on writing is increasingly important and culturally

necessary as text-based communication using devices like computers, tablets, and smartphones

becomes more common (Gee, 2010; Murphy & Smith, 2015).

Instructional Strategies That Support Young EL Children’s Writing Development

Despite the critical need for educators to focus on writing instruction, of the two

modalities of language related to print (i.e., reading and writing), the least research has been

done with young children in writing instruction (August et al., 2014; Hammer et al., 2014).

However, there is a growing body of work in which researchers have investigated instructional

strategies that support young EL children’s writing achievement.

Skills-Based Instruction

Researchers have found that isolated skills-based instruction, such as phonics worksheets,

can facilitate young EL children’s understandings of the form of print (e.g., letterforms, name

writing) and phonemic awareness (e.g., letter-sound relationships, invented spelling). However,

focusing on skills-based instruction alone neglects essential aspects of writing, such as

comprehension, composition, writing identity, and meaning-making (Barone, 2003; Manyak,

2004; Weber & Longhi-Chirlin, 2001).

One common theme found in the literature on writing instruction with young EL children

is the importance of focusing on meaning-making. Children are “active meaning-makers”

(Wells, 2009, p. 306) who use language to serve a variety of practical functions (Halliday, 1973,

1975). Halliday and Matthiessen (1999) describe meaning to be how people use language to

interpret experiences. When curricula include meaning-based instruction, such as journal writing,

academic conversations, and creating compositions on self-selected topics, young EL children

are likely to benefit by coming to understanding the functions of print (Barone, 2003).

Balanced-Literacy Instruction

Balanced literacy pedagogies mix phonics skill instruction and holistic instruction. These

approaches have been widely hailed to support young EL children’s writing (Araujo, 2002;

Barone, 2003; Falchi et al., 2014; Flynn, 2007; Matera & Gerber; 2008) because they place

foundational skills within the context of authentic texts and activities. Members of a community socially construct authentic activities as they move within the community’s regular social framework. In other words, authentic activities are “the ordinary practices of the culture” (Brown

et al., 1989, p. 34).

Examples of balanced literacy instruction within authentic activities include setting

stories in familiar places (Flynn, 2007) and allowing students to interact with real members of

their audience (Durán, 2017). Other examples include using model texts to draw attention to its

features before inviting children to engage in an activity related to the text or write independently

(Flynn, 2007; Matera & Gerber, 2008; Ranker 2009). Researchers argue that using balanced

literacy approaches to teach writing within the context of authentic, child-centered activities is a

beneficial way to help young EL children achieve literacy benchmarks (Barone, 2003; Flynn,

2007). Balanced literacy may also help young EL children overcome language barriers (Flynn,

2007), create more elaborate meaning-based compositions (Barone, 2003; Matera & Gerber,

2008; Martinez et al., 2010), develop a positive writing identity (Barone, 2003), and develop the

motivation to write by writing for their purposes (Guccione, 2011; Ranker, 2009).

Genre-Based Instruction

Recent research has centered on genre-based instruction to support young EL children’s writing (Durán, 2017; Gebhard et al., 2011; Pavlak, 2013; Shin, 2014). Genre-based instruction is informed by Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL; Eggins, 1994), which focuses on the

analysis of language features found within various genres. One application of genre-based instruction includes deconstruction and reconstruction of mentor texts (Pavlak, 2013). Gebhard

and colleagues (2011) and Shin (2014) developed and implemented genre-based curricula and investigated how writing in a blog facilitated children’s abilities to produce written texts in

English. The researchers found that this approach to writing instruction expanded the students’ audiences and purposes, allowed them to form social relationships, and taught them to think

critically about their linguistic choices.

Researchers argue that when teachers are adequately trained in genre-based approaches to

writing instruction, these approaches can lead to children writing successfully in many genres.

When teachers couple genre-based curriculum with blog-mediated writing practices, the approach can support young EL children’s emergent writing development and lead to a broader understanding of the various functions of writing (Gebhard et al., 2011; Shin, 2014).

Shared Writing Instruction

Shared writing is a group activity where the teacher and students jointly compose a text as the teacher acts as a scribe. Researchers found positive writing-related outcomes for young EL children with this type of instruction, especially when children wrote about authentic activities from their home and school lives (Manyak, 2008; Martinez et al., 2010). Young EL children drew from a wide range of resources, which led to increased home-school connections (Manyak,

2008; Martinez et al., 2010), listening and discussion increased (Martinez et al., 2010; Mohr,

2017), and children of all skill levels could participate as they were able (Manyak, 2001, 2008;

Martinez et al., 2010).

Integrated Literacy Instruction

Writing instruction can be integrated into learning about other academic topics. For example, Lee and colleagues (2009) investigated a curriculum designed to support the English writing proficiency of young EL children who were learning and writing about science.

Activities included: reading short, culturally-relevant vignettes, cooperative inquiry activities,

and providing strategies to improve comprehension of expository texts (e.g., key vocabulary,

pictures, graphs) before inviting students to write expository texts of their own. Other researchers

have examined integrated literacy instruction in preschool classrooms. In one study, literacy

activities include symbol-based play, such as cooking, dramatic play, block building, painting,

listening to books, and drawing pictures (Genishi et al., 2001); and creating literacy-enriched

block centers by adding picture books, labeling shelves, and including writing materials (Snow et

al., 2015, 2018).

Researchers argued that integrated literacy instruction led to a high likelihood of success in English literacy skills, including writing and content knowledge (Genishi et al., 2001; Lee et al., 2009; Snow et al., 2015, 2018). This approach provides children opportunities to practice

writing skills and learn about writing from their peers (Snow et al., 2015). By integrating literacy

instruction throughout the curricula, teachers were able to balance young EL children’s

individual language needs with content curriculum, embed literacy instruction into meaningful

contexts, and provide inquiry-based instruction that extended children’s thinking (Genishi et al.,

2001; Lee et al., 2009).

Asset-Based Pedagogies

Asset-based pedagogies are those who draw upon young EL children’s vast linguistic and

cultural repertoires and insight into the inner workings of language to build new skills (Durán,

2017). In every case, the researchers found that incorporating home cultural and linguistic

resources into the school curriculum and making space for a variety of languages and meaning-

making modes contributed to positive language, cultural, and writing outcomes (Axelrod & Cole,

2018; Bauer et al., 2017; Gort 2006; Kennedy, 2006; Machado & Hartman, 2019, 2020; Manyak,

2002; Ranker, 2009; Taylor et al., 2008; Zapata & Laman, 2016). Positive outcomes included

positive writing identities (Gort, 2006; Kennedy, 2006; Machado & Hartman 2019, 2020;

Manyak, 2002; Ranker, 2009; Zapata & Laman, 2016), metalinguistic awareness (Bauer et al.,

2017; Manyak, 2002), and higher test scores (Manyak, 2002; Kennedy, 2006).

Teacher Decision-Making and Writing Instruction

Research suggests that writing instruction teachers deliver could significantly influence young EL children’s writing achievement. Given the importance of the dialogic relationships

young EL children have with their teachers, it seems helpful to understand how teachers

contribute to those relationships and what influences their decision-making related to the writing

instruction they provide for young EL children. Based on a body of mainstream educational

research investigating teacher cognition (e.g., Calderhead, 1996; Carter, 1990; Clark & Peterson,

1986; Fenstermacher, 1994; Richardson, 1996; Verloop et al., 2001), Borg (2003) asserted that

“teachers are active, thinking decision-makers, who make instructional choices by drawing on complex, practically-oriented, personalized, and context-sensitive networks of knowledge, thoughts, and beliefs” (p. 81).

In a review of the research on teacher cognition as it relates specifically to language teachers’ practices, Borg (2003) identified several teacher cognitions (i.e., knowledge, thoughts, and beliefs) that are a part of those networks thus, influence their practices. They are trying to

implement instructional principles, and personal practical knowledge, beliefs, and convictions

are among the cognitions the researcher identified. Shulman and Shulman (2004) recognized

other influences: content knowledge, general pedagogical knowledge, curricular knowledge,

knowledge of the educational context, and educational goals and purposes. Other researchers

have found that teachers’ stated beliefs do not always correspond to their practices (Basturkmen

et al., 2004; Fung & Chow, 2002; Pajeras, 1992) due to situational constraints, including

directives to adhere to curricula that conflict with personal beliefs (Basturkmen, 2012).

Furthermore, practices and beliefs were more likely to correspond when teachers were more

experienced (Basturkmen, 2012).

Although the research is clear that the components of teacher cognitions identified by

Borg (2003) and Shulman and Shulman (2004) can influence their instructional decision-making,

Borg (2003) reviewed only two studies on writing instruction (Burns, 1992; Tsui, 1996), and

neither of those studies examined teachers of young learners. Moreover, no studies investigated

their students’ learning outcomes. Most studies were based on teacher responses to

questionnaires instead of interviews, which may have limited the accurate representation of

teachers’ voices. In my search for research on academic databases (e.g., Elsevier, Taylor &

Francis, ERIC, ProQuest, EBSCO host) pairing the keywords “teacher cognition” and “writing

instruction” and “teacher decision-making” and “writing instruction,” I found no studies

investigating the nature of mainstream teacher’s decision-making processes about young EL

children’s writing instruction.

Purpose Statement and Research Questions

The purpose of this study was to explore the dialogic relationships between two mainstream teachers and two young EL children in relation to literacy practices and writing outcomes. Specifically, I sought to answer the following research questions:

1. How did two first-grade students and teachers interact in the context of classroom

literacy practices?

2. Why did the teachers make the instructional choices they made as they taught the

young EL children to write in English?

3. How did the two focal students demonstrate their writing processes and products, and

how might the teacher-student dialogic relationships have influenced those outcomes?

Conceptual Foundations

Before conducting research, it is valuable for researchers to explore their own foundational beliefs, which influence their work (Crotty, 1998). In preparation for this study, I

have thought deeply about the beliefs that affect my research approach and have led me to my

topic.

Experiential Foundations

As an educator interested in young EL children and early childhood, I have also had personal experiences that inform my thinking more generally. First, I have traveled extensively and lived abroad in Estonia, Korea, and Saudi Arabia. As a young woman, I learned to speak

Estonian and lived and worked among the Estonian people. Through these experiences, I have come to value many different people’s perspectives and how those perspectives have been

formed based on experiences within their own cultures. In Estonia, I used a foreign language to

conduct my daily personal and work activities, and in Korea and Saudi Arabia, I did not speak or

understand the native languages. These experiences give me a unique understanding of what life

may be like for non-native English speakers who live in the United States, attend English

schools, and may not have the linguistic tools they need to participate fully in that environment.

As an early childhood educator, I understand that learning is complex and context-driven.

The early years can be an exciting but confusing time for any child trying to make sense of the

world, and even more so for children who do not speak or understand the language of their

community. I hoped that although I am a novice researcher, I would bring important foundational assumptions to the research that will give me a unique perspective and help me interpret the

findings in ways that will add value to second language literacy and early childhood education.

Philosophical Foundations

The philosophical worldview that most closely aligns with my thinking is critical realism. Maxwell and Mittapalli (2010) explain that critical realism is a philosophy accepting the

ontology (i.e., the nature of being) of realism and the epistemology (i.e., how knowledge is

attained) of constructivism. In other words, reality exists, but people construct their knowledge

about reality based on their personal experiences. Christ (2013) explains that critical realism

asserts that reality ranges from objective to subjective. Objective reality exists apart from human

understanding, but the subjective reality is truth individuals perceive as they engage in meaning-

making. This philosophy has led me to ask research questions that seek to understand both

teachers’ and students’ experiences and explore how they use those experiences to make choices and construct new understandings about writing.

Theoretical Foundations

A sociocultural theoretical perspective, stemming from the work of Lev Vygotsky (1896-

1934) and Mikhail Bakhtin (1895-1975), grounds my work. Specifically, I will use Situated

Learning (Lave & Wenger, 1991), a Sociocultural Theory of Writing (Prior, 2006), and a sociocultural perspective on writing development (Dyson, 2002).

Situated Learning. One particularly relevant application of sociocultural theory,

Situated Learning (Lave & Wenger, 1991), will serve as a guiding framework for the present study. Like other sociocultural perspectives, Lave and Wenger (1991) posit that learning occurs as people engage in everyday activities with others who share a common interest or communities of practice. When newcomers enter the community, they engage in legitimate peripheral participation alongside more experienced community members, first by observing the

community’s practices and gradually increasing their participation levels. In so doing, they appropriate the community’s tools, and their identities evolve as they begin to view themselves as and become fully participating members of the community. Brown and colleagues (1989) applied similar concepts to their theory of Situated Cognition, which regarded the school setting as the community of practice and the cultural practices therein less authentic than those practiced by community members outside the school setting. They encouraged school practices that paralleled authentic activities to prepare children to assimilate with real practitioners. Rogoff

(2003) applied sociocultural theory to her study of the development of young children and recommended ways in which adults could best help children learn alongside more experienced community members. She discussed how novice learners engage in apprenticeships with more experienced members of a community through guided participation.

Other scholars have used Situated Learning as a framework for their research on early or emergent literacy (Bernhard et al., 2008; Chung & Walsh, 2006; McCarthey & Garcia, 2005;

Manyak, 2001; Toohey, 1996, 1998), two of which focused on the tenet of legitimate peripheral participation. Chung and Walsh (2006) examined how pairs of kindergarteners and first graders moved from being observers on the periphery to “agents of the task” (p. 395) as they engaged in a collaborative story-writing activity mediated by a computer. Similarly, Manyak (2001) investigated how a collaborative daily classroom activity, writing and reporting the daily news, supported the progressive forms of community participation for a classroom of Spanish-speaking first and second graders immersed in an English-only classroom.

Other studies have focused on the tenet of communities of practice to frame their work.

Toohey (1998) investigated a classroom with young EL children and native English speakers.

The researcher examined how three classroom practices (e.g., sitting at your desk, using your

things, and using your own words and ideas) served to stratify the children over time

(kindergarten through second grade). She argued that the classroom practices inhibited the development of a community of practice and limited some students’ access to community resources that caused them not to participate in the community more fully. In contrast, in an earlier study, Toohey (1996) applied the theory to two newcomers, both young EL children, in a kindergarten classroom. She investigated the communities in which the two children participated, the community resources available to them, and how the classroom’s social structures defined their learning possibilities. She found that young EL children had access to community resources despite their limited English abilities.

Bernhard and colleagues (2008) investigated how a 12-month early literacy intervention,

The Early Authors Program, engaged 3-5-year-old children (n=280) in authoring story-book texts through the guided participation led by their parents. The researchers found that the children’s collaborations led to the development of a community of practice, within which the children became more fully participating members of a community of writers. Finally,

McCarthey and Garcia (2005) investigated the home and school writing practices of six

Mandarin-speaking and five Spanish-speaking elementary students. The researchers found that children’s literacy practices reflected the values of the communities and their societal influences.

Situated Learning is an appropriate framework for this study of young EL children’s writing. Classrooms are communities of practice where literacy practices provide authentic activities wherein young EL children can engage in guided participation and progress along the continuum of participation.

A Sociocultural Theory of Writing. Situated Learning (Lave & Wenger, 1991) is a general sociocultural theory of learning, which will help frame this study. Additionally, scholars

have applied a sociocultural perspective to writing and writing instruction, which will also guide

this work. Lev Vygotsky, a Russian psychologist, is often recognized as the architect of

sociocultural learning theory. He posited that language and writing are cultural tools, which

mediate higher-order thinking processes. His contemporary, Mikhail Bakhtin, was a literary

analyst, philosopher of language, and teacher whose work highlighted the role of language in

social and cultural interactions, especially as they related to literature. The attention Vygotsky

and Bakhtin gave to language created space for future researchers and scholars to apply

sociocultural theory to writing instruction and development (e.g., Bazerman, 2004; Dyson, 2010;

Englert, 1992; Gee, 2002).

Prior (2006) proposed A Sociocultural Theory of Writing, which views the act of writing

as a dialogic exchange of ideas and texts as “artifacts-in-activity” (Prior, 2006, p. 58). Writers

make use of an array of socio-historical resources (e.g., signs and symbols) that have developed

over time to communicate meaning. Even if the message is meant only for oneself (e.g., a diary,

a shopping list), the resources the writer uses are gleaned from the community within which the

writer operates on a day to day basis, so in this circumstance, writing remains a social activity.

According to Bakhtin (1981), writing is dialogic because writers are in constant conversation

with previous texts from which they borrow ideas and symbols. Also, writers write for an audience with whom they also converse. Prior (2006) asserted that the conversational nature of writing means that all text composed in a classroom is co-authored with the teacher. Teachers assume the role of a co-author of their students’ compositions because they provide parameters within which the students should operate (e.g., genre, topic, length) – choices that are part of an authors’ role. Moreover, teachers engage students in dialogue throughout the writing process through instruction, conferencing, and feedback. As co-authors of student texts, teachers’

function in students’ writing development is critical. Consequently, finding the most supportive writing instructional pedagogies is a crucial task for educators and educational researchers.

A Sociocultural Perspective on Writing Development. A sociocultural perspective of writing development reconceptualizes the commonly held belief that writing development occurs in a series of sequential, skill-building activities. Dyson (2002) envisioned the writing development of young children as a web of connections. She posited that children continuously access the entirety of their experiences with symbolic representation, both inside and outside school. They construct their understandings of symbols they have encountered and appropriate them for their purposes.

Limitations

Some situational factors limited the study. First, the school in which the study occurred used a published curricular program that influenced literacy instruction. I have described the curriculum in detail and considered its influence as I interpreted the data. The project also accommodated the school and classroom schedules, and I was subject to interruptions in data collection due to snow days during the winter months and testing in the spring. The study was also conducted over a short time in one single academic quarter. I alternated my visits between classrooms, limiting the amount of time I could spend in each. As a single student researcher, I was limited by the time I was able to devote to the project. Despite these limitations, I am confident that the project’s aims were met, and the findings will be significant to the fields of emergent and early literacy and second language writing.

Unique Contributions of this Study

The present study can contribute to the fields of emergent literacy and second language studies in unique and significant ways. First, the study will extend the current research body on

young EL children’s writing instruction by investigating the details of the teachers’ moment-by-

moment decision-making during literacy instruction. To my knowledge, this study was the first

to explore teachers’ rationales, motivations, and influences as they made instructional choices

surrounding literacy instruction.

The study can add to sociocultural theory by elucidating how newcomers (i.e., students) in a community of practice (i.e., a first-grade classroom) appropriate the practice of writing to make meaning, as they work alongside more experienced members of the community (i.e., teachers). For these reasons, educational researchers will likely benefit from the study and build upon its findings. The study may also help teachers and other educational practitioners by providing illustrative examples of instructional approaches to support young EL children’s writing development. Finally, the study has the potential to further my commitment, which I maintain as a “professional imperative” (Wagner, 2016, p. 31), to provide all children with equal access to education.

Summary

Despite the growing number of young EL children in U.S. schools, the achievement gap between English learners compared to native English-speaking children, and the importance of writing instruction and learning to students’ academic success, relatively little research on writing has been conducted with young EL children. Writing research conducted with these children suggests instruction such as skills-based, genre-based, balanced literacy, integrated

literacy, and asset-based pedagogies have been shown to be effective. A myriad of knowledge,

beliefs, personal perspectives, and curricular restraints have been shown to influence teachers’

disposition toward writing instruction and their decision-making as they provide writing

instruction. Based on this assertion, using a sociocultural perspective, I explored how and why

two mainstream, monolingual, first-grade teachers enacted literacy instruction and how two young EL children responded to that instruction. I conceptualized teachers’ enactment of literacy instruction and children’s responses to it as dialogic relationships, and I explored how these dialogic relationships might have influenced the writing outcomes of two focal students.

This dissertation consists of seven chapters. In the next chapter, I present a theoretical framework and review of the literature relevant to my study. In Chapter 3, I detail the methodology used, including the study design, procedures, and steps taken to maintain trustworthiness. In Chapters 4 and 5, I present the study findings, and in Chapter 6, I discuss themes taken from the cross-case synthesis (Yin, 2014). Finally, in Chapter 7, I acknowledge the study’s limitations and present methodological and theoretical insights. Furthermore, I present implications for educators and make recommendations for future research.

Chapter 2: Theoretical Framework and Literature Review

In this chapter, I review the corpus of relevant theoretical and empirical literature befitting this study. First, I examine research elucidating classroom practices supportive (or unsupportive) of young EL children as they learn to write in English. Based on this review, I then identify research areas that require further inquiry related to my study’s focus. Next, I report the theories used to ground the relevant empirical research and describe how researchers have used theory to conceptualize their studies. Finally, I illustrate how Situated Learning (Lave &

Wenger, 1991) and sociocultural perspectives of writing and writing development, particularly with young children from non-majority backgrounds, form a theoretical framework to ground this study.

Theoretical Framework

I grounded this study using a sociocultural perspective. Specifically, I drew upon Lave and Wenger’s (1991) theory of Situated Learning as a lens through which I designed the study and interpreted the findings. I also drew upon Prior’s (2006) Sociocultural Theory of Writing to understand and define what writing is and its function in society. Finally, scholars such as Dyson

(1989, 2002, 2010) offer sociocultural perspectives on writing development. These scholars provide insight into young children’s writing, particularly children who are minoritized or marginalized somehow. Taken together and supported by literature about young EL children’s writing specifically, these three theories provide the necessary perspective to ground the work.

Figure 2.1 is a graphic showing my conceptualization of how the theories work together to inform my understanding of the study.

Figure 2.1

Sociocultural Theoretical Framework

Situated Learning (Lave & Wenger, 1991)

Sociocultural Theory of Writing (Prior, 2006)

Sociocultural Perspective on Writing Development (Dyson, 2002)

Situated Learning

For this research, I used Lave and Wenger’s (1991) sociocultural theory of Situated

Learning as a guiding framework. This learning theory focuses on the ways people co-construct

knowledge as they participate in authentic activities situated within communities of practice.

Lave and Wenger (1991) argued that learning occurs as people engage in and create meaning

from everyday situations (i.e., authentic activities) with other community members. Whereas

conventional cognitive learning theories seek to explain how the individual learner internalizes

knowledge, Situated Learning explores the relationships between the learner and the outside

world. It rejects the “dichotomy between inside and outside” (p. 47) that is inherent in the notion of internalizing knowledge. Instead, Situated Learning asserts that to study the nature of individual learning, one must also explore how the whole person engages with others in the

culturally defined practices that comprise a group of people who share a common interest (i.e., a

community of practice). Understanding occurs not by collecting facts about the world, rather by

engaging in “activity in and with the world” (p. 33). In the sections to follow, I will describe the

concepts of legitimate peripheral participation and communities of practice in more detail. Then,

I will explain how one study of early literacy with young EL children (Manyak, 2001) provided a

template for applying this theory to this work. Finally, I describe how I use the tenets of

Situational Learning in this study of young EL children’s writing and writing instruction.

Legitimate Peripheral Participation. Legitimate peripheral participation is the

fundamental principle that defines Situated Learning (Lave & Wenger, 1991). This term

describes the process that begins when newcomers enter a community of practice. New community members develop social relationships with old-timers who are more experienced in

the community’s cultural practices. Newcomers engage in the authentic activities within the

communities of practice alongside the old-timers. By increasing participation, they learn the

knowledgeable skills required to construct new identities and eventually become fully

participating community members. Lave and Wenger (1991) describe their use of the term

peripheral to suggest a range of engagement levels or participation within a community. The

term refers to one’s social location within the group, not the physical. Participation begins by observing from the social sidelines (i.e., the periphery), increases over time to partial participation, and is eventually realized as full participation. Lave and Wenger (1991) clarify that peripheral or partial participation should not be interpreted to mean that the participant is

somehow disconnected from the group or the group practices. They describe their use of the term

legitimate to connote a sense of belonging to the community, even when participation in the

community activities is not yet fully realized.

The concept of legitimate peripheral participation grew from Lave and Wenger’s (1991)

desire to clearly define the notion of apprenticeship used metaphorically among cognitive and

educational researchers at the time (e.g., learners as apprentices, apprenticeship learning,

cognitive apprenticeship). They wanted to understand how the contemporary term

apprenticeship related to the historical, educational practice in many cultures. Lave and Wenger

(1991) set out to investigate specific instances of apprenticeship, and they provided examples of

apprenticeships within communities of practice to illustrate their conceptualization of legitimate

peripheral participation.

Communities of Practice. Lave and Wenger (1991) call the community of practice “The

Place of Knowledge” (p. 94). They use this term less to describe the physical location in which the activities occur and to situate the activities within a learning context. The community of practice comprises the participating community members (including those participating on the

periphery) and all the ways of doing (i.e., community practices or authentic activities) that have

been created over time and are continually changing as community members construct new

knowledge. From the periphery, newcomers who have legitimate access observe the community

practices and develop a sense of what it means to be a member of the community.

Lave and Wenger (1991) explained that community practices include the members

involved, what they say and do, and what life is like for them. Practices also include the language

used and how members of the community interact with one another, including members

participating at different levels of engagement (e.g., newcomers and old-timers). Furthermore,

practices include how community members and non-community members interact. Newcomers

must learn what other members are doing and what must be done to become full practitioners. As

they observe the community practices, they identify the available resources within the

community of practice and choose how they want to engage.

Communities of practice are where the learning is situated. Members of a community of

practice may have varied interests, different levels of participation or contribution, and may

disagree on some points of practice. Communities of practice may or may not be well-defined by

physical or social boundaries. Instead, a shared understanding of the practices defines the

community and how those practices matter in their lives.

Influential Scholars. Lave and Wenger (1991) are most often credited as the parents of

Situated Learning; however, their work grew from earlier work, and others have expanded these ideas since. First, Lave (1988) did earlier work in response to arguments from functional theory and cognitive psychology that children should be taught isolated skills away from the context in which they are used, and the children will be able to transfer the knowledge to a variety of settings. She participated in the Adult Math Project (AMP). AMP was a study in which non- experts, people she called “just plain folks (JPFs)” (p. 4), were observed participating in everyday activities that required mathematical calculations (e.g., grocery shopping, cooking,

Weight Watchers). Researchers followed JPFs as they performed the calculations their daily activities required (e.g., best buy analysis, weights and measures conversions, calculating Weight

Watchers points). They asked the participants to “think aloud” as they performed the calculations. The same JPFs were given tests like the ones presented in school in which they were asked to perform the same types of computations they performed in everyday situations.

The study was replicated with several different groups of people. The researchers found that

JPFs performed far better when making the same calculations during real-life activities (98-99%) than on the pencil and paper tests (50-74%).

Furthermore, there seemed to be no relationship between JPFs’ education levels and their performance on calculations during real-life activities. In other words, even people with low levels of conventional education could perform real-life calculations with high accuracy. These findings motivated Lave to seek a learning theory that would satisfactorily explain the learning in everyday settings and reject the notion that skills taught in isolation can be generalized to dissimilar situations.

Brown and colleagues (1989) are credited with the term Situated Cognition, although it is

often used synonymously with Situated Learning. They, too, rejected the notion that knowledge

can be separated from the situation in which it was learned and later applied to other dissimilar

situations. They asserted that knowledge is situated within activities, contexts, and cultures. In

other words, as people participate in activities that are located within a particular setting and as

they make use of the cultural tools related to that setting, they construct knowledge (i.e., learn).

Like Lave and Wenger (1991), Brown and colleagues (1989) defined authentic activities

as “the ordinary practices of the culture” (p. 34) and criticized much of the activity that takes

place in schools as the cultural practices of the school, which may not necessarily be the

authentic activities of practitioners in the world outside of school.

Brown and colleagues (1989) also coined the term cognitive apprenticeship to elucidate

how the practices associated with apprenticeship could be applied to the practices in a classroom.

They advocated for classroom practices, which simulate authentic activities to enculturate

students into authentic practices. This process involves (a) embedding the task to be taught

within authentic activity, (b) pointing out multiple ways to accomplish the task, and (c) allowing

students to work together to generate solutions. Brown and colleagues (1989) assert that teaching

practices embracing the principle of the cognitive apprenticeship will prepare students to be fully

participating members of their communities.

Another prominent scholar whose work is related to Lave and Wenger’s (1991) is

Rogoff. Rogoff (2003) focused on human development, particularly on young children (Rogoff,

1996; Rogoff et al., 1989). Like other sociocultural theorists, she viewed human development as

a transformation process taking place as people use cultural tools and participate in cultural

activities. Furthermore, as people participate together in cultural activities, they contribute to the

transformation of those activities. Across generations, people construct knowledge about using

cultural tools in new and different ways and pass those practices down to future generations. In

this way, people create cultural change even as their use of cultural tools and practices create

change in them. Rogoff (2003), like Lave and Wenger (1991), emphasized the ever-changing social-historical nature of culture as people participate in cultural practices.

Rogoff (2003) also discussed the many and varied ways in which children learn through

guided participation. She conceptualized guided participation not as a teaching method but as a

description of the various ways in which the values and practices of children’s cultural

communities guide children’s learning. Examples Rogoff (2003) gave of guided participation

were a) recounting, elaborating, and listening to narratives; b) participating in apprenticeships,

and c) learning through listening-in. Guided participation forms vary across cultures, but the

fundamental idea is similar to Lave and Wenger’s (1991) notion of legitimate peripheral

participation. Children learn by participating in cultural practices alongside more experienced

members of the community.

Situated Learning in Research of Early Literacy. Situated Learning has been used as a

framework for research in early literacy. The most compelling example I have found is a study

by Manyak (2001), who used an ethnographic approach to examine native Spanish-speaking

students’ literacy practices. They were situated in a first- and second-grade English immersion

classroom mandated by the state to provide English-only instruction. The class participated in a

daily literacy activity, The Daily News, in which the children sat in a circle around their rug and

shared stories from their lives (in English or Spanish). The teacher wrote the words in English

with a marker on a large piece of paper. Then, the class read the “news” aloud together. Later in

the year, students acted as reporters, and they wrote the stories as their peers related them. On the

following day, the teacher-led the class in editing the previous day’s news. To understand how the children appropriated the cultural practice of writing, Manyak (2001) drew upon legitimate peripheral participation (Lave & Wenger, 1991) because it allowed him to situate the children’s learning within the classroom’s community of practice as they engaged in the activity of writing

The Daily News. His research questions were directly related to the principles of legitimate peripheral participation. He investigated (a) the children’s participation in literacy practices and how their participation evolved, (b) the social relationships and identity positions that characterized the children’s participation in the literacy practices, and (c) how the literacy practices provided resources for learning and how those resources were made accessible.

After analyzing the data gathered from observations of the literacy practices in the classroom, Manyak (2001) again used principles from legitimate peripheral participation to interpret the findings. He found that by incorporating stories from their real lives, The Daily

News provided an authentic activity within which the newcomers (i.e., the children) could work alongside an old-timer (i.e., the teacher) to co-construct knowledge about writing in English and create new identities as writers. The children’s participation increased over time, and by the end

of the year, they were writing The Daily News almost entirely on their own. By framing his study

in legitimate peripheral participation, Manyak (2001) provided an excellent template to guide me

in this study.

A Sociocultural Theory of Writing

Prior (2006) proffered a Sociocultural Theory of Writing, drawing upon the key tenets of

sociocultural learning theory to illustrate how writing is a concrete, authentic, and functional

social activity situated in the writer’s socio-historical context. According to this perspective,

writers never produce text in isolation. Instead, they draw upon a vast network of appropriated

cultural resources (e.g., language, symbols, knowledge, technologies), which are constructed

over time and become tools to mediate the expression and perception of ideas (Wertsch, 2009).

In so doing, writers enter dialogic relationships (Bakhtin, 1981) with historical and

contemporary contributors of cultural resources and future consumers of their written products.

Users of language construct their texts by borrowing signs from others’ texts, “from their

landscape of textual possibilities” (Dyson, 2002, p. 127), and repurpose them to construct new

meaning.

Prior (2006) explained that before the advent of sociocultural theory, writing had been

viewed as an isolated activity in which a lone writer inscribed physical texts. As such, scholars

focused on the cognitive processes that took place within writers’ minds as they engaged in

writing activities. With the introduction of sociocultural theory, writing began to be viewed as an

activity distributed across modes of inscription, media, time, and social boundaries.

Subsequently, writing must necessarily transpire as a collaborative activity, the efforts of which

are distributed between and among co-authors. Co-authors may be identifiable and present throughout the collaborative process. Alternatively, they may remain invisible, undefined, and so

interwoven into the community’s fabric that writers are unconscious of their co-authors’ contributions.

According to Prior (2006), teachers play the role of co-author in students’ writing because they create parameters (e.g., genre, topic, style, structure, words, and phrases) within which students must perform. Furthermore, teachers engage in dialogic relationships with their students, influencing students’ work (Englert, 1992). In so doing, teachers undertake the tasks associated with authorship and are consequently a central figure in their students’ writing processes. Owing to the magnitude of teachers’ responsibility, educators have used sociocultural theory to guide their understanding of writing instruction.

Englert (1992) outlined the main assumptions of a sociocultural theory that contributed to her, along with her colleagues’, design of an instructional program to be used with upper- elementary- and secondary-aged children who had learning disabilities. In addition to the tenets already discussed, they assumed that writing instruction should occur within children’s zones of proximal development (Vygotsky, 1987), which include the tasks and activities children cannot complete on their own but can complete with guidance. Moreover, learning happens best when students engage in the whole activity rather than practicing skills in isolation. However, some support or scaffolding (Wood et al., 1976) may be needed along the way. Englert (1992) designed a writing instruction program comprised of teachers modeling the writing process and promoting a collaborative social dialogue. They aimed to help students internalize that dialogue and appropriate it for their purposes. The research team provided scaffolding tools, allowing teachers to help the students work within their zones of proximal development. Englert (1992) reported positive outcomes for students’ writing performance and their metacognitive knowledge.

A Sociocultural Theory of Writing (Prior, 2006) added an essential dimension to this

study. I viewed dialogic relationships as the culmination of instructional transactions between the teacher and student, both synchronous and asynchronous, and those implied by the teacher by making them part of the community’s daily practices. I drew upon Ranker’s (2009) notions of direct appropriation, which describes learning demonstrated directly following instruction, diffuse appropriation, which refers to learning demonstrated from a previous day’s lesson, and indirect appropriation, which describes learning evidenced by the application of instruction in a unique or novel way. Ranker’s (2009) conceptualization of appropriation implied ongoing dialogic relationships between teacher and student, even when the teacher was not present.

Literacy instruction provided a concrete, authentic, and functional social activity within

which the teachers and students in my study collaborated to create co-authored texts. Moreover, student-participants encountered their own interchanges with past, present, and future collaborators based on their personal experiences and used a wide array of cultural tools. A

Sociocultural Theory of Writing provided a useful framework to unravel the data and elucidate my interpretations.

Sociocultural Perspective on Writing Development

Anne Haas Dyson has written prolifically about sociocultural theory concerning young children’s writing (e.g., Dyson, 2002, 2003a, 2003b, 2004, 2008a, 2008b, 2010). Dyson (2002), having pursued a line of research focusing on young children’s writing development and instruction from a sociocultural perspective, views children’s writing development as a web of connections “to the whole of children’s symbolic repertoires and to the breadth of their textual landscapes” (p. 127). In other words, writing development does not occur along a straight course of sequential skill-building as many curricula are designed. Instead, children access the entirety

of their experiences with symbolic representation, both inside and outside school. They construct their understandings of symbols they have encountered and appropriate them for their purposes.

Dyson’s central question pertained to how children navigated, perceived, and synthesized the many and varied symbolic texts they encountered (e.g., books, environmental print, visual media, popular culture) through participation in the communities to which they belonged (e.g., home, school, peer groups, racial or ethnic groups, groups with common language backgrounds).

She asked how children synergistically adapted those texts to craft messages with meaning that which mattered to the children themselves. Dyson (2008a) differentiated between the “official” literacy practices sanctioned by schools and those practices constructed in the “unofficial dynamics of child-governed worlds” (p. 120). She asserted that parameters placed on “official” school literacy practices and narrow definitions of literacy might disregard vast “textual landscapes” (p. 141) available to children as meaning-making resources. To tackle this missed opportunity, Dyson (2008a) suggested educators reimagine school literacy to include (a) multimodal text production, (b) learning “the basics” through participation in a situated activity, and (c) recognizing “the basics” fluctuate as situations change. She also recommended providing regular time and space for children to share their texts with the class and explain their interpretations and intentions.

Literature Review

My literature review focuses on the current body of research, which informs my understanding of practices supportive of young EL children as they learn to write in English.

According to sociocultural perspectives, teachers play a critical role in creating social spaces and engaging in dialogic relationships leading to students’ appropriation of writing skills. Given the theoretical propositions upon which I grounded this work, I sought to explore not only what

teachers did in the name of literacy instruction and how the young EL children responded, but

how and why teachers made instructional decisions related to writing outcomes. Specifically, I

examined three related research areas. First, I examined teachers’ instructional practices related

to literacy. Second, I investigated young EL children’s participatory practices during literacy

activities. Third, I explored teachers’ reported beliefs and perspectives, which informed their

literacy-related classroom practices.

Studies included in this review met specific inclusion criteria. First, they addressed a)

literacy-related classroom practices for young EL children, b) children’s participation during

literacy activities, or c) teachers’ perspectives, which may have informed their literacy-related classroom practices. Furthermore, the researchers must have reported outcomes related to either children’s writing processes, products, teachers’ beliefs about instruction, or all three. The student-participants in the included studies were in preschool through third grade (ages 3-8), and all studies were published in scholarly, peer-reviewed journals between 2000 and 2020. My aim in setting these time parameters was to include a long enough period to understand how the scholarly discourse has developed while still limiting the research to the most current context.

Finally, I excluded studies limited to examining outcomes of specific programs (e.g., dual- language programs, sheltered English immersion programs) or out-of-school contexts (e.g., home, community); these studies lay beyond the scope of the current study.

Literacy-Related Instructional Practices

Literacy instruction, particularly writing instruction for young EL children, is a growing area of research. In this section, I present studies, which reported findings related to literacy- related instructional practices. Researchers investigated: a) skills-based instruction, b) shared writing instruction, c) genre-based instruction, d) integrated instruction, and c) asset-based

instruction. In the following sections, I describe the instructional practices, illustrate the ways

young EL children participated in the practices, and explain the teachers’ rationales for their

decision-making. Then, I recount the writing-related outcomes researchers attributed to the

instruction, and finally, I summarize by offering implications for teaching, as recommended by

the researchers.

Skills-Based Instruction. Five studies examined a range of skills-based instruction with

young EL children (Barone, 2003; Durán, 2018; Manyak, 2004; Raynolds et al., 2013; Weber &

Longhi-Chirlin, 2001). Manyak (2004) documented the instruction of a reading group of

Spanish-speaking ELs in first grade, which met twice weekly for 15 minutes throughout the year.

The teacher, a bilingual reading-support teacher, modeled highly regulated procedures to perform pronunciation and spelling tasks and demanded proper posture, body movements, and vocalization in a prescribed sequence. She had the children perform the tasks individually and intervened if they did not act with exactitude, even if they correctly spelled the words.

Barone (2003) conducted a three-year investigation (kindergarten through second grade) documenting the literacy instruction of the teachers in an elementary school serving a high population of children who were ELs. In kindergarten, she observed teachers providing phonics worksheets, alphabet journals, and center activities with little teacher guidance. In first grade, teachers focused mostly on phonics instruction using a basal reading series.

Raynolds and colleagues (2013) examined the phonics instruction of Spanish-speaking

EL children (n=36) and their monolingual peers (n=46) in five kindergarten classrooms.

Teachers used Fundations (Wilson, 2002), and they focused on letter sounds using picture cards and phonemic segmentation, featuring such activities as tapping out phonemes and writing dictated words.

Durán (2018) investigated a first-grade, mainstream classroom with six young Spanish- speaking children who, per district policy, received systematic, formalized instruction in English.

Nevertheless, they were all able to read and write in both languages at the end of the year. Their teacher commonly referenced Spanish writing conventions when teaching English, such as pointing out the inverted exclamation point at the beginning of an exclamatory sentence in

Spanish.

Finally, Weber and Longhi-Chirlin (2001) investigated the literacy instruction of two

Spanish-speaking EL first graders in classrooms where teachers provided instructional practices such as workbook pages, sentence dictation, and cutting up sentence strips so children could form new sentences. Students had few opportunities to compose texts or garner meaning from print, and the teachers did little to differentiate instruction for the young EL children in their classes.

Student Practices: Skills-Based Instruction. Young EL children participated in skills- based instruction in a variety of ways. Some actively resisted highly disciplined instruction by failing to pay attention (Barone 2003; Manyak, 2004) or mocking the procedures (Manyak,

2004), while others did whatever they could to avoid being publicly corrected, like watching the teacher instead of tracking print during choral read alouds (Manyak, 2004). Some young EL children could not find ways to collaborate or participate in expanded academic conversations

(Barone, 2003; Manyak, 2004; Weber & Longhi-Chirlin, 2001). They completed assigned tasks by guessing answers or copying from the teacher’s model or a peer (Barone, 2003; Weber &

Longhi-Chirlin, 2001).

Durán (2018) found that young EL children who had received formalized graphophonemic instruction in English extended it to their Spanish compositions. For example,

children used the English grapheme, not the Spanish one, to represent Spanish sounds, as in

“boneta” for “bonita” or “freholes” for “frijoles.” However, invented spelling in English did not

include Spanish graphemes to represent English phonemes, except for one student who had

received some formal Spanish instruction. The researcher found that children used spontaneously used talk, texts, and literacy knowledge to produce texts in both languages.

Teacher Rationales: Skills-Based Instruction. Curricula in the studies related to skills-

based instruction were mandated by the districts in which they were used. Additionally, teachers

reported other rationales for instruction. First, one teacher believed the highly disciplined form of

instruction in which she had been trained, which focused on individual performance, allowed

young EL children to practice self-discipline by restraining themselves from responding out of

turn (Manyak, 2004). Furthermore, teachers believed this form of instruction to be the most

efficient use of limited time (Barone, 2003; Manyak, 2004). Barone (2003) reported kindergarten

teachers’ feelings of frustration because they did not know how to communicate with young EL

children, so they focused only on alphabet knowledge. They did not try to build personal

relationships. One first-grade teacher believed that children needed strong foundational phonics

skills to be a successful reader, so she began the first half of the year, focusing only on phonics

skills outside the context of reading or writing (Barone, 2003). Teachers in Weber & Longhi-

Chirlin’s (2001) study considered the young EL children capable learners. They engaged the

children as much as possible but did not differentiate the mainstream instruction intended for

monolingual English speakers and depended on the ESL specialists to provide individualized

instruction.

Writing-Related Outcomes: Skills-Based Instruction. Most scholars agree that some

amount of skills instruction (e.g., phonics, word study, writing strategies) is an integral part of a

balanced approach to literacy instruction (Araujo, 2002; Barone, 2003; Flynn, 2007; Manyak,

2006, 2008; Matera & Gerber; Raynolds, 2013; Soltero-Gonzalez, 2009). One study suggested

that skills instruction can help children in their endeavors to become bi-literate (Durán, 2018).

However, when used in isolation, teachers may miss opportunities to make home-school connections (Barone, 2003) and tap into children’s existing linguistic resources provided by their

L1 (Barone, 2003; Manyak, 2004). Researchers found evidence to suggest that skills instruction supported the Spanish-speaking EL children’s spelling (Raynolds et al., 2013) and foundational knowledge about the form of English print (Barone, 2003; Durán, 2018; Weber & Longhi-

Chirlin, 2001). Nevertheless, this approach to instruction alone did not support children’s ability to comprehend or compose text (Barone, 2003; Manyak, 2004; Weber & Longhi-Chirlin, 2001).

Furthermore, when delivered in a highly disciplined way (Manyak 2004), some children responded to the instruction with resistance, and they paid little attention to the print tasks.

Consequently, they were labeled as “struggling” because they were not proficient in performing a task’s procedures, even though they demonstrated interest and writing ability in less prohibitive contexts.

Balanced-Literacy Instruction. Another group of researchers investigated classrooms where teachers used balanced literacy pedagogies, which mix phonics skill instruction and holistic instruction. Flynn (2007) investigated three teachers’ balanced literacy practices in inner- city classrooms in East London, whose students’ test scores consistently met and exceeded the national literacy standards. The students were in year two (six and seven years old), and a majority were young children who were ELs from diverse linguistic backgrounds. Flynn (2007) found that the teachers employed oral language to develop written language; taught and modeled literacy at the word-, sentence-, and text-levels; and centered instruction around authentic

activities.

Matera and Gerber (2008) examined the effectiveness of Project Write! (Schickendanz &

Casbergue, 2004; Strickland & Schickendanz, 2004), an early balanced literacy curriculum was designed to support English writing with Spanish-speaking Head Start preschoolers (N=40). The teachers began by reading a story to the class then used the book as a model text to teach a specific concept of print (e.g., directionality, distinguishing numbers and letters, the concept of

“word”), starting with simple concepts and moving toward more complex concepts as the weeks progressed. Then, the teachers engaged small groups of children in an activity related to the story and print concept. The students were assessed (using a pretest-posttest design) in both languages, and the results were compared to a control group that received business-as-usual instruction. The treatment group made more statistically significant gains than the control group in both Spanish and English writing.

Araujo (2002) investigated the relationships between oral language, reading, and writing development for a group of 20 Portuguese-speaking kindergarten children who were ELs. The teacher used a literature-based balanced literacy series (Gambrell, 1996) and facilitated literacy activities such as circle reading, journal writing, and phonics instruction using Portuguese and

English. She translated students emerging oral language into conventional written language, explicitly matched oral language to print, made text-to-life connections, asked children to find meaning in pictures, invited children to respond to texts in journals, and explicitly taught letter- sound relationships. At the end of the year, children understood written language (e.g., letter- sound recognition, making meaning from print) and transferred that knowledge to their writing, even without explicit instruction about how to do so.

Falchi and colleagues (2014) investigated the use of a balanced literacy curriculum

(Fountas & Pinnell, 1996) with two first-grade Mixteco-speaking EL children (an indigenous

Mexican language) in a dual-language program. Although the teacher used the prescribed curriculum, she also adjusted her lessons and expectations to include topics of interest to the children, allowed native language use, and made space for multiple modes of expression.

According to the academic benchmarks, one of the children excelled academically, and the other child, who expressed himself with drawings and engaged in topics of interest to him, did not meet the curricular benchmarks. However, because the teacher legitimized the second child’s modes of meaning-making and praised him as “un artista,” the child became excited when exploring meaning-making in a more open-ended way than the curriculum allowed.

Lowrance-Faulhaber and Williams (2019) examined the teaching beliefs and practices of a mainstream kindergarten teacher using the Teacher’s College Reading and Writing Project

(Calkins, 1994) curriculum (i.e., Reading and Writing Workshop). The five young EL children in her class spoke Japanese (n=2), Telugu (n=2), and Portuguese (n=1). The teacher began with the whole group, guided participation within authentic reading and writing activities, then allowed time for independent practice. She offered the children mediational tools (e.g., stretching words, letter-sound linking chart, Hunk Chunks within words), explicitly taught writing processes (e.g., identifying an audience, writing in a genre, revising), and integrated listening, speaking, reading, and writing instruction.

Finally, Fisher-Ari and Flint (2018) investigated two teachers’ changing perspectives and pedagogical practices as they implemented a writing workshop approach with young EL children in third grade. At the beginning of the year, the teachers used a prescriptive, skills-driven approach to literacy instruction that did little to connect with children. They implemented a series of small shifts over time, such as paired-writing activities, conferring with children about

writing, allowing self-selected topics, and maintaining writer’s notebooks. As the year

progressed, the teachers and children made this approach to writing instruction and practice their

own.

Student Practices: Balanced Literacy Instruction. Young EL children participated in

classroom literacy activities in different ways. Researchers observed some children who engaged

in the teacher-provided activities, followed the teacher’s model, responded to questions, and

interacted with peers (Lowrance-Faulhaber & Williams, 2019; Falchi et al., 2014). Fisher-Ari

and Flint (2018) described young EL children who recorded ideas and first drafts in their

notebooks, wrote increasingly about out-of-school experiences and interests, and wrote for multiple purposes and genres. As time went on, they showed a much greater interest in sharing their work with the class (Fisher-Ari & Flint, 2018). Researchers noted that other children interpreted literacy events to serve their own purposes (Araujo, 2002; Falchi et al., 2014). One child appeared bored and inattentive during prescribed activities he did not understand. However, he came alive when given activities focused on his interests or involved oral storytelling, music, or visual arts. The teacher made space for him to express himself in alternative ways (Falchi et al., 2014).

Teacher Rationales: Balanced-Literacy Instruction: Teachers offered a range of rationales for choosing balanced-literacy approaches to instruction. Fisher-Ari and Flint (2018) reported that teachers began the year expressing views that young EL children had linguistic, cultural, experiential, and familial deficits. Teachers believed the children’s lack of success was related to the parents’ lack of literacy skill, not their writing instruction, and they felt frustrated when children did not respond to the writing prompts in the ways they hoped. The teachers felt the burden of engaging children, developing their knowledge, and “fixing” their writing. Both

teachers were enthusiastic about trying a new approach, and as they did so, their understandings

of the writing process shifted (Fisher-Ari & Flint, 2018). Teachers expressed relief at the notion

of not having to impose writing topics on children, and they came to believe that self-selected topics helped children express themselves. Teachers believed writing workshops supported an additive view of children and honored the experiences the young EL children brought to the table

(Fisher-Ari & Flint, 2018; Lowrance-Faulhaber & Williams, 2019).

Teachers also expressed the belief that writing development emerges with young EL children as it does with monolingual children, just at a slower pace (Araujo, 2002; Lowrance-

Faulhaber & Williams, 2018). Also, literacy instruction aimed at young EL learners was suitable for monolingual children (Flynn, 2007). They believed reading and writing instruction and oral language practice should be integrated to help children connect speech and print and understand print’s affordances. However, teachers also believed explicitly teaching print conventions was critical for young EL children’s writing development. They often did so within the children’s authentic reading and writing (Araujo, 2002; Flynn, 2007; Lowrance-Faulhaber & Williams,

2018).

Writing Outcomes: Balanced-Literacy Instruction: Balanced-literacy approaches to instruction were demonstrated to support young EL children as they learned to write in English

(Araujo, 2002; Barone, 2003; Falchi et al., 2014; Flynn, 2007; Matera & Gerber; 2008).

Researchers concluded that a balanced literacy approach including explicit instruction of phonics and handwriting (Araujo, 2002), word recognition, print concepts (Araujo, 2002; Matera &

Gerber, 2008), and word-, sentence-, and text-level text construction (Flynn, 2007) contributed to positive writing outcomes in both languages (Matera & Gerber, 2008). Furthermore, balancing that instruction with meaning-making through oral language with strategies such as book

discussions, role-plays, “speaking onto the page,” and conferring about writing led to children acquiring the language used in conversations. Later, children applied that language to their writing efforts (Araujo, 2002; Falchi et al., 2014; Flynn, 2007; Matera & Gerber, 2008), and they better understood the interrelationships between oral and written language (Araujo, 2002; Flynn,

2007; Matera & Gerber, 2008).

Genre-Based Instruction. Researchers studied genre-based approaches to literacy instruction, characterized by explicit instruction of various genres’ features, often through deconstructing mentor texts (Durán, 2017; Gebhard et al., 2011; Pavlak, 2013; Shin, 2014).

Gebhard and colleagues (2011) and Shin (2014) investigated using a blog-mediated, genre-based curriculum in second-grade classrooms with young Spanish-speaking EL children. The four-step approach involved (1) a teacher-led introduction of a new genre, which included the deconstruction of model texts to identify features of the genre, (2) a teacher-led co-construction of a sample text in the genre, (3) guided instruction as students wrote drafts within the genre, and

(4) teacher analysis of student drafts including feedback used to revise the texts. The teachers created class blogs and taught the students and their parents how to post and exchange ideas using this tool. The students posted their texts on the blog. They exchanged comments with each other and other teachers, librarians, and family members before revising their texts for submission to the teacher.

Durán (2017) investigated using a writing curriculum in a first-grade classroom with young, Spanish-speaking EL children; the teacher was herself bilingual and delivered instruction in both languages. Within a writing workshop framework, the teacher and researcher created six units focusing on audience awareness. Children were asked to write for real readers and interact with those readers. For example, during Black History Month, the children created a hall display

of expository writing. They had the chance to interact with the school community members to

teach what they knew about the U.S. Civil Rights Movement.

Pavlak (2013) investigated the use of genre-based instruction to teach biography writing in a sheltered English immersion (SEI) classroom with three Spanish-speaking third graders with a range of English proficiency. The teacher read model biographies aloud to the class. Together, they deconstructed the texts by 1) identifying the parts of the texts, 2) developing vocabulary from the texts, 3) encouraging students’ active participation, and 4) increasing comprehension of the texts by using Spanish.

Student Practices: Genre-Based Instruction. Researchers reported that young EL children participated in genre-based instructional pedagogies socially and linguistically. All researchers agreed that students expanded their understanding of writing’s purposes (Pavlak,

2013), especially when their audiences grew (Durán, 2017; Gebhard et al., 2011; Shin, 2014).

They wrote so others would view them as competent writers, good friends, and children with privileged experiences (Gebhardt et al., 2011; Shin, 2014). The children used blogging to

“praise, thank, joke, apologize, request information and give information. Students also used blogging to compete, agree, disagree, defend opinions, give evidence, provoke, and scold”

(Gebhard et al., 2011, p. 17).

As children’s audiences and legitimized topics expanded, so did their purposes for writing. Their use of semiotic and experiential resources, persuasive rhetorical strategies, and multimodalities to communicate messages (Durán, 2017; Gebhard et al., 2011; Shin, 2014) increased. Durán (2017) found that children made more nuanced language choices based on their intended or imagined audiences. Spanish-dominant children wrote mostly in Spanish, but they used English phonology for unknown Spanish spellings (e.g., “bonita” as “boneta”). Children

who were balanced bilinguals seemed more sensitive to their readers’ languages, and they often switched from Spanish to English or vice versa on the same page or in the same sentence. Durán

(2017) also found that, while young EL children wrote in both languages, their syntax was more sophisticated when writing in Spanish to Spanish speakers. Furthermore, in all cases, researchers found that young EL children used genre features when they were made explicit (Durán, 2017,

Gebhard et al., 2011; Pavlak, 2013; Shin, 2014). They viewed themselves as authors (Pavlak,

2013) and used invented spelling and print conventions (e.g., capital letters and exclamation marks for emphasis). Moreover, texts became more linguistically and syntactically complex and meaningful as time went on (Durán, 2017; Gebhard et al., 2011; Pavlak, 2013; Shin, 2014).

Teacher Rationales: Genre-Based Pedagogies. Few of the teachers’ rationales for using genre-based pedagogies were reported. One teacher felt strongly that mentor texts helped familiarize students with features of the genre and develop vocabulary. The teacher believed that reconstructing texts in the same genre fostered students’ identities as legitimate writers (Pavlak,

2013). Another teacher used genre-based pedagogies in conjunction with blogging to give the young EL children a forum to write authentic, meaningful texts in the genre, which reflected their lives (Shin, 2014). Finally, one teacher believed a genre-based pedagogy focusing on audience awareness would allow the young EL children to use all of their linguistic, cultural, and multimodal assets as they wrote (Durán, 2017).

Writing-Related Outcomes: Genre-based pedagogies. Researchers have found genre- based pedagogies to support young EL children’s English writing by strengthening language skills (Gebhard et al., 2011; Pavlak, 2013; Shin, 2014), providing practice in higher-order thinking (Durán, 2017; Gebhard et al., 2011; Pavlak, 2013; Shin, 2014), and offering social benefits (Durán, 2017; Gebhard et al., 2011; Pavlak, 2013; Shin, 2014). Genre-based pedagogies

in which young EL children interacted with real audiences (Durán, 2017; Gebhard et al., 2011;

Shin 2014) seemed to increase children’s awareness of their readers and lead to a host of

benefits. In blog-mediated, genre-based approaches, in which the features of a range of genres were modeled and explicitly taught, researchers found children demonstrated sophisticated conceptions of print functions, complex grammar and syntax (Gebhard et al., 2011), and academic literacies in general (Shin, 2014). Pavlak (2013) found the deconstruction and co- construction of mentor texts supportive of vocabulary learning, reading comprehension, and the demonstrated ability to write in the studied genres.

Researchers reported additional positive writing outcomes related to the way young EL

children thought about language and literacy (Durán, 2017; Gebhard et al., 2011; Pavlak, 2013;

Shin, 2014). Genre-based pedagogies positively influenced young EL children’s rhetorical

astuteness (Pavlak, 2013; Durán, 2017), metalinguistic awareness (Gebhard et al., 2011), and

home-school connections (Gebhard et al., 2011; Shin, 2014). Finally, when teachers created

space for children to access the totality of their linguistic, experiential, and multimodal

repertoires and audiences (Durán, 2017, Gebhard et al., 2011; Shin, 2014), researchers argued

that young EL children’s cognitive flexibility increased, which they need to navigate among

cultural and linguistic contexts.

Researchers who studied genre-based pedagogies also found an array of social benefits for young EL children. Pavlak (2013) asserted that deconstructing mentor texts and jointly constructing texts within the same genre led to children viewing themselves as authors, indicating a positive writing identity. Researchers also posited that genre-based pedagogies influenced young EL children’s literacy instruction engagement and increased their motivation to write (Durán, 2017, Gebhard et al., 2011; Pavlak, 2013; Shin, 2014). Shin (2014) reported that

blog-mediated writing influenced children’s social standing because the writing appeared in a public forum visible by many contributors.

Shared Writing Instruction. Researchers examined shared and interactive writing practices employed by teachers to scaffold writing instruction. Shared writing is a group activity in which the teacher and students jointly compose a text as the teacher acts as a scribe.

Interactive writing is similar, but students take turns “sharing the pen” (McCarrier et al., 2000) as the teacher gradually releases the scribing responsibilities to the children. These approaches are a way to scaffold (Wood et al., 1976) instruction by providing support as children construct new knowledge by introducing one new component at a time and allowing students to concentrate their efforts before moving on to the next piece. Teachers gradually remove supports as students become more adept, eventually leaving the students to practice independently.

Manyak (2001, 2008) studied one such practice, The Daily News, occurring in two first- grade, English-only classrooms where the bilingual teachers conducted instruction and allowed

English and Spanish. The Daily News was a shared writing activity in which the children took turns orally reporting an event from home or school to the class, and a scribe (the teacher and later, a student-pair) transcribed the words and “published” the results as a text for the classroom library (Manyak 2001, 2008). In a similar activity, Martinez and colleagues (2010) investigated the use of message boards in a mainstream preschool classroom in which 15 of the 18 children were native Spanish-speaking ELs with varying levels of English ability. Message boards were small chalkboards on which the children drew pictures and wrote words that told stories of real- life events. They shared their stories and illustrations during circle time with the rest of the class and occasionally with parents or caregivers.

The teachers in both activities scaffolded instruction by guiding the children as they told

their stories. They repeated the children’s words, translated the language, made connections between speech and print, and extended their messages to build vocabulary. They also drew children’s attention to letter-sound relationships and concepts of print. As the year progressed, the teachers gradually withdrew their support, and the children worked on their own or with pairs

(Manyak 2001, 2008; Martinez et al., 2010).

Mohr (2017) investigated a researcher-developed, modeled-writing intervention (Mohr &

Mohr, 2009) in two dual-language and two mainstream second-grade classrooms in which 40% of the children were young Spanish-speaking ELs. The researcher taught a brief lesson that included a context-based discussion and modeled writing informational texts using an eight-step process (e.g., co-constructed sentences, interactive writing, sentence analysis, dictation). The children were then asked to extend the expository paragraph with three or four more sentences and draw a picture if time allowed.

Student Practices: Shared Writing Instruction. Manyak (2008) reported that students participated in text editing by offering solutions to spelling and grammar problems and rereading their work, making corrections before presenting their news items to the class during the Daily

News activity. The students collaborated in positive ways modeled by the teacher, and in so doing, they contributed to each other’s language and literacy development. The researcher saw the Daily News as an opportunity for young EL children to experience agency in their text production. As their languages changed, their roles shifted between helper and help-receiver

(Manyak, 2001). Martinez and colleagues (2010) studied the EL preschool children’s writing attempts and found they began with scribbles and marks, and later they added more organization and detail. Eventually, the young EL children labeled their drawings with letters, invented spellings, and keywords.

Teacher Rationales: Shared Writing Instruction. Teachers using shared writing

practices believed they strengthened home-school connections (Manyak, 2001, 2008; Martinez,

2010), legitimized out-of-school events as appropriate writing topics (Manyak, 2008), privileged

the language in which experiences occurred (Manyak, 2001; Martinez et al., 2010), and helped

children feel comfortable sharing (Martinez et al., 2010). Teachers wanted to help the young EL

children distinguish between school and home registers and learn presentation skills (e.g.,

speaking loud and clear) (Manyak, 2008). They wanted to make thought processes (e.g., editing

decisions, connections between oral and written language) during writing explicit (Manyak,

2008). In Manyak’s (2001) study, the teacher explained that she turned responsibility over to the

children when their writing skills had developed to the point where they were able to write the

Daily News successfully because she wanted them to experience the feelings associated with

being a writer.

Ms. Page was also distressed by a recent state mandate, brought about by California

Proposition 227, to use Spanish only for support and not for instruction. As an act of resistance

against the English hegemony being enacted by the school, district, and state, she believed the

Daily News provided an opportunity to regularly offer Spanish writing instruction while using

the school adopted literacy curriculum at other times during the day (Manyak, 2001).

Writing-Related Outcomes: Shared Writing Instruction. Researchers associated shared

writing instruction with positive writing-related outcomes. Message Boards and Daily News

reports became more elaborate, detailed, and complex (Manyak, 2001, 2008; Martinez et al.,

2010) as the year progressed. The children drew upon and demonstrated a wide range of

experiences, knowledge, and abilities (Manyak, 2001). The young EL children had developed

oral and written language skills akin to their English-speaking peers (Martinez et al., 2010). In

fact, Mohr (2017) reported the students who received the modeled-writing intervention, both monolingual (n=12) and young EL children (n=26), outscored the control group (n=24 monolingual, n=8 young ELs) on all measured features of an expository paragraph. Furthermore, the skills learned about expository writing were also demonstrated in the intervention group’s narrative writing.

As children shared their own meaningful and familiar experiences, home-school connections, and communication increased. Children were more motivated to write, out-of- school experiences became valued writing topics (Manyak, 2008; Martinez, 2010), and bilingualism became a valued academic resource (Manyak, 2008). Moreover, the activities fostered collaboration among children. Because the teachers had modeled appropriate behavior for collaborative activities when children began to collaborate, they were prepared to take on the social responsibilities in addition to the academic (Manyak, 2001, 2008). Researchers found that as time progressed, listening and discussion increased (even among visiting parents and caregivers) (Martinez et al., 2010; Mohr, 2017), and children found multiple ways to participate according to their abilities (Manyak, 2001, 2008; Martinez et al., 2010). Finally, publishing the

Daily News as part of the classroom library gave the written products an ongoing, authentic, and elevated status in the classroom community (Manyak, 2008).

Integrated Literacy. Four studies investigated how teachers integrated literacy instruction throughout the content curricula. Lee and colleagues (2009) examined third graders’ science writing achievement (24% were young EL children, predominantly Spanish or Haitian-

Creole speakers). Their mostly bilingual teachers were participating in a professional development (PD) intervention designed to help teachers support English proficiency for young

EL children within the context of learning and writing about science. The teachers delivered

instruction from curricular units on scientific topics that included literacy strategies, culturally

relevant experiences, and in both languages. They explicitly taught the students to describe,

explain, predict, and report, and then they assigned expository paragraphs about the topics.

Similarly, Genishi and colleagues (2001) explored how one preschool teacher taught

literacy in a classroom where most children were young ELs, representing various home

languages. The teacher was an English-Cantonese bilingual speaker, and all languages were allowed. The curriculum maintained a balance between child-centered and teacher-guided, symbol-based activities (e.g., cooking, dramatic play, block building, painting, science activities, listening to books). The children created symbols by drawing pictures, writing, and dictating stories scribed by their teacher. Letter-sound relationships were taught within the context of the activities.

In a series of articles, Snow and colleagues (2015, 2018) qualitatively examined the writing activities of three EL children, who were native Spanish-speakers, three native English- speakers from a low-income neighborhood (Snow et al., 2015), and three diverse language speakers from a high-income neighborhood (Snow et al., 2018) as they engaged in literacy- enriched block play. The researchers aimed to determine whether the young EL children benefited from this type of play as much as their native English-speaking peers. As part of the morning routine, the children were given one hour of free play before writing instruction. One choice was a block center that included toy vehicles, plastic dinosaurs, other animals, small foam and wooden alphabet blocks, Lego blocks, plastic interlocking cubes, and toy people. The teacher added picture books, labeled shelves, and hung a sign that read, “I can build a…” on the wall, making it a literacy-enriched center. As they played, the children drew pictures and were encouraged to write words “however they knew” (Snow et al., 2018, p. 752), and the teacher

wrote the children’s comments about the pictures verbatim.

Student Practices: Integrated Literacy Instruction. While Lee and colleagues (2009) did not report students’ practices as they engaged in literacy activities, Genishi and colleagues

(2001) explained that children began to create symbols that conveyed meaningful messages as a part of their regular play. For example, they copied the names of their chosen areas of play as part of their plan for the day. They experimented with writing tools provided at the writing center on self-selected topics as part of their play or on teacher-assigned topics as part of a theme.

Writing took on various forms (e.g., marks on the page, strings of letters, drawings) typical of young children.

Similarly, Snow and colleagues (2015, 2018) found a range of responses from the young

EL children to the literacy-enriched block play from the young EL children. One girl who demonstrated alphabet knowledge and a desire to write during writing instruction did not use the block center’s writing materials. A boy used the writing materials during block play, but he did not seem to understand or want to discuss the purpose of his writing; additionally, he demonstrated knowledge about writing during writing instruction time that he did not seem to access during block play. Another boy wrote more than the other students, including the English speakers, although his writing strategies were less advanced.

Teacher Rationales: Integrated Literacy Instruction. The preschool teacher whose practices Genishi and colleagues (2001) examined explained that she did not dwell on children’s cultural and linguistic differences, except to provide accommodations as needed. She took a similar approach to instruction for young EL children as she did with monolingual students, although the pacing may have slowed down. The teacher believed that conferring with children about their writing products led to more significant investment in their own work. Using an

integrated, play-based approach to literacy instruction helped the children gain valuable social

skills as they learned to collaborate, plan, and solve problems.

Writing Outcomes: Integrated Literacy Instruction. Although the writing outcomes

were different, given the children’s ages, all research teams concluded that the integrated literacy

activities the young EL children engaged in provided a high likelihood of success in both English literacy skills, including writing, and content knowledge (Genishi et al., 2001; Lee et al., 2009;

Snow et al., 2015, 2018). Integrated instruction helped children make word-print connections, write letters and letter-like forms, write their names and friends’ names, label objects and items in their illustrations, and write words using invented spelling (Genishi et al., 2001; Snow et al.,

2015, 2018). Third-grade students’ expository writing scores increased comparably to those of their monolingual peers after one year of integrated instruction (Lee et al., 2009).

By integrating literacy instruction throughout the curricula, teachers were able to balance young EL children’s individual language needs with content curriculum, embed literacy instruction into meaningful contexts, and provide inquiry-based instruction that extended children’s thinking (Genishi et al., 2001; Lee et al., 2009). Furthermore, young EL children made social connections to other children and adults (Genishi et al., 2001) and constructed shared meanings about content through cooperative, hands-on reading and writing activities (Genishi et al., 2001; Lee et al., 2009; Snow et al., 2015, 2018).

Asset-Based Pedagogies. The largest group of studies I examined investigated the instructional practices of teachers who delivered asset-based literacy pedagogies and how young

EL children participated in classroom practices. Durán (2017) described asset-based literacy pedagogies as those which leverage young EL children’s “useful insights into how language works that can be helpful in literacy learning” (pp. 92-93). Asset-based approaches play to young

EL children’s existing linguistic knowledge instead of viewing their limited English as an

obstacle to learning. The majority of the studies occurred in a writing workshop setting (Bauer et

al., 2017; Gort 2006; Machado & Hartman, 2019, 2020; Manyak, 2002; Ranker, 2009; Zapata &

Laman, 2016), which seemed to lend itself well to asset-based approaches. Children often have

more autonomy than in more narrowly defined approaches to writing instruction. In the writing

workshops, teachers began with a minilesson, often reading a book aloud to the class and

highlighting the topic-related text. The teachers introduced a writing tool or strategy, and the

children were invited to use that tool in their own writing if it was appropriate for their

composition.

Gort (2006) observed four first-grade Spanish-speaking ELs and four of their English-

speaking peers in a two-way bilingual education program during their writing workshop. The

program usually focused on foundational literacy skills in the native languages before formally

beginning second language instruction in second grade. However, two first-grade teachers

offered a special writing workshop for children who had met grade-level literacy levels in the second half of first grade.

Manyak (2002) investigated a first- and second-grade teacher’s instructional practices in a classroom with a mix of Latinx Spanish-speaking children and African American English- speaking children. Most Spanish speakers had low-ability levels in English and were placed in this class because the teacher was bilingual. She taught in both Spanish and English, despite a state English-only mandate. The teacher used a balanced literacy approach to instruction with shared and guided reading, writing workshop, word study, interactive writing, and literature- based units. The teacher’s use of both languages throughout instruction encouraged the children to use hybrid literacy practices, drawing upon both languages and home and school registers.

Ranker (2009) conducted a qualitative case study on the hybrid composing practices of six first-grade EL children within a sheltered English immersion (SEI) classroom, meaning the instruction occurred in English. All children were young ELs. The children were organized into two groups of three and collaborated with one another as they composed text in a literature-based writing workshop.

Bauer and colleagues (2017) qualitatively investigated the writing instruction in a dual- language immersion kindergarten classroom. Minoritized students (Spanish-speaking Latinx and

English-speaking African American children) were taught in both English and Spanish. The aim was for each group of students to learn the language and literacy of the other group. The researchers focused on one set of “buddy pairs” (p. 10), a boy of Mexican descent, and an

African American girl who worked together throughout the year. Their teacher supported them by giving them opportunities to talk during morning messages, read-alouds, and writing activities as part of a writing workshop. The researchers aimed to discover how the children’s peer interactions shaped their writing within this unique context.

In a cross-case analysis (Stake, 1995), Zapata and Laman (2016) explored how elementary school teachers with varying linguistic backgrounds supported young EL children’s writing development using translanguaging instructional strategies within a writing workshop.

García (2009) explains a translanguaging perspective views language as dynamic because it changes as it is used for a variety of purposes, and language users are continually drawing upon their knowledge of the language and its use within cultural groups to communicate with other members of those cultural groups. One English-speaking teacher in an English-dominant, second-grade, multilingual classroom found ways to incorporate the students’ native languages and cultures into her writing instruction. Children took photographs at home then authored

poems about their photographs, including words from both languages. Parents visited and read

books aloud in their native languages, performed cooking demonstrations, shared foods from

their cultures, located their home countries on a map, and showed pictures of holiday

celebrations. One parent wrote in Japanese alongside her child (Zapata & Laman, 2016).

Finally, Machado and Hartman (2019, 2020) studied the composing practices of a group

of 44 multilingual students (Urdu, Amharic, Chinese, Yoruba, and Tibetan were represented) in

Hartman’s second-grade classes (two groups daily). The teacher designed a poetry unit for the

writing workshop to promote translanguaging writing practices. However, most children had received no formal instruction in their native languages. The teacher replaced recommended texts with examples of bilingual poetry, and he taught a series of mini-lessons in which he

showed how code-meshing could be used as a literary device. He encouraged children to use any

word they knew, no matter the language.

Although not in a writing workshop per se, Axelrod and Cole (2018) investigated the

translanguaging practices in a Heritage Language program, with kindergarten through fifth-grade

Spanish-speaking EL children who met twice weekly for 45 minutes before school. A group of

eight bilingual undergraduate students supported the researcher-led activities, such as creating

multi-media presentations about El día del niño (Children’s Day), writing letters and captions for

photographs to send to pen pals in Oaxaca, and interpreting school newsletters from English to

Spanish.

Kennedy (2006) conducted a case study to investigate how five first-graders from diverse

linguistic backgrounds developed as writers in one monolingual classroom. Also, the researcher

explored how the children’s identities as multi-lingual learners formed over one academic year.

Due to declining standardized test scores, the district implemented a new balanced literacy

curriculum that integrated reading, writing, and oral language skills instruction in a literacy-rich environment (Sulzby & Teal, 1991). Mid-year, the children were not making progress in their writing with the balanced literacy approach alone, so the researcher began providing individualized instruction in writing, in which she asked the children to “speak onto the page”

(Elbow, 1995). With this technique, students free-wrote in a natural voice and in whatever language they felt comfortable.

Another perspective of asset-based pedagogies is multiliteracies (New London Group,

1996). The term expands the definition of literacy from reading and writing to include “the complex range of multimodal practices required to comprehend, manage, create, and communicate knowledge in our technologically sophisticated, multilingual, culturally diverse, globalized societies” (Taylor et al., 2008). Multiliteracy pedagogies are designed to legitimize all modes of meaning-making (e.g., speech, print, artwork, technology-based). They are intended to make space for children from every cultural and linguistic background to engage in a range of meaning-making modes so they can communicate within and across communities.

Taylor and colleagues (2008) conducted a qualitative investigation of a kindergarten classroom in Toronto with 27 children, all of whom spoke minority languages at home (e.g.,

Tamil, Urdu, Punjabi, Gujarati, Hindi, Cantonese) and a bilingual teacher (English-Farsi), who was an Iranian-Canadian. The school was made up of an exceptionally culturally and linguistically diverse population, so the teachers took an approach to writing instruction they called “linguistically inclusive pedagogy” (p. 278) as part of a national project entitled “From

Literacy to Multiliteracies” (p. 269). With support from their families and teachers, the children authored Dual-Language, Multimodal Identity Texts (Cummins, 2004), including illustrations, photographs, and texts in two languages that told personal stories.

Student Practices: Asset-Based Pedagogies. Researchers observed the ways young EL children moved between and among languages. Gort (2006) observed the young Spanish- and

English-speaking ELs’ composing practices in a dual-language writing workshop and examined their writing products. The researcher proposed the term interliteracy to describe how Spanish- and English-dominant bilingual first graders moved between languages when given a choice of language, a phenomenon observed by other researchers as well (Axelrod & Cole, 2018; Bauer et al., 2017; Kennedy, 2006; Manyak, 2002; Machado & Hartman, 2019, 2020; Ranker, 2009;

Taylor et al., 2008; Zapata & Laman, 2016). Researchers found that young EL children’s language choices were situational based on the topic and their intended audience (Axelrod &

Cole, 2018; Bauer et al., 2017; Kennedy, 2006; Manyak, 2002; Zapata & Laman, 2016). When asked to “speak onto the page,” they wrote with a natural voice (Kennedy, 2006). Manyak (2002) noted that young EL children and their teachers used Spanish to make the instruction comprehensible. Machado and Hartman (2019, 2020) likened how young EL children interacted with their new language to young monolingual children’s emergent literacy.

The young EL children in Gort’s (2006) study composed mostly monolingual texts.

When they substituted a word from the other language (i.e., lexical codeswitching), it was usually an English word within a Spanish text. Spanish-dominant children codeswitched when writing in English and Spanish, but English-dominant children only codeswitched when writing in Spanish. When encoding home language texts, researchers observed children using English graphemes, which they had been formally taught, to represent phonemes from their home languages (Axelrod & Cole, 2018; Gort, 2006; Kennedy, 2006; Machado & Hartman, 2019,

2020; Ranker, 2009). Gort (2006) documented interliteracy in skills related to encoding, spelling, monitoring, punctuation, capitalization, editing, and revising.

Researchers also observed young EL children using various strategies, resources, and

tools to help them write. In Ranker’s (2009) study of six young EL children’s hybrid literacy

practices, the researcher found that the students implemented three types of hybrid composing

practices, which allowed them to appropriate (Wertsch, 2009) the tools their teacher offered.

Direct composing practices occurred when the children used a tool immediately following the lesson in which it was presented. For example, one girl wrote a story about what she and her mother did on each day of the week in the same manner as the model text her teacher read to the class. Using diffuse composing practices, children used a tool that had been offered by the teacher during previous lessons. For example, a group of three girls wrote a collaborative story

that did not employ the tool offered on that day, but they did use a previous day’s tool of

“stretching out the word and writing what you hear” (p. 413). Finally, children used indirect

composing practices when they utilized the teacher-offered tools in unexpected ways or applied

it to a broader theme. One day, the teacher taught how a good story has a problem and a solution.

Three boys took the opportunity to write a story about a baseball game. They were superheroes,

an unexpected application of a previous genre study of comic books and had a conversation

about racial identities and social status surrounding one of the story’s characters.

Researchers observed how children used their peers as a resource as they collaborated

with each other by translating words, orally rehearsing texts together, and reading their texts

aloud. By drawing on each partner’s strengths, children could accomplish the explicit

instructions and the teacher’s intent for their writing assignments (Bauer et al., 2017). Young EL

children used books, existing texts, and environmental print, sometimes without prompting

(Machado & Hartman, 2019, 2020; Ranker, 2009) as resources for their writing. They

appropriated academic vocabulary modeled by their teachers (Zapata & Laman, 2016). They also

drew upon existing knowledge learned at home, on the playground, or as part of their culture or

religion (Axelrod & Cole, 2018; Kennedy, 2006; Machado & Hartman, 2019, 2020; Manyak,

2002; Taylor et al., 2008; Zapata & Laman, 2016).

Finally, researchers observed how asset-based pedagogies influenced young EL children

socially and emotionally as they constructed identities as bilingual and bi-literate agents. Young

EL children seemed to show a sense of pride, autonomy, and power as they engaged in asset- based practices. Bilingualism became an admired and desired skill that bilingual children showed off, and monolingual children revered (Bauer et al., 2017; Machado & Hartman, 2019, 2020;

Manyak, 2002; Taylor et al., 2008; Zapata & Laman, 2016). In fact, Zapata and Laman (2016) found that monolingual children were just as engaged in a demonstration given in a foreign language as young EL children. They demonstrated this by listening for cognates, asking questions throughout the presentations, and inviting the guests to return. Machado and Hartman

(2020) observed young EL children using poetry to express profound emotions, assert agency, and enact resistance in their writing. Remarkably, they expressed opposition to the anglicization and mispronunciation of their names. Although, in one case, a young EL child seemed to reinforce the existing dominant English discourse by expressing a desire for a more typical

American name.

Teacher Rationales: Asset-Based Pedagogies. Researchers who studied asset-based pedagogies reported a variety of rationales teachers gave for their instructional choices. Teachers believed that asset-based approaches were the best way to balance teaching young EL children the necessary skills and knowledge about writing and using them to express ideas (Bauer et al.,

2017; Zapata & Laman, 2016). When they focused on writing processes, teachers believed children’s mastery of print conventions would follow (Gort, 2006; Machado & Hartman, 2019,

2020). They believed in the value of using young EL children’s home languages as a resource to

support literacy development in English (Axelrod & Cole, 2018; Machado & Hartman, 2019,

2020; Manyak, 2002; Ranker, 2009). Also, explicitly showing children the similarities between

their two languages was an essential step in the process (Bauer et al., 2017). Teachers believed

that children should be exposed to writing early (Gort, 2006; Taylor et al., 2008). One teacher

expressed her hope that young EL children would learn not only to write across languages but to

make intentional decisions about when to do so (Zapata & Laman, 2016).

Teachers also believed that asset-based approaches were useful to motivate children to

write (Axelrod & Cole, 2018; Bauer et al., 2017), and used both languages strategically to reach

as many children as possible at any given time (Manyak, 2002). Teachers recognized children as

agentive users of language and hoped to invite children’s worlds (e.g., play, homes, families,

cultures) into their writing (Machado & Hartman, 2019, 2020; Taylor et al., 2008; Zapata &

Laman, 2016).

Some teachers said they used asset-based pedagogies for social, cultural, or political

purposes, especially in response to state-enacted English-only policies in schools. Teachers opposed restrictive language policies because the policies marginalized children who spoke a language other than English at home. They expressed concern about the message these policies sent to children about their home cultures and languages (Manyak, 2002; Ranker, 2009; Zapata

& Laman, 2016). One teacher said she felt limited by the policy in her school (Ranker, 2009).

Two teachers expressed their desires to bridge the cultural divides in the communities and schools, particularly between the African American English-speaking students and the Latinx

Spanish-speaking students (Bauer et al., 2017; Manyak, 2002), and the English-only policies served to widen the divide (Manyak, 2002). Finally, teachers and teacher-researchers were

interested in exploring culturally sustaining pedagogies (Axelrod & Cole, 2018; Machado &

Hartman, 2019, 2020; Taylor et al., 2008) and cultivate linguistic diversity in the classroom

(Machado & Hartman, 2019, 2020).

Writing Outcomes: Asset-Based Pedagogies. Without exception, the researchers found

that incorporating home cultural and linguistic resources into the school curriculum and making

space for a variety of languages and meaning-making modes could be helpful in not only producing English text but in helping children make sense of their two (or more) languages and cultures (Axelrod & Cole, 2018; Bauer et al., 2017; Gort 2006; Kennedy, 2006; Machado &

Hartman, 2019, 2020; Manyak, 2002; Ranker, 2009; Taylor et al., 2008; Zapata & Laman, 2016).

The children who were learning English began to integrate words from their home languages into their writing, write bilingual texts, and write about their experiences before coming to the United

States (Zapata & Laman, 2016). Consequently, these asset-based pedagogies seemed to support

young EL children’s developing identities as they came to understand their own unique experiences (Gort, 2006; Kennedy, 2006; Machado & Hartman 2019, 2020; Manyak, 2002;

Ranker, 2009; Zapata & Laman, 2016). The instruction also mitigated the loss of children’s heritage languages (Taylor et al., 2008; Zapata & Laman, 2016). Inviting family members to act as experts provided them with a platform to teach their children cultural values. Together with the school, they created complex “intergenerational literacies and transnational communities of practice” (Taylor et al., 2008, p. 288) that benefited the children’s literacy learning (Taylor et al.,

2008; Zapata & Laman, 2016).

Bauer and colleagues (2017) found that both students in the bilingual buddy-pairs

benefited from one another in ways that would not have been possible without the buddy-pair experiences. They expanded their linguistic repertoires, metalinguistic awareness, and

appreciation for Spanish, the minority language. The researchers also concluded that teachers whose classrooms were linguistically diverse could help all students access their full linguistic and multimodal repertoires. They could also help children develop their creative processes that accessed their full linguistic repertoires and incorporated experiences from their daily lives

(Zapata & Laman, 2016). Doing so may position young EL children to have greater access to the larger communities to which they belong, or will belong in the future, by preparing them to communicate in multiple ways and negotiate meaning across a range of cultural groups (Taylor et al., 2008; Zapata & Laman, 2016).

Manyak (2002) asserted that hybrid practices in a first- and second-grade classroom with a mix of Spanish-speaking Latinx children and English-speaking African American children allowed them to develop awareness about written language and how it works. Hybrid practices also contributed to increased motivation and participation, promoted collaboration across languages (a socially significant finding in a broader community fraught with racial tensions between Latinx and African American people), and contributed to children’s competent reading and writing identities. Furthermore, bilingualism was viewed as a highly valued academic asset by both students and teachers. Manyak (2002) asserted that biliteracy should be the goal for bilingual children. Findings suggested that young EL children can integrate teacher-offered tools with their own composing purposes and apply the integrated tools in various and unexpected ways (Manyak, 2002; Ranker, 2009; Machado & Hartman, 2019, 2020).

In addition to a range of metalinguistic and social advantages, language development was evidenced by test scores. Manyak (2002) reported the average class score on the Stanford

Achievement Test, Ninth Edition (SAT-9; Psychological Corporation, 1996), was in the 63rd percentile. Six of the nine first-grade Spanish speakers who took the test scored above the

national median on English reading. By the end of the year, students’ composition scores had been raised dramatically. Kennedy (2006) reported that all young EL children in her study progressed by one to three composition levels. The researcher suggested finding ways to honor students’ home languages and using instructional approaches that supported the children’s use of their natural voices and vocabulary from their L1s.

Summary of Theoretical Framework and Literature Review

Situated Learning (Lave & Wegner, 1991) is a sociocultural learning theory that provides a fitting framework for this research. The theory conceptualizes learning as progressive levels of participation within communities of practice, which often begins with legitimate peripheral participation. As newcomers to the community engage with old-timers in the community’s practices, they gradually adopt new identities as fully participating, community members. A

Sociocultural Theory of Writing (Prior, 2006) applies sociocultural theory principles to writing and the writing process. The theory draws upon the Bakhtinian concept of dialogic relationships to emphasize the continuous socio-historical interactions writers have with past cultural contributors and future consumers of their work. Prior (2006) emphasizes the critical role teachers play as they engage in dialogic relationships with their students through instruction and classroom practices. Dyson’s (2002) sociocultural perspectives on the writing development of young children explain the dynamic, non-linear ways in which children gain necessary skills by interacting in social activities meaningful to them.

I investigated how and why teachers provided writing instruction for young EL children, how the children participated in that instruction, and how they appropriated it in their independent writing. I relied on the tenets of Situated Learning (Lave & Wenger, 1991), a

Sociocultural Theory of Writing (Prior, 2006), and sociocultural perspectives of writing

development (Dyson, 2002) to conceptualize how the community members (teachers and

students) participated in the classroom community’s literacy practices. I sought to understand

how the community practices and dialogic relationships supported young EL children’s efforts to

become fully participating members of a broader community of writers.

By examining the body of literature, I was able to identify a wide array of curricula,

instructional approaches, and classroom practices as supportive of young EL children’s writing

development. A common thread woven through the research was the critical role teachers played

in children’s learning. In many cases, teachers adapted curricula to align with their views and

beliefs about what was best for their students’ situations (Falchi et al., 2014; Machado &

Hartman, 2020; Manyak, 2001; Soltero-Gonzalez, 2009). They also used their knowledge of

children’s backgrounds and abilities to recognize and capitalize on teachable moments (Araujo,

2002; Flynn, 2009; Manyak, 2001), and they developed their own classroom practices to provide

the most supportive experiences for young EL children as they learned to write (Axelrod & Cole,

2018; Bauer et al., 2017; Durán, 2017, 2018).

It stands to reason, and it has been well documented, that teacher practices are influenced heavily by their views and beliefs about how children learn best (Hopkins, 2016; Lowrance-

Faulhaber & Williams, 2019; Schmid, 2018). However, although some researchers reported

teachers’ beliefs influencing classroom practices, few studies explored in-depth how teachers’

beliefs were manifested in the moment-by-moment instructional interplay with their students.

My aim was to fill this gap in the literature by exploring the complexities of how two teachers made instructional decisions for their young EL students, how those decisions were manifested in their teaching, how two focal students responded to the instruction, and how relationships among the players may have influenced student writing outcome.

Chapter 3: Methodology

Study Purpose

1. How did two first-grade students and teachers interact in the context of classroom

literacy practices?

2. Why did the teachers make the instructional choices they made as they taught the

young EL children to write in English?

3. How did the two focal students demonstrate their writing processes and products, and

how might the teacher-student dialogic relationships have influenced those outcomes?

Study Design

For this study, I used a multiple-case research design (Yin, 2014). The case study design is often used in social science research, particularly educational research, because it has the potential to help researchers “understand complex social phenomena” (Yin, 2014, p. 4) by attempting to answer questions about how or why those phenomena occur. Yin (2014) explains that case study designs are ideal for investigating contemporary issues within real-world contexts. Learning to write is indeed a complex social process (Vygotsky, 1987), and learning to write in an L2 confounds the process even more (Dworin, 2003). Furthermore, by exploring events that occurred within the natural setting of two contemporary first-grade classrooms, I gained a deep understanding of the subtleties and nuances involved in the participants’ experiences surrounding writing and writing instruction. Thus, a case study design was ideal for the topic I investigated.

Multiple-case study designs rely on replication logic to compare two or more similar or

dissimilar cases in which the same phenomenon is occurring, with the aim of gaining a deeper

understanding of the phenomenon (Yin, 2014). A case is a bounded system in which the

researcher identifies and defines the parameters of the study, including participants, locations,

timeframes, and processes to be explored (Harrison et al., 2017) with the aim of focusing the

data collection and analysis on an express object of study. In this study, the two bounded cases I

investigated were the communities of writers situated in two first-grade classrooms at the same

school. The specific objects of study, or units of analysis, were the dialogic relationships of the

two teachers and each of their focal students (one in each class). I explored what influenced the instruction, how the instruction was executed, how the students responded, and the outcomes that might have been attributable to the dialogic relationships.

Although the units of analysis in this study were the dialogic relationships between

teachers and their students, to accomplish the study aims, I looked beyond the direct dialogue

that occurred between the teachers and students. I also considered the indirect or implied

messages that occurred between them as a result of the community context and practices, which

were influenced by the teachers’ motivations. As such, my goal was to understand the

perspectives influencing the teachers’ instructional decision-making concerning the focal

students and how the students used those instructional transactions to mediate their independent

writing. The study design and procedures described in the following sections were approved by

the university’s Internal Review Board (IRB#: 2018-4499).

Recruiting Participants and Obtaining Consent

I used a process of purposeful selection (Maxwell, 2013) to identify the setting and participants for this study. I intentionally chose a school, teachers, children, and activities to

observe, which would most effectively address my research questions. What follows is an explanation of the process I undertook to locate a setting and recruit study participants.

Inclusion Criteria

I sought to find a school district serving young EL children, which included early

childhood classrooms (either kindergarten or first grade) in which the teachers a) had at least

three years' experience teaching young EL children, b) used the same general literacy

curriculum, and c) could provide periods of writing practice so that I could observe the children’s writing processes.

Once the school was confirmed, I looked for focal students who met the necessary inclusion criteria. The identified students would a) be in kindergarten or first grade, b) speak a primary or home language other than English, and c) “require language assistance to effectively participate in instruction,” according to the state’s definition of EL (ODE, n.d.). Because young

ELs come from diverse cultures, language backgrounds, countries of origin, immigration

experiences, and educational backgrounds (Wagner, 2016), I considered these characteristics

when selecting focal students; however, because this was an exploratory, qualitative study, the

inclusion criteria remained flexible regarding these various particulars. I purposefully looked for focal students who demonstrated varying levels of English proficiency, hoping to capture a range of possibilities that may occur as teachers and students engage in writing instruction and practice.

Recruitment and Consent Procedures

To recruit participants, I networked with educational professionals in the area to locate a school with teachers and students who met the inclusion criteria and were willing to participate in the study. Once I identified a school, I met with the principal and school psychologist (the

principal’s designated liaison for the project) to provide general information about the study,

gain the principal’s permission to conduct the study, and collaborate with them to identify

teacher and student participants. I then observed four of the five first-grade classrooms in the school (all had expressed interest in participating) on two separate occasions, and I chose two classrooms, which met the inclusion criteria and where I deemed my presence would be least disruptive to the classroom milieu. One was co-taught due to an unusually large class size, and

adding an additional venture to the lively pace might have either placed an undue burden on the

teachers, interfered with the children’s learning, or both. In another classroom, the teacher would

be going on maternity leave before the end of the data collection period.

After I had identified the classrooms and teachers, Ms. Hawkins and Ms. Maddox (all

participant names are pseudonyms), I met with them together to provide a Teacher Information

Letter, explaining the study procedures, and a Teacher Consent Form. I explained both

documents section by section, and I answered the teachers’ questions and addressed their

concerns. I obtained a signed consent form from the teachers and gave both teachers a copy for

their reference.

After Ms. Hawkins and Ms. Maddox had consented to participate, I worked with them

and with the school psychologist to identify students who met the inclusion criteria and whose

parents would most likely allow their children to participate in the study. The school served a

population of new immigrants, some of whom had a general mistrust of outsiders, according to

school personnel. The teachers and school psychologist identified families whom they frequently

saw at school for events, parent-teacher conferences, and drop-off and pick-up, and with whom

they believed they had developed relationships of trust. Furthermore, the teachers each taught a

literacy block in the morning with leveled-reading groups and writing instruction in the

afternoon with their homeroom classes. Because my units of analysis were teacher-student

dialogic relationships, to adequately address the research questions I posed, I asked the teachers

to identify students from their homerooms who remained with them when their classes switched

for the literacy block. Ideally, they would also recommend students whose performance was

representative of the reading levels to which they were assigned. Ms. Hawkins suggested Mario,

and Ms. Maddox suggested Rudy as student-participants for the study. Both boys met the prescribed inclusion criteria.

When Mario and Rudy had been identified as possible participants, I sought consent from their parents and assent from the children themselves, with the help of the school psychologist and assisted by a Spanish translator. The school psychologist and translator called both boys’ mothers and invited them to come to the school for brief meetings to discuss the project. The school psychologist, the translator, and I met with each mother individually to provide an information letter about the study procedures and a parent permission form, both translated into

Spanish. With an introduction from the school psychologist, to assuage any feelings of mistrust of outsiders the mothers may have held, and the help of the translator, I explained the forms section by section, answered their questions, and resolved any concerns the boys’ mothers had about the study. The mothers were informed that their children’s participation was not required and that nonparticipation would not affect their children’s grades or relationships with their teachers or the researcher. The school psychologist restated this point to help mitigate any feelings of coercion. I explained that as a token of appreciation when the data collection was concluded, each family would receive a $25 gift card to a nearby pizza restaurant.

Once the mothers consented to the study, the school psychologist sent for the children to join the meeting. They were both somewhat familiar with me because I had observed in their

classrooms, but their mothers, the school psychologist, and the translator stayed in the room as I

explained the study to each child. As members of a vulnerable population, it was important that

the children felt comfortable in the meeting with adults they knew and trusted to avoid potential

feelings of coercion and to help me establish a trusting relationship. Using a child assent form as

a guide, and with the help of the translator, to ensure the children understood, I sought and

obtained both boys’ verbal assent to participate in the study. I assured them, and the other adults

in the room restated, they could decline at that time or any time during the course of the study by

simply saying, “no,” or by telling their parent, their teacher, or me they wanted to stop. The boys

were informed that nonparticipation would not affect their grades or relationships with their

teachers or the researcher. After each child gave verbal assent indicating they were willing to

participate in the study, and I had signed the assent form, I informed them of the gift card they

would receive, about which I had previously informed their mothers. I waited until after the

children gave their verbal assent to inform them of this to avoid any potential feelings of

coercion.

Setting

The study took place in two mainstream, first-grade classrooms located within an

elementary school in a Midwestern suburb, which served young EL children. According to the state’s school report card, the school’s population was made up of children who were 72.4%

Hispanic; 15.9% Black, Non-Hispanic; 8.1% White, Non-Hispanic; and 2.4% Multiracial.

Furthermore, 51.4% of the children in the school were ELs, and 92.3% of the school’s children

came from families who were considered economically disadvantaged. The language of

instruction was English, and the school used an inclusion model of English instruction, wherein

children who were ELs attended class with their native English-speaking peers, and a team of

ESL specialists provided support.

English Learner Identification and Intervention

Three ESL specialists, one of whom was bilingual, and one bilingual paraprofessional

comprised the ESL team. They screened the children upon entering kindergarten (Fall 2017) to

identify those who were young ELs using the IDEA (Individualized Development of English

Activities) Proficiency Test (IPT; “IPT and OTELA Judgment-Based Alignment,” 2011). Then, in the spring of each year thereafter, to monitor progress, all children who were ELs took the

Ohio English Language Proficiency Assessment (OELPA; ODE, 2018), given in an online testing format and assessing proficiency in the four language skills (i.e., domains): reading, writing, listening, and speaking.

After taking the OELPA (ODE, 2018), the children earned scores in each language skill, which were expressed as Level 1-beginning, Level 2-early intermediate, Level 3-intermediate,

Level 4-early advanced, and Level 5-advanced; based on their scores, children were classified as emerging, progressing, or proficient. Children who were considered emerging scored a combination of Level1s and 2s and children who were considered proficient scored a combination of Level 4s and 5s. If children earned any combination of scores that did not meet the criteria for emerging or proficient, they were considered progressing. (The OELPA

Achievement Level Descriptors [ALDs] for all four language domains for first grade can be found in Appendix A.) When children earned a composite score of Level 3, they moved to a

“monitoring only” status in the ESL program, and once they received a composite score of level

4 or 5, they exited the ESL program and were considered “mainstream.” In the spring of 2017, when Mario and Rudy were completing kindergarten, 57 kindergarten children in their school took the OELPA (ODE, 2018). Of those children, 16 earned a composite score of Level1, and 41

earned a composite score of Level 2. No kindergarteners scored higher than a level 2 that year.

The OELPA (ODE, 2018) scores were used to help develop interventions for the children in the ESL program. In addition, the ESL team used information from the Measures of

Academic Progress (MAP) test (Northwest Evaluation Association, 2020) and the AIMSweb

(Pearson, n.d.) to inform decisions about language interventions for children who were ELs.

They met in the fall of each year with their entire intervention team (e.g., curriculum coach, school psychologist, speech therapist, special education intervention specialist) to determine the best interventions for each child. Then, they worked closely with the classroom teachers to communicate each child’s needed areas of growth, and the classroom teachers focused on those areas in class. Moreover, the last 45 minutes of each day was spent in “intervention.” During this time, all first graders separated into small groups of about six to eight children, led by a teacher or paraprofessional, to receive extra instruction or practice time in those areas of language the intervention team had identified as opportunities for growth.

Participants

Teacher-Participants

Both first-grade teachers who participated in the study had significant teaching experience in early childhood classrooms with young ELs. They both had received training in

Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol (SIOP; Echevarria et al., 2017) training, which was provided by the school as professional development. SIOP instructional features include:

 linking instruction to standards, language objectives, and content objectives;

 linking instruction to student background experiences and prior learning;

 using language or visuals children who are ELs understand without lessening content

or achievement expectations;

 teaching explicit learning strategies;

 providing frequent opportunities for social interaction;

 allowing time to practice newly taught language and content skills;

 providing abundant (90-100% of the time) learning activities that support objectives,

engage students, and maintain a pace appropriate for the students’ language abilities;

and

 using continuous and interactive assessments by observing student performance

systematically

In addition to SIOP training, the county’s Education Service Center provided an ESL specialist who made frequent visits to the school to observe classrooms, make presentations, and keep the teachers informed about the latest research in the education of young EL children.

According to Ms. Hawkins, their school had the highest population of ELs in the district, and as

such, they had been well prepared to accommodate, assess, and otherwise serve the children at

their school (December 7, 2018).

Ms. Hawkins. Ms. Hawkins was well educated and highly experienced teaching young

EL children. She earned a bachelor’s degree in early childhood education; then, she went directly

to graduate school to earn a master’s degree in the same area of study. She began teaching in the

school where the study was conducted. Ms. Hawkins taught two years of preschool, two years of

kindergarten, and was teaching first grade for the eighth consecutive year at the time of the

study. In all, she had taught for 12 years in the same school.

Ms. Hawkins’ native language was English, and although she had studied French in high

school and college and had completed online Spanish lessons offered by the district, she did not

consider herself a speaker of any language other than English. However, Ms. Hawkins did report

that she knew basic Spanish vocabulary, like colors and numbers, and had picked up the language from the children in her classes over the years. She also said that when she spoke with parents, she understood much of what they said, but she was unable to speak Spanish well enough to communicate with them, so she relied on translators.

Ms. Hawkins generally embraced the theory of multiple intelligences (Gardner, 1983), according to her understanding. She said, “I think [the children] all have a way that they learn best, so I think you just have to find what works for that child” (December 7, 2018). Thus, in a class with 27 children, like Ms. Hawkins’ homeroom, she tried to bring the same information multiple times in multiple ways with the goal of reaching all the children. She viewed a low level of English proficiency as just one of many traits that children brought with them to school, and she tried to address it in the same way she addressed all individual learning needs. She had observed that children who had someone at home talking to them, reading to them, and helping them with their homework tended to be those who were most successful in school, regardless of the language being used at home. Children who were native English speakers but had fewer out of school experiences and less support from adults at home were generally placed in the lower reading groups. Ms. Hawkins also understood that the young EL children in her classroom had different experiences from each other related to factors such as time in the U.S., time in school

(regardless of which country), and whether the children had older or younger siblings.

Consequently, she tried to make sure each child received what he or she needed to be successful at school.

Ms. Maddox. Ms. Maddox was also well educated and highly experienced teaching young EL children. She earned a bachelor’s degree in child development and had taught preschool at another location for two years. She taught two more years of preschool at the school

where the study was conducted, then Ms. Maddox earned her k-8 teaching license and began teaching first grade. At the time the study was conducted, she was in her 18th year as a first-grade teacher and her 24th year in teaching overall. Ms. Maddox earned a master’s degree in reading four years before the study was conducted.

Ms. Maddox’s native language was English, and she studied Spanish in high school and college; though, she did not consider herself fluent in Spanish. To describe her level of proficiency, she said, “I know enough words that, within context…if, the child does not have a lot of English, I can understand what they’re saying. And if a parent comes in and asks questions,

I can sometimes figure out what they’re saying.” Then she added with a smile, “I do not speak

Spanish well.” (December 6, 2018).

Ms. Maddox believed in “hands-on” learning and believed in providing experiences through which the children could explore and solve problems on their own. She tried to provide learning experiences that were challenging enough to stretch children’s current abilities, but not so far beyond their abilities that they could not be successful. Ms. Maddox described teaching as finding “that real fine line between verve and rigor, and frustration.” She acknowledged that the line was different for each child in the class, and she paid attention to children’s work as well as their body language and facial expressions to know how far to push them. Ms. Maddox tried to accommodate instruction based on her continuous observation and assessment of each child’s abilities. She reported that, based on her observations, most of the young ELs in her class were more adept with the social language needed to navigate the school day than with academic language, so she tried to bring more academic language to her instruction. Ms. Maddox also believed that the SIOP teaching strategies in which she had been trained were good instructional strategies for all young learners. For example, using picture cues or visuals to teach vocabulary

or communicate meaning is a strategy she had also been taught to use with English speakers.

Furthermore, young EL children had different levels of proficiency, so she viewed differentiation

as something she did for individual learners, not necessarily the young EL children as a group.

Student-Participants

As previously described, I consulted with the school psychologist and the teacher-

participants to identify one student-participant in each classroom who met the inclusion criteria

as the focal students for the study. They proposed Mario and Rudy, both first-grade boys, who

had entered the school as kindergarteners the previous year, neither of whom had attended

preschool. Both boys were of Guatemalan descent, and they were both identified as young EL children; therefore, they received ESL services.

Mario. Mario, who was in Ms. Hawkins’ homeroom and reading group, was born in

Guatemala as was his one older sister, whom Ms. Hawkins had taught in a previous year. He also had a younger brother, born in the U.S., after the family immigrated. Mario’s exact age at the time he came to the U.S. was unknown to the school personnel, but they were fairly certain, based on patterns they had observed with other immigrant children, his introduction to school,

and formal English instruction occurred when he had entered kindergarten the previous year.

However, Mario may have had some exposure to English before he started school because his

older sister was learning English at school and consistently completed her homework. Ms.

Hawkins recalled that when she taught Mario’s sister, her parents were as involved and

supportive of her learning (e.g., reading, talking, encouraging homework) as they were with

Mario. Mario spoke Spanish with his mother and a Guatemalan dialect with his father. Mario

was placed in the highest of five leveled-reading groups, based on formal assessment scores given by the school curriculum coach in May of his kindergarten year. This assessment was part

of the school’s adopted reading program, Success for All (SFA; Madden et al., 1991), the

particulars of which I will describe in a later section. Moreover, on the OELPA (ODE, 2018) out

of 5 possible points, Mario scored a 3 in listening, a 3 in reading, a 3 in speaking, and a 2 in

writing. He earned an overall composite of “progressing,” which indicated to the school he

“needed language assistance to effectively participate in instruction” (ODE, 2018). Ms. Hawkins reported that he was a “middle to low” performer in the highest leveled-reading group with good foundational skills. She acknowledged that the language of instruction was an obstacle, but he worked to overcome the obstacle and “accomplish[ed] what he need[ed] to accomplish, and he score[d] well” (December 7, 2018). Ms. Hawkins said he was not a child she would typically go to for help translating for a child who was brand new and had very little English, but he was able to understand and communicate for himself. She said Mario did not speak much, but when he did, she understood him, and she often read his facial expressions to check for understanding in class or when she spoke to him. She said,

He’s one of those kids—I think he surprises you when you work one-on-one with him.

He’s just so quiet, you don’t realize how smart he is, or you don’t realize what kind of a learner he is because he’s not really volunteering. He’s not, you know, flashing out that, “Oh! I can do this,” or whatever…Yeah, Mario has some really great skills (December 7, 2018).

Ms. Hawkins also described Mario as a loner. She had not observed him developing any close friendships with other children in the class, but it did not seem to her that he minded. He worked well in partnerships and sat at a table with “two girls that [were] rather chatty,” but he generally stayed focused on his own work and ignored distractions. Mario never needed to be disciplined, he stayed away from other children with whom he could potentially get in trouble, and other children had never “tattled on him.” According to Ms. Hawkins, he was helpful, he

liked things to be in order, and he was very honest. “He just does his own thing,” she said. “He’s

just a lone wolf, and he’s happy that way” (December 7, 2018).

Rudy. The school personnel had less information to share about Rudy’s family and background. He had been born in the U.S. after his family immigrated from Guatemala, in a different city than the one where they lived at the time of the study. The school personnel confirmed that Rudy’s family had immigrated but were unable to identify exactly when. They

knew he had older siblings within the district, but none of the siblings had attended the school, so

the school personnel did not know many details about them. On a few occasions, during my

observations, Rudy mentioned a brother who went to another school, but he did not know how

old his brother was, nor in which grade. Spanish was the primary language spoken at home, and

there was no Guatemalan dialect in his family's languages. Rudy reported his mother knew a

little English, and she sometimes read him English-language books. He said he only wrote at school, but when pressed, Rudy said he wrote letters to friends who lived far away, and he had made a list of things he would like for Christmas during the recent holiday season.

Rudy was placed in Ms. Maddox’s middle leveled-reading group (the third-highest of

five) based on his SFA (Madden et al., 1991) test scores in the spring of his kindergarten year.

On the OELPA (ODE, 2018), also given in the spring of his kindergarten year, he had scored a 2

in listening, a 2 in reading, a 3 in speaking, and a 2 in writing, which gave him an overall

composite of “progressing” and qualified him for ESL services. Ms. Maddox described Rudy as

a “middle of the road” learner. She said she had children who could identify 80 sight words and

children who could identify 120 sight words, and Rudy could identify 100. While he was not the

most fluent reader in the class, he was also not disfluent. Ms. Maddox described Rudy as a

“fairly strong reader,” but she also noted he had started the year as a better reader than he was a

writer. For example, he was able to decode and read the word “they,” but when he was asked to

write it, he would write only the initial “th” instead of writing the word phonetically, as in “tha.”

Ms. Maddox also described Rudy as a “safe writer.” He wrote sentences such as, “I like my

mom,” which were simple, so he had confidence in his ability to be successful. At the time of the

participant interview with Ms. Maddox (December 6, 2018), she reported that in the past few

weeks, something seemed to have “click[ed]” with Rudy. She noticed in his written work that he

was writing more complete thoughts and attempting to write more challenging sentences. Still,

Ms. Maddox felt that Rudy was a slightly stronger reader and a slightly weaker writer than other

children in her reading group.

Ms. Maddox described Rudy’s social position within the classroom as “just one of the

gang.” She said the other children did not clamor to be his partner, but no one was upset when

Rudy was assigned as a partner. He spent social time with the boys in her homeroom class who liked race cars, video games, dinosaurs, and dragons. Ms. Maddox assessed Rudy’s role in that group as a “mediator” because he seemed to have a calming influence on the other boys. When conflicts arose, he would say something like, “No. It’s OK. He’s got this. No. It’s OK.” He also noticed when a new student, who did not speak any English, needed help navigating the classroom procedures. Rudy helped the child with tasks like clipping his name to the behavior chart and telling him what was being served for breakfast and lunch. The girls in both Ms.

Maddox’s classes tended to dominate the social hierarchy, and Rudy responded by simply ignoring them. However, when the homeroom switched to reading groups, only five children remained with Ms. Maddox, and Rudy was the only boy. In that group, according to Ms.

Maddox, Rudy seemed to be quieter and shyer; he tended to be "…more passive with the girls”

(December 6, 2018).

Curriculum

The district had adopted SFA (Madden et al., 1991) as the literacy curriculum to be used

school-wide during the 90-minute morning literacy block. In addition, the first grade had about

30-45 minutes in the afternoon for writing instruction and practice. The teachers had more

freedom to choose how to use that time, but according to Ms. Hawkins, they were encouraged to

use a writing workshop approach based on the framework developed by the Teacher’s College

Reading and Writing Project (TCRWP) at Columbia University, and both teachers chose to do

so. To gain a deeper understanding of the teachers' instructional choices, I examined published

materials from the Success for All (Madden et al., 1991) curricular program and the TCRWP

Units of Study series (Calkins & Neville, 2003). What follows are basic descriptions of each of

these curricular programs.

Success for All (SFA)

Every morning, the first-grade children divided into leveled-reading groups and switched

teachers for 90-minute literacy blocks. The groups were created using the results of an SFA assessment the teachers referred to as the "Roots Test," given by the curriculum coach in May

2018, which was the end of the children's kindergarten year. The first grade used Reading Roots

(Slavin & Madden, 2010), an SFA program designed for early readers, including 48

comprehensive literacy lessons given across four increasingly challenging levels. Lessons were

comprised of “systematic phonics instruction, rich literacy experiences, oral-language and

vocabulary development, thematically focused writing instruction, and opportunities to read

decodable stories (p. v).” Because of the integrated nature of phonics, reading, and writing

instruction, I felt it necessary to investigate how the Reading Roots (Slavin & Madden, 2010)

curriculum had been designed, so I would understand the whole process by which the children’s

writing outcomes might occur.

Reading Roots lessons are designed to extend over three days; however, the first-grade

teachers at the school in which the study was conducted taught the lessons over four days as one

way to differentiate learning for the high population of young ELs in their classrooms. Each 90-

minute literacy block is divided into three parts: 1) FastTrack Phonics instruction (20-30 minutes, 2) the study of a Shared Story (30-35 minutes), and either 3) a read-aloud Story Telling and Retelling (STaR) story (20-30 minutes) or Adventures in Writing (30-40 minutes). Strategies to differentiate for ELs were also interspersed throughout each lesson. Finally, student progress is monitored using periodic assessment tools, data collection, and student progress tracking. (An annotated sample lesson plan can be found at http://www.successforall.org/wp-

content/uploads/2016/09/410558000_RR4_AnnotatedLesson31_Reduced.pdf.)

FastTrack Phonics. According to Slavin & Madden (2010), FastTrack Phonics

instruction begins each 90-minute literacy block and targets phonemic awareness. Daily,

previously introduced graphemes and their accompanying sounds are reviewed, a new grapheme

or grapheme combination is introduced, and the children practice writing graphemes, which

represent phonemes, which were both previously and newly introduced. The instructional arsenal

includes

 colorful picture cards to cue vocabulary words;

 “key cards,” which showed the upper- and lower-case graphemes and a picture of

something representing the grapheme’s sound;

 interactive videos, some of which featured “Alphie,” an animated alligator who

appears throughout the series;

 alliterative phrases and rhymes to cue letter sounds (e.g., Bb “The boy bats balls.”; -

ng: “Bring the king a ring.”);

 an alphabet chant with accompanying motions (e.g., “A is for apple [pretend to take a

bite of an apple], B is for bat and ball [pretend to hit a ball with a bat]; C is for

caterpillar climbing up the wall [move one finger in the shape of a ‘c’ then use two

hands to climb upwards]” [p. 365]);

 letter writing cues with accompanying picture cards (e.g., /b/ bat and ball: Down the

bat and right around the ball);

 and partner work (e.g., reading words and sentences from a Partner Practice Book

targeting new and reviewed sounds).

Shared Story. After FastTrack Phonics, the lessons move to the study of a Shared Story.

On the first day of instruction, the new story is introduced with a preview of decodable vocabulary words found in the story (i.e., green words) and high-frequency or irregularly spelled sight words (i.e., red words). In the higher levels, other more complex words, called challenge words, are also introduced. Video presentations and picture cards are available for each story to help with vocabulary instruction. First, the teacher reads the words, then the children read the words with a partner, and finally, the children read the words alone. The lesson then moves to a teacher-led discussion, which includes examining the title and cover art, making connections to background knowledge, discussing possible themes, and making predictions about the story. The first read-through of the story takes place in a large group. The children read the “student text”

(text in large font containing words the children may recognize or be able to decode) either chorally, taking turns, or with a partner; the teacher reads the “teacher text” (text in smaller font with more challenging words that provide context to the story) and asks questions to check for understanding as they read the story together. As the lessons progress, student text increases, and

teacher text decreases. On the second and third days, the students practice reading fluency and answer written comprehension questions with their partners. They may take turns reading a page or two of the stories aloud in class, and on the third day, the class reads the story in unison, and a story test is administered to check reading comprehension and vocabulary.

Story Telling and Retelling (STaR). On the first day of the lesson cycle, in the final 20-

30 minutes of the literacy block, the teacher reads a trade book included in the curriculum. This activity is meant to target oral language, vocabulary, and listening comprehension development.

The teacher begins by previewing the book, making connections to background knowledge or prior learning, and using pictorial or other clues to make predictions about the story. They review new vocabulary words (i.e., STaR words), then the teacher reads the story, and as she does so, she points out how the vocabulary words are used in context and leads the children in a discussion about the story. When she finishes the story, she asks the children to use the new vocabulary words in sentences they compose themselves, both orally and in writing. On the lesson cycle’s second day, the teacher reviews the story with the class, then reviews the structure of the story using a graphic organizer like a story star, a story map, or an idea tree to identify important parts of the text. Finally, the teacher engages the class in a retell activity (e.g., dramatization, guiding questions during a reread of the story, creating a graphic organizer) in which the children compose oral or written sentences to retell or critique the story.

Adventures in Writing. In the last 30-40 minutes of the literacy block on the third day of the lesson cycle, the teacher gives the students a writing prompt related to either the Shared

Story, the STaR story, or both. The teacher starts this portion of the lesson with a prewriting activity meant to clarify the instructions and brainstorm ideas. Then, the teacher models the assignment by composing sentences of her own and writing them using strategies from a Writing

Strategies Bank (e.g., draw a picture, write sounds you know, say-spell-say). The children discuss their assignment with a partner and orally plan their sentences together, then they are given time to write their sentences independently. At the end of the literacy block, they take time to share their writing with the class.

Strategies for ELs. Interspersed throughout the SFA lessons, icons are displayed in the left-hand margin to provide resources for the teacher to differentiate for students who may need language support. These strategies include a) pantomime, or acting something out; b) Total

Physical Response (TPR), a technique in which the learner demonstrates a word with a physical motion; c) realia, displaying actual objects to communicate meaning; d) displaying picture cards showing objects or actions; and e) pointing to words, concepts, or illustrations found in the book.

Student Progress Monitoring. Student progress is monitored systematically with assessments designed to measure growth and place students in the appropriate reading groups.

Assessments in phonemic awareness and expressive and receptive vocabulary are administered regularly by the classroom teacher, and scores are recorded in a database for reporting and statistical analysis on a school-wide level. Additionally, in the fall, winter, and spring of each year, the curriculum coach conducts formal assessments with each child in oral reading, reading comprehension, fluency, and high-frequency words. These are the scores used to determine placement in reading groups.

Writing Workshop

The workshop approach to writing instruction was created based on the foundational work of Murray (1984, 2004) and Graves (1985), and it was further developed by Calkins

(1994). In the TCRWP Units of Study series of reading and writing curriculum, specific procedures for a workshop approach to writing instruction are laid out as part of The Predictable

Five-Part Workshop Framework: 1) the minilesson (10 minutes), 2) independent writing practice called work time (35-45 minutes), 3) the teacher conferring with individuals or small groups, 4) mid-workshop teaching, and 5) sharing (Calkins & Neville, 2003).

The Minilesson. A writing workshop begins with a brief minilesson to last no more than ten minutes. A minilesson is explicit instruction, given by the teacher, of a single teaching point, which is a writing strategy of the teacher's choosing. The minilesson begins with a one-minute connection, during which the teacher points out how the new teaching point fits into the work they have been doing already or past experiences the children have had, and she names the teaching point. In the next three to five minutes, using a process called teaching, the teacher explains the steps involved in the strategy and models it, so the children see exactly how to use the strategy successfully. She then gives the children one to three minutes of active engagement, during which the children attempt the strategy on their own or with a partner. Finally, the teacher spends about one minute making a link from the new strategy they just learned to their ongoing work. She invites the children to use the new strategy in their individual writing, along with the other strategies they have already learned.

Work Time. After the teacher dismisses the children from the large group minilesson, the children scatter for work time. During this 35-45-minute period, the children practice writing about topics of their own choosing using the strategies they have been taught thus far. They each find a comfortable space in the room to write, and they continue to work on ongoing pieces or begin new ones. All children do not work on the same assignment; rather, they work at their own pace.

Conferring. As the children are writing, the teacher moves around the classroom and meets with individuals or small groups of four to six children to confer with them about their

work. In this portion of the five-part framework, the teacher has a chance to interact one-on-one with students, respond to their questions, and remind them of strategies they have at their disposal. If she finds several children who would benefit from the same teaching, she gathers them in a huddle, and she takes about a minute to model a strategy that has already been taught or to give them a helpful tip. Then, the children return to writing, and the teacher either stays to coach them or moves off to another student.

Mid-Workshop Teaching. If the teacher finds a teaching point from which the whole class would benefit, she interrupts the students’ writing to briefly (three to five minutes) give a mid-workshop teaching point. At this time, she reminds them of a strategy they have already been taught or of ongoing writing habits. She may offer a tip to help them execute a strategy in another way.

Share. In the last three to five minutes of the workshop, the teacher invites a few students to share their work with the rest of the class. She uses this time to highlight how the children have used the writing strategies she has taught and reminds them of the progress they have made.

This portion of the five-part framework can be executed in a variety of ways, but whichever way the work is shared, the teacher has a chance to offer instruction and motivate the children to continue writing.

Data Collection

Denzin and Lincoln (2011) explained that qualitative research focuses on “qualities of entities and on processes and meanings” (p. 17), which cannot be experimentally measured. They explained that qualitative research could help shed light on “situational restraints” and is best suited to answer questions about “how social experience is created and given meaning” (p. 17).

The research questions I asked were about how teachers and students created meaning about

writing in English from the social experiences (i.e., dialogic relationships) within the context of literacy instruction and practice.

The study was explanatory in nature. According to Yin (2014), explanatory case studies aim to explain, or elucidate, how or why something came to be. The aim of this study was to explain how and why two young EL children’s writing outcomes came to be. To do so, I observed teachers’ enacted instruction and focal students’ behavior as they participated in dialogic relationships with their teachers, including periods of writing practice. To understand teachers’ intentions, I interviewed them to learn what guided their thinking regarding the young

EL children in their classrooms. To explain student writing outcomes, I evaluated writing products and considered how the focal students perceived and comprehended their teacher’s instruction and used it to mediate their writing.

Semi-Structured Interviews

After all the participants had been recruited and given consent, I conducted one audio- recorded semi-structured interview with Ms. Hawkins (December 7, 2018; 36 minutes) and one with Ms. Maddox (December 6, 2018; 53 minutes). The semi-structured interviews were guided conversations meant to gather information from the teacher-participants about the context of their school and classrooms as well as their intentions and perspectives (DiCicco-Bloom &

Crabtree, 2006). I sought to understand their educational and linguistic backgrounds, teaching experience, perspectives on writing, views of young EL children, and whether and how the teachers differentiated instruction for those children in their classrooms.

To learn more about the content of the teachers’ instruction, I asked them to describe their current approach to literacy instruction generally and writing instruction specifically, and the reasons they chose these approaches. By asking these questions, I hoped to gain a broad

understanding of the instruction the children were receiving from the teachers' perspectives in

addition to published information about the curriculum they used. I asked them to describe their

perspectives on the usefulness of SFA (Madden et al., 1991) with children generally and with

young EL children specifically. All of this was valuable information to understand the situational

contexts in which the literacy instruction took place and why the teachers made the instructional

choices they did. I used an interview protocol (Appendix B) as a tool to guide our discussions.

Participant Observations

To understand the cultures of the classroom communities I studied, I employed

ethnographic data collection methods as part of the multiple-case study design. Ethnography is a type of qualitative research concerned with studying "groups and people as they go about their daily lives" (Emerson et al., 2011). The ethnographic data collection method I employed was participant observation (Spradley, 1980; Yin, 2014). As a participant-observer, I had the advantage of observing the context of the natural setting, obtaining immediate data, and gaining insight into the study participants' social behaviors and motives (Yin 2014). Spradley (1980) explained, "Participation allows you to experience activities directly, to get the feel of what events are like, and to record your own perceptions" (p. 51). Participant observation seemed the obvious choice as a data collection method to answer my research questions directly.

As a participant-observer, I tried to balance my role as an outside observer with my role as a participant in the classroom community. During my observations of each teacher's instruction, I sat at a table behind the large group of children and passively observed (Spradley,

1980) the instruction with little input on my part. Occasionally, the teacher would ask me, as another adult in the room, to comment on an experience, clarify a fact, or check the spelling of a word, so I was aware my presence was felt, but my interaction with the group was very minimal.

I offered short answers while maintaining a friendly demeanor by smiling and using a pleasant voice tone, so the participants would be more likely to feel comfortable and behave naturally. I also had short, informal conversations with the teachers before and after instructional sessions to comment on or help me understand what I would observe or had observed. These conversations not only helped me interpret their actions and intentions, but they were also meant to create a relationship of trust and establish myself as a temporary member of their classroom community, if only in a limited way.

When observing the young EL children as they practiced writing, I adopted a more moderate participation (Spradley, 1980) style. I interacted with the children more actively by doing such things as asking questions about their work and their thinking, answering questions in a limited way, providing cues, offering encouragement, and redirecting them back to the task at hand. I reminded the children there were no right or wrong answers to my questions; I just

wanted to know what they were thinking, and every answer was a good answer. In so doing, I

was aware that my presence as a researcher might alter the ways in which the children behaved

or made sense of their teacher's instruction, but because they were young children, my goal was

to develop trusting relationships over time, so they would feel comfortable going about the

business of learning to write while being watched.

Spradley (1980) suggested that in some social situations, attempting to avoid any

interaction with participants completely may call greater attention to the researcher's presence

and increase the level of obtrusiveness. In this case, it seemed conspicuous for young children to

have a silent adult, with whom they had had limited previous contact, sitting next to them

watching, video recording, and typing on a laptop because that was not something that had

occurred in their classroom experiences, and it may have unnerved them. However, they were

used to interacting with teachers and other adults in the school, so although the environment was

changed by my presence, by interacting with the children to some degree, as adults generally do

in a classroom setting, I hoped to replicate an environment that was as natural as possible, while

still accomplishing the goals of the study.

Observing the children as they participated in the instructional sessions and writing

practice, rather than simply evaluating writing products, was crucial for me to understand how

they were learning to write. Dyson (2002) has written extensively about how children construct

knowledge about writing through their recurring social practices. Children’s knowledge and

understanding are not limited to what they know about the conventions that govern print or their alphabet knowledge, but also how written language can be useful to them to convey meaning in their personal social realms. She wrote, “It is impossible to reduce writing or writing development to a set of textual features or conventional rules to be mastered” (p. 122). Moderate participant observations allowed me to understand the children’s writing process, so I could

understand how the children were making sense of the complexities of producing text to convey

meaning. Therefore, I used this data collection method to observe children’s talk and actions as

they participated in their teacher’s instruction and practiced writing.

Field Notes and Video Recordings. Nastasi and Schensul (2005) explained that

observations involve recording the details of what the research participants say and do, including

“interpersonal interactions, activities, events, and contextual features in the natural setting” (p.

184). To document my observations, I made field notes (Emerson et al., 2011) and video

recordings of the teachers’ instruction as well as the children's writing practice. Emerson and colleagues (2011) described the range of ways researchers might create field notes to turn their experiences in the field into a written record. On one end of the spectrum, researchers who are

fully immersed in a setting may choose to make no written record during the activity itself, so they can more thoroughly experience the activity without being concerned with recording the details. They may reflect on and record the event and their reactions later. On the opposite end of the spectrum, researchers may make meticulous notes of their observations so they can recall the experience with as much detail as possible later. They explain that the level of detail in researchers' field notes may directly correspond with their level of participation. In other words, passive observation is more conducive to recording greater detail, while more active participation makes writing very detailed notes difficult and may detract from the researcher's ability to experience the event as it is occurring. In my study, I created detailed field notes during passive observations of instruction and less detailed field notes while moderately participating with the children. I wanted to engage with the children in real-time and be fully present as I watched what they were doing and interacted with them. Stopping to write detailed observations and verbatim quotes from the participants would have likely taken my attention away from the children and yielded less meaningful interpretations of my observations.

To compensate for the lack of detail in the field notes, I made video-recordings of the observations using the camera feature on my password-protected mobile phone. Video recordings allowed me to return to the observations repeatedly, recall my first impressions, notice things I missed in real-time, and amend my interpretations based on a complete understanding of what occurred. Video recordings also afforded me the benefit of watching the teachers' instruction and the children's participation in that instruction both separately and together. In other words, during a writing lesson, I was able to attend to the teacher as she moved through the lesson and notice details as I focused on her. Later, when returning to the recording of the same lesson, I could focus fully on the child and observe the ways in which he responded

to the teacher, the other students, and the new information. Because I gathered the data as a sole researcher, making video recordings was the best way to obtain the breadth and depth of information, I needed to answer the research questions I had posed.

Observation Schedule. From January 10 through February 11, 2019, I conducted observations of the four-day Reading Roots (Slavin & Madden, 2010) lesson cycles in each classroom, and I video recorded them using the camera on my password-protected mobile phone.

I completed eight observations of the literacy block in Ms. Hawkins' classroom and seven in Ms.

Maddox's. Due to scheduling issues and technical difficulties beyond my control, I was not able to observe a continuous four-day cycle in Ms. Hawkins' classroom. Instead, I observed portions of three cycles, and I observed writing in all three cycles. In Ms. Maddox's classroom, I was able to observe two continuous cycles; however, after two days of the second cycle (January 28-29), the school was closed for three days due to winter weather, so Ms. Maddox condensed the lesson down to three days and completed it when the class returned the following Monday, February 4.

I also observed and recorded six afternoon writing workshops in Ms. Hawkins' classroom and nine in Ms. Maddox's. Initially, I observed in the afternoons after already observing the morning literacy blocks. However, I was unable to manage and prepare the volume of video data

I had collected, so I made the decision to stop observing writing workshops until the observations of the literacy blocks were completed. Therefore, one-third of these observations were completed in January, and two-thirds of these observations were completed between March

4 and March 14 after a two-and-a-half-week period of OELPA testing, during which I did not observe. In all, I collected 10 hours and three minutes of video in Ms. Hawkins’ class and 12 hours and 40 minutes in Ms. Maddox’s. A summary of the data collection schedule is found in

Table 3.1.

Table 3.1

Data Collection Schedule

Date Ms. H Ms. M Interview Literacy Writing Interview Literacy Writing Block Workshop Block Workshop 12/6/18 X 12/7/18 X 1/10/19 X X 1/11/19 X X 1/15/19 X 1/16/19 X X X 1/17/19 X 1/18/19 X X X 1/22/19 X 1/23/19 X 1/24/19 X 1/25/19 – 1/28/19 X 1/29/19 X 1/30-2/1/19 – 2/4/19 X X 2/6/19 X 2/7/19 – 2/8/19 X 2/11/19 X 2/12/19 X 2/13-3/1/19 – – – – – – 3/4/19 X X 3/6/19 X X 3/7/19 X 3/11/19 X X 3/12/19 X X X 3/14/19 X

Note. On 1/25/2019, although I observed and video recorded the literacy block, the video data was lost during an upload. On 1/30-2/1/2019, the school was closed due to winter weather, so no data was collected. On 2/7/2019, Ms. Hawkins was out for a professional development day, so no data was collected. On 2/13-3/1/2019, OELPA tests were being completed, so no data was collected.

Stimulated-Recall Interviews

In addition to the semi-structured interviews and direct observations, I conducted two

stimulated-recall interviews with each teacher. Stimulated-recall is an interview technique that has been widely used in educational research (for examples, see Akbari & Dadvand, 2014;

Baker, 2009; Cherrington & Loveridge, 2014; De Silva & Graham, 2015; Owodally, 2012; Tode,

2012). Lyle (2003) explains that in this type of interviewing technique, the researcher video- records the study participants’ behavior, then the video is played back to the participants, and they are asked to recall their thought processes during the activity by “thinking-aloud” as the video plays. Stimulated recall relies on the assumption that viewing a recording of an event will prompt participants’ memories of that event, so they can report their thoughts and decision- making processes at the time the event occurred (Yinger, 1986).

I began the stimulated recall interviews by assuring the teachers that my purpose for conducting the interviews was to ascertain their thoughts and decision-making processes, not to critique their teaching. I audio-recorded the interviews and had them transcribed for analysis rather than taking copious notes, so I could remain focused on the video and what the teacher was describing. The procedure I used to conduct these interviews was based on the practice of

Walkwitz and Lee (1992), who interviewed the teachers in their study as soon as possible after each filmed lesson, and the teachers had access to the video player and were free to stop or pause the video at any time they wanted to make a comment. I also stopped the recording at critical points during the lesson (e.g., the learning activity shifted, the teacher assisted a student, a critical incident occurred that changed the lesson flow) and asked probing questions developed by McNair and Joyce (1979): (a) What were you thinking at that point? (b) What were you noticing? (c) Was there anything else you thought of doing but decided against, and (d) if so,

what was it? Throughout the interview, I was careful not to comment on what I was thinking or noticing as an observer; rather, I carefully listened and recorded their responses.

Some evidence exists that the process of engaging in stimulated recall interviews could cause teachers to reflect on their teaching and deliver higher quality instruction (Cherrington &

Loveridge, 2014). To reduce the chances of having this think-aloud exercise offer an alternative explanation for the results, I conducted the interviews only twice for each teacher. The goal for this exercise was to have minimal impact on instruction and for the opportunity for any potential impact to be relatively equal across participants.

Photographs and Documents

Finally, I collected other forms of qualitative data, such as photographs, documents, and physical artifacts. For example, I took photographs of the classroom to help me remember such details as the classroom’s layout, the presence of environmental print, and the availability of writing materials. I also took photographs of children’s work samples, with the aim of using authentic assessment (Cohen & Spenciner, 1994) to examine the children’s writing proficiency in a real-life context. I wanted to know to what degree they were demonstrating what they had been taught in their own writing. I also took photographs of teacher models of writing, co- created class texts, and worksheets, or graphic organizers. I used these photographs and documents in conjunction with observation data to make inferences and draw conclusions about the instruction, teachers’ motivations, and children’s writing processes and outcomes.

Data Analysis

To analyze the data, I used the recommendations of Yin (2014), Miles and colleagues

(2014), and Saldaña (2016) as my main resources. To begin the analysis, I processed and prepared the data, and then I analyzed each case separately using a cyclical coding process

(Saldaña, 2016). Next, I performed a cross-case synthesis (Yin, 2014) of the teacher and student

participants. Finally, I returned to my original research questions and drew findings from the data

that may have answered those questions.

Data Processing and Preparation

Before qualitative data can be analyzed, the raw data must be processed into “expanded

write-ups” (Miles et al., 2014), which can be understood by others and not just the researcher

who collected the data. To do this, I followed a systematic process to create interview transcripts

and comprehensive observation records. First, as soon as possible, following an interview or

observation, while the event was still fresh in my mind, I returned to the field notes and filled in

any incomplete information as I remembered it. For example, I converted shorthand or

abbreviations I used to save time while recording an event into complete thoughts or sentences,

and I filled in any missing information I could accurately recall, which I did not have time to

write down at the moment. Fleshing out the field notes in this way made the data intelligible for

others to read (and for me to read later), and the process stimulated my memory and helped me

recall important details I may have forgotten otherwise. This step also helped me review the

events of the day and guided my thinking as I returned for the next observation or interview.

Next, I prepared the video recordings by moving the digital video files from my

password-protected mobile phone to my password-protected laptop, and I combined smaller video files into larger, complete videos of the day’s observations using video-editing software.

To clarify, while observing, I had turned off the video camera at times (e.g., during transitions), so at the end of an observation, I had several small files to combine. Then, I viewed the video recordings of observations and made notes to remind myself of questions I wanted to ask the teachers, the students, or my dissertation committee; connections to the literature and theory; or

general thoughts about things I noticed to guide my continuous data collection process.

In addition, I prepared the photographs and documents I had collected. I moved the photographs from my mobile phone to my laptop, and I edited them using photo-editing software. For example, I removed actual names and replaced them with pseudonyms, I cropped photos to reduce unnecessary space, and I adjusted the clarity, color, and brightness to make the photos easier to see. In some cases, I perused the video data to find and clip more photos I may have missed or to find a higher quality version. I stored paper documents I collected from the school in an expanding pocket file. All data were stored in my secure home office.

Interview Transcriptions and Observation Records. After the data collection period had ended, I changed all video files into audio files to protect participants’ identities and sent them to a team of professional transcribers to be transcribed. The transcribers signed non- disclosure agreements before I sent them the files to protect the participants. When the interview transcripts were returned, I reviewed them as I listened to the interviews to ensure they were accurate. For the observations, after receiving the transcripts, I viewed the videos again and added descriptions of visual data that had not been captured in the transcripts of the audio files. I also merged my field notes with the transcripts and created comprehensive observation records, which I used for the next phases of data analysis.

NVivo. NVivo is computer software specifically designed for qualitative research. I used

NVivo as a tool to store, organize, and code the data I had collected. This tool assisted me in managing the large volume of data I collected by organizing the data and allowing me to sort and group the data in a variety of ways (e.g., by date, by case, by file type). It also allowed me to code the data in the next phase of analysis. As soon as the data were collected, I loaded them into

NVivo to be organized. Also, I used NVivo as I prepared observation records after receiving the

transcripts, so I could watch videos and sync them with the records for easy retrieval. I linked passages in observations to photographs relating to the text (e.g., a work sample or teacher model). I exported all observation records to a file on my laptop, which automatically backed up to a secure cloud file, secured and monitored by the university. Once all data were prepared in the ways I have described, I was ready to move on to the next phase of the analysis.

Deductive, Inductive, and Cyclical Coding

Once the data were prepared, I engaged in a coding process that was both deductive and inductive (Miles et al., 2014). Codes are labels assigned to passages of data, which give them meaning. Deductive coding is an approach to data analysis in which researchers begin with a

“start list” (p. 81) of a priori codes based on such things as the conceptual framework or the research questions. As researchers closely examine the data, they sort it using the initial a priori codes; however, other codes may emerge that were unpredictable at the outset. As this happens, researchers begin a process of inductive coding, which allows research findings to become evident through close examination of the raw data, consideration of the range of possible interpretations of the data, and making judgments about which themes contained therein were most frequent, dominant, or significant (Thomas, 2006). Qualitative researchers may choose to use either deductive coding, inductive coding, or a combination of the two.

Miles and colleagues (2014) also described an iterative coding process, which provided detailed procedures for researchers as they analyze data. They identified three universal tasks for researchers to accomplish for successful analysis of qualitative data: 1) data reduction, 2) data display, and 3) drawing conclusions. Saldaña (2016) explicated the detailed procedures of these three tasks in a model of cyclical coding.

First Cycle Coding: Data Reduction. The First Cycle (Saldaña, 2016) of coding began

with data reduction, which involved meaningfully organizing the raw data into a manageable form. After the data were processed and prepared in the ways I have described, I began the data reduction process by using process codes, descriptive codes, and subcodes to assign short labels to data passages, and I organized those codes into broad categories based on my research questions. According to Miles and colleagues (2014), process codes are useful for studies in which researchers examine the actions and interactions of study participants over time and seek possible consequences of those actions. In this study, I examined the actions and interactions of teachers and students and sought related outcomes in children’s writing proficiency, so process codes to connote actions were appropriate. Descriptive codes are nouns used to summarize topics briefly, and they are useful in studies such as this one, which involve the collection of a wide range of data forms; they are particularly useful for studies in which the researchers are examining social environments. I used descriptive codes to label data from the teacher interviews and the focal students’ writing samples. Finally, in the First Cycle (Saldaña, 2016) of coding, because of the wide range and large volume of data I collected across participants and cases, I created subcodes as secondary codes to the primary process and descriptive codes. Miles and colleagues (2014) explain that subcodes are helpful when general primary codes require further detailing to “enrich the entry” (p. 80).

I began by creating five broad categories corresponding with my research questions: 1)

Writing Instruction, 2) Writing Strategies and Modes of Participation, 3) Instructional Choices,

4) Writing Proficiency, and 5) Context. I created an initial codebook using short labels for codes based on information I gleaned from the literature as a “start list” (Miles et al., p. 81). I also wrote detailed definitions for each code, so as I engaged in the coding process, I could recall my intentions and ensure I did not stray from the original meaning of the code. As I studied and

coded the data, new codes emerged, and I added them to the codebook, along with their

definitions, through an inductive process.

Writing Instruction. To create codes related to writing instruction, I began with

Wagner’s (2016) Framework of Writing Instruction to Support the Positive Writing Identities in

DLLs in the Elementary Years and used it in conjunction with the aspects of writing instruction

supportive of young EL children as they learn to write, which I had identified in the literature. I created process codes such as “assigning varied writing products” with subcodes such as “using digital technologies,” “using multilingual texts,” “using multimedia texts,” and “using graphic organizers.” An example of a process code that emerged in the writing instruction category was

“integrating reading with writing” with subcodes such as “teaching concepts of print with model texts,” “using model texts as a shared experience,” “reading child-created model texts.”

Modes of Participation and Writing Strategies. To examine the data collected during

observations surrounding the ways in which the focal students behaved during writing

instruction, and as they practiced writing, I used inductive coding. At the outset, I understood

that the ways in which each child participated in writing instruction and practice would be highly

individual, and I wanted to keep my thinking open as I observed them. I created process codes to

describe their behavior, such as “engaging with adults,” with subcodes such as “trying to please”

and “responding to feedback.” Another example was “using print as a resource” with subcodes

such as “using a book,” “using environmental print,” and “using own writing.”

Instructional Choices. In the category of codes called “Instructional Choices,” I relied

heavily on a position statement from the National Association for the Education of Young

Children (NAEYC, 2009), which emphasized the importance of teacher knowledge and decision-

making and detailed some criteria teachers may consider. Using this resource as a starting point,

I created descriptive codes such as “accessible instruction” and “foster supportive community of learners.” An example of a descriptive code that emerged from the data was “scaffolds,” with subcodes such as “adapted material,” “task analysis,” “graphic organizer,” “progressive complexity,” and “provide a resource.”

Writing Proficiency. To create initial descriptive codes for the fourth category, “Writing

Proficiency,” I examined two analytical tools to develop descriptive codes of children who were young EL’s writing. The first was the “Grades K-1 Proficiency Level Descriptors” (p. 221) from the Language Assessment Scales (LAS) Links™ (McGraw Hill, 2006), which was a series of assessments specifically designed to examine children who were ELs. The five proficiency levels

(i.e., beginning, early intermediate, intermediate, proficient, and above proficient) included specific descriptors of linguistic elements that explicitly correlated with the four language skills; listening, speaking, reading, and writing; and described the five levels of proficiency. I used the descriptors for writing, which included qualities like “uses correct grammar such as singular nouns, subject pronouns, subject/verb agreement, modal auxiliary verb constructions, and future tense,” and “uses writing conventions such as capitalization and sentence-ending marks in declarative, interrogative, and imperative sentences” (p. 221). These specific descriptions gave me an idea of some details in the writing products to look for when examining children’s use of print conventions; however, they did not address the breadth of what I hoped to examine, particularly composing text (i.e., generating ideas, turning ideas into words and sentences), so I used another resource as well.

The OELPA ALDs (ODE, 2018) for writing were aligned with state standards, and this was the assessment given to the student participants in the study on a yearly basis to assess their need for additional language support. As such, these descriptors would likely be aligned with the

teacher-participants’ goals for their students, and I hoped they would help me view the data with a slightly broader lens. The achievement levels in the OELPA ALDs (ODE, 2018) were organized by language domain and grade, and they moved across five levels of increasing proficiency: beginning, early intermediate, intermediate, early advanced, and advanced.

Examples of descriptors for first-grade writing included “…participating in short written exchanges,” and “asking and answering simple questions and composing short written text about familiar topics” (p. 16). The descriptors in this source seemed to be more focused on the students’ success in different types or genres of writing rather than the particulars of grammar and punctuation and provided more insight into the success young EL children may experience in composing rather than transcription only. When used in tandem, both analytical tools provided a place to start when performing a qualitative analysis of written products to explore student outcomes pertaining to writing.

In the initial codebook, for the category of “Child Writing Proficiency,” I created descriptive codes for: “spelling,” “grammar,” “writing to describe or explain,” and “writing conventions.” Subcodes included such descriptors as “spells a sight word correctly from memory,” “demonstrates an understanding of the subject-verb agreement,” “retells a series of events in writing,” and “uses ending punctuation.” During the inductive coding process, I added subcodes, and I added a descriptive code for “genre writing” with subcodes such as “how-to,”

“informational text,” “narrative,” “response,” and “retelling.” I also added additional subcodes to the original descriptive codes as they emerged in the data.

Context. Finally, in the broad category of “context,” I began with descriptive codes such as “assessments,” “child background,” and “classroom environment,” which corresponded with the semi-structured interview protocol (Appendix B) and information I gleaned from the

literature that could potentially be related to study findings. While the initial descriptive codes

remained constant, themes emerged in the data to which I assigned subcodes. For example, for a

primary descriptive code “teacher perspectives,” I added the subcodes “preferences,” “views of

children,” “views of self,” and “views on instruction.”

When I finished the data reduction process on July 30, 2019, within the five broad categories, I had 46 primary codes and 125 subcodes. By using process codes, descriptive codes, and subcodes and by organizing them into broad categories corresponding with my research

questions, I was prepared to engage in the Second Cycle (Saldaña, 2016) of coding, data display,

during which pattern codes were created.

Second Cycle Coding: Data Display. For the Second Cycle (Saldaña, 2016) of coding, data display (Miles et al., 2014), when the data collection period was completed, I examined the process codes and descriptive codes in search of patterns or commonalities that recurred in the data and seemed to be linked; then, I condensed the codes into pattern codes (Miles et al., 2014).

Pattern codes are descriptive or explanatory codes that group the First Cycle (Saldaña, 2016)

codes into fewer, more manageable chunks of data. Pattern codes can be used in a variety of

ways, and in this study, I looked first for patterns in each participant related to the research

questions. As I considered the range of possible interpretations of the data, I relied on the body

of literature about writing instruction and writing development of young EL children to guide my

thinking. I also considered the theoretical propositions grounding this work: Situated Learning

(Lave & Wenger, 1991) and the Sociocultural Theory of Writing (Prior, 2006), based on

Vygotsky (1987), Bakhtin (1981, 1986), and other sociocultural theorists who expounded upon

their work. I identified patterns by noticing repeated behaviors surrounding writing events,

seeking meanings and explanations, which seemed to be part of the local context, and offering

common sense or theoretical explanations for observed writing behaviors (Miles et al., 2014).

Question 1 Data Displays. As I identified instructional patterns and participatory patterns, I created data displays to organize the data and assist me in the next phase of analysis, drawing conclusions. For example, to address the first research question, regarding teacher- student dialogic relationships, for each teacher, I created a three-columned table entitled

Instructional Patterns, and for each young EL child, I created a table entitled Participatory

Patterns.

For these initial Instructional Patterns data displays, I condensed the descriptive and explanatory codes from the First Cycle (Saldaña, 2016) of analysis into pattern codes and listed them in the first column. I labeled the second column “manner,” and the third column

“behavior,” and in the rows beneath, I described the manner (i.e., ways) in which the participants enacted the patterns and the specific behaviors in which they did so in the appropriate columns.

For example, in Ms. Hawkins initial Instructional Patterns table, in the first column, I identified the pattern: “Integrated Multiple Modes of Meaning-Making,” in the second column, I identified the manner: “coupled visual representation with linguistic modes of meaning-making to convey messages,” and in the third column I identified the behaviors: “group discussions about storybook illustrations.” For the initial Participatory Data Displays, I created the same three- column displays. An example of one row in Mario’s display was, in the pattern column:

“Engaged With Others,” in the manner column: “limited oral participation,” and in the behavior column: “usually waited for others to give answers.”

Next, I examined the tables for each teacher-student pair and looked for related patterns.

Through several iterations of two data displays entitled, Case 1: Ms. Hawkins and Mario’s

Related Patterns and Case 2: Ms. Maddox and Rudy’s Related Patterns, I identified three related

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instructional and participatory patterns, which were common across both cases, and

conceptualized those related patterns as dialogic relationships. Eventually, the data displays were

organized into three columns labeled 1) manner, 2) enacted instruction, and 3) enacted

participation, and the three dialogic relationship patterns were identified with table spanners

across the entire width of the display. In the left-most column were listed the manner

(corresponding to the subcodes) in which the patterns played out in the classroom, and in the intersecting cells, I listed each participant’s related behaviors. The final iterations of these tables

are displayed throughout Chapters 4 and 5.

Question 2 Data Displays. To answer the second research question regarding why the

teachers made the instructional decisions they did, I created a data display for each teacher

entitled, Summary of Instructional Patterns and Rationales. In the left column, I listed the

“Instructional Patterns,” and below each pattern, I identified the individual instructional moves I

observed each teacher make. In the right column, I listed “Rationales Shared by Teacher,” and I

listed the teachers’ stated motivations for each move I had identified. For example, on Ms.

Hawkins’ table, across one row below the pattern “Integrated Multiple Modes of Meaning-

Making,” I wrote, “Coupling visual and linguistic.” In the adjacent cell, I listed three bulleted

rationales Ms. Hawkins had offered to explain the instructional decision. Exposure to visual

modes helps children translate to linguistic modes

 To reach every type of learner

 To help with recall

As was the case with the tables displaying dialogic relationships, these were working

documents I used to organize the data. As my understanding of the data grew, the data displays

changed.

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Question 3 Data Displays. After having completed the First Cycle (Saldaña, 2016)

analysis, it became clear that to answer the third research question regarding writing outcomes,

the data reduction I had performed on the writing samples had not reduced the data enough to

yield meaningful results that were easily interpreted. My goal was to use the portfolios of writing

samples I had collected from each child, along with my observations of their writing processes,

to holistically assess their writing proficiency in areas of both transcription and composing. I was

interested in examining if and how the children were appropriating what they were being taught,

and I also wanted to understand how their proficiency may compare to writing standards for

children their age, regardless of language status. After all, the larger research problem to which I

intended to contribute answers was closing the achievement gap between children who are ELs

and native English speakers. The two analysis tools I had used, LAS Links (2006) and OELPA

ALDs (ODE, 2018), provided some information about the children’s proficiency in transcription

and composing, but my analysis still lacked whole categories of information regarding writing

proficiency that would more thoroughly answer my questions. Both tools were designed to assess

specific writing products as part of examinations that were delivered using methods particular to

those tests, so although the tools gave me a “start list” (Miles et al., 2014) to develop codes, as I

examined the data, it became clear that the student-participants displayed writing proficiencies that those two tools did not address.

I turned to the work of Cohen and Spenciner (1994) for guidance. They described alternative forms of assessment that would assist me in my analysis of the children’s writing samples. First, they explained a seven-step process to develop a curriculum-based assessment instrument that corresponds with the curriculum to evaluate the children’s progress in what they had been taught. They suggest:

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1. identifying a purpose,

2. analyzing the curriculum,

3. developing performance objectives,

4. developing assessment procedures,

5. implementing the assessment procedures,

6. organizing the information, and

7. interpreting and integrating the results.

Using these steps as a guide, I reevaluated my assessment plan and tackled the task in a different way; albeit my assessment was not strictly curriculum-based. The Reading Roots

(Slavin & Madden, 2010) assessments the children were given were already based on that curriculum, and I wanted to explore how the children’s writing may compare to a broader set of standards. Furthermore, I had already begun an authentic assessment (Cohen & Spenciner, 1994) process by collecting writing samples and observing writing taking place as part of the daily practice within the classroom community. Nevertheless, Cohen and Spenciner’s (1994) guidelines gave me a scaffold to develop a more comprehensive way to assess the children’s writing outcomes.

The first step in Cohen and Spenciner’s (1994) guidelines for developing a curriculum- based assessment was to state my purpose for assessing the children’s writing clearly. My purpose was twofold. My first aim was to evaluate how well the children had appropriated the writing strategies they had been taught, and my second aim was to evaluate how their writing fared in comparison to writing standards developed for first graders across the board. To accomplish this dual-purpose, I implemented a variety of procedures throughout the seven-step process, although because I developed the plan after having collected the data, I completed the

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steps out of order.

After having identified the two-fold purpose, I returned to the Reading Roots (Slavin &

Madden, 2010) curriculum, the LAS Links (2006), and the OELPA ALDs (2018) to create performance objectives, organize the information, and interpret the results. I also used the Traits

Rubric for K-2 drawn from 6 +1 Traits® Writing (Education Northwest, 2018) as a foundation

for an amalgamated rubric, incorporating all three resources (Appendix C). 6 +1 Traits® Writing

(Education Northwest, 2018) is a model of writing instruction and assessment, aligned with the

Common Core State Standards (CCSS), which provides rubrics containing detailed descriptors of

seven writing traits: a) ideas, b) organization, c) voice, d) word choice, e) sentence fluency, f)

conventions, and g) presentation.

The Traits Rubric for K-2 (Education Northwest, 2018) provided a comprehensive set of

descriptors within the seven writing traits, across six progressively complex levels, and it

provided a framework to which I added more specific language from the other assessment tools.

I carefully matched language from all three rubrics to correspond with the descriptions in the

traits, in addition to descriptions of writing or writing behaviors, which emerged in the data. The

performance objectives (Cohen & Spenciner, 1994) I identified were the seven writing traits and

their synthesized descriptions. I compared the student-participants’ writing against the performance objectives to evaluate how well the children had appropriated the writing skills and strategies they had been taught and how their writing fared in comparison to writing standards developed for other children their age.

At this point, for steps four and five of Cohen and Spenciner’ s (1994) guide to curriculum-based assessment, develop and implement assessment procedures, I had already done the work. I had observed the children as they learned about and practiced writing, I had asked

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them questions about their thinking, and I had collected writing samples. These assessment

procedures gave me as much information as possible, given the study limitations, to accomplish

my defined purpose for assessment.

The next step in the curriculum-based assessment was to organize the information. I did

so according to the Reading Roots (Slavin & Madden, 2010) curriculum in ways that would

provide evidence to use in a holistic evaluation using my new amalgamated writing rubric. I

created a series of detailed data displays to organize the various features of the writing. Doing so

organized the data into a form that was more manageable, and in some cases, quantitative, which

provided information I used to evaluate and interpret the results in a holistic way. I continued my analysis of the student-participants’ writing samples using the amalgamated writing rubric I had created.

The first data display I created for each child was called Text Found in Writing Samples.

In the left-hand column, I listed the date the writing sample was collected; in the middle column, which I called “unedited,” I transcribed the text as closely as possible to the way it had appeared in the sample. In the right-hand column, I called “edited,” I entered the corrected text according to the way the child read it to me aloud. I referred to this table frequently as I created other data displays, and the side by side comparison made trends in the writing samples easier to see.

In addition, I used the text from the “edited” column to perform an analysis using an online Text Analyzer from https://www.online-utility.org/text/analyzer.jsp. I entered the text into

an empty field, and the free software returned such information as a word count, word frequency,

and lexical density. Lexical density is one measure of how informative or complex a passage of

text is (Halliday, 1985). It is calculated by counting the total number of content words, or words

that carry meaning (i.e., nouns, adjectives, verbs, and adverbs) and dividing it by the total

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number of words. I used information from this analysis to create a data display for each child

called Summary of Lexical Analysis. These tables included the total number of words the

children used, the number of unique words used, the total number of sentences written, the

average number of words per sentence, and lexical density. The tables also included the words

used most frequently, in order of greatest to least, and I highlighted the “red words,” “green

words,” and “challenge words” vocabulary from the Reading Roots (Slavin & Madden, 2010)

curriculum, the children included in their writing. Organizing tables this way gave me easily

accessible information about word choice and text complexity for a more holistic analysis of the

writing samples.

Next, I created detailed data displays of the student-participants’ spelling entitled

Detailed Use of Spelling Patterns in Writing Samples. The columns were organized to

correspond with the children’s writing samples in the order in which they were collected, and the

rows were organized according to the Reading Roots (Slavin & Madden, 2010) curriculum. For

example, the first column was labeled “Lesson Number and Green Words.” The rows beneath

listed the Reading Roots lesson numbers yielding data, Lessons 1-39, and the easily decodable

vocabulary words identified in each story (i.e., green words). The second column was labeled

“Red Words,” and the rows beneath listed the high-frequency or irregularly spelled sight words

(i.e., red words). The next column was labeled “Letters and Sounds,” and the rows below listed

the graphemes or combination of graphemes introduced in the FastTrack Phonics portion of the

corresponding lesson, along with the graphemes’ associated phonemes. Therefore, the cell to the

right of Lesson 1 and the subsequent rows below listed “m /m/,” “a /ă/,” and “s /s/” because those three corresponding letters and sounds were introduced in Lesson 1, over the course of three or four days.

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The subsequent columns were labeled with the dates and short descriptive titles of the

writing samples. For example, the column to the right of the “Letters and Sounds” column on

Rudy’s spelling table was labeled, “1/11 PB&J,” and the adjacent column to the right was

labeled, “1/16 glad / Snow.” On January 11, I had collected a writing sample about how to make

a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and on January 16, I had collected one writing sample in the

morning session, which was a sentence about the characters in the story being glad, and one in

the afternoon session, which was about building a snowman. The subsequent columns proceeded

from left to right in this way, with the writing samples listed in chronological order.

After having set up the spelling summary tables, I analyzed the spelling in each writing

sample according to the vocabulary words and graphemes each word contained. In the cells

where a grapheme’s row and a writing sample’s column intersected, I listed every word in the

sample containing that grapheme. If the grapheme was used correctly, I simply listed the word

and bolded the targeted grapheme in that word (e.g., “last” next to “a /ă/”), and if the word contained a spelling error, I wrote the word as it appeared in the sample and the corrected spelling in parentheses (e.g., “thn (then)” next to “e /ĕ/”). Analyzing the spelling patterns in this way allowed me to make inferences about the children’s appropriation of specific phoneme- grapheme relationships and productive use of vocabulary and sight words in their writing. I created similar summary tables for capitalization, punctuation, spacing, and grammar. I used the series of tables and the writing samples to move through the assessment instrument, compare the data to the descriptors, and evaluate how the children’s writing compared to what they had been taught and to standards written for children their age. Having this information, along with the data displays I created for each question, made it possible to move on to the Third Cycle

(Saldaña, 2016) of data analysis, drawing conclusions (Miles et al., 2014).

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Drawing Conclusions. Creating an assessment tool and data displays, like the ones I

described, helped me gain a clear understanding of the patterns, which had occurred with each

participant and case, so I was able to draw conclusions. To understand these findings with more

depth, I then performed a cross-case synthesis (Yin, 2014) by stacking the comparable cases

(Miles et al., 2014).

Cross-Case Synthesis. A cross-case synthesis (Yin, 2014) merges the data from both cases, allowing researchers to compare the findings of each and draw conclusions based on information gleaned across cases. This is done by first creating visual displays for each individual case, using a uniform set of variables, with the goal of thoroughly understanding each case. I had done this in the previous cycle to prepare the data for synthesis. Then, the researcher

“stacks” (Miles et al., 2014, p. 103) the case-level matrices by creating one “meta-matrix” (Miles et al., 2014, p. 103), combines the data from each individual case and allows for systematic comparison.

Once the data were organized into matrices across individual cases, I synthesized the data displays I created during the Second Cycle (Saldaña, 2016) of data analysis and compared the patterns that occurred in each case by creating meta-matrices for each research question.

Synthesizing the findings in this way allowed me to draw conclusions, form explanations, and confirm or build upon the theoretical propositions I had asserted. To do this, I worked backward.

I began with the meta-matrix for research question three, comparing the children’s writing outcomes, and formed generalizations about each child’s writing relative to one another. Then, I used the information from the two other meta-matrices to draw conclusions about the relationships that might exist among writing outcomes, teacher rationales, and dialogic relationship patterns. I set these conclusions against the backdrop of my theoretical framework

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and the existing body of literature to understand what role the data collected in this study may play in the ongoing conversation about writing and young ELs.

Trustworthiness

I employed planned strategies to ensure the qualitative data I collected and analyzed were trustworthy (Shenton, 2004). Guided by Guba’s (1981) four constructs, which correspond with validity criteria used by quantitative researchers, Shenton (2004) recommended strategies to ensure the following criteria are met: (a) credibility (internal validity), (b) transferability

(external validity), (c) dependability (reliability), and (d) confirmability (objectivity).

Credibility

According to Shenton (2004), credibility in qualitative research is a construct that addresses how believable the researcher’s data collection, analysis, and conclusions are, or how closely they come to reality. To establish credibility in the study, I chose research methods

(interviews and observations) that were best suited to address the qualitative questions I posed.

Also, the recruiting procedures I planned and undertook allowed me to “develop an early familiarity” (Shenton, 2004, p. 65) with the teachers and administrators of the school where I conducted the study. I continued to develop a positive rapport by visiting each classroom often and remaining friendly and as unobtrusive as possible. In this way, the participants were more likely to become comfortable with my presence and behave in the same ways they would if I were not there; I observed the most natural behaviors possible and was more likely to provide an accurate description and analysis of the observations. In addition, the recruiting plan included opportunities for potential participants to decline to take part, and no professional or social coercion was present. In the early stages of the data collection period, especially just before I conducted interviews, I encouraged the teachers to be honest and frank and reminded them that

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my role as a researcher in their classrooms was independent of their relationship with their employers. Anything they revealed to me would be used for the purposes of this study and would not be connected to their job performance. In this way, I found participants who were genuinely interested and willing to take part in the study, and I ensured that the information they provide was an honest representation of their experiences (Shenton, 2004).

I also used triangulation to establish credibility. Using more than one method to collect data (i.e., interviews, observations, document collection) allowed me to offset the limitations and capitalize on the benefits of each method. For example, by conducting interviews, I hoped to understand the teachers’ perspectives about writing instruction, and through observations, I hoped to understand whether and how those perspectives were manifested in the classroom. I also establish credibility by drawing on multiple cases to inform the study, including two children and two teachers. Using multiple cases allowed me to verify the experiences of the individual participants by comparing them to each other, and it gave me a deeper understanding of the answers to the research questions. In so doing, the study was more robust and likely more believable in the eyes of the wider research community.

Other strategies Shenton (2004) recommended for establishing credibility were to invite peers to scrutinize my interpretations of the data and to engage in frequent debriefing with my faculty advisors. I followed these recommendations by staying in close contact with the co-chairs of my dissertation committee by meeting with one or both regularly, either by phone or in person. In these meetings, I sought their professional opinions about my methods, interpretations, and biases about the data. I asked them to challenge my assumptions and share their own perspectives and experiences with research that would elucidate flaws and allowed me to refine my approach; thereby, strengthening my arguments (Shenton, 2004).

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Finally, I performed member checks by returning to the teacher participants and asking them to verify that their words and my interpretations of their words and actions truly reflected what they intended. I conducted these member checks throughout the data collection process when questions arose so that the participants’ verification would inform my continuing interpretations of the data. In addition, after I created the individual Summaries of Instructional

Patterns and Rationales tables, I sent them to Ms. Hawkins and Ms. Maddox by e-mail to verify whether my interpretations of their words and actions are accurate. They both read and returned the tables, adding clarification or additional information when necessary.

Transferability

Transferability refers to how the findings from this study pertain to other similar situational contexts (Shenton, 2004). I followed Guba’s (1981) recommendation and garnered as much detail as possible about the classroom and personal contexts within which the participants were operating. I did this by conducting interviews and collecting demographic information and other documents. In my description of the contexts, I included: the number of schools and classrooms in which I collected data; the inclusion criteria for participation in the study and how the participants met those criteria; the number of participants from whom data were collected; the number, frequency, and duration of data collection sessions; and the number of weeks or months over which data were collected. By providing a thick description of the contexts within which the study participants functioned, consumers of the research will be better able to form their own interpretations about how the findings might be transferred to other settings (Shenton,

2004).

Moreover, transferability in qualitative research occurs gradually over the course of several studies; when the totality of results are taken into consideration, researchers and

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consumers of research can gain a complete understanding of how each study fits into a broader

perspective (Dervin, 1997). I contributed to this understanding by providing a thorough review

of the related literature in the beginning of this research report and ending with a complete

discussion of how the study’s findings and my interpretations fit into the larger corpus of

research on emergent writing with young EL children.

Dependability

Dependability in qualitative research is the extent to which other researchers can replicate the study, although not necessarily achieving the same results in a varying context (Shenton,

2004). Shenton (2004) recommends achieving dependability by providing enough detail in the planning, execution, and reporting of the research for the study to serve as a prototype for other researchers. I have described the research design in detail, and when I reported the research, I

described the execution of the design with similar detail. I managed the data in a way that

allowed me to record the operational detail of the data collection and analysis processes and

“address the minutiae of what was done in the field” (p. 72). Finally, together with the

dissertation committee, we engaged in an iterative appraisal process throughout the duration of

the study, as well as at the study’s end, to assess the appropriateness of the choices I made, and I

was transparent about the results of this assessment in the research report.

Confirmability

The concept of confirmability is the extent to which the study’s findings are an accurate

reflection of the participants’ experiences and perspectives and not the experiences and

perspectives of the researcher (Patton, 1990). Triangulation of methods and participants is one

strategy that I used to ensure confirmability, and I also acknowledged my own experiences,

perspectives, and biases within the research report as recommended by Miles and colleagues

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(2011). To do so, I provided rationales for decisions made along the way and acknowledged the affordances and limitations that might have arisen because of those decisions. I also engaged in

“reflective commentary” (Shenton, 2004, p. 72) by maintaining a running log of my emerging interpretations, theories, and questions that arose as I engaged in data collection and analysis. I recorded dates, times, and locations of each entry so that this log would serve as an audit trail for others to understand the process that led me to form conclusions. This log, along with the other procedures I used to manage data, strengthened the confirmability of the research.

Summary of Methodology

The purpose of this study was to explore the teacher-student dialogic relationships related to literacy practices in two mainstream classrooms and the influence those relationships might have had on the writing outcomes of young EL learners. In the previous sections, I have detailed the multiple-case study design I used to explore the ways in which the teachers enacted instruction and how they went about making instructional choices. Furthermore, I explored the ways in which two focal students, who were young ELs, used that instruction to mediate their independent writing. I recruited participants and obtained consent and assent in an ethical way, and once I obtained consent, I began a rigorous data collection process. I used data collection methods common to case study research, like semi-structured interviews, participant observations, stimulated recall interviews, and the collection of artifacts such as documents and photographs, with the aim of gleaning information, which would answer the stated research questions. By engaging in a combination of deductive and inductive coding in a cyclical data analysis process, I organized the data in such a way as to gain an in-depth understanding of the practices and processes that occurred within and around the dialogic relationships between the teachers and students. Finally, I detailed the ways in which I maintained trustworthiness as I

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engaged in the project. The study was a robust exploration of literacy instruction and writing appropriation with young EL children, which contributes to the fields of emergent literacy and second language studies in significant ways.

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Chapter 4: Findings-Case 1

1. How did two first-grade students and teachers interact within the context of classroom

literacy practices?

2. Why did the teachers make the instructional choices they made as they taught the

young EL children to write in English?

3. How did the two focal students demonstrate their writing processes and products, and

how might the teacher-student dialogic relationships have influenced those outcomes?

In this chapter and the next, I share findings related to each of these questions. Chapter 4

is dedicated to Case 1 (Ms. Hawkins and Mario), and Chapter 5 is dedicated to Case 2 (Ms.

Maddox and Rudy). In each chapter, findings are organized according to research questions with

sections dedicated to Dialogic Relationships (Research Question 1), Rationales for Instruction

(Research Question 2), and Writing Outcomes (Research Question 3). As expected in a qualitative study, themes in the data represent pervasive patterns across multiple instructional interactions. That said, the data referenced will often reflect a teacher’s implementation of different parts of the same lesson. By frequently referencing a small set of lessons, I aim to provide the necessary context to fully demonstrate how patterns played out in the classroom.

What follows is my attempt to weave a connecting thread throughout the integrated literacy

activities captured in the data and demonstrate how the breadth of teacher-student dialogic

relationships during literacy activities might have culminated into children’s writing outcomes. I

begin with a brief snapshot of Ms. Hawkins and Mario.

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Snapshot: Ms. Hawkins and Mario

Ms. Hawkins’ classroom was busy with the hustle and bustle of first graders learning to read and write in ways typical of young children. The atmosphere felt joyful and alive with movement, conversation, play, giggles, and fun. Although the atmosphere was lively and sometimes noisy with chatter, children were consistently engaged in learning. Ms. Hawkins’ classroom culture appeared conducive to young children’s learning, particularly those children whose home language was one other than the language of instruction.

Mario seemed at ease in the milieu of Ms. Hawkins’ busy classroom, and he generally conveyed a cheerful disposition through his expressive face and body language. However, he tended to keep to himself. Mario rarely spoke in group settings, and when he did, he spoke very softly. Mario seemed to have limited self-initiated interaction with his peers, but he knew the classroom routines, as evidenced by listening to and following Ms. Hawkins’ instructions, organizing his materials, staying on task, and completing his work quickly in ways that met his teacher’s expectations, and occasionally encouraging others to do so as well.

Ms. Hawkins and Mario’s Dialogic Relationship

To answer this research question, I describe Ms. Hawkins’ instruction by deconstructing episodes I observed and explicating themes in instructional patterns. Then, I share additional examples of corresponding participatory patterns in Mario’s own attempts to convey meaning.

By juxtaposing the teacher’s instructional patterns with student’s participatory patterns, I demonstrate dialogic relationships that seemed to exist between the two. Three dialogic relationship patterns were observed: a) integrating multiple modes of meaning-making, b) using scaffolding, tools, and strategies for writing instruction and learning, and c) providing and engaging in social activities. The three patterns are summarized in Appendix D.

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Ms. Hawkins and Mario’s Integrated Modes of Meaning-Making

Ms. Hawkins taught using multiple modes of meaning-making within literacy activities.

She combined visual and linguistic modes and integrated reading and writing instruction by

incorporating books and other printed materials into the lessons. Likewise, Mario conveyed

messages by integrating visual and linguistic modes of meaning-making in his writing process

and products and using books and other print resources.

Ms. Hawkins’ Integration of Visual and Linguistic Modes of Meaning-Making.

Alongside oral language, Ms. Hawkins complemented her instruction with visual forms of meaning using pictures and non-verbal communication. Examples from Ms. Hawkins’ instruction highlight her use of group discussions about illustrations, gestures and pantomime, and visualization to help her students comprehend and use the English language for their purposes. Although modes of meaning-making were rarely taught or used in isolation, I will underscore an example of one mode’s use here (visual information) while elucidating how other modes were integrated. To provide context for examples that occurred during the same basal reader instructional cycle, I will list the dates for instruction at the first mention of the cycle.

On the first day of the story cycle [2/6/2019-2/11/2019] for Reading Roots (Slavin &

Madden, 2010) Lesson #39, The Three Wishes (Rice, 2003d), Ms. Hawkins led a discussion about the book’s cover art as she introduced it to her class. The story was of a woodcutter in

Sweden granted three wishes by a magical elf he had rescued in the forest. The smartboard displayed the book’s cover, illustrating a man and a woman looking at each other and smiling while jointly holding a white rabbit. The couple was framed by a heart made of link sausages

(Rice, 2003d).

Facing the children, Ms. Hawkins used a pointing stick to navigate the screens on the

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smartboard and draw the children’s attention to the images displayed. She began the lesson by introducing the title of the book, then asked about the picture.

Let’s go ahead and look at the picture. I see that there is a heart here, and actually, the

heart is made of sausages. [points to illustration with pointing stick] There are sausages

around here.

The children began to respond, and they had a short conversation about their experiences eating sausages. Then, Ms. Hawkins continued.

Ms. Hawkins: And I also see a man and a woman, and they’re looking at each other.

They’re looking at each other. Do you think they like each other?

Children: Yes!

Ms. Hawkins: What tells you that, Amber?

Amber: Because they have the smiles.

Ms. Hawkins: They have a smile. What do you think, Eli?

Eli: They have a bunny.

Ms. Hawkins: They do have a bunny. So, they look happy to me. He’s got his arm

around her, and I see the heart, so they must love each other. What do you think?

Eli: Oh, yes!

In this example, Ms. Hawkins displayed a visual representation and asked the children to tell her what meaning they could find. They spoke about how the couple might feel. Amber could tell they were happy by noticing the couple’s facial expressions, and Eli listened to Ms.

Hawkins’ spoken suggestion that the couple loved each other and responded by speaking aloud in agreement. This example illustrates how Ms. Hawkins used a visual mode of meaning by encouraging the children to think about, listen to, and explain their interpretations, as well as

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showing them how to look for clues in the illustration to help them deduce meaning. In just the first few moments of the story’s introduction, she integrated language and visual modes to help the children find and explain the meaning.

Although this was a reading lesson in which Ms. Hawkins’ stated intention was to focus on building children’s receptive proficiency, she gave them a chance to express their interpretations of the pictures. They translated thoughts about the illustrations into language, either their own or those of their peers before they were later asked to write them down as answers to comprehension questions about the story. They also practiced looking at the illustration’s details, which served as a model of how writers use pictures to support and extend their meaning.

Another example took place while reviewing vocabulary for this story. When Ms.

Hawkins used the word “lumberjack” to explain what a woodcutter was. When the children did not remember the word from a previous story, as she had hoped, she pantomimed a woodcutter cutting down a tree. Then, she referenced the illustration of an ax, included an onomatopoeic sound effect, “Wachoo! Wachoo!” and further explained, “You have to be really strong to chop down a tree!”

Later, after watching a vocabulary video about scouts cutting down trees in the forest,

Ms. Hawkins invited the children to participate in bringing meaning to the word one more time.

She asked the children to stand up and pretend to be a woodcutter. “Kind of like when you swing a baseball bat, you’re gonna do the same kind of motion, except, I believe, they do it a little lower,” she explained as she demonstrated the motion. Then, all the children pantomimed swinging an ax. By using pantomime and gestures jointly with illustrations, reading, and speaking during a vocabulary activity, Ms. Hawkins modeled and gave the children practice

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using alternative strategies for communication when they did not know the words.

Another way Ms. Hawkins integrated visual representations was through a visualization technique observed in a writing lesson [3/11/2019] introducing the genre of “how-tos” (i.e., procedural text). She asked the children to imagine that they would become teachers in the next week or two, and they would practice teaching things they knew how to do. “Think about that.

Close your eyes for one second. Use your brain. What is something you know how to do?” She repeated the question slowly. “What is something you know how to do?” The children closed their eyes. Ms. Hawkins waited a moment; then she said, “One, two, three. Eyes on me. Raise your hand if you would like to share. What do you know how to do?” Children raised their hands and offered responses. Ms. Hawkins often used this technique, and in so doing, she helped the children create a picture in their minds that they could describe verbally or in writing.

Mario’s Integration of Visual and Linguistic Modes of Meaning-Making. Mario also coupled visual and linguistic modes to convey meaning. He drew illustrations, gestured to others’ illustrations or images, and modeled his illustrations after seeing print images. Mario also paired circumlocution strategies by describing an item or action (Rossiter, 2005) in his writing with illustrations and pantomime to reflect his intended meaning and extend meaning during the writing process.

For example, in the culminating writing activity for The Three Wishes (Rice, 2003d), Ms.

Hawkins asked the children to imagine they were granted three wishes by an elf in the forest and invited them to write about what their wishes would be and why. For one wish, Mario wrote, “I wish for money. / So can. / be happy!” After Mario wrote the sentence, he began drawing circles in the space provided for drawing. Previously, I had seen him represent the word “a lot” by writing a number 1, followed by many zeros, so I remarked, “That looks like a big number. That

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is a lot of money! It’s zeros.” Mario quickly corrected me, “Coins!” Then I understood that

Mario might have been recreating the image in the story representing the woodcutter’s wish for money (Figure 4.1), illustrating stacks of silver coins. It appeared that Mario chose to borrow the illustrator’s representation of money and appropriate it for his own purposes. He paired the illustration with the written words to extend their meaning, and he said the word, “Coins!” to help me understand the meaning of his illustration.

Figure 4.1

Representation of Money Illustration in the Story and Mario’s Illustration of Money

After completing his illustration of money, Mario wrote, “I wish for. /a toys So. /I can be rich.” Then, he began drawing a picture of toys (Figure 4.2) represented by several shapes, including circles, ovals, and rectangles. Then, he added a smiley face with the word “yay” next to it. I asked him to tell me about the picture.

Researcher: That’s a lot of toys!

Mario: I picked them out. I wrote a word right there.

Researcher: What’s that word? [looking closer] I see. I can read it. It says, “yay.”

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Figure 4.2

Mario’s Illustration of Himself Picking out Toys and Saying, “Yay.”

In this example, Mario used spoken language to explain that the smiley face in the picture represented himself, and he was picking out toys. Mario also used written text within his illustration to convey the emotion he felt as he was picking out toys. Although I understood the shapes represented toys and “yay” meant Mario was excited, I would not have understood his intention to represent the action of picking out toys without his explanation. However, just as

Ms. Hawkins had used spoken language to point out how details in illustrations conveyed meaning, Mario used spoken language to point out how he intended the details to extend the meaning of his written words. Within the context of Ms. Hawkins’ minilesson about writing a

“how-to,” Mario slowly and deliberately wrote the “how-to” about riding a bike and used print resources, as shown in Figure 4.3.

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Figure 4.3

Mario’s “How-To” About Riding a Bike and Environmental Print Resources

When Mario had written, “First, Put a halmit. / Secind, Put Your / hand in hard / Silider. /

Last, Put Your / feet in the / hard...” he stood up and walked over to the bulletin board where the

picture of a square was displayed along with the word “square.” I called him back over to the table to ask him where he was going. “I don’t know how to spell square. It’s over there.” Mario pointed over his shoulder to the bulletin board, then scurried across the room, this time leaving his paper on the desk. He came back and wrote without speaking, “S-q-u,” then returned to the picture, checked the spelling once again, and came back to write the rest of the word, “a-r-e,” saying the letters aloud as he wrote them. When Mario finished writing, I initiated the following conversation to understand what Mario had written:

Researcher: Ok. So, what are we learning? What are you teaching me how to do?

Mario: I don’t know.

Researcher: What are the hard “siliders” and the “hard squares?”

Mario: [He points to the third picture on his “how-to” of a vertical line with a small

horizontal rectangle attached to the bottom (Figure 4.3).] These are those. [He

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pantomimes pedaling his feet.]

Researcher: Oh, they’re pedals! Pedals. OK.

Mario: And these “siliders” help you to hold on. [He points to the second picture in his

“how-to” of a slightly curved horizontal line with a tall, narrow oval attached to the

right side (Figure 4.3).]

Researcher: Handlebars. The handlebars that you hang on to with your hands? So,

you’re riding a…? Do you know what that is called in English?

Mario: Umm… [I pause, but he does not respond.]

Researcher: A bicycle?

Mario:Yeah.

Then, Mario gathered his supplies and began to transition into the next activity. As he walked to the line where the other children were gathering, he stopped by the wall where pictures of shapes were displayed, and he pointed to the cylinder (Figure 4.3). It finally became clear what he meant by “siliders;” he described the shape of a handlebar by using the word “cylinder.”

In this example, Mario used circumlocution to write about how to ride a bicycle because he did not know the English vocabulary. Instead of asking what the English words were for handlebars or pedals, he found a way to write what he wanted to write by describing the objects and pairing the descriptions with illustrations. Still, his meaning was unclear to me because he had misspelled “cylinder” as “silider.” I could not understand his pronunciation of the word or his drawings. When I asked him to extend his meaning, he used pantomime to show me he meant

“pedal,” and he gestured to a poster to show me what he meant by “silider.” Mario used the same meaning-making strategies in his writing process and product that he had seen his teacher use, specifically pantomime, gestures, and illustration.

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Ms. Hawkins’ Use of Books and Print to Facilitate Writing Instruction. As illustrated in the previous section, Ms. Hawkins used storybooks from Reading Roots (Slavin & Madden,

2010) curriculum as the foundation of her literacy instruction. She repeatedly exposed the children to the books, used books for topic ideas, and connected writing tasks to shared reading experiences.

On the first day of the instructional cycle for The Three Wishes (Rice, 2003d), Ms.

Hawkins spent at least 45 minutes preparing the children to read the book for the first time. As described in the previous examples, she used the pictures to introduce the setting, characters, and other genre features. She asked the children to make predictions, discussed the meaning of vocabulary words, and sparked conversations about the book. Then, she taught the vocabulary words using pictures, videos, and kinesthetic activities such as pantomime. Finally, she sent the children to their seats to spend time with the book by themselves.

When the children went to their seats, Ms. Hawkins asked them first to write the red words (i.e., irregularly spelled words from the story) on their marker boards and second, to find the story’s red words and highlight them. Then, the children returned to the carpet with their books and highlighters in hand, and Ms. Hawkins displayed the book on the smartboard using the document camera. Together they found red words in the story, and she highlighted any the children had missed on their own. The children then went back to their seats or found a comfortable spot in the room and read the story’s first four pages aloud to themselves. When the children had completed their reading, they returned to the carpet and took turns reading aloud and listening to their peers read aloud. Between turns reading, Ms. Hawkins asked guiding questions, pointed out the highlighted red words, and helped the children decode words or sounds they stumbled over.

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For homework, the children were assigned to read the story aloud at least once with someone at home every night of the story cycle. (As a motivator, children who completed their homework every night were invited to a special school-wide celebration that took place once each quarter.) The homework assignment gave the children even more exposure to the book. Ms.

Hawkins reminded the children that they could read the book to anyone—a parent, grandparent, sibling, neighbor, or friend. She explained that their homework partners did not have to speak

English; if their partners listened to the children read, they could sign the homework pages.

The next day, Ms. Hawkins was out and left instructions for the children to read the remainder of the book aloud and as a group as they had done with the first four pages. Then, they answered the comprehension questions at the end of the book, first orally, then in writing. On the third day, the class finished answering the comprehension and vocabulary questions at the end of the book. They did so first orally in the large group, and Ms. Hawkins guided them by showing them where to find the answers in the story, reading the passage aloud, and discussing how the passage answered the question.

Before the children were assessed on the fourth day of this instructional cycle, they read the entire book aloud to themselves once again. Then, Ms. Hawkins reviewed the setting, characters, and events of the book once again, giving them yet another chance to talk about the story on the carpet. When Ms. Hawkins sent the children to their seats to take their tests

(including answering two comprehension questions using complete sentences), she encouraged them to look for the answers in the text as they wrote.

In all, the children read the book at least twice in class to themselves, twice with the large group, and three times outside of class before they were assessed. They also spent a great deal of time talking about the book, using the book’s language, and listening to others use the language

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in the book. Ms. Hawkins hoped that the children would comprehend the meaning and learn how

the words were used in context by repeated exposure to the model text. That way, they would be

able to use the language themselves, both orally and in writing, as they wrote the answers to the

test’s comprehension questions.

Ms. Hawkins also used books as model texts to teach concepts of print. For example, when the class was reading The Three Wishes (Rice, 2003d) aloud, they came to the word,

“Chop!” Ms. Hawkins stopped, drew an exclamation mark on the whiteboard, and asked, “What

is this mark?” The children remembered that it was an exclamation mark, and it made the word

“chop” an “excited word.” Using the book as a model text to draw the children’s attention to this

print concept, Ms. Hawkins wrote “Chop!” with the exclamation mark on the whiteboard and

read the passage twice, once with expression and once without to model how the exclamation

mark impacted the meaning of the word and made the story more interesting.

Finally, Ms. Hawkins used books as a shared experience for writing. On the day before

the culminating writing activity, Mrs. Hawkins wanted the children to begin thinking beyond the

book they had studied. She read a related story as a shared activity the children could use as a

springboard for their writing. The book was a different version of the story in The Three Wishes

(Rice, 2003d) called Sausages, written by Jessica Souhami (2006) and recommended in the

Reading Roots (Slavin & Madden, 2010) curriculum as the STaR story for this lesson. As Ms.

Hawkins read the story, she paused to ask the children questions related to the genre (e.g.,

“What’s the character’s name?), compare details of the two stories (e.g., “So, they’re thinking long and hard about what their wishes were. Did they think in the other story about what they wanted?”), and invite children to make predictions (e.g., “Who wants to make a prediction of what will happen next?”). When the story ended, Ms. Hawkins moved to the easel and used a

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Venn Diagram, shown in Figure 4.4, to help the children compare and contrast the two stories and give them another chance to talk, listen, and think about the story.

Figure 4.4

Co-Created Venn Diagram Comparing The Three Wishes (Rice, 2003d) and Sausages (Souhami, 2006)

After completing the diagram, Ms. Hawkins said, “Close your eyes and quietly think.

One, two, three—open your eyes. Raise your hand. Tell me one thing. “If a little elf came up to you today and said, ‘I will give you three wishes,’ tell me one thing you would wish for.” The children took turns sharing their wishes. Some responses included, “a hoverboard,” “a unicorn,”

“slime,” “mailbox,” “a cat,” “money,” and “three-thousand-million dollars because I would get rich!” Then, Ms. Hawkins invited the children to think over the weekend about their wishes so they could write about them when they returned.

The following Monday morning, after the comprehension assessment of The Three

Wishes (Rice, 2003d), she invited them to the carpet, where she asked them to turn to face the

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easel. She began, “On the board, we’re going to need a list of things that we wish for.” She then

invited each child to share a wish and a reason why they wanted that wish; as they did so, she

made a list of their wishes on the board.

This example shows how Ms. Hawkins used the storybook as a shared activity about which the children could write. They had studied The Three Wishes (Rice, 2003d) for the previous three school days, then they read another version of the same story and discussed the similarities and differences. This step was a way for Ms. Hawkins to go beyond the book they had been reading and extend the story’s ideas to a similar story. Then she helped the children take their thinking one step further and make connections from the stories to themselves by inviting them to think about their wishes. Eventually, Ms. Hawkins asked the children to write about their three wishes.

Mario’s Use of Books and Print as Resources for Writing. Mario also used books and other printed text in his writing process. He wrote about the topics related to stories when assigned, and he used books and other print as resources for spelling and answering comprehension questions.

Mario used the teacher’s print regularly for ideas and word spelling during large group activities. For example, when writing about his three wishes, Mario consulted the list of wishes the class co-created as a pre-writing activity. After writing his first wish, “mallbox [sic],” Mario stood up and walked over to the easel to examine the list for a few minutes. When he returned to his seat, I asked, “Did that help you get some ideas?” “Yep,” he replied. He sat down, laid his head down on his arm, and wrote “m.” Then, he stood up, returned to the easel, came back to his seat, and wrote “-o-n-.” He went back to the easel one more time, and when he returned, he wrote, “-e-y” on the page.

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During another afternoon writing workshop [3/4/2019], Ms. Hawkins read Leprechaun on the Loose (Jones, 2008). Just as she had done with her reading group when they read The

Three Wishes (Rice, 2003d), the class brainstormed what they would wish for if they met a leprechaun. When the children went to their seats to practice, they completed a prewriting page, and Mario quickly wrote three sentences, but this time, he chose to wish for a tablet instead of a mailbox. He wrote, “I wish for a t-,” looked up at the easel, wrote an “a,” and repeated this pattern, writing one letter at a time, until he had written “tablet” on the page.

On my next visit, Ms. Hawkins provided materials for the children to make a construction paper leprechaun and a page that read, “I caught a leprechaun. My three wishes are….” She asked the children to look at their practice pages to remind them what they had wished. Mario seemed eager to get started. He made his way directly to his cubby to find his practice sheet, which he found in his writing folder and brought back to his seat. He looked it over and said to himself, “All right. I can do that.” He put his paper in his folder and restored it to his cubby.

When he returned to his seat, he wrote from memory, speaking the words as he did so. “I Wish for a tablet! / I wish for money! / I Wish for toys!” (Figure 4.5) In this example, Mario went back to his writing for reference, and then he easily completed the assigned writing task. Just a glance at his practice page gave him enough information to remember his ideas and spell words that, during prewriting, he had needed to copy from the board (i.e., tablet, money).

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Figure 4.5

Mario’s Pre-Writing and Final Product for Leprechaun on the Loose (Jones, 2008)

As I observed Mario’s writing process, I noticed he used books as a resource for spelling and finding answers to comprehension questions when he needed help. For example, earlier in the year, on the second day of an instructional cycle [1/22/2019-1/25/2019], the children read

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Reading Roots (Slavin & Madden, 2010) Lesson #37, Planting Seeds in May (Rice, 2003c). Ms.

Hawkins sent the children to their seats to answer four comprehension questions on the book’s last page. First, she reviewed the questions with the class and showed them where to find the answers, but she told them they were now in the second half of first grade and should answer the questions by themselves. She reminded them to use their books for help if they got stuck.

Mario took his book, pencil, and a folder to a table in the back of the room. He opened his book to the page where the questions were printed, propped up his folder around the book to shield others’ views, laid his head on his upper arm so only the back of his head was visible, and began to write the answers to the questions (see Figure 4.6).

Figure 4.6

Mario’s Comprehension Questions for Planting Seeds in May (Rice, 2003c) [1/23/2019]

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Mario did not look back in the book to use as a resource for the first question, but I saw him turn back pages while writing the answer to the second question, “How did Fran help Vick?”

The print in the story read, “…Fran yanked grass and tossed it in the pail” (Rice, 2003b, p. 4).

Mario wrote, “by Put the grass in. / the Pail.” He also looked back in the book as he was writing the answer to the fifth question, “Why did the children get raincoats?” The book read, “‘Let’s get our raincoats,’ said Vick. ‘We can plant the seeds in the rain!’” Mario wrote, “theY can Plant the. / Seeds in the rain.” The similarity of the sentence found in the book and Mario’s response suggests he found the answer to the question by using the book as a resource. I asked Mario why he looked back in the book in the following exchange:

Researcher: Can you tell me what you were thinking about when you were going back

to the book?

Mario: I was going to the last page.

Researcher: You were going to the last page? Why?

Mario: So, I could spell the word plant.

These examples demonstrate how Mario used books as resources for spelling and responding to comprehension questions. Mario seemed to find Ms. Hawkins’ strategy of using the storybooks as a resource for writing useful in completing the tasks she required of him.

Although she reminded the whole group to use their books, Mario did so without any additional prompting as he wrote.

Although Mario seemed adept at finding available resources to help him write, I never observed him using the word wall. Ms. Hawkins had displayed 30 of the 199 Red Words on the back cabinets; however, I did not observe Mario using the word wall as a resource, nor did I observe Ms. Hawkins directing students’ attention to the word wall. Using the word wall did not

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seem to be one of this classroom community’s regular practices.

Ms. Hawkins and Mario Using Scaffolding, Tools, and Strategies

Much of Ms. Hawkins’ instruction seemed to teach the children how to understand and convey messages about something they had learned (e.g., the events of a story) or their own ideas (e.g., three wishes). To do this, she scaffolded the lessons and gave the children tools and strategies to support their writing. She modeled the writing process, made connections from prior knowledge to new learning, and frequently offered structured graphic organizers. Mario responded by closely following the teacher’s model, exhibiting varied levels of connection to new learning, and following the graphic organizer’s structure.

Ms. Hawkins’ Explicit Instruction. One strategy Ms. Hawkins used before inviting the children to write was explicit instruction, mainly by modeling the writing process. After the class co-created a list of wishes in the culminating writing activity for The Three Wishes (Rice,

2003d), Ms. Hawkins modeled the writing process before sending the children to their seats to write. She modeled how writers think about and organize ideas. She also demonstrated how writers make choices about expressing their ideas, putting them onto the page, and drawing pictures to extend their ideas.

When the brainstorming activity with the list of wishes (see Figure 4.7) was complete,

Ms. Hawkins asked the children to turn toward the front of the room and face the smartboard. In the graphic organizer she displayed (see Figure 4.7), “My Three Wishes” appeared across the top of the page, and below were three blank clouds. She explained, “I’m going to give you a paper.

Your paper has three little clouds on it, and I want you to think of three things to wish for. I’m going to give you my example. I’m going to wish for money.”

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Figure 4.7

Ms. Hawkins Graphic Organizer for “My Three Wishes” Model.

Ms. Hawkins wrote “money” in the first cloud and continued to fill in the graphic organizer offering a reason for each wish. Then, she displayed another graphic organizer, also in

Figure 4.7. The page’s left side showed three empty boxes, meant for illustrations, and to each box’s right were six horizontal lines for text. Ms. Hawkins modeled the writing process by thinking aloud as she wrote.

Ms. Hawkins: You may draw a picture of each thing, and then I want you to write me

what you’re wishing for and why you are wishing for it. So, the first thing I want is

money. [makes a dollar sign in the first box; writes on the lines as she speaks] I-will-

wish-for-money-so-I-can-be-rich.

Gregory: Oh, snap!

Ms. Hawkins: Yep, so I can be rich, and then I don’t have to work anymore, and I can

stay home and just… OK, let me tell you. I wish for a healthy family. So, here are my

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three kids.

Ms. Hawkins: I-wish-my-kids-will-be… [stops writing and looks at the class] What’s

rule number one when we’re writing?

Ruby: We have to be quiet.

Ms. Hawkins: Because can I write anything when it’s loud?

Children: No!

Ms. Hawkins: Make sure you’re quiet when I’m writing. I wish my kids were healthy

because I love them. [writes as she repeats] I-love-them. And which number was what?

Children: Number 2!

Ms. Hawkins: [moves to the third box] Let me draw a koala here. [draws a koala; writes

as she speaks] I-wish-I-had-a-koala-because-they-are-so-cute!

Children: CUTE!

Ms. Hawkins: So those are my three wishes. I drew a picture. My picture matches my

words, I wrote what I wished for, and I wrote why I wished for it. I’m not just going to

say money, kids, koala. I added lots of details and information.

In this example, Ms. Hawkins modeled how to organize the topic’s details by writing one detail in each cloud. She then began drawing an illustration, a dollar sign ($), which represented the word she had written in the first cloud, money. As she drew, she explained that she wanted them to write what they wished for and why. When the children were getting excited and started to chat, Ms. Hawkins turned what seemed to be an opportunity for classroom management into a teaching opportunity, “Can I write anything when it’s loud?” She modeled how writers sometimes need quiet so they can think clearly.

I also observed Ms. Hawkins use this technique during the previously cited lesson on

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writing “how-tos,” in which she used visualization, asking the children to close their eyes and create a mental image of something they knew how to do. In this lesson, she placed a graphic organizer for “how-tos” on the document camera. Ms. Hawkins’ objective for this lesson was to model writing in a new genre and have the children begin practicing. She began, “For the next week or two, you are going to become a teacher. What does a teacher do? What is something you know how to do?” Ms. Hawkins asked the children to close their eyes and think about her question as she repeated it.

In this example, Ms. Hawkins modeled a vital part of the writing process and asked the children to participate alongside her. Together, they took some quiet time, without distractions, to stop and think about what they wanted to write. The children responded by quieting down, stilling their bodies, closing their eyes, and thinking. In so doing, they matched their energy level to their teacher’s, readied themselves to learn, and participated in the writing process with their teacher.

These two episodes and the prewriting activities show how Ms. Hawkins modeled several writing processes. She demonstrated how writers take time to think, brainstorm ideas, organize ideas, turn ideas into language that has meaning, write the language on the page, and use pictures to extend meaning.

Mario’s Response to Explicit Instruction. Mario participated in a writing process that closely emulated Ms. Hawkins’ model, and he created written products that looked like his teacher’s. He used the teacher’s models to check for spelling, ideas, and structure. As the semester progressed and Mario seemed more comfortable with me, I noticed him providing oral commentary and posing questions to himself as he drew pictures and wrote the words. Mario might have spoken aloud for my benefit because he anticipated my questions, but he might also

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have been “thinking aloud,” as he had seen Ms. Hawkins do. Furthermore, Mario re-read his work, self-corrected, and took time to stop and think in the way Ms. Hawkins had modeled.

In another lesson, during an afternoon writing workshop [3/12/2019], Ms. Hawkins modeled writing a “how-to” on the topic of brushing teeth. She showed a short video reminding the children of the steps and then co-created, with the class, a list of other things the children knew how to do. Next, Ms. Hawkins wrote a “how-to” on the graphic organizer displayed on the smartboard with the document camera. She thought aloud and spoke as she wrote, creating the model in Figure 4.8. “First, put toothpaste on my brush. Next, brush teeth. Last, spit and rinse.”

She did not say the sentences aloud before writing them on the page, but she did so as she wrote.

She also added commas after first, next, and last on the model, but she did not mention to the class how introductory words or commas are used in English print. She told the children they could write about anything they chose; it did not have to be about brushing teeth or anything else from their list. These were just ideas to get them started.

Mario watched the video attentively with his gaze on the screen, hands in his lap, and body still. He did not contribute verbally as the children brainstormed ideas, nor when Ms.

Hawkins was writing the model. After Mario moved to his seat to write, he wrote his name on his paper (Figure 4.8) then sat for a few minutes with his head lying on his arm, staring into space. He wrote, “First,” then paused for a few moments. In my role as a participant-observer, I asked a question to help him get started.

Researcher: What are you going to do first?

Mario: [to himself] Let’s see. [looks at the model on the smartboard and begins to write,

“put”]

Researcher: Are you just going to write what she wrote?

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Mario: Yep!

Researcher: OK.

Mario: [begins to write “toothpaste;” lifts head up to look at the smartboard] Oh!

Toothpaste is a long word! [erases “put”] Toothpaste is a long word! It’s a long, long

word! I can’t even spell that!

Researcher: You can’t spell toothpaste?

Mario: [rewrites “put” a bit larger] Nope. It’s so super-duper long! It’s just spelled on

the smartboard. It’s super-duper big! [looks at the smartboard and writes “toothpaste,”

saying each sound aloud as he does so]

Researcher: So, are all long words hard to spell?

Mario: Yep. [reads “toothpaste” from his page; says each word aloud before he writes

it on the page] …on …your … tooth …tooth … toothbrush. [says something inaudible as

he draws a toothbrush]

Figure 4.8

Ms. Hawkins’ Model and Mario’s Subsequent Product for How to Brush Teeth

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In this example, Mario closely emulated his teacher’s model. He began by sitting quietly and thinking before he began writing. Once Mario decided to use the teacher’s idea and write about brushing teeth, he used her model to write the text and draw the pictures. Mario wrote

“First,” including a comma, just as the teacher had, although I saw nothing to indicate he knew why the comma was there or whether it changed the meaning in any way. He used the teacher’s model to spell the word “toothpaste” and commented on the word’s size, but he spelled the rest of the words independently. Mario wrote “tooth bush,” a word as long as “toothpaste,” which follows a similar spelling pattern, without rechecking the model. He followed the same text and sentence structure his teacher had (i.e., a sequence of tasks using transition words written in the imperative) and spoke the sounds and words aloud as he wrote, just like his teacher had done.

Mario also emulated Ms. Hawkins’ illustrations of a toothbrush containing toothpaste, a mouth full of teeth with a toothbrush next to it, and many lines above a circle to indicate spitting into the sink. Mario did veer from the illustrations in the model somewhat by drawing a sink where the spit was going instead of a face with spit coming out as Ms. Hawkins had done.

Ms. Hawkins’ Connections. In addition to modeling the writing process, Ms. Hawkins made explicit connections from students’ prior knowledge and experiences to new learning. I repeatedly observed this strategy as she explored The Three Wishes (Rice, 2003d) with the children and prepared them to write about it. For example, when talking about the setting, Ms.

Hawkins reminded the students of another story they had read, set in Sweden, to connect to previous school experience. Then, when explaining the fairy tale genre’s features, she reminded them of a familiar out-of-school experience.

Ms. Hawkins explained that The Three Wishes (Rice, 2003d) was a fairytale, a made-up story with magic. She reminded the children that Frozen (Del Vecho et al., 2013), the popular

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Disney movie with which the children were familiar, was also a fairytale because it was a made- up story with magic. The children chatted for a bit about Frozen’s (Del Vecho et al., 2013) magic, and Ms. Hawkins reminded them that real people could not turn things to ice. She picked up a nearby pair of scissors and asked rhetorically, “Can I touch this pair of scissors and turn it into ice?” Although a few children protested, Ms. Hawkins insisted, “No, it’s not possible. So,

Elsa, Anna—a fairytale; they are magic.”

Ms. Hawkins made similar connections as she read Sausages (Souhami, 2006); she asked questions to guide the children’s thinking back to the familiar story, The Three Wishes (Rice,

2003d). For example, “So, they’re thinking long and hard about what their wishes were. Did they think in the other story about what they wanted?” Then, Ms. Hawkins facilitated the comparison exercise with the Venn Diagram described previously (see Figure 4.4) to help the children notice the two stories’ details and make connections between them. In this exercise, the children practiced connecting the less familiar story to the more familiar one.

In this same example, Ms. Hawkins continued to build connections by asking the children to imagine themselves in the story and think about what they would do. “If a little elf came up to you today and said, ‘I will give you three wishes,’ tell me one thing you would wish for.” By asking the children to imagine themselves in the story, she was going beyond building connections to a familiar story; she asked the children to connect the characters and events in the story to themselves. She demonstrated by making a connection to her own life, “I wish that my kids were all really, really, really, really healthy!” Then, Ms. Hawkins asked the children to go home and think about what they might wish.

When the children returned after the weekend, Ms. Hawkins again asked them to share their wishes. However, this time, she asked them to name their wish and say why they wanted it,

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building upon their previous classroom experience and adding a new element; thereby,

strengthening the connection. Together, they made a list, and she gave everyone a chance to offer

an idea. As the class co-created their list of wishes, the children gave suggestions of their genuine, sincere wishes, with everyone contributing. They did not wish for gold or sausages like the characters in the story; they wished for things relevant to their own lives like computers, slime, money, and a sparkly bow.

In the example, Ms. Hawkins began with a story that was a compulsory piece of the school curriculum and helped the children connect from idea to idea until they had a whole list of ideas they could build upon as they wrote. Furthermore, because she set the activity in a large group setting and required each child to give a wish and a reason, their ideas triggered even more ideas, and they began making connections to each other’s ideas.

Mario’s Connections. Mario made connections to some of the topics Ms. Hawkins assigned, but his connection-level was often difficult to discern. He usually waited for others to respond to questions, and when he spoke, he did so very softly. His connections to the assignment became more evident as I observed him write or when he told me about his drawings or text, but it was rarely evident in the written product itself. Furthermore, Mario’s level of connection seemed to vary according to the topic. I observed him both rush and prolong assignments about topics in which he had little interest. However, he seemed very interested in the writing assignment about The Three Wishes (Rice, 2003d) when he told the class he wished for a mailbox in the earlier example.

Recall that in the culminating writing activity for The Three Wishes (Rice, 2003d), Ms.

Hawkins asked the children to imagine an elf granted them three wishes in the forest. Just as they had done previously, Ms. Hawkins sat at the easel and asked each of the children to offer an idea

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to add to a list of possible wishes, but this time she asked them to give a reason. When she came to Mario, Ms. Hawkins asked, “All right, Mario, what do you wish for?” Mario did not respond right away, so after a moment, she asked again. “What do you wish for?” She paused and gave him a chance to think. Then she asked, “You want me to come back to you?” Mario nodded, so she moved on to someone else. Several more children responded. “A hot dog because it’s so yummy!” “A squishy because it’s squishy, and it smells good!” “A sparkly bow because it’s pretty.” Then Ms. Hawkins returned to Mario. “Mario, did you think of anything?” Mario hesitated a moment, so she invited another child to respond. Soon, Mario was ready and got Ms.

Hawkins’ attention by raising his hand.

Ms. Hawkins: Did you think of something?

Mario: [very quietly] A mailbox.

Ms. Hawkins: What? Say it loud so they can hear you?

Mario: [louder] A mailbox.

Ms. Hawkins: A mailbox? Why’s that?

Mario: [quietly] So I can get mail.

Ms. Hawkins: Ooh! I love getting mail! [writes “mailbox” on the board] Mailbox—

Hey! People might send you money in the mail!

Gregory: Oh, snap! [Other children begin to chatter and comment on Mario’s idea.]

“Ooh! A mailbox!” “I have a mailbox!”

Mario’s answer was unique from all the others—a mailbox. It seemed that Mario had connected to the idea of making wishes and the importance of being careful and not wasting his wish on something foolish. Ms. Hawkins’ reaction to Mario’s suggestion went beyond the connection Mario had made with the story, and she made a connection to him by responding

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with enthusiasm to his important wish: “Ooh! I love getting mail!” Then, she connected Mario’s idea to ideas other children had shared. “Hey! People might send you money in the mail!” Other children began to connect to Mario’s idea, “Oh, Snap!” “Ooh! A mailbox!” “I have a mailbox!”

As he wrote and drew pictures for that same assignment, Mario’s verbal comments demonstrated enthusiasm about the topic. When he returned to his seat to write, Mario began to write his wishes in the clouds of the graphic organizer shown in Figure 4.7. I wanted to learn more about how he decided to write about a mailbox.

Researcher: You had a hard time answering. [Mario ignores me and writes “mallbox”

in the first cloud] Mailbox… [laughing; goes to the front and studies the class list of

wishes then returns to his seat] Did that help you get some ideas?

Mario: Yep! [smiling and moving furtively]

Researcher: You’re happy? Are you happy?

Mario: Yep! [writes “money” in the second cloud and “new toys” in the third cloud]

Researcher: Some kind of toys, new toys. [Mario writes the number one with many

zeros behind it to indicate an enormous number.] Just a whole bunch of toys. Cool…

[laughing] Okay, do you want a bazillion new toys?

Mario: Yes! [turns the graphic organizer over and draws a mailbox and writes, “I Will

Wish. /for a mallbox. / so I can. /S(g)et mall.”]

Mario’s enthusiasm for this assignment was evidenced by his smile, increased speed, and increased chatter about his writing. Mario’s interest in the topic was also demonstrated by the following conversation that occurred when I asked him about his punctuation in the sentence, “I

Wish for money. / So can. / Be happy!”

Researcher: Why did you put an exclamation point?

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Mario: Because I’m excited.

Researcher: Because you’re excited to get a lot of money?

Mario:Yep!

By evaluating his written product, I was unable to discern how connected he was to the

topic. However, by observing his response to Ms. Hawkins’s instruction and his writing process,

it became evident that his connection was strong. On this day, Mario seemed especially excited

about his topic. When Mario’s connection to the assignment seemed weaker, he often appeared

to rush or prolong the work, as in the previous example of Mario writing about his three wishes

after reading Leprechaun on the Loose (Jones, 2008) (Figure 4.5). He wrote a practice page for the assignment, and he completed the writing portion of the leprechaun project very quickly without much thought. He was writing a similar assignment for the third time. Besides, Mario

seemed very eager to finish the writing so he could start constructing the leprechaun. When he

began that portion of the activity, he became quite chatty, moved quickly, and smiled and

laughed until his leprechaun was finished. Mario was the first in the class to finish. Although he

enjoyed the activity, he seemed to connect more to the craft project than the writing.

In contrast, I occasionally observed Mario prolong assignments about which he seemed

confused or less connected. On March 15, Ms. Hawkins showed an interactive video about St.

Patrick’s Day. Mario watched the video attentively and shouted out responses to the

comprehension questions posed periodically throughout the interactive presentation. When it was

finished, Ms. Hawkins switched gears. She gave a short review lesson on writing “how-tos,”

using the example of riding a bike—a topic about which Mario had already written and possibly

did not want to write about again.

When the children went back to their seats, they had about ten minutes to write

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something, and Mario seemed to struggle. He wrote, “First,” then stopped to think. After a few

moments, to help spark some ideas, I asked, “What are you going to teach?” He mumbled

something inaudible, then moved his pencil down to the second set of lines on the page and

wrote, “Second,” then he stopped writing, audibly gasped, and rubbed his head. He stopped to

watch some children at another table, then pointed at them and said, “Over there.” I asked,

“What?” He responded, “I’m watching them.” When I turned my attention to other children at

his table who were sword fighting with their crayons, Mario sat up straight, put his fists in the

air, then dropped them and his forehead down on the table with an audible bang. When I did not

respond, he addressed the two other children at his table and said, “Look at the red bag over

there! See the red bag!” After a few minutes of distractions, Mario finally began to write. He

wrote, “St. Petricks is green thing.” Then, he drew a picture of a shirt in the box left of the lines

meant for an illustration.

On this day, Mario attentively watched and interacted with the video about St. Patrick’s

Day, but when asked to write a “how-to,” he seemed to have trouble connecting the video to writing in the genre. Ms. Hawkins did not intend the children to write a “how-to” about St.

Patrick’s Day, but Mario either misunderstood the assignment or had not connected to any other topics. As a result, he was uncharacteristically distracted by other things around him and had trouble getting started writing. When he finally began writing, he wrote information he had learned from the video about St. Patrick’s Day rather than how to perform a task. Mario seemed to struggle with the assignment, possibly because he had not connected to the material in the short review lesson about writing “how-tos.” Instead, he connected to the video information and did not seem to know how to translate that material into a “how-to.” When contrasted with the other examples given in which Mario did seem to make connections to the material, he relied

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heavily on Ms. Hawkins to make explicit connections for the children and have enough time to think.

Ms. Hawkins’s Use of Graphic Organizers. Some of the tools Ms. Hawkins used to scaffold writing instruction were graphic organizers. The graphic organizers she provided were specific to the writing task—its genre and defined objective. For example, after the children read

The Ice Storm (Livingston, 2003) [1/10/2019], Ms. Hawkins’ objective was to assess how the children comprehended the story and how they used English print to convey meaning in a sentence. The genre (responding to comprehension questions) called for children to provide specific information about a book they had read. The goal was for the children to demonstrate comprehension of the events in the story rather than express their own ideas (e.g., “Why did school close?” “Why did the lights blink off?”); however, meaning-making was necessary for the children to provide the required information. In this case, Ms. Hawkins gave the children a graphic organizer that posed a question and provided lines on which to write the response.

In another example, in an afternoon writing workshop [1/18/2019], Ms. Hawkins’ objective was to teach the children a few basic drawing concepts, have the children draw a picture, and write a sentence or two about the pictures. She provided a graphic organizer that showed six boxes on the top of the page, with each box showing the next step in drawing a pig.

Below was a large box where the children were to draw a picture of a pig. Under the large box were a few lines for children to write something about a pig. The graphic organizer was highly structured and corresponded with the assignment’s objective.

Finally, in the culminating writing activity for The Three Wishes (Rice, 2003d), Ms.

Hawkins used the graphic organizer with the clouds and stars on one side and boxes and lines on the next page (shown previously in Figure 4.7). She showed how writers organize ideas with just

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a word or two in a prewriting activity and then systematically expand those ideas into full sentences. By providing graphic organizers, Ms. Hawkins gave the children a tool to visualize the steps involved in a writing task and a genre’s structure.

Mario’s Use of Graphic Organizers. Mario followed the structure of the graphic organizers in every example I observed (Figure 4.9). When responding to the comprehension questions for The Ice Storm (Livingston, 2003), he answered each question on the lines provided.

When learning to draw a pig and write about it, he drew the pig in the space provided, following each step, and then he wrote a sentence, “The pigs like. / mud!” Finally, when Mario wrote the assignment for The Three Wishes (Rice, 2003d), he understood that the clouds on the front page should correspond with the boxes on the back page; thus, he maintained his teacher’s desired structure for the assignment with the help of the graphic organizer.

Figure 4.9

Mario’s Graphic Organizers

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Social Activities and Engagement

Ms. Hawkins provided socially constructed literacy activities in which the children could

participate daily. For example, she created opportunities for young EL children to talk during all

writing process phases. Moreover, she subscribed to a writing workshop approach, which includes social interaction as one of its tenets. As mentioned, Mario was a quiet child and seemed to prefer to keep to himself, so he engaged minimally with others. Nevertheless, he participated in the required talking activities and the writing workshop in ways unique to him.

Ms. Hawkins’ Opportunities for Talk. Ms. Hawkins created many opportunities for children to speak about their books or other experiences. She sparked group discussions by asking questions, invited children to engage in pair-talk activities, and had them read aloud.

During writing practice, she arranged seating in groups at tables where children sat face-to-face; she allowed chatter amongst the children, encouraged them to ask each other for help, and allowed them to speak in their language of choice.

Ms. Hawkins often sparked a conversation by reminding the children of a shared experience—or one she knew they had had individually—or by displaying a visual representation and asking related questions. The children then shared their ideas and listened to their peers, and the learning became synergized by the social context within which it occurred. In the following introduction of vocabulary words used in The Three Wishes (Rice, 2003d), Ms.

Hawkins showed pictures coupled with the words in print; then, she said each word, asked the children to repeat it and offered a brief explanation or question about the word. For the picture of a man with a beard, the teacher tried to convey the meaning of the vocabulary word “beard” by talking about Santa’s beard and then discussed the meaning of the vocabulary word “elf” in the following exchange:

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Ms. Hawkins: Beards—men can grow beards. Well, why does Santa Claus have a very

large beard?

Gertie: What’s this part? [points to space above her lip and under her nose]

Ms. Hawkins: The part below your nose? A man can grow it just like a beard; it’s a

mustache, but there must be something about a beard in this story. [changes to the next

slide]

Felipe: [points to the picture on the smartboard] Is that an elf?

Ms. Hawkins: Yeah, elves are usually teeny tiny. Do you think elves are real?

Children: [they disagree] No! Yes! Yes, they are magic!

Ms. Hawkins: I’ve never seen an elf.

[children debate the magical nature of elves]

Melanie: I saw an elf in Santa’s workshop!

Ms. Hawkins: Yeah, Santa supposedly has a bunch of little elves that help him, and have

you guys... have you guys ever seen a rainbow?

Children: Yes! Yeah! I saw one at the park!

Ms. Hawkins: They say at the end the rainbow is a type of an elf—a leprechaun, and if

you find him, you’ll have a big pot of gold. I’ve never seen it…

Paulo: [calls out excitedly] I…I saw him!

Ms. Hawkins: …so I don’t know.

Paulo: He made a mess at my house!

In this verbal exchange, Gertie’s question gave Ms. Hawkins a chance to explain the meaning of another related word (i.e., mustache) that did not appear in the story. Then, when an elf picture appeared, Felipe recognized and named it. Ms. Hawkins’ response to Felipe, asking if

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elves are real, sparked someone to assert they were not only real but magical. An impromptu discussion ensued among the children about whether elves were, indeed, magical. Melanie offered evidence by referring to the original discussion about Santa, explaining that elves must be real because she saw one! The picture of the elf was not a Christmas elf, so as an observer, I had not made the connection to Santa Claus and was surprised when Melanie did. I assumed her idea was connected to Ms. Hawkins’ earlier reference to Santa Claus’ beard. Melanie’s comment seemed to spark another thought in Ms. Hawkins; there are distinct types of elves, like leprechauns, which made her think about a rainbow. So, she asked about a rainbow, which sparked, for one child, a visit to the park where a rainbow appeared, and Ms. Hawkins added the bit about the leprechaun and a pot of gold. Paulo insisted that he had seen a leprechaun who had

“messed up [his] house!”

After Felipe identified the elf, Ms. Hawkins could have moved on to the next slide and the next word, but instead, she chose to entertain a brief conversation. This example is just one of many I observed in Ms. Hawkins’ classroom. The conversation jumped from topic to topic. What might have been a quick and simple definition of a vocabulary word became a dynamic exchange of ideas about topics that mattered to the children. By sharing their ideas and listening to others’ ideas, the children went beyond the simple activity of defining words and made powerful connections to their own and each other’s experiences. The children had a chance to listen to new vocabulary being used or try to use it themselves before being asked to use it in their writing.

Ms. Hawkins also invited the children to participate in pair-talk activities. To illustrate,

Ms. Hawkins reviewed the comprehension questions for Reading Roots (Slavin & Madden,

2010) Lesson 37, Planting Seeds in May (Rice, 2003c) [1/23/19] before sending the children to

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their group tables to write their responses. She followed a “think-pair-share” pattern in which she posed the question, asked the children to turn to their “knee partner” to find the answer in the book and discuss it, then asked for volunteers to share the answer with the group. If a child struggled to answer the question, she encouraged them to ask their partner for help. Ms. Hawkins asked, “Why was Vick in a hurry to plant the seeds?” Mario turned to his partner Felipe; they chatted, looked in their books, and pointed, then clasped their hands together and raised them in the air to indicate they were ready. After a few moments, when more children had raised their hands, Ms. Hawkins asked Felipe to answer.

Ms. Hawkins: Felipe, without starting with the word “because,” why did Vick hurry to

plant his seeds? Remember, you can always ask your partner. [waited a few moments as

Felipe thought then stared up at her blankly] Can you help him out, Mario? Why was he

in a hurry?

Mario: Because it was gonna rain soon.

Ms. Hawkins: It was! Can you say that sentence without using the word “because”? Try

again.

Mario: It was gonna rain soon.

Ms. Hawkins: Kiss your brain! That was perfect! [Mario responds with a grin.]

In this example, Ms. Hawkins gave the children time to think about the response, work

with their partners to talk about and find the answer in their books, and then invited them to

share. Felipe and Mario had already found the answer, but when Felipe was asked to share it

with the group, he seemed to draw a blank. Ms. Hawkins asked his partner, Mario, to “help him

out” by offering the correct response.

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Mario’s Opportunities for Talk. Mario did not take advantage of the myriad opportunities to talk afforded him. When I observed, he engaged only minimally in conversations with peers, adults, or the group. I have intentionally used “engaged” to describe

Mario’s social interactions rather than “participate” because I do not mean to imply that he did not participate fully in the classroom community, nor that he participated on the periphery.

Instead, Mario’s level of participation in the classroom community was not necessarily evidenced by his use of oral language with other people.

During group discussions, Mario usually directed his gaze toward wherever the action was taking place (e.g., his teacher, another speaker, the smartboard). He occasionally answered questions posed to the whole group, which required a group response. Mario often waited for others to respond and volunteered answers only when his teacher called on him, usually giving a correct response, like when answering questions about Planting Seeds in May (Rice, 2003c) with

Felipe in the previous example. Nonetheless, he rarely raised his hand to volunteer, and when he did speak, he spoke very softly, causing his teacher or me to ask him to speak up.

While most children chatted about what they would write as they practiced writing at their tables with their peers, Mario generally stayed very quiet and focused on his writing. While writing the second assignment about three wishes, for example, (“I caught a leprechaun. My three wishes are…;” Figure 4.5), Mario diligently focused on writing—so much so that he missed some of the teacher’s additional instructions. After Mario checked his prewriting to remind himself of his three wishes, he put it in his cubby and returned to the table where Gertie and Ruby, his tablemates, were chatting with me about what they would write. I tried to respond to their questions generally and redirect them to their task, so they would feel comfortable with, but not distracted by, my presence.

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Gertie: I want slime, make-up, and money.

Researcher: Slime, make-up, and money.

Ruby: Three things I want—and actually, I’m going to get two because two is enough for

slime.

Researcher: OK. It sounds like you have some good ideas on how to start writing your

paper.

Gertie: Me too!

Researcher: Mario, do you have some ideas?

Mario: [He ignores my question. He kneels on his chair, lies with his chest on the table,

and rests his left cheek on his left hand. He speaks aloud as he writes.] I-wish-for-a-tablet

Ms. Hawkins asked all the children to stop what they were doing and look at her as she explained what to do when they finished writing and demonstrated how to construct the leprechaun. Mario did not look up; instead, he stayed focused on his writing and continued to speak aloud as he wrote. Ms. Hawkins continued, “You can use my model to help you.” At that,

Mario looked up at Ms. Hawkins, looked over at the easel where her model leprechaun sat, and back at Ms. Hawkins as she showed the children the leprechaun’s shoes and hat. Mario began writing again before Ms. Hawkins was finished, quickly finished up, and hurriedly drew illustrations in the row of boxes at the bottom of the page.

As Mario’s tablemates continued to chat with each other, ask me questions, and chat with

Ms. Hawkins, who stopped by to check the children’s progress, Mario stayed focused on his drawings, seemingly oblivious to anything else happening around him. When he finished, he stood up and said to his tablemates, “So now what should I do?” He had been busy writing when

Ms. Hawkins had given the instructions.

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In this example, Mario used oral language to speak the words aloud, as he wrote.

However, he ignored me when I asked him a question, avoided a conversation with his peers,

missed the instructions Ms. Hawkins gave about how to proceed when they finished writing and

did not engage with his teacher when she was nearby, as his peers did. Mario seemed to have a

keen ability to focus on the task at hand and ignore distractions, which served him well in many

ways. However, his tendency to keep to himself caused him to miss some opportunities to talk

that might have also helped his writing.

Ms. Hawkins Use of Writing Workshop. According to Ms. Hawkins, the first-grade teachers were given the freedom to conduct afternoon writing sessions in whatever way they deemed most appropriate for their students. It was suggested (but not required) they follow

Calkins’ (1994) Writing Workshop model, and Ms. Hawkins writing instruction was aligned with this approach. She began with a five to 10-minute minilesson, conferred with students, provided extended time to practice writing, conferred with individual children, and occasionally invited children to share their work with the class.

In a short minilesson to her homeroom [afternoon of 3/11/2019], Ms. Hawkins introduced writing in the “how-to” genre. After asking the children to close their eyes, think about something they knew how to do, and eliciting a few responses, she decided to write about

“How to Build a Snowman.” She displayed a graphic organizer (Figure 4.10) on the document camera with three squares drawn vertically down the left margin for illustrations and four horizontal lines next to each box to write the words. She explained to the children that she wanted them to start jotting down ideas of things they knew how to do on this day. She printed her name and date on the paper, then she pointed out the parts of the graphic organizer and explained what each box or line was for.

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Ms. Hawkins: Here is a box where you can write your illustrations, and then next to

them, on the lines, is where you can write the steps of “How-to.” I bet you guys know

how to make a snowman. I’m going to write about how to make a snowman. So, I am

going to write a sentence for each step. I'm going to make it three steps, and then I’m

going to draw my picture. So, “First, make three balls." [writes as she speaks; draws

three varied-sized circles in the square next to the lines] You need a big one, a medium

one, and a small one. “Next, stack the balls." [writes as she speaks; draws three varied-

sized circles, one atop the next] So, the big one, the middle one, and the little one. And

then, “Last, add a nose, arms, and eyes." [writes the sentence then draws a nose, arms,

and eyes to the snowman]

Melanie: And a hat.

Ms. Hawkins: And if you want to, add a hat [draws a hat on the snowman]. That is how

you make a snowman.

Figure 4.10

Ms. Hawkins’ Model of a “How-To”

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This mini-lesson took about six-and-a-half minutes, during which Ms. Hawkins explained what a “how-to” was, described the structure of the graphic organizer, and modeled the process of writing in the new genre. Then, consistent with a writing workshop approach, she sent the children to their seats for time to practice.

When the children moved from the minilesson to individual practice, some sat at tables of four with two children on each side of the table facing each other. Others sat or lay on the carpet by themselves or with one or more other children. Still others sat by themselves at a desk or table away from the group. Ms. Hawkins allowed the children to choose where in the classroom they wanted to write. Although children were responsible for completing their individual writing assignments, the seating configuration encouraged children to work together and use each other as a resource for their writing. Ms. Hawkins told the children, “If you need some help, you can talk to me, or you can talk to a friend to give you some ideas.”

During writing practice, Ms. Hawkins typically chatted with children one-on-one or in small groups about their writing. On this particular afternoon, she also walked around the room and conferred with the children. Ms. Hawkins did not confer with Mario, though, because he was timid, and she was wary of too many adults watching him; she wanted him to feel comfortable as he wrote. Nevertheless, I observed her confer with other students. On this day, most conferences with the children were aimed at generating topic ideas that were individual to them, as in the following exchange between Ms. Hawkins and Ana.

Ms. Hawkins: Ana, do you know how to put your shoes on?

Ana: No.

Ms. Hawkins: I can tell because you haven’t worn ‘em all day. [They both smile.] Do

you know how to put your hair in a ponytail?

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Ana: No.

Ms. Hawkins: Do you know how to paint your fingernails?

Ana: No.

Ms. Hawkins: Do you know how to make slime?

Ana: Yes! Yes!

Ms. Hawkins: You could write about that.

Sometimes, Ms. Hawkins circulated around the room, stopping at tables to talk with the children as she did with Ana. Other times, she invited a small group of purposefully selected children, usually about five, to sit with her at a table as they wrote. She did this during the reading group, when the children were writing about what they would like to do on a snow day as a culminating writing activity for Reading Roots (Slavin & Madden, 2010) Lesson 34, The Ice

Storm (Livingston, 2003) [1/10/2019].

After having a short conversation about ice skating, Ms. Hawkins said, “OK, now, let’s look at our writing." She leaned in to look closely at Miguel’s paper. “Now, as I’m looking at this, you have your words both spelled correctly, which is great, but I can’t tell where your sentence begins because I only see lower-case letters." Miguel looked up, smiled, then erased the first letter of the sentence, and changed it to uppercase.

Toward the end of the session, Ms. Hawkins conferred with Alexandra about her composition.

Ms. Hawkins: Tell me if this makes sense. [reads from Alexandra’s paper] "I like to go

ice skating." That sounds like a good sentence. "Because my mom likes to go." Do we

start with because?

Alexandra: No.

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Ms. Hawkins: No, so how can you change your sentence?

Alexandra: [picks up the eraser and erases “because”]

Ms. Hawkins: Good, you can just erase it. Now let's look at this sentence. “Ice skating."

Is that sentence “ice skating,” or is that just a word?

Alexandra: A word.

Ms. Hawkins: OK. See if you can make that into a sentence.

Alexandra: [works for a few minutes while Ms. Hawkins confers with another child]

Ms. Hawkins: [returns to Alexandra and points to a sentence on her paper] Now, read

that sentence again, Alexandra.

Alexandra: “I like to go ice skating. My mom likes to go ice skating. My family likes to

go ice skating.”

These exchanges illustrate how Ms. Hawkins strategically divided her attention among a few children and conferred with them individually while the others worked.

Sharing writing with the class is another part of the writing workshop model. I observed

Ms. Hawkins invite children to share their writing with the group only once during an afternoon writing workshop [1/18/2019] when some of the children asked to share the illustration and composition they had completed earlier that week about a present. Eli was the first to volunteer, so Ms. Hawkins invited him to the front of the room and displayed his paper on the document camera for the class to see. After Eli read his sentence, Ms. Hawkins said, “Give him a round of applause!" The children clapped as they moved their hands in a circle. “I really like that he has a capital letter right here for ‘Like.’ I see he’s got good finger spaces, and I can see he has a period at the end of his sentence. Who else would like to share?" Ruby raised her hand, so Ms.

Hawkins invited her to come up, and she placed Ruby’s paper on the document camera.

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Ms. Hawkins: Oh! I see multiple sentences. Read it to us.

Ruby: “I like presents. I love give presents.”

Ms. Hawkins: “I love give presents.”

Ruby: “I like give presents?”

Ms. Hawkins: I like all of these sentences, Ruby. I see that you have finger spaces. Can anybody tell me what Ruby should go back and add at the end of her sentences?

Children: A period!

Ms. Hawkins: Ruby, what should we add at the end of our sentences?

Ruby: A period?

Ms. Hawkins: A period. Now, let me read this sentence to you one more time, Ruby. “I like presents. I love give presents.” How can we fix that? What sounds better?

Ruby: Giving.

Ms. Hawkins: Very good. “I love giving presents." [addresses the class] Do you remember…what day was it when I was writing something, and I totally didn’t realize that I made a mistake? When did I realize I had made my mistake? What did I have to do? Tamika?

Tamika: Reread.

Ms. Hawkins: I had to reread. When we write, that’s called revising or editing. Make sure you reread your sentence because when you show me your sentences, what do I always say? What’s the first thing I said to you, Ruby?

Ruby: Read!

Ms. Hawkins: I said, “Read it to me.” And I’ll say, “Does that make sense?” And a lot of times, you automatically go, “Oh!” As soon as you say it, you realize it. So, before you

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come to me today, reread your sentence, OK?

These examples illustrate how Ms. Hawkins allowed children to share their work with the class.

Ms. Hawkins also used sharing work as an opportunity to offer encouragement (e.g., “Let’s give him a round of applause!”), draw children’s attention to print concepts (e.g., “I see that you have finger spaces.”), and writing strategies (e.g., “I had to reread. When we write, that’s called revising and editing.”).

Ms. Hawkins’ approach to writing instruction, patterned after the writing workshop model, was one way she provided social literacy activities. She provided an environment in which children could learn in ways that suited their individual needs while still engaging in social interactions necessary for literacy learning. The social nature of the classroom community of emergent English writers provided a place where children could talk to, learn from, and teach each other while practicing writing in a safe place in which they were free to make mistakes.

Mario’s Engagement with Writing Workshop. Although Ms. Hawkins created a classroom environment that invited social interaction during her writing workshop, Mario only minimally engaged in social interactions. This is not to say that Mario did not participate in writing practice or did not demonstrate the appropriation of the skills taught during the minilessons. Rather, Mario’s participation and appropriation were not demonstrated by how he interacted with others during the workshop.

Mario stayed focused on his writing task until it was completed; however, some parts of the writing process were conspicuously missing from Mario’s writing behavior. Although Mario seemed to give a great deal of thought to his writing, he talked very little as he generated ideas

(something his tablemates did at great length). I never heard him orally rehearse what he planned to put on the page, on his own, or with anyone else. When I asked him what he planned to write,

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he usually ignored my question.

I also noticed that Mario did not ask for the teacher’s help when he seemed stuck. For example, after watching the video about St. Patrick’s Day, then participating in a minilesson about writing “how-tos,” Mario seemed to struggle with the assignment. He sat for several minutes thinking, responded to distractions around the room, and finally wrote about the St.

Patrick’s day video, a topic that was not appropriate for the “how-to” genre. He never asked his teacher, me, or his peers for help. In another example, when he could not remember the words

“handlebar” and “pedal” in his “how-to” about riding a bike (Figure 4.3), he sought a solution on his own and used vocabulary he knew (i.e., cylinder, square) to describe the objects instead of seeking help.

Finally, when children were dismissed for writing practice, Mario avoided crowds. For example, after the minilesson about how to draw a pig, Ms. Hawkins pulled up some pictures of pigs on her phone. Mario was nearby, so he looked at the picture and seemed very interested.

When a mob of children began to form around him, he stepped away. He tried to keep looking from a less crowded spot, and he seemed to still be interested, but he eventually gave up, walked away, and when the crowd thinned out, he went back to look at the picture. Although this example did not relate specifically to his writing, it speaks to his general participation during social literacy activities and perhaps his role in the classroom community. I found Mario to be a

“lone wolf,” just as Ms. Hawkins had described him (interview, December 7, 2018).

Summary of Ms. Hawkins and Mario’s Dialogic Relationship

The classroom community Ms. Hawkins and the children created was one in which Mario was able to work toward being a member of a larger community of English writers, and the patterns of instruction and participation seemed to result in a dialogic relationship. Ms. Hawkins

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integrated multiple modes of meaning-making into her instruction and the literacy activities she facilitated by coupling visual representations with linguistic modes of meaning-making and using books to facilitate writing instruction. Mario also coupled visual representations with linguistic modes of meaning-making, and he used books and other written texts as resources for his writing. Ms. Hawkins scaffolded instruction by explicitly modeling the writing process, making connections to students’ prior knowledge and experiences to new learning, and providing graphic organizers as tools. Mario emulated the writing process and products modeled by his teacher and made connections to some of the topics Ms. Hawkins assigned. However, his level of connection was often difficult to discern. He used the graphic organizers to follow the structured format of the writing assignments. Finally, Ms. Hawkins created social literacy activities through opportunities for children to talk and incorporating a writing workshop approach to instruction.

Although opportunities to engage in social interactions were common in Ms. Hawkins’ classroom, Mario only minimally engaged in oral language or other social interactions with others during literacy activities. Nevertheless, Mario actively participated in the literacy activities within the classroom community.

Ms. Hawkins’ Rationales for Instruction

To answer the second research question, I return to the three instructional patterns observed and recount each teacher’s rationales for her instructional decisions. Interview data revealed that Ms. Hawkins’ instructional decisions focused on creating a space where children seemed to be at ease learning in the ways that worked for them. Ms. Hawkins explained how she had built structure into the classroom community's daily practices early in the year by establishing routines, which helped children know what to expect and what was expected of them. Ms. Hawkins’ goal was to create a classroom culture conducive to young children’s

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learning, particularly those children whose home language was one other than the language of

instruction. In the subsequent sections, I explain Ms. Hawkins’ stated rationales for each of the

identified instructional patterns. The patterns are summarized in Appendix E.

Ms. Hawkins’ Rationales for Integrating Multiple Modes of Meaning-Making

Ms. Hawkins taught using multiple modes of meaning-making within literacy activities.

She understood that young EL children did not learn to write in isolation; rather, reading and writing instruction were interwoven through practice within community activities. Each mode of meaning-making (e.g., reading, writing, visual) depended on the other modes to grow.

Ms. Hawkins’ Rationales for Integrating Visual and Linguistic Modes. Ms. Hawkins

explained that visual forms of meaning-making were particularly important for young EL

children, who might not have the language proficiency to fully understand all that is being said

or communicate their own messages. “I feel like if they can see it, they’ll be better able to

explain it” (interview, February 12, 2019). Ms. Hawkins believed that coupling visual and

linguistic modes of meaning-making in her instruction also made it possible to reach every child.

She explained, “I think they all have a way that they learn best, so I think you just have to find what works best for that child” (interview, December 7, 2018). Thus, by bringing new learning multiple times in multiple ways, she was more likely to reach every type of learner.

When I asked Ms. Hawkins why she used the visualization technique on the day she wrote the first “how-to” about building a snowman, she explained her belief that asking children to close their eyes helped them think.

If you make up a mental image—like, make a movie, like a mind movie. Just take the

time to really close your eyes and think. Don't worry about what everybody else is doing

around, you know because they can get distracted by other people. I just wanted them to

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have a moment of quiet, where they’re just thinking about, “Well, what’s something I can

do?” (interview, March 12, 2019)

She explained that she spent a lot of time asking the children questions, and sometimes,

children just needed time to process the words and put an image in their minds of what they

wanted to say. Asking them to close their eyes and imagine was her way of allowing a few

moments of quiet to ignore outside distractions and think about what they might want to express

before expressing it. She considered this prewriting activity an important part of the writing

process. Ms. Hawkins also shared her belief that although some children, like Mario, did not choose to share their thoughts with the group after opening their eyes, they still benefitted by listening to their peers' language who did choose to share.

Ms. Hawkins’ Rationales for Using Books and Printed Text. Ms. Hawkins used

books as the foundation of her literacy instruction, and the use of books to facilitate writing was

part of the Reading Roots (Slavin & Madden, 2010) curriculum. However, Ms. Hawkins was

cognizant of the needs of the young EL children in her class, so she intentionally used the books

in ways that would benefit her learners.

These kids are really good decoders; they've learned all of the sounds they need for first

grade. They're great decoders, but it's that—and they're even pretty good with fluency—

it’s the comprehension part (interview, February 12, 2019).

To address this issue, Ms. Hawkins used printed texts as tools to impress upon the

children that the purpose of reading and writing is to share meaning, and she showed them how

English print works to accomplish that objective.

Ms. Hawkins believed that reading aloud and listening to others read helped children,

especially young EL children, learn the meaning and appropriate usage of words, not just how to

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decode them. She also had the children write the new vocabulary words in the book on their whiteboards then highlight them in the book, so when they encountered them while reading, they would recall their meaning, not just decode them and move on.

Ms. Hawkins understood that children needed to see, hear, and speak the language multiple times to comprehend its meaning and make it their own. She reiterated her belief that children learn best in unique ways, so to reach more than 20 children, two-thirds of them young

EL children, “You just have to bring that thing multiple times” (interview, December 7, 2018).

She understood that repeated exposure to the same concept in multiple ways would increase the likelihood of reaching all the children. By explaining something using different words or communicating using a different mode, something may become clear to a child who did not previously understand.

Ms. Hawkins hoped that by repeatedly exposing the children to a book, they would comprehend the meaning and learn to use the language themselves, both orally and in writing, as they wrote the answers to the comprehension questions on the book test. After the children studied The Three Wishes (Rice, 2003d) and completed the book test, she explained how she had been scaffolding the lesson throughout the week, intending to invite them to express their ideas as a culminating writing activity.

You know, we orally talked about it. We wrote out our list, and then I wanted [the

children] to think just very simply, “These are my three wishes,” before they put them

into a sentence because this was like, the baby step of, “OK, now pick” (interview,

February 12, 2019).

Ms. Hawkins explained that she also wanted the children to have a list of ideas in writing and the book to use as resources. In this example, Ms. Hawkins wove reading, writing, listening,

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speaking, and visual modes of meaning-making into her lesson to teach children how to decode and encode the words, understand their meaning, and appropriate them for their own use.

Ms. Hawkins’ Rationales for Using Scaffolding, Tools, and Strategies

Ms. Hawkins used scaffolding by explicitly modeling the writing process, making connections to new learning, and using graphic organizers. She shared her belief that children needed to see the writing process before engaging in it themselves. By introducing concepts with increasing complexity and providing children with the tools and strategies they needed, she hoped they would be successful in writing in English.

Ms. Hawkins’ Rationales for Explicit Instruction. One strategy Ms. Hawkins often used before inviting the children to write on their own was explicitly modeling the writing process. Ms. Hawkins explained that she sometimes used the visualization technique to integrate visual and linguistic modes of meaning-making and model part of the writing process. She explained that for the first “how-to” minilesson, part of her intention for using the visualization technique was to model thinking about writing.

Well, they were being chatty, and we always talked about before we write a lot of times,

people need to think. We talked about how, you know, writing is sort of a quiet time.

Sometimes people come up with ideas really quickly; other times, it takes you a long time

to think of your writing, and that's OK (interview, March 12, 2019).

Ms. Hawkins explained how she never felt like a very good writer when she was in school, and she did not enjoy writing because she had trouble producing ideas. She needed quiet and time to think before she started putting her thoughts onto the page. During this lesson, Ms.

Hawkins admitted she had the same struggle with this “how-to” lesson.

I was having a hard time, even thinking. I'm going, “God! What can I even write?" You

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know, I was a little bit anxious because the other thing had gone so long, so I wasn't as

prepared as I wanted to be. [I was] just like, “OK. What have I written about before?

What have we used before?" I was like, “Oh, snowmen!" You know, it just snowed last

week. We talked about making snowmen before, and so I was trying there; honestly, I

was trying to think of something. And that’s the way I think about things. I need quiet. I

can't have all of [them] chatting. That was sort of my classroom management way of

nicely being able to say, “Be quiet” (interview, March 12, 2019).

In this example, Ms. Hawkins modeled an important part of the writing process and asked

the children to participate alongside her. Together, they took some quiet time to stop and think

about what they wanted to write. The children responded by quieting down, stilling their bodies,

closing their eyes, and thinking. In so doing, they matched their energy level to that of their

teacher’s, readied themselves to learn, and participated in the writing process with their teacher,

just as Ms. Hawkins had intended.

Ms. Hawkins’ Rationales for Making Connections. Ms. Hawkins made explicit

connections to purposefully selected personal experiences. She wanted to help the children make

their own connections to what they had read and to express their own ideas, first orally and later

in writing. In an interview, Mrs. Hawkins explained that she wanted the children to do more than

just write about the book. “This is not, ‘You have to read book thirty-five because you’ve got to

take a test on book thirty-five’” (interview, December 7, 2018). She wanted the children to understand that writing could also be about self-expression and sharing their own thoughts and ideas. Moreover, she knew they would be more motivated to write if they wrote about something that mattered to them.

SFA is very much like, “OK. This is what you’re writing about.” And that’s what I hate

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about writing. …I can care less about what you want me to write about, but, you know,

you give me more free time and ask my opinion or whatever, they’re more likely to write

(interview, December 12, 2018).

By linking ideas from the curriculum to the children’s own ideas, Ms. Hawkins tried to engage the children and motivate them to write.

Ms. Hawkins’ Rationales for Using Graphic Organizers. Ms. Hawkins assigned structured writing tasks and provided graphic organizers so children could visualize each genre's structure. She also used them as part of an overall strategy to give children a chance to navigate new information or practice new skills before introducing the next step in a process. The assignments I observed had clear objectives broken into smaller, more manageable tasks Ms.

Hawkins called “baby steps” to provide scaffolding. She told me the tasks were introduced with increasing complexity (e.g., discuss illustrations, introduce vocabulary, read alone, read together, answer questions orally, write answers). Her goal was to give the children time to think about and practice one new concept at a time.

Ms. Hawkins scaffolded the culminating writing activity for The Three Wishes (Rice,

2003d) in this way. She explained that the activity's objective was to give the children practice conveying their ideas in written form rather than demonstrating their comprehension of a story, as they had done in the book test. Ms. Hawkins wanted the children to think about their ideas and translate those ideas into English. Then, she wanted the children to inscribe those ideas onto the page. She designed the activities leading to the assignment so they could do just that. Eventually,

Ms. Hawkins modeled the process of writing in that genre and offered a graphic organizer, so the children would know exactly how to deliver the expected result. Her stated purpose was to allow children the freedom to maneuver within the structure. However, by assigning a structured

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writing task, breaking the assignment up into increasingly complex steps, explicitly modeling the steps, and providing graphic organizers to visualize the steps, Ms. Hawkins hoped to give the children the tools and strategies they needed to complete the assignments successfully.

Ms. Hawkins’ Rationales for Providing Social Activities

Ms. Hawkins believed that to become a member of a larger community of writers, young

EL children needed to engage in social interactions with others in a classroom community. She explained why she provided ample opportunities for children to talk and shared why she chose a writing workshop instructional model.

Ms. Hawkins’ Rationales for Providing Opportunities to Talk. One way Ms. Hawkins provided social literacy activities was by creating opportunities for children to speak about the books they were reading or other experiences they had had. She explained one goal for these activities was to help the children recall meaning rather than simply decoding and encoding words. Another goal when she asked the children to respond to questions was to offer children a chance to share their ideas and listen and learn from their peers’ ideas and attempts at making meaning. She said she intended to “…give the children a chance to express their ideas in English and also listen to their peers’ ideas." By sharing their ideas and listening to others' ideas, the children went beyond the simple task of decoding or defining words and made powerful connections to their own and each other’s experiences. This gave the children a chance to either listen to new vocabulary, phrases, or sentence structures, try to use it themselves, or both before being asked to use it in their writing.

Another reason Ms. Hawkins gave for creating opportunities to talk was to allow children time to translate their ideas from thoughts into their home language and then into English before writing them down. During these conversations, she tried to give each child time to respond

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before moving on to the next child. She explained that both the young EL children and those who

were native English-speakers needed time to “talk through it in their heads."

Even though English was the language of instruction, Ms. Hawkins felt strongly about allowing the children to speak in the language of their choice throughout the day, and especially during writing activities.

I encourage them to speak in their home language because there are so many of them that

speak Spanish—or there is a certain dialect of Spanish; that's a resource [they] can use.

It's OK. I encourage them. Are they supposed to be learning English here? Yes, but

they're going to get their thoughts, and they're still learning when they're talking to their

friend or whatever in that language.

Ms. Hawkins explained that, although she did not have newcomers to the U.S. in her high-level reading group, she did have newcomers in her homeroom (during the afternoon writing workshop), who spoke very little English. She wanted them to use the language they knew to negotiate school systems, use their voices, and meet their needs. “That's how they survive. They don't know English. Whatever language they speak, that's how they get through the day." Although Ms. Hawkins spoke only a little Spanish herself, she encouraged children to help each other when they were unsure what to do next, especially if they were brand new to the school in a brand-new country. She understood that young children need to have frequent, rich conversations for language learning to occur, and she did not want children in her class to spend their school days in silence because they were not confident in English. She also wanted her children to feel like school was a safe place, and they were part of a community in which the members helped each other.

Ms. Hawkins’ Rationales for Using Writing Workshop. Ms. Hawkins chose to pattern

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much of her writing instruction after the writing workshop model. Ms. Hawkins allowed the

children to choose where they wanted to write in the classroom because she believed they should

sit where they felt most comfortable. She encouraged the children to talk to each other about

their writing, and she did not mind when they were talkative or moving about during writing

time if they were still learning. “I'm not real strict; if you're still learning, be wiggly—if that's

how you learn best, cool! Go for it! Those little things don't bother me. If you need to ask your

friend, that doesn't bother me." She understood that children, particularly those who were young

ELs, needed opportunities to talk to develop language production skills, first orally and then in

writing.

Ms. Hawkins also believed that some children needed direction when choosing a spot in

the room to help them be most successful. At times, she asked certain children or pairs of

children to sit at a worktable on the room's perimeter because she knew the children would be

more focused on their work if fewer distractions were around. Ms. Hawkins said, “I'll have

certain kids, and I’ll go, ‘Just go sit over there. You're not in trouble. It's just a better learning

spot for you.’" Ms. Hawkins shared how she had asked a talkative child, Alexandra, and a

partner to sit at a worktable near her while she assessed other children. Ms. Hawkins wanted to

monitor Alexandra’s behavior, reduce the possibility of other children being disturbed, and allow

Alexandra the freedom she needed to learn in her way. “She's talk-, talk-, talk-, talking. Cool! Go talk, talk, talk, talk—as long as you're not disrupting whatever else is happening.” Ms. Hawkins also explained that earlier in the year, independent writing time was much more structured. As the year progressed and the children became comfortable with the established routine, she allowed them more freedom. “As we got used to each other and we worked everything out, I can trust that they're going to do it; we get to be more relaxed."

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Ms. Hawkins also preferred the writing workshop approach because it allowed her to address individual learners' needs, as she had done with Alexandra. Moreover, during extended writing practice, she was able to confer with children about their writing. On March 11th, when children were writing their first “how-to,” she told me her goal was to encourage them to start thinking of ideas and jotting them down. “By the end of the week, they’ll start coming up with a lot more ideas once they start to understand and get what it means and what they’re supposed to do” (interview, March 12, 2019). On that day, most conferences with the children aimed to generate topic ideas that were individual to them.

Ms. Hawkins did not confer with Mario while I was there. I asked her about this in a member check performed by e-mail, and this was her reply:

[I tried] to step out of Mario’s space when you were observing. He was quite timid, and I

knew he might not open up as well if two adults were looking over his shoulder. I did

keep a conference log on each student, so each student got the same amount of help—or

like with Mario, more of him telling me about what he was writing about and why. He

did very well at opening up when prompted, and his stories always gave me a good

giggle (personal communication, September 12, 2019).

According to her, Mario did not seek help during his conferences. Instead, he told his teacher about what and why he was writing, which was consistent with my observations.

Ms. Hawkins also shared why she gave children a chance to share their work with the class. I observed this only once, but because the children asked to share their work, I inferred this was an exercise they had done before, and Ms. Hawkins confirmed this. Moreover, Ms. Hawkins explained that when the children shared their work with the class, they seemed to pay closer attention to their work details because they knew others would see it. She also expressed regret

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that they could not do it more often because time did not usually permit. The first-grade teachers were allotted about 30 minutes for writing instruction in the afternoons, so Ms. Hawkins prioritized writing practice and spent less time sharing.

Summary of Ms. Hawkins’ Rationales for Instructional Decisions

Ms. Hawkins taught with intention and was able to verbalize why she made the choices

she did. She delivered instruction by integrating multiple modes of meaning-making in hopes of

reaching every type of learner and assisting children with recall. She also believed that when

children received information visually, it made productive language easier. Using books as

model texts in literacy instruction helped children understand how to use language to make

meaning. She believed that reading books together provided a shared experience, which children

could use for their writing. Scaffolding instruction was also important to Ms. Hawkins. She

believed that providing a model by thinking aloud while writing made the writing process steps

explicit, and when children saw the teacher make mistakes, notice them, and fix them, they

would be more likely to self-correct in their writing. After creating a model, it was available as a

print resource for children to use as they wrote. Ms. Hawkins also scaffolded instruction by

helping the children make connections to past experiences by sharing personal stories and paying

attention to what interested the children. By doing so, she believed they would be more engaged

and make better sense of the unfamiliar. She also wanted children to feel safe and successful and

inspire a sense of community in the classroom. Finally, Ms. Hawkins provided highly structured

graphic organizers as a scaffold to show how writing in various genres is structured, and she allowed children time to practice one new concept at a time. She believed when children knew what exactly was expected of them, it reduced frustration, and they would be more likely to try.

Ms. Hawkins created social literacy activities, the first of which was creating

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opportunities for young EL children to talk. She believed this gave children a chance to express their ideas, listen to their peers' ideas, and translate their ideas into English before being required to write them down. Ms. Hawkins emphasized the need for young EL children to use language to build their linguistic repertoire, no matter the language. She encouraged children who were not confident in English to speak in their home language so they would be able to negotiate school systems, use their voices, and get their needs met. She also relied on children to help their peers who could not communicate with their teacher. Ms. Hawkins believed the inherently social writing workshop model of instruction because it allowed for children's learning needs to be met through writing conferences, as one example. She believed that brief minilessons were a way to avoid overwhelming children with added information, which is why she did not confer with

Mario in my presence—to avoid overwhelming him. She occasionally invited the children to share their work with the class because they tended to pay closer attention to details; however, time constraints often caused her to prioritize writing practice over sharing. In sum, Ms. Hawkins intended to create a learning environment where individual children would be successful in the ways most appropriate for them.

Mario's Writing Outcomes

In this section, I describe how Mario demonstrated proficiency in writing by reporting the results of the assessments of all writing products I observed him write and my observations of his writing processes. To evaluate Mario’s writing samples, I used his Ohio English Language

Proficiency Assessment (OELPA) scores from the Spring semesters of his kindergarten and first- grade years as well as the writing rubric developed for this study. As described in Chapter 3, the school used the OELPA to measure the young EL children’s progress in English listening, speaking, reading, and writing. The achievement levels ranged from one to five: 1) beginning, 2)

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early intermediate, 3) intermediate, 4) early advanced, and 5) advanced (Achievement Level

Descriptors [ALDS] are in Appendix A). The writing rubric represents a synthesis of three writing rubrics (LAS Links, 2006; OELPA ALDs, 2018; Traits Rubric for K-2) into one and maintains the Traits Rubric for K-2’s (Education Northwest, 2018) basic structure. The resulting rubric includes seven focal areas (Ideas, Organization, Voice, Word Choice, Fluency,

Conventions, and Presentation), each of which is evaluated as Beginning, Emerging, Developing,

Capable, Experienced, or Exceptional.

In the descriptive analysis that follows, I used the amalgamated writing rubric (Appendix

C) as a guiding tool reflecting the possible range of young EL children’s writing. I used language from the three rubrics to describe my observations and made the rubrics available to consumers of this research to clarify my meanings. Although I borrowed the seven focal areas from the

Traits Rubric for K-2’s (Education Northwest, 2018) basic structure, my application was likely not the purpose for which the rubric was designed. For that reason, I intentionally avoided using the descriptive headings from the rubric to categorize my findings. My aim was to present my own description and interpretation of the participants’ writing using the rubric as a guide.

Mario’s Ohio English Language Proficiency Assessment (OELPA) Outcomes.

In the Spring Semester 2018, his kindergarten year, Mario achieved Level 3 in listening,

Level 3 in reading, Level 3 in speaking, a Level 2 in writing, and an overall progression assessment. In the Spring Semester 2019, his first-grade year, Mario scored Level 5 in listening,

Level 4 in reading, Level 3 in speaking, and Level 3 in writing. It appears that his receptive language grew, especially listening, which advanced two levels, his speaking remained unchanged, and his writing advanced one level. Mario’s overall assessment was progressing. The scores are summarized in Table 4.1.

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Table 4.1

Mario’s OELPA Achievement Levels

Language Kindergarten First Grade Skills Spring 2018 Spring 2019 Listening 3 5 Speaking 3 4 Reading 3 3 Writing 2 3 Overall Progressing Progressing

Mario’s Writing Rubric Outcomes

The following description of Mario’s writing outcomes is organized according to the writing traits: ideas, organization, voice, word choice, sentence fluency, conventions, and presentation. Examples of Mario’s writing (both process and products) and my analysis are used to explain my descriptor choices from the rubric. Many of the writing products discussed in this section have appeared in previously mentioned figures.

Mario’s Ideas. The key question to be answered for the “ideas” trait is: “Does the writer engage the reader with fresh information or perspective on a focused topic?” (Education

Northwest, 2014, p. 1). The “ideas” trait was evaluated based on Mario’s proficiency in conveying the main idea and offering details and support for that idea.

Mario’s Main Idea. Mario composed mostly simple sentences about a single idea. The text he wrote about the main idea seemed to depend on the graphic organizer he used. For example, when Mario wrote, “The pigs like mud!” [1/18/2019] the organizer led him to follow the steps to draw a picture, then write one or two sentences about it, and he did just that. When he wrote in response to comprehension questions about stories, he usually wrote one clear, simple sentence on the line provided, as he did for the book, Planting Seeds in May (Rice,

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2003c) when he wrote, “the blue jay PeKt. / the SeedS.” [1/23/2019]

When Mario wrote in response to a prompt (e.g., “I Wish for a / tablet! / I wish for money! / I Wish for toys!” [3/6/2019] or in the “how-to” genre (e.g., “First, Put a halmit! /

Secind, / Put Your / hand in hard / Silider. / Last, Put your / feet in the / hard Square.”

[3/11/2019], he wrote three sentences in the lines provided in the graphic organizer and drew illustrations to correspond with each sentence. Mario wrote about a clear idea in these examples, but he did not explicitly state it (e.g., If I captured a leprechaun, I would make three wishes; I know how to ride a bike.) Writing an explicit, cohesive sentence stating the main idea was not part of the instruction, nor was it part of the graphic organizer. The sentences he did write conveyed a clear message about a single idea, but Mario failed to focus the reader’s attention on that idea with a topic sentence. Nevertheless, Mario followed his teacher’s instructions and filled in the graphic organizers as expected. He proved to be capable of writing a few sentences about one main idea when the genre called for it.

Mario’s Details and Support. Mario’s sentences were simple and clear, but they rarely provided much detail or support. The one exception to this was when his teacher explicitly told the children to give a reason for each wish during the culminating writing activity for The Three

Wishes (Rice, 2003d).

Mario’s illustrations were related to the messages conveyed in the sentences. Although he conveyed additional details to me verbally, these expanded ideas were rarely evident in the product itself. For example, when Mario wrote, “I Will WiSh. / for a mallbox. / So I can. / Set mall.” he drew a very basic picture of a mailbox (Figure 4.5). He talked more about it when he said, “It’s an igloo mailbox;” however, he did not write this detail on the page with words.

Moreover, he did not add to the picture communicating to a reader that this was an “igloo

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mailbox," nor did Mario explain what he meant by the phrase. Was it a mailbox that stood

outside an igloo in the Arctic, or was it a mailbox shaped like an igloo? Another example

occurred when Mario wrote, “I WiSh for. / a toys So. / I can be rich." He talked more about his

drawing (Figure 4.5), telling me, “I picked them out. I wrote a word right there,” indicating the

“yay” he had added to the picture. Although Mario told me the picture was of him picking out

toys, there was nothing in the drawing itself that communicated his actions. However, the smiley

face and the “yay” did add additional detail to the written words; however, most of Mario’s

drawings related to the main idea but did not provide additional detail.

Mario’s Organization. The key question posed for the writing trait, “organization,” was,

“Does the organizational structure enhance the ideas and make them easier to understand?”

(Education Northwest, 2014, p. 2). The organization trait was evaluated based on Mario’s

proficiency in including a beginning, middle, and end; his use of transitions; and his use of

sequencing to convey meaning.

Mario’s Beginning, Middle, and End. The writing samples I collected from Mario were

structured according to the graphic organizers Ms. Hawkins provided, which did not include a

space for a clear beginning or end. Mario never included a topic sentence nor a concluding

sentence, but the sentences he wrote in the body each conveyed a different detail about the topic,

as in this example: “First, Put a halmit! / Secind, Put Your / hand in hard / Silider. / Last, Put your feet in the / hard Square." [3/11/2019] Mario did not include a topic sentence to introduce his intention to explain how to ride a bike, nor did he include a concluding sentence to signal a clear ending. Still, each sentence in the piece conveyed a distinct step, indicating that Mario seemed to understand the graphic organizer's logic.

Mario’s Transitions. Mario included limited and predictable transitions between ideas in

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his writing, and he did so only when his teacher required it. He used the conjunction “so” to link

ideas (independent clauses) three times in the sentences declaring his three wishes for an elf: “I

Will Wish. / for a mallbox. / So I can / Set mall.”; “I wish for money. / So can / be happy!”; and

“I WiSh for. / a toys So. / I can be rich.” [2/11/2019] On the day Mario wrote these three wishes

for an elf, Ms. Hawkins specifically instructed the children to give a reason for each wish, so

Mario completed the assignment as his teacher required. He clearly understood that the word

“so” could link ideas, although he did not usually include more than one idea in a sentence. For

example, when Mario wrote about his three wishes for a leprechaun, Ms. Hawkins did not ask

the children to include a reason, and Mario did not include one.

Mario used the introductory, temporal words “first,” “second,” and “last” in three writing

samples. In his “how-to” about riding a bike, he wrote, “First, Put a halmit! / Secind, Put Your /

hand in hard / Silider. / Last, Put your / feet in the / hard Square." In his “how-to” about brushing

teeth, he wrote, “First, Put / toothpaste on / Your tooth buSh. / Secind, bushing / teet. / Last, You

/ Spit." When he began to write a “how-to” about St. Patrick’s day, he wrote, “First, / Second, /

Last,” on the lines when he seemed to still be struggling with choosing a topic. These examples indicated that Mario might have successfully appropriated the use of introductory, temporal words in the “how-to” genre.

When writing answers to comprehension questions about The Ice Storm (Livingston,

2003), Mario used the conjunction “and” five times in two sentences to link the character’s names within a sentence. He wrote, “The bus can’t take Vickand Fran. / home” and “Jimand Jack and Deenaand Fran. / and Vick they hav No School." [1/10/2019] These were the only examples of transition words found in Mario’s writing samples.

Mario’s Sequencing. Mario sequenced his sentences in a way that would make sense to a

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reader. His use of introductory, temporal markers “first,” “second,” and “third” were examples of this. Nothing in the writing product would indicate Mario’s wishes were written in any particular order; however, his behavior as he wrote his wishes for a mailbox, money, and toys indicated he was writing according to the magnitude of his desire. For example, he returned to his seat and wrote “mailbox” right away because, it seemed, this was the wish about which he was most certain. After writing “mailbox” on the graphic organizer, he went to the easel to search for more ideas. The other writing samples were either only one sentence that did not require sequencing

(e.g., “The pigs like mud!”) or responses to comprehension questions, which were already sequenced by the publishers according to the order of events.

Mario’s Voice. The key question to be answered for the writing trait “voice” is, “Does the reader hear this writer speaking in the piece? (Education Northwest, 2014, p. 3). I evaluated this trait based on Mario’s expression of feelings or mood, individual expression, and engagement with or awareness of an audience.

Mario’s Feelings or Mood. Mario expressed feelings in his writing about wishes, although they were often predictable and repetitious. For example, in the sentence “I WiSh for money. / So can / be happy!” [2/11/2019], Mario expressed happiness at the thought of having money by using the word “happy” and by using an exclamation point. Mario repeatedly told me that exclamation points were used to express excitement about something. He continued to express excitement with exclamation points in the second piece about wishes [3/6/2019] “I Wish for a / tablet! / I wish for money! / I Wish for toys!" Happiness and excitement were the only feelings I observed in the limited sample of writing I collected from Mario.

Mario’s Individual Expression. Mario occasionally shared his personality or point of view in his writing; however, at times, he seemed to borrow his teacher’s or peers’ points of

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view. For example, Mario’s wish for a mailbox on February 11th was an original idea unique to

him. He gave it a lot of thought before he wrote about it, and it was the first thing he wrote when

he returned to his seat from the large group brainstorming activity. The other wishes, written on

February 11th and March 6th, might or might not have been expressions of Mario’s point of view.

Tablets, money, and toys were all mentioned by peers in both brainstorming activities that preceded writing practice. On February 11th, Mario returned to the easel for ideas after writing

“mailbox” on his graphic organizer. He might have simply borrowed from the group list, but that

is not to say he did not make a personal connection with tablets, money, or toys. After all, he did

not choose other items from the list that many of his peers had chosen and continued to repeat

(e.g., slime, video games).

When Mario wrote the “how-to” about brushing teeth on March 12th, his connection was

not evident until he was drawing the third picture next to the words, “Last, You / Spit.” (Figure

4.8). After Mario drew the illustration of spitting into the sink, he got my attention, pointed to his

picture, and said, “That’s the toothpaste.” I wanted to find out more about what he was thinking,

so, in my role as a participant-observer, I decided to invite him to elaborate.

Researcher: That’s the toothpaste spit right there?

Mario: Yeah, and that is so disgusting ‘cause it’s on there.

Researcher: Is it disgusting? What’s disgusting about it?

Mario: The things are in your teeth!

Researcher: So, you want to get that out of your mouth, right?

Mario: Yep!

Researcher: How are you showing that? Do you want to say more and say it’s

disgusting? Do you want to write about how disgusting that is?

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Mario: Hmm. [makes the dot on his “i” a little heavier, then sets his pencil down,

ignoring my question]

This occasion was one of only a few times, Mario initiated a conversation with me, which

indicated to me that he had something important to say about his picture. Although Mario

borrowed his teacher’s idea and relied heavily on her model to create his own written product, he

understood the meaning of what he wrote. He made a personal connection that went beyond

anything written by the teacher or discussed in class (i.e., the things in your teeth that go in the

sink after you brush are disgusting).

It is possible that having viewed a video about brushing teeth before watching Ms.

Hawkins’ presentation on how to write a “how-to,” Mario made a strong connection to the topic and wanted to express his point-of-view. His initiation of the conversation with me about the toothpaste left in your mouth after brushing being “disgusting” indicated he had an opinion.

However, even when I invited him to write about it, he chose not to do so. There was nothing about the final written product to indicate he had something more to say than what Ms. Hawkins had written in her model.

Mario’s Engagement With or Awareness of Audience. Mario’s writing showed little

indication that he wanted to engage with or was aware of an audience, although, at times, his

actions during the writing process did so. For example, in an episode I described earlier, Mario’s

task was to answer comprehension questions about Planting Seeds in May (Rice, 2003c). Mario

moved to the back of the room at a table by himself, propped a folder up around himself to

obscure his work from view, and very thoughtfully and deliberately answered the questions,

looking back in his book when he needed to. Although the spelling and writing conventions were

not perfect, the content of his answers was correct. Though his writing product did not reflect his

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awareness of the audience, his actions during the writing process indicated he was aware that his

teacher and I would read his answers. He seemed to want to do his best to prove he had learned

the material; thus, he was a good reader and writer.

Furthermore, Mario often glanced up at me or looked at the camera while writing, which indicated he was aware of me, the researcher, as his audience. The most vivid example of this

occurred on my seventh visit to the classroom [1/24/2019]. During a Reading Roots (Slavin &

Madden, 2010) phonics lesson, Ms. Hawkins dictated sentences, and the children wrote the

sentences on a small whiteboard, then raised them in the air so their teacher could check their

answers as she walked around the room.

Ms. Hawkins said, “I turned the page. I turned the page. /Ur/ not /ir/ like in whirl. We

have ‘nurse with a purse’ for /ur/." Mario wrote quickly and was the first child to hold up his

whiteboard. He looked at me then turned the whiteboard toward me so I could snap a photo. He

had written, “I turn the page." A few moments later, Ms. Hawkins walked by me and observed,

“He keeps looking at you…He’s like, ‘I know you need this!’”

During the writing process, Mario’s actions demonstrated he was aware of his teacher

and me, the researcher, as his audience. However, I never saw anything in his writing products

that indicated he was writing for an audience. Even when writing “how-tos,” there was nothing to indicate who he might be teaching to ride a bike or brush their teeth. When he wrote his wishes, he might have been thinking about an elf or leprechaun as his audience, but I cannot definitively draw that conclusion. Mario’s awareness of an audience in his writing products remained unclear or accidental.

Mario’s Word Choice. The key question posed for the writing trait, “word choice” was,

“Does the author’s choice of words convey precise and compelling meaning and/or create a vivid

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picture for the reader?” (Education Northwest, 2014, p. 4). The “word choice” trait was

evaluated based on the quality of words Mario chose and how effectively he used words to create

meaning. As described in Chapter 3, I conducted a lexical analysis using Text Analyzer

(Adamovic, 2009) and cross-referenced the results with the vocabulary words (i.e., red words and green words) introduced in the Reading Roots (Slavin & Madden, 2010) curriculum.

Mario’s Word Quality. I evaluated Mario’s word quality based on five criteria: a) use of

general, common, or high-frequency words; b) use of vocabulary words from the Reading Roots

(Slavin & Madden, 2010) curriculum (i.e., red words and green words); c) use of new, academic,

or challenging words; d) use of descriptive words; and e) word variety.

Mario used 183 total words and 98 unique words in the 10 writing samples. Of the total

words, 80 (44.7%) were red words, 57 (31.2%) were green words, and 3 (1.6%) were challenge

words. The words Mario used most often were “the” (16 times); “I” (nine times); “wish” (seven

times); “for” (six times each); and “a,” “in,” “and,” “can,” and “put,” (five times each). Mario

also used five descriptive adjectives (“happy,” “rich,” “hard,” “hard,” “green”). Overall, Mario

seemed to be developing a personal lexicon of words he knew well enough to use in his writing.

He used mostly common or high-frequency words and new vocabulary he had probably learned

at school. He also began experimenting with more descriptive words and academic or

challenging words (e.g., square, cylinder).

Mario’s Word Usage and Meaning. The criteria used to assess Mario’s word usage and

meaning-focused on whether he used original words or words in original ways and how

effectively he used new, academic, or challenging words. A lexical density analysis evaluated the

number of Mario’s words that conveyed meaning or provided information (i.e., content words)

compared to the total number of words he used. Mario used about as many content words (52%)

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or words that added meaning to the text (i.e., nouns, adjectives, verbs, adverbs) as function

words (e.g., non-specific pronouns, auxiliary verbs, articles, conjunctions) in his writing. Most of

the words Mario used were high-frequency words (e.g., “the,” “I,” “and”), vocabulary words

from a story or a video shown in class (e.g., “toothpaste,” “St. Patrick’s”), or words Ms.

Hawkins’ used in models (e.g., “money,” “tablet”). Of the 127 unique red words and 450 unique

green words identified in stories, Mario only attempted to write 26 and 35, respectively. The

phrases “hard square” and “hard cylinder” were the only words Mario used that were not used in

the teacher’s literacy lesson immediately preceding the writing practice.

Mario’s Fluency. The key question posed for the writing trait, “fluency,” was, “Does the

author control sentences, so the piece flows smoothly when read aloud?” (Education Northwest,

2014, p. 5). The “fluency” trait was evaluated based on his sentence structure and syntax, the

variety of sentence lengths and patterns, which create rhythm, and how Mario used transitions to

link words, phrases, or clauses. Mario’s writing most often corresponded with the descriptions of

a developing or capable writer.

Mario’s Sentence Structure. Mario’s sentences were mostly simple, declarative sentences, although he did write three compound sentences and three sentence fragments.

Additionally, he arranged most words and phrases in syntactic, conventional ways that did not impede understanding, although two syntax errors were present.

Mario wrote mostly statements containing a subject and predicate in one independent clause—simple sentences. For example, when responding to comprehension questions about The

Ice Storm (Livingston, 2003), Mario wrote, “a ice storm ben[g]an early." This statement was a sentence containing a subject (a ice storm) and a predicate (ben[g]an early), all within one clause. Mario followed this pattern until the lesson in which Ms. Hawkins asked him to explain

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his choices. He wrote three compound sentences (i.e., two independent clauses connected by a coordinating conjunction): “I Will WiSh. / for a mallbox. / So I can. / Set mall. / I WiSh for money. / So can be happy! / I WiSh for. / a toys So. / I can be rich.” These were the only compound sentences I found in Mario’s writing samples, which indicated that Mario could write more sophisticated sentences. However, he chose not to unless encouraged to do so by his teacher.

Mario wrote imperative sentences when writing in the “how-to” genre (three imperative sentences about riding a bike and three imperative sentences about how to brush your teeth).

Although this “how-to” closely resembled his teacher’s model (Figure 4.8), Mario’s contained some subtle differences that indicated he, at least partially, understood that imperative sentences often contain the implied subject, “you” (i.e., you understood). For example, the first sentence in

Ms. Hawkins’ model was, “First, put / toothpaste / on my / brush." Mario wrote, “First, Put / toothpaste on / Your tooth b[r]ush." Mario’s use of the possessive pronoun “your” instead of

“my,” which Ms. Hawkins used, indicated he understood he was telling someone else how to brush their teeth, not his. Ms. Hawkins’ third sentence was, “Last, spit and / rinse." Mario’s third sentence was, “Last, You / Spit." Mario explicitly stated the subject “you” instead of implying it as his teacher had done in his sentence. I did not observe any instructional move or teaching interaction that would indicate that Mario had been explicitly taught what an imperative sentence was or that imperative sentences often contain the implied subject “you." Yet, somewhere in his experience, Mario seemed to have acquired a limited understanding of this concept.

Mario’s writing samples also contained three sentence fragments, two of which were in response to comprehension questions, although Ms. Hawkins repeatedly emphasized the importance of writing in complete sentences. For example, one comprehension question posed at

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the end of The Ice Storm (Livingston, 2003) asked, “When did the lights blink off?," and Mario

wrote, “When mom was making dinner.” In response to the question, “Why did Vick need to

plant fast?" posed at the end of Planting Seeds in May (Rice, 2003c), Mario wrote, “By Put / the

grass in. / the pail." The final sentence fragment occurred in Mario’s “how-to” on brushing teeth.

He wrote, “Second, b[r]ushing teeth.” In this case, it seemed that Mario had difficulty with the verb tense when writing in the imperative. Even though Mario’s writing contained a few sentence fragments, he presented most ideas in clear, simple sentences.

Mario most often used conventional English syntax, meaning he arranged words and phrases within a sentence in ways that made sense. I found two instances in which Mario seemed to struggle with English syntax, the first of which was probably due to a direct translation from

Spanish. In response to the comprehension question, “Why did Vick need to plant fast?” Mario wrote, “it was gunu rain Went / the Sun." At first, I did not understand, so he and I negotiated meaning in the following exchange.

Researcher: What does that sentence mean?

Mario: The sun—the thunderstorm moved when the gray clouds coming to the middle.

Researcher: Oh, so the rain—the sun is going to move, and the rain clouds are going to

move to the middle and cover up the sun? Ok, and so what does this question ask?

Mario: It was going to rain.

Researcher: But read the question, though. Read the question.

Mario: Why did Vick needed to plant fast?

Researcher: Oh! Because it was going to rain, and the sun was going to go away.

At face value, Mario’s arrangement of words in his sentence was not understandable to

me; after this exchange, I understood his meaning, if written conventionally, to be “It was going

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to rain, so the sun went [away]." According to a colleague, who is an English-Spanish bilingual

educator, the Spanish phrase “Se fue el sol” would be a correct Spanish construction, and its

direct translation would be “There went the sun." In Spanish, putting the predicate before the

subject is an acceptable construction, so for Mario to write, “went the sun” instead of “the sun

went” would make perfect sense (J. Hutchins, personal communication, August 16, 2019). If

Mario had constructed this sentence correctly, according to English conventions, and included a

coordinating conjunction, it would have been another example of a compound sentence, a more

sophisticated sentence structure.

One other example of an error in syntax was in response to a comprehension question

posed in The Three Wishes (Rice, 2003d). Mario wrote, “they use their wish to. / get out the

SauSage.” Construction of this sentence, which might have more accurately conveyed Mario’s

meaning, would be, “They used their wish to get the sausage off [her nose].” In addition to the

tense error (“use[d]”) and the incorrect preposition (“out” instead of “off”), the word order

changed the meaning of the sentence. If Mario had chosen the correct preposition, he would have

written, “They used their wish to get off the sausage.” This construction implies that they (the

story characters) were on the sausage. If Mario had written, “to get the sausage off,” he would have better conveyed his meaning that the sausage was on the character, not the other way around.

Overall, Mario used mostly simple, declarative sentences correctly, and although he occasionally used sentence fragments, they did not impede understanding. Mario wrote three compound sentences, but only when instructed to do so by his teacher, and his use of the imperative when writing in the “how-to” genre demonstrated an acquired understanding of the implied subject “you." Mario made two syntactical errors, one of which impeded my

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understanding of his meaning without further questioning, and another, for which I was able to infer meaning. Mario’s sentence structure and syntax corresponded with the descriptions for a developing or capable English writer, although his use of the imperative corresponded with the description for an experienced English writer.

Mario’s Sentence Variety. Mario varied his sentence length slightly, but he began his sentences in mostly the same way. As a result, Mario’s sentences often had a mechanical rhythm; however, he easily read them aloud. He wrote a total of 28 sentences or sentence fragments. The sentences or fragments ranged in length from three words (e.g., “Secind, bushing / teet.” and

“Last, You / Spit.”) to 13 words (“Jimand Jack and Deenaand / Fran. / and Vick / they hav No

School”), but 18 of the 28 sentences or sentence fragments (64%) were between five and eight words in length. In the first six writing samples I collected, between January 10th and February

11th, every sentence began with a subject-verb construction (e.g., “A ice storm began…”; “I

like…”; “The pigs like…”; “The cat spilled…”; “The elf will grant…”; “I wish…”). In the first

of the final four observations, the graphic organizer Ms. Hawkins provided included the words

“First,” “Second,” and “Last,” at the beginning of each set of lines included for Mario to write

his three wishes if he ever caught a leprechaun. In the writing samples I collected at the final

three observations, Mario began each one with the words, “First,” “Second,” and “Last."

The lack of variety in sentence length and beginnings in Mario’s writing resulted in

somewhat mechanical rhythms. The clearest examples of this are in the two pieces about wishes,

written on February 11th and March 6th. When read aloud, the consecutive sentences in each

piece take on an almost metered rhythm.

I Will WiSh. / for a mallbox. / So I can. / S[g]et mall.

I WiSh for money. / So can / be happy!

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I WiSh for. / a toys So. / I can be rich.

and

I Wish for a / tablet!

I wish for money!

I Wish for toys!

In the first sample, Mario’s sentences were longer than those in the second sample, but his

sentences followed a similar pattern or rhythm within each sample. Although the rhythms were a

bit robotic, his writing was consistently easy to read aloud.

Conventions. The key question posed for the writing trait, “conventions,” was, “How

much editing is required before the piece can be shared as a final product?” (Education

Northwest, 2014, p. 6). Mario’s use of conventions most often corresponded with the

descriptions of a capable writer. I evaluated his use of conventions based on his spelling,

punctuation, capitalization, and grammar.

Mario’s Spelling. Mario’s spelling of red words (the vocabulary list used to count high-

frequency words) was generally correct (e.g., a, and, is, was, I, like, the, no, in, be, my, by, put,

so, your, say, out, for, they, open, their, when, blue). However, he occasionally made minor

errors [e.g., “hav(have),” “benan(began)”]. Mario consistently used the following letters to

represent their corresponding sounds in his writing samples: m, s, n, i /ĭ/, d, p, c /k/, b, f, l, h, w,

th, which suggests he had appropriated them for his own use. Mario inconsistently used the

following letters to represent their corresponding sounds: a /ă/, e /ĕ/ -nd, g /g/, br-, and ai. Data indicate he might still have been developing proficiency in the grapheme-phoneme relationships.

Mario used “a” to represent /ă/ 19 times, most often in one-syllable words to which he had repeated exposure in a story. On the final day of data collection, he used invented spelling to

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spell “St. Patrick’s” as “Petricks” after watching a video about the upcoming holiday. Similarly, in an invented spelling, he spelled the word helmet as “halmit." This word was the only misspelling of /ĕ/ out of 12 appearances, three of which appeared in the word second—a word for which Mario did not use a print source to spell. Nevertheless, representing the /ĕ/ in “helmet” with the letter “a” and the /ă/ in “Patrick’s” with the letter “e” suggests he might still have been confusing these grapheme-phoneme relationships.

Mario spelled less frequent or more challenging words using invented spelling [e.g.,

“mallbox” (mailbox), “Spiled” (spilled), “Secind” and “Secund” (second), “silider” (cylinder),

“PeKt” (pecked) “gunu” (gonna)] or a print source (e.g., money, tablet, backpack, square).

Sometimes he spelled difficult words correctly without checking a source (e.g., school).

Mario’s Punctuation. Mario’s effective use of punctuation grew throughout the 10-week data collection period. In early samples of his work, he sometimes forgot end marks, and he often put periods at the end of every line of text instead of at the end of each sentence. On multiple occasions, I asked him why he put periods at the end of the line, and he responded, “For they won’t squish together." He seemed to have confused the purpose of end marks with that of spacing. When I returned in March after a two-week pause in data collection for OELPA testing,

Mario was consistently using end marks appropriately. On March 11, while writing the “how-to” on brushing teeth, Mario wrote, “Second, bushing. / teet." After writing the second period after the word “teet,” he went back and erased the first period after “bushing." I wanted to find out more about his understanding of end marks and how the change in his understanding had occurred, so I asked him.

Researcher: Why did you take that one away?

Mario: We don't need two periods. We just need this one right here. [points to period

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after “teet”]

Researcher: How do you know that?

Mario: No period up there. Only down.

Researcher: My question is, how did you learn that? Because it used to be that you used

to put a period on every line. [points to the end of every line] So, how did you learn not to

do that anymore? How did you learn just to put one period at the end of a sentence?

[begins to draw picture]

Mario: I don’t know how. I don’t have to put one right there.

Researcher: Right, did somebody tell you that? Or did you just figure it out yourself?

Mario: I figured it out by myself.

Researcher: OK, can you tell me how you figured it out? [no response; continues to

draw his picture] If you think of an answer, you tell me.

Mario had a difficult time explaining why he only needed one period, which came at the end of the sentence instead of at the end of each line, and he was not able to explain how he came to that understanding. Nevertheless, he did not make that error from March 6th forward.

Furthermore, Mario forgot end marks on seven sentences from January 10th through February

11th (e.g., “The bus can’t take Vickand Fran. / home”; “the elf will grant. / Garth the three

WiSheS”). After I returned in March, however, Mario never again neglected an end mark. He seemed to understand how to use them according to English conventions.

Mario used other punctuation besides periods. He often used exclamation points to show excitement, as in “The pigs like mud!” on January 18th and “I Wish for toys!” on March 6th. He also experimented with commas when he used the temporal words “first,” “second,” and “last” on March 11th, March 12th, and March 15th. I never observed Ms. Hawkins explicate why she

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used a comma to set introductory words apart from the sentence; however, she used commas in

her models. She provided a graphic organizer with the words and commas already printed on the

page.

Mario’s Capitalization. Mario also showed growth over time in his use of capitalization.

In early writing samples collected on January 10th and 23rd, Mario forgot to use an upper-case letter to begin six sentences, all of which were answers to comprehension questions (e.g., “a ice storm ben[g]an early.”; “the blue jay PeKt. / the SeedS.”). Mario always capitalized the pronoun

“I,” and he always capitalized proper names (e.g., “Jimand Jack and Deenaand Fran. / and

Vick…”).

At times, Mario added capital letters in unnecessary places (e.g., they have No School.”).

This error usually occurred when the lower-case letters were the same as the upper-case letters, just smaller (e.g., a ice Storm, School, Went), or with lower-case letters that conventionally descended below the line (e.g., Put, Your). When Mario wrote the word “get,” however, he used the lower-case form of “g”—a much different form than the upper-case “G”—and g’s descender did not descend below the line. Because of this, it was difficult to determine if Mario was adding unnecessary capital letters or if he was still gaining control over letterforms and sizes.

Mario’s Grammar. According to the grammar analysis, Mario usually used simple grammar, and he most often did so correctly. Mario also experimented, sometimes successfully, with more sophisticated grammar. Mario used nouns in both the subjective and objective cases, and there were examples of each noun case in both singular and plural forms. For example, in the sentence, “the cat Spiled the. / Seeds.” Mario used the singular-subjective noun “cat” and the plural-objective noun “Seeds." In the sentence, “The pigs like mud!” Mario used the plural- subjective noun “pigs” and the singular-objective noun, “mud." He used the singular-subjective

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pronoun “I” nine times (e.g., “I like to open”), the singular-subjective pronoun “it” once (e.g., “it was gunu rain”), and the plural-subjective pronoun “they” three times (e.g., “Jimand Jack and

Deenaand Fran. / and Vick they hav No School”). More sophisticated use of pronouns occurred when, as previously mentioned, Mario wrote imperative sentences in the “how-to” genre; he used the singular-subjective pronoun, “you” in the sentence, “Last, You / Spit." In other imperative sentences, he used the implied subject “you” (i.e., “you” understood) in the sentences,

“First, Put a halmit! / Secind, Put Your / hand in hard / Silider. Last, Put your feet in the / hard

Square.” He did the same in the sentence, “First, Put / toothpaste on / Your tooth buSh." Then he used the present progressive tense in the sentence, “Secind, bushing / teet.” The use of the word

“b[r]ushing” instead of “brush” and the lack of a possessive pronoun to indicate whose teeth are being brushed (i.e., your teeth) was a one-time error. Mario might have been still gaining control over the imperative mood. No instances of pronouns in the objective case appeared in Mario's writing products.

Mario also used a variety of verb forms. He used transitive verbs (e.g., “like mud,” “put the grass in. / the pail,” “PeKt / the seeds,” “Spiled the Seeds”), intransitive verbs (e.g., “like to open,” “went the sun,” “wish for money,”), and auxiliary verbs (e.g., “is beginning,” “was making,” “can get,” “can be,” “will wish”). He also used verbals in the infinitive form (e.g., "I like to open"), present participles (e.g., "Mom was MaKing..."), and past participles (e.g., "...ice

Storm ben[g]an..."; "...Went the / Sun."; "...blue jay PeKt..."; "cat Spil[l]ed..."); although, in the sentence, "by Put the grass. / in the pail" he failed to use the correct participial form of "put"

(i.e., "by putting the grass in the pail."). Conversely, in the sentence "Secind, b[r]ushing /teet[h]."

Mario incorrectly used the participial form of "brush." In any case, he used an assortment of verb forms, which suggests he was experimenting and learning to gain control over them.

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Mario usually used the correct tense (simple present) when writing in genres requiring his

ideas, and he seemed to make more errors when writing answers to comprehension questions that

required the past tense. On January 10th, in response to comprehension questions, Mario used the present tense when the past tense was more appropriate (e.g., "The ice Storm is ben[g]aning…") because he was writing about a story, which had already occurred, and the author wrote in the past tense. In the sentence, "The bus Can't take Vickand Fran. / home", the correct verb derivation was one Ms. Hawkins had not yet taught (i.e., modal verbs in the past tense).

Although "could" was a red word and Mario had seen it written in stories, I never observed his

teacher explicitly teaching the concept of modal verbs or, for that matter, the past tense of any

irregular verbs. Additionally, the correct derivation of "can't" to "couldn't" would have required

the negative form of the verb as well as its contraction. Mario made a similar error in the

sentence, "theY can Plant the. / Seeds in the rain"; the past tense of "can" is "could," and it would

have been the correct verb tense. Alternatively, Mario could have written the verb in the simple

past tense (i.e., "They planted..."); no modal verb was necessary, but Mario chose to experiment

with the slightly more sophisticated form.

Three other errors in tense occurred in later sentences. In "the elf will grant. / Garth the

three WiSheS", Mario used the future simple instead of the more appropriate past simple (i.e.,

granted), and in "they use their wiSh to. / get out the SauSage." he used the present simple tense

instead of the past simple. Interestingly, in the first "Three Wishes" piece, written on February

11th, Mario wrote, "I Will WiSh. / for a mallbox...," in the future simple. However, both of the

following sentences were written in the present simple (i.e., “I wish”). If the idea had been

written completely, his first sentence using the simple future would have been correct (e.g., "If I

capture an elf, then I will wish for a mailbox."). However, in Ms. Hawkins' model, she wrote “I

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will wish...", “I wish...", and “I wish" consecutively, just like Mario's. Or, more precisely,

Mario's wishes were written just like Ms. Hawkins'. Finally, as previously mentioned, Mario used the present participle used for the present progressive tense, “Secind, b[r]ushing teet[h].” in an imperative sentence that required the present simple tense.

To summarize Mario’s use of verb tenses, of the 28 verbs he used in the 10 samples I collected, 20 were written in the correct tense. Of the eight errors in tense, seven (88%) occurred when he wrote answers to comprehension questions, which required the past tense. I collected the earliest samples during the literacy block when Mario wrote in that genre, and he did not attempt to write any sentences in other genres in the past tense. As a result, it is difficult to infer that Mario demonstrated growth over time; it seems more likely that he was still gaining control over the past tense.

Though Mario was still gaining control over verb tenses other than the present simple, he demonstrated a thorough understanding of subject-verb agreement for the subjects and verbs he used. He made only one error early on in a somewhat tricky sentence, “Fran say No mice can. / get in my backpack." The sentence, written correctly, would say, “Fran said, ‘No mice can get in my backpack.’” It required Mario to use a relatively complex set of grammar skills, some of which he had not been taught. For example, a quotation in a narrative that includes a sentence within a sentence might also include two verb tense. One might be used by the narrator writing about something occurring in the past (i.e., “Fran said,”), and another by the character, which might be written in the present tense (i.e., “No mice can get in my backpack.”). This sentence also required the use of the negative (i.e., “No mice”) and a modal verb (can), and it was slightly longer (9 words) than Mario’s average sentence length (6.67 words). The sample was also taken on the first day of data collection, January 10th, and no subsequent subject-verb agreement errors

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occurred.

Mario used other parts of speech as well, including adverbs, adjectives, and prepositions.

He used adverbs of time (e.g., “a ice storm benan early.”; “When Mom was MaKing. / dinner.”;

“First,”; “Secind,”; “Last,”), one adverbial phrase of manner (e.g., “by put[ting]”), and descriptive adjectives presented earlier (e.g., happy, rich, hard, green). Other types of adjectives included the articles “a” and “the." In one case, Mario erroneously used “a” instead of “an” (e.g.,

“a ice storm”), and once he neglected to include an article when one was called for (e.g., “…in

[the] hard / Silider.”). Mario used two numerical adjectives (e.g., “…No mice…”; “…three

WiSheS…”) and five possessive pronouns (e.g., “…my backpack.”; “…their wiSh…”; “…Your / hand…”; “…your / feet…”; “…Your tooth b[r]uSh.”), and he used two qualifiers, which were vocabulary words from stories (e.g., “…ice Storm…”; “…blue jay…”). Mario used prepositions of place (e.g., “…in the rain.”; “…on / Your tooth b[r]uSh.”), some of which were used erroneously (e.g., “…get out [off] the SauSage.”; “…Put Your / hand in [on] hard / Silider.”;

“…Put your / feet in [on] the / hard Square.”), and in one sentence, he neglected a preposition

(e.g.“…Put [on] a halmit!”). Mario used the preposition of purpose “for” six times in his “three wishes” pieces (e.g., “I WiSh for…”). Finally, as explained previously, Mario used the coordinating conjunction “and” six times to link characters’ names and the coordinating conjunction “so” three times to give reasons for his wishes. He did not use any subordinating conjunctions.

Mario’s Presentation. The key question posed for the writing trait, “presentation,” was,

“Is the finished piece easy to read, polished in presentation, and pleasing to the eye?” (Education

Northwest, 2014, p. 7). Mario’s presentation most often corresponded with the descriptions of a capable writer. I evaluated his presentation based on his handwriting, spacing, and drawings.

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Mario’s Handwriting. Mario's handwriting was readable in all ten writing samples.

Though the letters were not consistent in size, even within a single word or line of text, the

letterforms were always identifiable. For example, in the sentence, "Secind, b[r]ushing / teet."

(Figure 4.8), the word "Secind," was written in very small letters, the word "bushing" was

written in very large letters, and the word "teet." on the next line was written in small letters. He

seemed to be aware of the size of his letters, though, because, in the first sentence of the same

piece, he wrote "First, Put..." then erased the word Put, which was written in very small letters,

and rewrote it using letters of a size that matched the word "First," Nevertheless, all the letters

maintained a consistent form.

Another example of this was in his "how-to" about riding a bike (Figure 4.3). The last

sentence reads, "Last, Put your / feet in the / hard Square." The word "Put" is written in relatively

small letters, and the word "your" is written in quite large letters. The letterforms are consistent

and recognizable, but the sizes are inconsistent.

As previously mentioned, I found it difficult to tell the difference between an unnecessary

upper-case letter and a misjudgment of letter size. A good example of this is the "how-to" about

riding a bike (Figure 4.3). In the second sentence, "Secind, Put Your...," the word "Your" has a

very large "Y" concerning the other letters in the word. However, it is more like a lower-case "y"

because the descender slants from right to left at the apex of the upper angle instead of coming

straight down as an upper-case "Y." The "y" in "your" in "Last, Put your...” is large, but it is the

same size as the other letters in the word. The "s" in "First" in the sentence, "First, Put a /

halmit!" is smaller than the upper-case "F" and similar in size to the “r” and “t,” but the lower-

case “i” is as tall as the "F" and written in the form of a lower-case “i” (i.e., a vertical line with a dot on top).

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Mario’s Spacing. Mario's spacing between words was nearly perfect, with a 98% score.

Except for three examples, he included spaces between words, and he did not add extra spaces

where they did not belong. In the sentence, “The bus can't take Vickand Fran / home,” Mario

neglected to include a space between the words “Vick” and “and.” In the same sample, Mario

wrote, “Jimand Jack and Deenaand Fran. / and Vick they have No School”. He forgot a space

between “Jim” and “and” and between “Deena” and “and.” Mario also left a big space between

the list of characters’ names and the plural pronoun, "they." I wondered if he sensed a need for a

pause here, which could have been indicated with an em-dash (i.e., Jim, Jack, Deena, and Fran—

they had no school.) It seems he was not certain how to construct this complicated sentence, so

he just did the best he could to get his point across. Maybe adding a big space was part of his

meaning-making.

Mario’s Drawings. Mario created drawings in the empty boxes included on the graphic

organizers meant for drawings, placed on the page to correspond with the related text. For

example, in his "how-to" about riding a bike (Figure 4.3), he drew a bike helmet in the box next to the sentence, "First, Put a halmit!". He drew a handlebar in the box next to the sentence,

"Secind, Put Your / hand in hard / Silider." Finally, he drew a pedal next to the sentence, "Last,

Put your / feet in the / hard Square." He placed his drawings in places that reflected the meaning of the text and did not obstruct its cohesion.

Summary of Mario’s Writing Outcomes

In sum, Mario seemed to be developing into a capable writer of English, but he still had a

few growth opportunities. Most of Mario’s writing presented the information or perspective

required by the assignment or genre. He seemed to be learning how to convey that information or

perspective using sentences and illustrations. He wrote sentences, which were related to each

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other and their corresponding illustrations. However, he did not demonstrate an understanding

that the ideas were focused on a single topic or main idea.

Mario’s writing organization seemed to be developing a basic structure, although it

lacked introductory and concluding sentences. He demonstrated he knew how to link a reason to

an idea using the word “so” when called upon to do so, but he never offered a reason for an idea

without being prompted. He seemed to have appropriated the use of temporal words when

writing in the “how-to” genre.

Mario's individual voice seemed to be emerging and developing in his writing. Although

predictable and repetitious, Mario expressed feelings of happiness and excitement in his work.

Sometimes he expressed a personal point-of-view, but other times, it was unclear whether this opinion was his own or borrowed from his teacher or peers. Although my observations of Mario during the writing process demonstrated he was aware of his teacher or me as his audience, he did not show awareness of or engagement with a reader in his writing products.

Mario seemed to be developing a personal lexicon of meaningful words and words serving a functional purpose within sentences. However, he used few descriptive words to create images in his writing. Mario often used vocabulary words to which he had probably been introduced during a literacy activity, and he used them appropriately. However, he used far fewer words than had been introduced, and he often repeated or copied the teacher’s model.

Mario capably used simple sentence patterns. He experimented with a few sophisticated sentence structures (i.e., compound, imperative), though he usually began sentences in the same way and varied only slightly. The repetition in sentence patterns, beginnings, and lengths created somewhat mechanical rhythms, although his sentences were easy to read aloud. Mario used a few transitions to link words and clauses; however, he did not use transitions to link sentences

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together to create a cohesive writing piece that flowed when read aloud.

Mario capably used English writing conventions consistent with the expectations of his

grade level, and when errors occurred, it usually did not negatively affect the readability of the

piece. Mario generally spelled grade-level, high-frequency words (i.e., red words) correctly, and

he spelled less frequent or more challenging words phonetically, with some spelled correctly.

Mario demonstrated growth over time in his use of end punctuation, demonstrating his

understanding that punctuation belongs at the end of the sentence rather than at the end of a text

line. He also experimented with commas following an introductory word (i.e., “First,”) after Ms.

Hawkins included them in her model. Mario showed growth over time in his use of capitalization

at the beginning of a sentence. He consistently capitalized the pronoun “I” and the initial letters of proper names. When Mario used upper-case letters erroneously, it might have been due to a lack of control over letterforms and sizes rather than a misunderstanding of capitalization. Mario used mostly simple grammar constructions using both singular and plural nouns and pronouns, various verb forms, and various verb tenses. However, he seemed most comfortable using the present simple tense. His subject-verb agreement was nearly always correct. He often experimented with other parts of speech, such as adverbs of time and manner; adjectives, including articles and possessive pronouns; prepositions of place and purpose; and coordinating conjunctions.

Mario created writing products that were readable and visually appealing for his age and writing experience. He formed his letters consistently and according to English conventions, although he seemed to still be gaining control over his letters' size. Mario's drawings were placed

to support the meaning of his text and did not obstruct its cohesion, probably due to his fidelity

to the graphic organizers Ms. Hawkins provided.

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Chapter 5: Findings-Case 2

In this chapter, I continue my report of the findings related to each of my guiding research questions, by focusing on Ms. Maddox and Rudy. As in Chapter 4, findings are organized in sections dedicated to Dialogic Relationship (Research Question 1), Rationales for

Instruction (Research Question 2), and Writing Outcomes (Research Question 3). I begin with a brief snapshot of Ms. Maddox and Rudy.

Snapshot: Ms. Maddox and Rudy

Ms. Maddox’s room was a pleasant and inviting place. Children busily went about the business of first grade, and there seemed to be a sense of order and effort to their activities. Most often, the members of the classroom community appeared to be enjoying themselves and each other. Ms. Maddox was a teacher with a strong presence; she commanded respect from her students, and it appeared they were eager to give it. The children seemed to know what she expected of them and, they were able to negotiate the classroom routines and procedures without much effort. In turn, it was evident that Ms. Maddox held her students in high regard, demonstrated by listening to them attentively, sharing personal stories, and remembering details about the children they had shared. She expected effort and progress from the children and created a rigorous yet friendly environment where they could succeed.

Rudy appeared to do well with Ms. Maddox’s classroom structure, and he seemed to have a genuine affection for his teacher. He spoke of her often and recounted stories she had shared with the class. Rudy often spoke to me, his peers, the paraprofessional, who helped in the morning literacy block, and Ms. Maddox. He often smiled and laughed, and he presented a friendly, even-tempered disposition. Rudy seemed to enjoy his time at school, but he sometimes struggled with focus and organization. He often became distracted and sometimes needed

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reminding to return to his task, though he did not actively seek to avoid work. Together, Ms.

Maddox and Rudy operated within this classroom community, where they created an

instructional and participatory dynamic unique to them.

Ms. Maddox and Rudy’s Dialogic Relationship

Ms. Maddox and Rudy enacted the three related instructional and participatory patterns of a) integrating multiple modes of meaning-making, b) using scaffolding, tools, and strategies, for writing instruction and learning, and c) providing and engaging in social activities. In the following sections, I deconstruct episodes, explicating themes in instructional patterns, and following up with examples of Rudy’s participatory patterns as he attempted to convey meaning in his writing. A summary tables of the related patterns are found in Appendix F.

Ms. Maddox and Rudy’s Integrated Modes of Meaning-Making

Ms. Maddox used multiple modes of meaning-making in her literacy instruction. She

combined visual and linguistic modes, and integrated reading and writing instruction by using

books and other printed materials throughout. Rudy also incorporated visual forms of meaning-

making in his writing process and products, and he used books and other printed materials in the

classroom as resources for writing.

Ms. Maddox’s Integration of Visual and Linguistic Modes of Meaning-Making. Ms.

Maddox integrated visual and linguistic forms of meaning making by leading group discussions about illustrations from the story and using gestures and pantomime to make meaning. On the first day of Reading Roots (Slavin & Madden, 2010) Lesson 28 [1/28], she introduced Is There an Alligator in the Pond? (Rice, 2003b) by displaying the cover art for the book. The illustration was of three children, two identical looking boys, one in front of the other, and one girl sitting on a wooden raft. The raft was floating in a pond, and a big pair of eyes emerged just above the

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surface of the water. The boy in front was pointing at the eyes, and the boy in back had three curved lines drawn above his head. All the children had expressions on their face that denoted fear or worry; their eyes were opened wide, pupils dilated, eyebrows raised, and mouths open in the shape of a circle.

After chorally reading the title of the story, Ms. Maddox began, “Let’s look at this picture.” The children started to chatter about the picture, and Ms. Maddox pointed to the big pair of eyes emerging from the surface of the water. The children discussed to whom the eyes might belong. Then, Ms. Maddox pointed to the children’s faces.

Ms. Maddox: What do you think they’re feeling on this log? It’s called a raft. How do

you think they’re feeling?

Rudy: Scared.

Ms. Maddox: Why do you think they’re feeling scared? What gives you the clue

because, you know, if you saw an alligator, you’d be scared, right? What else is in the

picture that gives us a clue? Sylvia?

Sylvia: The back one, the other twin, he’s wiggling.

Ms. Maddox: [points to the boy and wiggles her head] Yeah! He’s wiggling. You see

the lines like they’re shaking? Look at their faces. Look at Deena. She’s like [imitates the

girl in the drawing’s facial expression]. Yeah. She doesn’t look very happy does she.

In this example, Ms. Maddox led a group discussion about an illustration to introduce the story. She showed them how to deduce meaning from the illustration's details that might help them understand the text as they read. She asked questions, and when the children answered, she asked more questions to invite them to elaborate (e.g., “Why do you think they’re feeling scared?

What gives you the clue…?”). When Sylvia noticed the curved lines above the boy’s head and

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said they meant he was wiggling, Ms. Maddox responded by gesturing to the picture and pantomiming the action of shaking in fear. In this way, she brought the two-dimensional illustration to life by acting out what the illustrator might have been trying to communicate.

After reviewing the story vocabulary, Ms. Maddox returned to the book and, before reading it with the children, led a “picture walk” by going through the story, page by page, and asking the children questions about what meaning they could garner from the illustrations. She reintroduced the characters the children had met in earlier stories (Jim and Jack, who were twins, and Deena, the girl). The following is a short sample of the class discussion.

Ms. Maddox: So, what’s Jim and Jack doing?

Ruth: They’re swimming!

Ms. Maddox: They’re swimming! They’re swimming in the pond! Look at Deena.

Gianni: It looks like she’s scared.

Ms. Maddox: Maybe she’s scared, and it looks like she doesn't want to go in, and she's

kind of like, “I don't think so!” If it was me, I’d be going, “It’s too cold to get in! I don’t

want to get in that old water!” I like to swim, but I don’t like to be in the cold. [turns the

page and gasps] Oh!

Nelly: She got to swim inside.

Ms. Maddox: She got inside. Where are they going to go, do you think?

Renzo: Onto the wood.

Ms. Maddox: Onto the wood. And what do we call that wood?

Gisela: Raft!

Ms. Maddox: Onto the raft. How are they feeling right now?

Caleb: Happy.

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Ms. Maddox: Happy, but not like here, right? [turns the page and points to a different

picture] Here they’re worried and scared, but here, they’re kind of happy, aren’t they?

In this example, Ms. Maddox’s questions about the story illustrations gave the children a

chance to deduce meaning and translate thoughts into language. She found opportunities to

extend their meaning, like when Ruth said, “They’re swimming!” and Ms. Maddox replied,

“They’re swimming! They’re swimming in the pond!” Ms. Maddox also implicitly corrected

Nelly’s incorrect preposition (i.e., “She got to swim inside!”) when she repeated Nelly’s words

and asked a follow-up question, “Where are they going do you think?” Then, Renzo joined in

with the more appropriate preposition, “Onto the wood!” Ms. Maddox built on Renzo’s response by asking another question. “What do we call that wood?” Gisela responded, “Raft!” By talking about the story illustrations, Ms. Maddox found opportunities to extend the children’s language

and create collective meaning about the story by building one response upon another. Allowing

the children to listen to and produce language about the story was applied to their writing later

when she assessed their comprehension.

Rudy’s Integration of Visual and Linguistic Modes of Meaning-Making. Rudy integrated visual and linguistic meaning-making in his writing process and products. He seemed frustrated when he did not know how to draw what he was thinking about, or an illustration did not turn out as he hoped, but he always persisted and found ways to represent his ideas. Rudy used printed pictures or objects found in the classroom as models for his drawings, and he talked about his drawings with his tablemates, who helped him. He used gestures and pantomime to negotiate meaning when he did not know the right words to express his ideas. Rudy usually drew first and then wrote the text, but even when he wrote first, his ideas evolved as he drew the pictures.

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During an afternoon writing workshop [3/4/2019], Rudy began writing what was

intended to be an informational text, an “All About” tigers book. Four children were seated at his

table, two on each side facing each other, working on books about self-selected topics. As I

chatted with Rudy about his writing, other children joined our conversation. Rudy read aloud

what he had written on the first page of his book, “I like tigers because they are fast.” Then he

added, “I don’t know what to write anymore.”

Angela, who sat across from Rudy, said, “Tigers are brown.” Rudy, Angela, and Nelly

discussed tigers and cheetahs' color and whether they had spots or stripes. “I’m just gonna say

tigers are yellow,” Rudy declared, and he grabbed a yellow marker and drew a yellow tiger on

the top left corner of the large square meant for an illustration. Rudy continued to chat with the

other children and me about what tigers looked like as he drew the rest of his picture. Then,

Nelly looked over and noticed where Rudy had placed the yellow tiger on the page. She asked

why the tiger was up so high on the page, and when Rudy shrugged, she offered, “Maybe he’s on

a mountain.”

After some discussion, Rudy reached for a blue marker and said, “There’s another tiger

that’s blue that’s gonna fight him.” He drew for a moment then said, “He’s on a mountain. I

don’t know how to draw a mountain.” Nelly said, “I know. You do like this.” She traced the

shape of an “M” with a capped marker on her paper. Rudy traced an “M” in the air and said,

“Like this? Is it like this? …Like an—like an “M?” Rudy noticed alphabet cards on the wall and

observed the “M” shaped like a mountain (Figure 5.1). “Oh yeah! It’s like a mountain! I’m

gonna make it big!” Once Rudy got started, he began to draw and add more to his oral narrative about tigers, although he did not add more text to the page. By the end of the writing workshop, he had a yellow tiger and a blue tiger on top of a big brown mountain, and they were going to

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fight. He also added a yellow diamond in the middle of the mountain, using my ring as a model, and invited me inside the imaginary mountain, “Do you wanna go in there ‘cause there’s a diamond!” He seemed to be so caught up in his pretending that he forgot he had started out writing an “All About” book. His final product and the illustration he used to draw the mountain are shown in Figure 5.1.

Figure 5.1

Rudy’s Drawing of Two Tigers on a Mountain and the Illustration he Used as a Resource.

This example demonstrates how Rudy coupled visual and linguistic modes of meaning- making in his writing process and products. He often struggled with how to draw, so with the help of his tablemates and other models (e.g., my ring, the “M” alphabet card), Rudy approximated the things he wanted to represent. He pantomimed when he drew the mountain in

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the air as a rehearsal before committing it to the page. As he integrated language into his drawing

by talking with his peers and me, he developed more complex ideas about his writing. He started

with the words, “I like tigers because they run fast.” After creating a drawing to go with the text

and collaborating with his peers, his picture no longer supported his words. However, he had

added detail to his original statement and extended the meaning of his text through the

illustrations. Rudy usually drew his pictures first then wrote the text about his pictures, so in

other samples of Rudy’s writing, this mismatch did not seem to occur.

Ms. Maddox’s Use of Books and Print to Facilitate Writing Instruction. Ms. Maddox

used books and other printed texts in her literacy instruction. She repeatedly exposed children to

books and used the books they read together as shared experiences about which the children

could write. Ms. Maddox also used books as model texts or foundational activities to teach print conventions and genre features in writing. The following example illustrates how she did so.

On the second day of Reading Roots (Madden & Slavin, 2010) Lesson 28 [1/29/2019],

Ms. Maddox invited the children to the front of the room and asked them to bring their books, Is

There an Alligator in the Pond? (Rice, 2003b). She began the lesson by asking the children to

point to the book's title and read it aloud together. Then she said, “Let’s answer that question.

Was there an alligator in the pond?” The children responded, “No!” Ms. Maddox continued to

ask questions about the story, and the children responded by remembering the details they had

read the day before in school and for homework the previous evening. She asked questions about

the setting, Alligator Pond, and the characters. The children recalled the characters’ names and

details about them, like Jim and Jack were twins. Ms. Maddox connected the conversation to a

future writing activity when she reminded the children about the story map they would complete

at the end of the lesson in the following discussion about a minor character, Deena’s mom.

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Ms. Maddox: No, she really isn’t important, but could we put her in there if we were

listing our characters names on a story map?

The class continued reviewing the events of the story, then Ms. Maddox sent the children to their seats to read with their partners, and she brought a small group to a table where she listened to them read aloud. When the children had read for 10 minutes, they returned to the carpet, and Ms. Maddox prepared them to write responses to the comprehension questions at the end of the book. She told the children to read the whole question, think about what it was asking, and look back in the book to use as a resource.

Ms. Maddox went on to explain how to write a complete response in a full sentence. She explained that when the question started with “what” or “how,” the children were asked to tell.

“What happened? What were they doing? What was going on?” She explained that the answer should include enough information to make sense to someone who had not read the book. Then, they practiced one question together.

Ms. Maddox: Let’s read question number four. [with children] “How did the kids feel

when they saw the frog?” So, how are we going to start that sentence? We have to write it

in a full sentence. Are we just going to say “sad” or “mad” or “glad’ or “relieved?” …So,

how are we going to start that sentence if we’re going to say it in a whole sentence?

Sara: The kids…

Ms. Maddox: The kids…

Leon: …were…

Ms. Maddox: …were… OK. You have to say, “The kids were” or, “The kids felt.” OK?

That’s how you need—you can’t just write “happy.” “Sad.” “Mad.” “Scared.” OK? You

have to write a whole sentence.

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Ms. Maddox reminded the children to start the sentence with an uppercase letter and end it with a period. Then, she displayed the book on the smartboard using a document camera, pointed to the lines on which the children were meant to write, and reminded them to write their letters small enough to fit in the space provided. Then, she reiterated the importance of including spaces between the words and addressed Rudy directly.

Ms. Maddox: What do I have to have between my words?

Children: Spaces!

Ms. Maddox: Spaces. Why do I have to have spaces between my words, Rudy? My

friend who doesn’t like to put space between his words. Why do you have to put space

between your words? So, you can…

Rudy: …read it?

Ms. Maddox: So, we can read it. Why do I put a space between my words?

Rudy: So, we can read it.

Ms. Maddox: So, we can read it. If it’s all scrunched together, it’s hard to read, isn’t it?

Yeah? Make sure we have our space.

This example shows how Ms. Maddox returned to the book she had introduced the day before, which the children had read again for homework, and reviewed the story's details. In so doing, she reminded the children of the narrative genre’s features (e.g., title, setting, characters, plot), which they would be required to recall for their future writing. She had them read the book one more time, giving them repeated exposure to the book before asking them to write about it, then explicitly walked them through the steps of how to write the answer to a comprehension question. Ms. Maddox said to read the question, look for keywords like “what” or “how,” and think about what information to give. She reminded them to use their books as resources and

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how to find the place in the story where the information would most likely be located. Then, she orally composed and constructed a sentence that answered a practice question. Ms. Maddox took the opportunity to remind the children about print concepts, such as capitalization, punctuation, and use of space.

Rudy’s Use of Books and Print as Resources for Writing. Rudy used books and other printed text as resources for his writing, specifically for spelling, drawing, and answering comprehension questions. Sometimes he looked for resources on his own, but he often did so after being prompted by his teacher or one of his peers. The following example illustrates how

Rudy did so.

On the third day of Reading Roots (Slavin & Madden, 2010) Lesson 28, Is There an

Alligator in the Pond? (Rice, 2003b) [1/17/2019], Ms. Maddox read the lesson’s recommended

StaR story, Trosclair and the Alligator (Huggins, 2013), aloud to the children. When the story was over, she said, “You guys are going to tell me your favorite part of the story. ‘My favorite part was… I liked it because…’” Then, she passed out a piece of paper with a large square covering the top two-thirds of the page for a picture and a series of lines on the bottom third of the page for writing.

Rudy sat down at his seat, and after writing his name and date on the paper, he started to write his sentences. He wrote “My” then asked aloud, seemingly to no one in particular, “How do you spell favorite?” In my role as a participant-observer, I chose not to help this time because

I wanted to observe how he would proceed on his own. When no one responded, he started to quietly say the word to himself and write down the sounds he heard. He wrote, “faybrd prt of the bock.” Ms. Maddox, who was walking around the room conferring with children, stopped to chat with Rudy about the spelling of the word “part.” She stayed at his table, helping his tablemates,

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and after a few moments, Rudy asked for more assistance.

Rudy: What is his name again?

Ms. Maddox: Trosclair.

Rudy: Trosclair…

Ms. Maddox: You can come look at the book and see his name. You can come get

it…off of my desk.

Rudy: OK. [stands and walks to the desk to retrieve the book]

Rudy returned to his desk with the book and looked as he wrote “Trosclair” on his paper.

Then he got up, took the book over to the word wall, probably to find the spelling of the

next word “stepped,” which was not displayed, and he returned to his seat. Another child,

Tobias, who sat at a neighboring table, asked Rudy for the book. With Ms. Maddox’s

permission, he took it to his classmate, and when he returned to his seat, he continued to

write “step on the.” When he came to the word “alligator,” he returned to Tobias’ desk to

retrieve the book, without being prompted and used it to spell the word.

When he was finished with the book, Rudy returned it to his teacher’s desk, came back to his seat, and reread his sentence softly to himself, pointing to each word with his pencil. He began writing something on his paper, then noticed he had made an error. “Oh! Not a number two!” Then he erased and looked up toward the front of the room, then at the word wall in the back, seemingly to find the spelling of the word “because.” When he could not find it right away, he sat for a minute and tried to get his teacher’s attention, but she was busy helping other children. Ms. Maddox read from someone’s paper.

ʻ…because he was brave.’ You make sure you spell “because” right. It’s on your [red

word] cards, and it’s on the word wall. ‘Because’ is not B-E-C-U-Z. It is not C-U-Z. It’s

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got lots of letters in it, and you need to have them all spelled correctly.

A few children were struggling with the same spelling, and Ms. Maddox directed each of them to the same resources. When Rudy asked her about the spelling, she simply said, “Go find it. You can find it.” He walked over to the wall, pointed to the word “because,” and said, “It was right here.” Ms. Maddox replied, “OK, then write it. If you know it, then write it.” Rudy returned to his seat and wrote “because,” glancing back at the word wall after writing each letter. He used the word wall again to spell “was,” after being prompted by Ms. Maddox, and used invented spelling to spell “fonnee” [funny]. When Ms. Maddox checked on Rudy again, she helped him correct the spelling by asking him to remember, from his phonics lessons, the letters that make the /ŭ/ sound and the /ē/ sound when it comes at the end of a word. Rudy used the phonics cards posted at the front of the room to recall the letters. As shown in Figure 5.2, Rudy's finished product read “My faybrd Part of thebock / is wentrosclair steponthe / Alligator because it / Was funny.”

Figure 5.2

Rudy’s Favorite Part of Trosclair and the Alligator (Huggins, 2013)

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This example illustrates how Rudy used print resources, including books and wall displays, to help with spelling and to remember one detail of the story, Trosclair’s name. In that case, he did so only after his teacher had prompted him and permitted him to take the book from her desk. However, when he needed to spell “alligator” again, he remembered on his own where the word was written and retrieved the book from his classmate to use as a resource. When he went to the word wall, probably to spell the word “stepped,” he took initiative to look for a resource, although it was not there. This action, along with his failure to find the word “because” the first time he looked, might indicate that Rudy lacked familiarity with the word wall. Later, I observed Rudy using the word wall as a spelling resource more often. I also observed him using the phonics cards displayed at the front of the room on several other occasions.

Using Scaffolding, Tools, and Strategies.

Ms. Maddox scaffolded her lessons and offered tools and strategies to support the English writing efforts of young EL children. She used explicit instruction, including modeling the writing process, made connections from personal experiences to new learning, and offered the children graphic organizers to help them write. Ms. Maddox’s Explicit Instruction. Ms.

Maddox used explicit instruction to scaffold lessons, which included modeling the writing process. She thought aloud as she created a model product to make her writing decisions explicit; however, she did not create a model the first time she introduced a new genre. Instead, she scaffolded the writing process by explaining the steps and teaching minilessons in large groups to model and practice the writing process together. Ms. Maddox gave the children time to practice writing in the new genre, and she used the information she gleaned from the children’s first attempts to guide her instruction on subsequent days. She used books and student writing samples as models, and she emphasized to the children that the models she created were hers

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because they contained her thoughts and ideas, and the children’s work products were their own.

Moreover, she erased, covered, or removed her models before sending the children off to

practice. How Ms. Maddox used explicit instruction to scaffold the writing process is illustrated

in the following examples.

For about two weeks [3/4/2019-3/14/2019], I observed Ms. Maddox five times. She

explicitly taught the children how to write informational texts, or “All About” books, through a

series of minilessons in the afternoon writing workshops. On the first day, I entered the room just

as the children were getting settled for writing practice, and in a previously described episode, I

observed Rudy as he wrote a book called “All About Tigers.” Before he began writing, he

referenced a pre-writing brainstorming activity. The page had “All About Topics” written across

the top and a nine-square grid beneath. Rudy had written and drawn pictures in each square

(Figure 5.3).

Figure 5.3

Ms. Maddox’s Model and Rudy’s List of Topics to Write “All About”

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At the second observation [3/6/2019], Ms. Maddox invited the children to engage in a

“think-pair-share” activity. She asked them to bring their brainstorming papers to the carpet, and she displayed the model of the activity she had created previously. The children told their partners their chosen topic and recounted three things they knew about that topic. Then, a few children shared their responses with the class.

After giving several children a chance to share, Ms. Maddox displayed the cover of an

“All About” book on the smartboard, using the document camera. The book was the same format as the book about Tigers Rudy had written two days earlier. Ms. Maddox pointed to a blank line beneath the words “All About” and told the children to write their topics there. She displayed a model text, Seahorses (Corse, 2011), and pointed out how the book’s cover followed the same pattern with the title across the top, the author’s name at the bottom, and a seahorse picture in the middle. Then, Ms. Maddox turned to the next page, the first of three additional pages stapled to the cover, each containing a large box for a picture and several lines beneath the box for text. She explained that the children should write one thing they knew about their topic on each page.

The next day [3/6/2019], Ms. Maddox began the lesson by reading a few pages from a model informational text, Polar Bears in Danger (Edwards, 2008), and she discussed facts about polar bears. After Ms. Maddox read, she asked, “So, when we read this book, what is this story all about?” The children responded, “Polar bears,” and they recounted some of the book's facts.

Then Ms. Maddox asked, “Did any of this book say, ‘I like…?’ …Did any of this book say, ‘I see…?’” The children responded, “No,” and Ms. Maddox explained the difference between a

“true fact” and an event in a story.

In the next activity, Ms. Maddox displayed a two-column pocket chart on the easel with a paper strip displayed at the top of the left side, which read, “All About Book.” A paper strip on

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the top of the right side read, “A time when something happened story.” She had a stack of paper strips, each containing a model sentence, and as she read each sentence, she had the children tell their partners where the sentence belonged. The first strip said, “Polar bear cubs stay with their moms for two years.” After talking about it with their partners, the children agreed the sentence belonged in an “All About” book because it was a fact from the book they had just read. The next sentence strip read, “I saw a polar bear at the zoo.” After discussing it with their partners,

Ms. Maddox asked the children to raise their hands if they had gone to the zoo on a field trip when they were in kindergarten. Only some of the children raised their hands. Ms. Maddox explained this was a sentence about something that happened to some people but not to everyone, so it belonged in the column labeled, “A time when something happened story;” “All

About” books are for things that are always true for everyone.

After following the same pattern with several model sentences, Ms. Maddox explained that sentences in “All About” books should start with the word the book is about. She told them not to start with the word “I.” Instead of “I like…,” “I saw…,” or “I think…,” she gave the examples, “Polar bears are…,” “Polar bears can…,” “Cheetahs can…,” and “Circles are….”

Then, she had the children orally compose sentences about their chosen topics. If the sentence started with “I” or “my,” she stopped them and modeled how to compose a sentence starting with their topics instead. When several children had a chance to practice composing sentences orally with their teacher’s guidance, Ms. Maddox told them they could write either “All About” books or pretend stories. However, they must decide in which genre they were writing and write their sentences accordingly. Then, she sent them to their seats for writing practice.

At the fourth observation of these two weeks [3/12/2019], Ms. Maddox continued her instruction about the difference between facts and events in a story. She displayed another poster,

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divided into two columns entitled “All About” and “Story,” and she facilitated a similar activity.

After Ms. Maddox helped the children evaluate the sentences, she asked Jessica to retrieve a

book from her writing folder. Jessica had written a story about school, which Ms. Maddox

displayed on the smartboard and read to the class. The sentences all began with, “At school,

I…,” then recounted something Jessica did at school. Ms. Maddox used Jessica’s book as a model to show how this was a story, not an “All About” book, and she explained that Jessica had told her so before writing it. Ms. Maddox used Jessica and her story to demonstrate the difference between an informational text about school and a school story. Then, she sent the children off to practice writing.

On the fifth and final observation [3/14/2019], Ms. Maddox created a model of an “All

About” book. When I arrived, children gathered on the carpet, and Ms. Maddox sat in a chair behind them near the document camera, where she displayed the cover of an “All About” book.

She had written “Ice Skating” on the top line below the words “All About.” Next to the word,

“By,” Ms. Maddox had written her name on the line at the bottom. She explained to the children that she would write an “All About” book about ice skating. Then, Ms. Maddox looked up, as if she were thinking, and asked, “What do I know about ice skating?” The children began shouting out answers, and Ms. Maddox corrected them. “Wait. That’s what you know about ice skating.

What do I know about ice skating? …I’m going to write about what I know about.” One child asked, “What you know?” Ms. Maddox responded:

Ms. Maddox: I know lots of things. I'm going to tell you what I know about, OK? What I

know about ice skating. I know that girl ice skaters wear fancy dresses. … “Girl ice

skaters wear fancy dresses.” [counting the words on her fingers as she said them] What

do I have at the beginning of my sentence?

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Gianni: A capital.

Ms. Maddox: A capital. [begins writing on the first empty page of the book.] “Girl,” I

know how to do ice because we just talked about that and how to skate. [writes “ice

stat…”] Whoops!

Renzo: It's a “t!”

Ms. Maddox: It is a “t,” what should it be?

Renzo: It should be a “k.”

Ms. Maddox: [erases the “t” and writes a “k”] Skate, what says /er/?

Sylvia: “E-R!”

Ms. Maddox continued writing the sentence in this same way, asking the children to tell her what letters made the sounds in the words “fancy dresses.” Then, in unison, the class read the sentence she had written, and Ms. Maddox asked if this was a sentence for an “All About” book or a storybook? She referred to the previous lesson’s poster with two columns entitled “All

About” and “Story.” After some discussion, they agreed this was a sentence for an “All About” book, and Ms. Maddox turned the page of the book she was writing and continued similarly.

This series of related examples details how Ms. Maddox used explicit instruction to teach the children the writing process's details when writing an informational text. She did so by introducing one new concept at a time with increasing levels of complexity. Ms. Maddox began with the first step in the writing process, idea generation, by creating a list of topic ideas, along with illustrations, and inviting the children to do the same (Figure 5.3). Next, she displayed the

“All About” pages on which they were to write, and she pointed to each line or space on the page and described what should go in each space. She used a model text, Sea Horses (Corse, 2011), which followed a similar pattern for the book cover, as an example of exactly how the cover of

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their “All About” books should look. She told the children three details should be included in their books, one for each page.

After giving the children some extended time to practice the new genre, Ms. Maddox found they were having trouble distinguishing between facts and story events, so she engaged in a series of activities to explicitly teach the concept and give the children a chance to focus on smaller skills needed to complete the larger task of writing a whole “All About” book. She read a model informational text, Polar Bears in Danger (Edwards, 2008). She juxtaposed sentences from the book with sentences about the same topic but constructed as sentences from the narrative genre (i.e., events in a story). Ms. Maddox explained how to look for clues in the sentence to decide which genre it belonged to (e.g., fact from a book vs. something that happened in a story; begins with topic vs. begins with “I” or “My”), so they could apply that knowledge when constructing their sentences. Then, she gave them a chance to orally compose and construct their sentences with her guidance, stopping them, and helping them find the language they needed to complete the task.

Ms. Maddox used Jessica’s story about school to point out features of a story and make explicit how they differed from the features of an “All About” book. Finally, she constructed her model of the new genre when she wrote, “Ice Skating.” She used guided questions as she did so, and although she made it clear that this was her book, she involved the children in the fine- grained decision-making process of using English spelling patterns and print conventions. In this series of mini-lessons, Ms. Maddox used explicit instruction to make the process of writing in a new genre clear to the children in her class.

Rudy’s Response to Explicit Instruction. Rudy responded to Ms. Maddox’s explicit instruction by attending to the details of his writing. He often reread his writing, self-corrected

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errors, took time to think about writing decisions and asked for help when he did not know how

to proceed. Still, as an emergent writer, he often made errors, which he did not notice. Finally,

Rudy used his teacher’s models to guide his writing, but he did not emulate it exactly.

In the afternoon writing workshops [3/4/2019 and 3/6/2019], Rudy wrote what he

intended to be an “All About” books about tigers and school, respectively. These were the only

attempts at informational texts I observed Rudy write, and they were written early in the series of

minilessons about the genre. He seemed to prefer writing stories or telling what he liked about topics that interested him rather than recounting facts he knew. One afternoon [3/6/2019], I

observed Rudy compose and illustrate a book entitled “All About School.”

Rudy sat down with his blank book and began to write, “school” on the line beneath the

words, “All About.” He looked up at the word wall, possibly to check the spelling of the word,

but it was not listed, so he continued to spell it from memory. When finished, Rudy wrote his

name and pointed to the space in the middle of the page. “I’m gonna draw a picture here,” he

announced; then, he chose a marker and began to draw. He drew a picture of a yellow square,

which he explained was the school. Inside the yellow square was a purple rectangle, divided in

half with a vertical line, and four horizontal lines extending across the shape, which Rudy told

me was a window. Next to the rectangle was a person with a smiley face dressed in blue. “That’s

me!” (Figure 5.4)

Rudy turned the page of his book, looked up in the air as if to think, smiled, and wrote, “I

lik S….” He stopped, looked around, and wrote “…cho ol” from memory. After a pause, he

wrote “be”; then, Rudy twisted himself around to check the spelling of “because” on the word

wall, and he finished writing the word. When he came to the end of the first line, he moved his

pencil to the next line and easily wrote, “we go outside inPla….” After writing the letter “a” the

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first time, he erased and rewrote it before adding a “Y” to the end of the word and placing a

period at the end of the sentence. Rudy spent some time quietly drawing a picture of two

children, and then he turned the page to write another sentence.

Figure 5.4

The First Three Pages of Rudy’s Book, “All About School”

After taking a few seconds to think, Rudy wrote “Sch o olis”; then, he began to say the next word's sounds. “/b/,” Rudy wrote “ber,” and said, “better.” He looked up at me and asked,

“How do you do better?” In my role as participant-researcher, I chose to support his spelling without giving him every letter. “/b/ /ĕ/ Say it slowly. /b/ /ĕ/ /t/ /ûr/,” I said the sounds slowly as

Rudy listened. He erased the “r” at the end of “ber,” and I repeated, “Say it really slowly and write every sound you hear.” Rudy looked up and said, “bet.” He wrote one “t,” and as he did so, he said “/ûr/” and wrote “er.”

These examples illustrate how Rudy responded to Ms. Maddox’s explicit instruction.

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Rudy created a book cover in the way Ms. Maddox explained by writing what the book was “all

about” on the top line, a picture in the middle, and his name on the bottom line. He took the time

to think of an idea, and occasionally, he noticed when he made errors. Rudy self-corrected the

“a” in “play,” and although he made some spelling errors, he used the word wall to spell

“because.” When he tried to spell “better,” he reread the letters he had written, “ber,” noticed it

was spelled incorrectly, and thought for a moment about how to correct the error. When he did

not know how to proceed, he stopped and asked for help. These were all strategies Ms. Maddox

explicitly taught.

At this early stage in the series of minilessons about informational texts, it seems Rudy

did not understand the concept Ms. Maddox later spent more time on, which was how to identify

a fact, so he wrote outside of the genre he chose. Nevertheless, when Rudy stated his opinions

about school, he gave reasons using the word “because,” indicating he might have appropriated

this skill Ms. Maddox had explicitly taught earlier. Recall the previous example from the

morning literacy block [1/17/2019], when Ms. Maddox told the children to write their favorite

part of the story, Trosclair and the Alligator (Huggins, 2013). She said, “You guys are going to tell me your favorite part of the story. ‘My favorite part was… I liked it because….’” Rudy gave a reason on that day, “…because it was funny” (Figure 5.4), and he repeated the skill when he wrote, “All About School,” which might have been a response to Ms. Maddox’s explicit instruction.

Ms. Maddox’s Connections. Ms. Maddox made connections from students’ prior knowledge and experiences to new learning by observing the children, listening to them talk, and noticing what interested them when they wrote. Ms. Maddox also made cross-curricular connections by showing the children how what they were learning in the literacy block or writing

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workshop could be applied to other subjects and vice versa. Finally, Ms. Maddox made instruction personal by sharing personal stories related to the topic.

On the second day of Reading Roots (Slavin & Madden, 2010) Lesson 28 [1/16/2019],

Ms. Maddox and the class were rereading the Shared Story Is There an Alligator in the Pond?

(Rice, 2003b). As she and the children took turns reading, she reviewed the setting, characters, and events by asking questions and noticing the illustrations' details. The story was about children swimming in a pond, and at one point, she stopped and asked the children if they had ever swum in a pond? Then, she shared a story about being stung by a jellyfish. Mikko commented:

Mikko: Those animals are bad!

Ms. Maddox: Well, it’s not that they’re bad. I was in their environment, right? …Where

does the jellyfish and the fish live?

Mikko: Ocean.

Ms. Maddox: In the ocean. When I was in the ocean, they thought I was attacking them.

…I wasn’t, but you know when you’re playing and you’re moving, like this? [wiggles

and waves arms] Remember, we talked about that with bumblebees. When you guys start

going like this [wiggles and waves arms], they think you’re trying to hurt them. Yeah.

Same thing. When I was playing in the ocean, the jellyfish thought I was trying to attack

him. I wasn’t, so then his defense, the way to protect himself, is to sting you so you won’t

hurt them. So, he stung me. I don’t like swimming in the ocean because of it. I don’t like

to swim in water where I can’t see.

In this example, Ms. Maddox connected the story to a personal experience she had as a child. When Mikko had a negative reaction to the jellyfish, Ms. Maddox used the opportunity to

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make a cross-curricular connection to something they had studied in science. She used academic

vocabulary, like “environment” and “defense;” then she reminded the children about their

experiences with bumblebees. Ms. Maddox explained how bees sting to protect themselves just

as jellyfish do. These young children likely have had very little experience with alligators who

might attack in a pond (the subject of the Shared Story). However, by observing the children,

Ms. Maddox connected her experience with a jellyfish to their experiences with bumblebees. She

connected prior knowledge (i.e., animals’ environments and defense mechanisms) to the new

learning in the story about children who were afraid an alligator might be in the pond where they

were swimming.

Rudy’s Connections. Rudy seemed to make connections to new learning, which was

usually apparent by observing his behavior during writing instruction or practice. His level of

connection seemed to be related to the topic. When he seemed especially interested in a topic, he

was visibly excited. He smiled, laughed, and became very talkative.

To illustrate, during the practice portion of an afternoon writing workshop [3/7/2019],

Ms. Maddox was circulating the room and conferring with children about their ongoing writing projects. Rudy came to his seat, riffled through his writing folder, and found a storybook he had already started. He told me it was about Roblox, an online gaming platform where users can create and play games of their own, and other users can download and play many of the games at no cost (Roblox Corporation, 2020). As Ms. Maddox conferred with Nelly, Rudy’s neighbor, about her work, Rudy left the table to retrieve a plastic stencil of math shapes. When he returned,

Ms. Maddox asked him about his topic, and he identified it as a pretend story rather than an “All

About” book (the topic of the day’s minilesson). Rudy outlined the characters and main events of the story he had planned—two people are racing, crash, one person gets out of the car, and the

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other person dies. “Oh! My goodness! That sounds very scary!” Ms. Maddox replied, and she moved on to another child who was asking for help.

Rudy began using the stencil to trace shapes for his picture on the book’s cover. He looked up and said, “Ah! This is gonna be hard.” Nelly asked him what he was writing, and

Rudy replied:

It’s a game. Roblox is a game where you can play every game. And if you don’t got

like—and if you cannot download one now, any game, you can just go to Roblox ‘cause

it has a lot of games in it. …You can download it now, I think. …I have one in my phone

and my mom’s phone too. I have a phone.

Rudy returned to his drawing, and when he was finished, he turned the page and began drawing people. On the center of the page, one person was drawn from the shapes on the stencil

(e.g., rectangular body, circular head) and had a happy face. Another, smaller person, also with a happy face, was on the left side of the page, and a third person, with a sad face, was on the right side of the page. Then, he turned to Nelly and said, “I changed my mind. It’s not about what I told you. I changed my mind.” Nelly looked up then went back to work on her piece. Rudy looked over at me and repeated, “I changed my mind. It’s not about what I told you.” He pointed to the people with happy faces and said:

Rudy: These are the winners. [indicates the people on the page]

Researcher: The winners of what?

Rudy: The race.

Researcher: … So, this is the winners? These are the winners? [points to the people on

the left and right sides of the page]

Rudy: In the middle.

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Researcher: What’s in the middle? What’s the middle guy?

Rudy: [points to the middle person] This is the winner and [points to the sad-faced

person on the right] this is the loser, and [points to the small person on the left] this is

like…[moves his finger from side to side on the page while he thinks] …it’s like…it’s

like the second loser.

Researcher: Oh, second place? He came in second place. OK. …So, this is first place,

second place, third place? [points to each person as she says each place] OK. So, what

are you going to write on this page about that?

Rudy: These are the winners… These are the winners. These are the winners, but there’s

two more people racing and they’re going to crash.

He spoke with a cadence as if he were reading, the same way he spoke when I had previously observed him orally composing sentences with Ms. Maddox. Rudy picked up his pencil and began to write. When he had finished writing this page it read, “thesetheWeners but theris / Stel Som PeoPle thatar rasign.” The final product is shown in Figure 5.5.

Figure 5.5

The Cover and First Page of Rudy’s Story about Roblox

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In this example, Rudy seemed connected to his topic, evidenced by his eagerness to talk about it and how much he had to say, including what Roblox was, how to access it, peripheral information (e.g., “I have a phone”), and a detailed story with a setting, characters, and plot. He connected an out of school experience, downloading and playing Roblox, to his writing, and in so doing, he used this experience together with skills he had learned at school to create his book.

Skills he learned at school were identifying the piece as a story rather than an informational text, using the word wall for spelling, drawing pictures related to the text, and orally composing and rehearsing the text before writing on the page.

Ms. Maddox’s Use of Graphic Organizers. One tool Ms. Maddox used pervasively throughout her instruction was graphic organizers. Some graphic organizers she used were less structured than others. For example, the inside pages of the books she used during the afternoon writing workshop contained only a space to draw a picture and lines beneath for text, as shown in previous examples. Conversely, during the morning literacy block, she used more structured graphic organizers, such as story maps, to assess comprehension at the end of a lesson. In the following example, Ms. Maddox used a detailed graphic organizer for writing in the “how-to” genre.

On the third day of Reading Roots (Madden & Slavin, 2010) Lesson 30 [2/4/2019], Ms.

Maddox explained how to write a “how-to.” The class had been studying Cupcakes (Rice,

2003a), a story about children who made cupcakes the week before. The school had been closed for five days due to winter weather and a weekend, so Ms. Maddox began with a detailed review of the story. She reviewed the characters, setting, and events of the story by asking the children questions, reminding them to look in their books for answers, and calling on volunteers for responses. Then, she asked them to close their books, and she moved to the whiteboard mounted

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on an easel to the left of the smartboard.

Ms. Maddox reminded the children of a conversation they had had about making tortillas and connected that conversation to the book's topic and the new writing assignment. Then she asked, “If I was to make cupcakes, what kind of things—what kind of ingredients would I need

to do it?” The children responded by calling out ingredients the children had used in the story,

and as they did so, Ms. Maddox created a list in a column on the left side of the whiteboard:

“eggs, milk, butter.” Then, above the list, she wrote, “Ingredients,” and asked, “What else would

you need?” Alina responded, “A bowl.”

“Oh!” said Ms. Maddox, “So, there are things that you need that is like—that aren’t necessarily ingredients.” She drew a line down the middle of the page and wrote “Materials” at the top of the right column. “Ingredients are foodstuff that we need, and then there’s like, materials that we need—the stuff. Materials are the stuff. Then the children started offering items for the list such as a spoon, a cupcake tin or pan, and [paper] cups to line the cupcake pan.

After listing all the items needed for making cupcakes (Figure 5.6), Ms. Maddox reviewed the steps for making cupcakes they had read in the story. She asked the children guided questions, and the children responded by stating the basic steps: put the ingredients in a bowl, mix it, cook it, and eat it. As they did so, Ms. Maddox displayed a graphic organizer (Figure 5.6) on the smartboard using the document camera. Then, she repeated the difference between ingredients and materials, and she erased everything listed on the whiteboard, except the words

“Ingredients” and “Materials.” When a child asked her why she was erasing, Ms. Maddox responded, “Because if I leave all this stuff up here, it's going to be like you just copied. Right?”

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Figure 5.6

Ms. Maddox’s List of Cupcake Ingredients and Materials and the Graphic Organizer

Next, Ms. Maddox drew the children’s attention to the graphic organizer and explained what to write on each line.

Ms. Maddox: You're going to write the date [indicates the date line]. That's always what

we do, right? And then, it says, “How to… How to? Make cupcakes?” [points to the line

next to the words “How To”]

Gianni: Make cupcakes.

Ms. Maddox: Very good. And here, it says, “Ingredients.” [points to the line next to

“Ingredients”] Ingredients are? …Food you will need. So, you're going to write the food

you're going to need. And then, it says, “You will need…” [points to the line next to the

words] …Those are the materials you'll need, the stuff you would need to make it. We

just talked about that stuff. What was some of that stuff?

Jessica: The tin.

Ms. Maddox: The cupcake tins, the cupcake… the… 232

Sara: Mix.

Ms. Maddox: No.

Elian: Spoon?

Ms. Maddox: The spoon, the…

Ivar: The bowl.

Ms. Maddox: The bowl. Then, you're going to write three directions on how I can make

the cupcakes: first, next, last.

After explaining what to write on each line, Ms. Maddox sent the children to their seats to write.

Rudy’s Use of Graphic Organizers. Rudy usually completed the graphic organizers, as

Ms. Maddox requested. At times, however, he seemed to struggle to pay close attention, and he became confused about what he was supposed to write on the given lines. The following event occurred when he wrote his “how-to” about making cupcakes [2/4/2019].

When Ms. Maddox called the children to the carpet for the writing lesson, she asked them to bring their books. Rudy was still finishing his phonics work, and the other children had already arrived at the carpet. Rudy scrambled to put away work and riffled through his folder to find his storybook, which he could not find. The paraprofessional helped Rudy locate his book in his backpack. By the time he was ready, Ms. Maddox had reviewed the characters in the story and was moving on to the setting.

As the lesson progressed, Rudy seemed to be following along in his book and directing his gaze toward whoever was speaking; however, he did not volunteer any answers. When Ms.

Maddox moved to the easel on the left side of the class and asked the children to list the ingredients for cupcakes, Rudy, who sat on the first row, turned his body all the way around to face the other children instead of turning partially to face the easel. He looked at another boy in

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the class, whose face I could not see, laughed, and made non-verbal gestures as if answering a question. Eventually, Rudy turned his head toward the easel, but he did not volunteer any responses. He looked at the whiteboard, but he fidgeted during most of this portion of the lesson.

He sat up to kneel on his knees, rolled his book up like a telescope, held it up to his eye, and looked around the classroom. Then, he tapped his marker against his mouth and yawned. When

Ms. Maddox displayed the graphic organizer, Rudy turned his body back around to face the smartboard and directed his gaze forward; however, he did not contribute verbally to the discussion.

When Rudy went to his seat to write, he found his pencil and whispered the words to himself as he read, “How to,” and as he wrote, “MaKe copckakes,” he continued to whisper the sounds of the words. After a brief distraction, Rudy read the next line. “In...” he looked at his neighbor, Sara, and asked, “What’s this word?” “It’s food,” Sara replied. Rudy returned to his writing, and on the line next to the word “Ingredients,” Rudy sounded out the words “MilCK botter” and examined the word butter, repeating it to himself. “Butter. You will need milk.

Butter. Butter. Peanut butter.” Then, Rudy sat back in his chair, flopped his pencil around between his fingers, and said, “What else do you need?” Rudy sat up tall, wide-eyed, and said,

“eggs,” and he wrote “eggs.” He looked at his paper and read, “You will need…” After another brief distraction from his tablemate, Inez, Rudy looked at his pencil and said again, “You will need…,” he stopped to think, then said quietly, “milk,” and wrote the word on the line next to the words, “You will need…” followed by the word “botter [sic].” Inez must have noticed Rudy was writing ingredients on the line Ms. Maddox had instructed was for “materials” or equipment needed to make the cupcakes. Inez said:

Inez: Spoon. And the next one's spoon, spoon. Not eggs. Spoon.

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Rudy: No. You will need milk, butter, spoon? You will need milk, butter, eggs. [writes

“egs” on the line.]

Inez: [walks around to where Rudy is seated and begins pointing at his paper] There you

need eggs. [indicates the line next to “Ingredients”] The eggs that will be there. You'll

need to mix the cupcakes. [makes a mixing motion]

It seemed Inez was trying to tell Rudy to write the needed equipment on the line next to “You will need:” instead of the food items, but her instructions were not clear, and Rudy looked confused.

Ms. Maddox, who monitored the classroom from a side table, where she was also working on scoring children’s assessments, noticed Inez out of her seat and asked what she was doing. Sara held up her paper, pointed to the bottom portion of the paper where Ms. Maddox had instructed the children to write three directions, and said, “He doesn’t know how to do this.” Ms.

Maddox called Rudy over and asked him to recount the steps for making cupcakes. She advised him to look in his book, if he could not remember, and reread what the children in the story had done and in what order. Rudy returned to his seat, opened his book, looked through it, and on the first set of lines to write directions, he wrote, “We Need Milckbotterthen / We Meedeggs.”

In an earlier lesson, writing in the same “how-to” genre, the class had made peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on an earlier day, and they wrote the steps they had performed to accomplish the task. In this example, the graphic organizer was simpler since it did not require the children to write the ingredients and materials, and Rudy did not seem to be confused about what to write on the lines. Both completed graphic organizers are shown side-by-side in Figure

5.7.

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Figure 5.7

Rudy’s “How-Tos” About Making PB&J and Cupcakes

In the first example, the class had been away from school for five days, and this morning,

Rudy seemed to be struggling to pay attention. However, Ms. Maddox had explicitly shown the children where to write the ingredients and materials on the graphic organizer; when Rudy came to the line that read, “You Will Need:” he did not know what to write on the lines. The graphic organizer did not use the same language Ms. Maddox had used (i.e., “You Will Need” vs.

“materials or stuff”), and it looked different than the “how-to” graphic organizer Rudy had encountered before. Then, his peers’ attempts to help him only served to confuse Rudy more, and although Ms. Maddox was able to get him back on track, he still never listed the materials, and on the first line meant for directions, he listed the ingredients for the third time.

Social Activities and Engagement.

Ms. Maddox provided social literacy activities in which the children participated daily,

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including opportunities to talk as part of literacy instruction and the writing process.

Furthermore, she used a socially constructed writing workshop approach to writing instruction.

Rudy was an easy-going, friendly child who interacted with his peers as “one of the gang” (Ms.

Maddox interview, December 7, 2018). He participated in the oral language activities and

writing workshop in ways characteristic to his personality.

Ms. Maddox’s Opportunities for Talk. Ms. Maddox gave the children opportunities to talk as part of her literacy instruction. She had the children read aloud, asked guided questions to spark discussion, and had the children engage in pair-talk activities. Moreover, Ms. Maddox arranged the seating so that children sat at tables facing each other, which invited social interaction, and she allowed chatter during writing practice. However, she encouraged them to speak in English during the day when they were learning to read and write in English. Finally, as she conferred with children, she asked them questions about their writing, and she helped them orally plan their text before putting it on the page.

I have illustrated how Ms. Maddox had the children read aloud and asked guided questions to spark discussion in previous sections. For example, recall how she taught the Shared

Story from Reading Roots (Slavin & Madden, 2010) Lesson 28 [1/15/2019-1/16/2019], Is There an Alligator in the Pond? (Rice, 2003b). Ms. Maddox walked the children through the story by looking at the pictures, asking guiding questions about the pictures, and asking the children to orally respond. She asked some closed-ended questions, such as, “How do you think they’re feeling?” Then, she followed up with open-ended questions, such as, “Why do you think they’re feeling scared?” which invited a complete response. Then, the class read the story aloud together.

On the following day, Ms. Maddox reviewed the characters, setting, and events of the

story by asking more guided questions and, once again, inviting the children to respond orally.

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Then, she sent them to their seats to read the book aloud with their partners, and when they

returned, she prepared them to find the answers to the comprehension questions at the end of the

book and construct sentences, which would offer the best responses. She said, “You have to say,

‘The kids were,’ or, ‘The kids felt.’ …You can’t just write “happy.” “Sad.” “Mad.” “Scared.”

…You have to write a whole sentence.” She gave the children a chance to practice composing

sentences orally before being asked to write them down.

Ms. Maddox also used pair-talk activities regularly. Recall the minilesson she taught on

Wednesday, March 6th, about writing informational texts or “All About” books. She displayed

her model “All About Topics” pre-writing activity, which she had created in front of the class on a previous day, and she had the children bring their copies to the carpet. Once there, she asked them to turn to their partners and tell their chosen topic and three things they knew about it. After a few minutes, Ms. Maddox directed the children’s attention back to herself and began calling on children, one at a time, asking them what they were going to write about and what they knew about the topic. Some ideas were Santa Claus, snails, and Cheetahs. When she called on Rudy, he did not have an answer right away, so she asked again, and they engaged in the following dialogue:

Ms. Maddox: What did you talk to your partner about?

Rudy: Umm…King’s Island. (a local amusement park)

Ms. Maddox: Tell me a couple of things you know about King’s Island…What are you

writing about?

Rudy: It has rides. …You can play games at King’s Island.

Ms. Maddox: Tell me something else you know.

Rudy: You can get food.

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Ms. Maddox: Is it free, or do you have to pay for it?

Rudy: You have to pay for it.

Ms. Maddox: You have to pay for it.

In this example, Ms. Maddox gave the children a chance to talk about their writing and listen to each other talk about their writing. By conferring one-on-one with Rudy, Ms. Maddox asked questions to extend his thinking as the rest of the class looked on. Doing this allowed Rudy a chance to orally rehearse his writing, and the rest of the class a chance to glean ideas or language from the conversation to which they were made privy.

Ms. Maddox also gave the children opportunities to talk about their writing as she conferred with them during writing practice. During the morning literacy block [1/18/2019], the children completed a story map as a final assessment for the storybook Is There an Alligator in the Pond? (Rice, 2003b). The story map was a graphic organizer that included spaces for children to write the title, the setting, and a list of characters. Across the bottom were three boxes containing lines for writing text labeled “Beginning,” “Middle,” and “End.” The children were meant to write the story's events that corresponded with the label of each box.

Rudy had written most of his responses with the paraprofessional and his partner, Nelly, and used his book as a resource. In the box labeled, “Middle,” he had written, “Jim an d JaK /

Deena got / scerdbe c ose / thy sot i twas…” Ms. Maddox came to check on him, and she read what he had written so far. She helped Rudy find the spelling of the word “alligator,” which he added to the end of the sentence, and she reminded him that “thought” starts with a /th/ sound, not a /s/. Rudy corrected his error, and Ms. Maddox asked:

Ms. Maddox: OK. What happened there at the end?

Rudy: They knew it was a frog?

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Ms. Maddox: And then what did they do at the very end? They knew it was a frog. They

saw it was a frog, and then what happened?

Rudy: They got out to eat up sandwiches?

Ms. Maddox: Right! [slaps table] Perfect!

In the last box, Rudy wrote, “Th yn oo it / w asa f o gin / t h y g o t t o / eat / SageCheS

(They knew it was a frog, and they got to eat sandwiches. Figure 5.8).

Figure 5.8

Rudy’s Completed Story Map of Is There an Alligator in the Pond? (Rice, 2003b)

In this example, Ms. Maddox used writing practice time to help Rudy spell words and also asked him to recall the events of the story and repeated his words. This allowed Rudy to think about what he would write and orally rehearse the language he needed to write it. Although his final sentence contained errors in spelling and other print conventions, having spoken his thoughts aloud to his teacher, he wrote close approximations to the words representing his

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thoughts.

Rudy’s Opportunities for Talk. Rudy took advantage of the opportunities Ms. Maddox afforded him to talk before he wrote. During independent and partner reading activities, he read aloud, engaged in pair-talk activities, responded when called upon, raised his hand to volunteer responses, and usually responded in unison when questions were posed to the group. Rudy’s chosen language was usually English, except when speaking with peers who did not speak

English or when he and a peer wanted to say something privately. Furthermore, Rudy was often quite talkative during writing instruction and practice; he often talked about his drawings and stories, and he initiated conversations with adults and peers to seek assistance.

Rudy used oral language in large-group settings when it was appropriate. For example, one afternoon [3/12/2019], Rudy arrived at the carpet for the minilesson chatting with a group of other children as they gathered. Ms. Maddox was sitting on a chair in front of the group, and

Rudy called her name. He told her he had noticed the digraph “ph” written on the box of his mother’s new phone, and he and his teacher had a short chat about his discovery and the sound the letters represented. When the lesson started, Ms. Maddox continued her instruction about the difference between facts and events in a story. Recall that a poster was displayed on the easel, divided into two columns labeled “All About” and “Story.” Ms. Maddox randomly drew, from a cup, wooden craft sticks, with the children’s names written on them. The child whose name Ms.

Maddox drew came to the front of the room, read a sentence aloud from a paper strip, and placed it on the poster in the appropriate column.

One of the strips read, “There are lots of teachers at school.” Elian, the child who had read the sentence, nodded his head to indicate, “Yes, there are lots of teachers at school.” Ms.

Maddox posed the question to the class to help Elian find the right answer, but the children could

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not reach a consensus about whether this was a sentence for an “All About” book or a story. She asked a few children to share their opinion and defend it to the class. Rudy eagerly raised his hand, and when called upon, he said they should put the strip in the middle between the columns.

He responded that some schools might have a few teachers, while others might have a lot of teachers. His reasoning seemed to be that if the statement was not true for all schools, it should not be in an “All About” book. This was a criterion Ms. Maddox had given the children to evaluate the sentences in a previous lesson. (She said the statement, “I saw a polar bear at the zoo” was not true for everyone, so it belonged in the “story” column.) After much discussion, the class decided to follow Rudy’s suggestion and place the sentence in the middle of the two columns because the word “lots” made the sentence ambiguous.

Finally, Rudy’s name was drawn from the cup, and he eagerly moved to the front of the room. He read the sentence, “I love recess,” and correctly identified it as a sentence belonging to a story, “Because it has ‘I,’” he said, without any prompting. Ms. Maddox praised him for remembering the clue about the word “I” and reminded the class that sentences in “All About” books do not begin with the word “I.”

This example demonstrates how Rudy contributed to the oral language that took place in large groups. He chatted with his peers as the children were gathering. He appeared confident enough to initiate a conversation with his teacher about an academic connection he had made outside of school (i.e., the digraph “ph”). Then, when the class was contending about how to classify the sentence, “There are lots of teachers at school,” he raised his hand and orally shared his thinking about it, which led to a rich conversation about how to evaluate sentences as facts or events in a story. Finally, when his name was called, he read the sentence aloud, identified the correct response, and added an extra piece of relevant information he knew that had not been

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requested when he said, “Because it has I.”

Rudy was also quite talkative during writing practice. In the previous example, when

Rudy wrote an “All About” book about tigers [3/4/2019], Rudy said, “I don’t know what to write anymore.” This comment led to Angela and Nelly, his tablemates, helping him decide how to draw the tigers, what colors to use, and where the story would be set—on a mountain. Then,

Rudy created a story about tigers fighting, and his tablemates helped him find a resource to draw a mountain, the alphabet card for the letter “M,” which displayed a picture of two mountains

(Figure 5.1).

Other previous examples illustrate how Rudy used oral language during writing practice, when Rudy wrote about Roblox [3/7/2019], and when Rudy wrote “How to Make Cupcakes” during the morning literacy block [2/4/2019]. He spoke the sounds of words as he wrote them

(e.g., “make cupcakes”). He read his writing aloud and asked himself questions (e.g., “Butter.

You will need milk. Butter. Butter. Peanut butter. …What else do you need? ...Eggs.”). Rudy might have been trying to find his place and refocus after being distracted, or he might have been reading the words back to hear how they sounded. When he said, “peanut butter,” which wasn’t written on the page, it appeared he was making a connection to a previous experience when he wrote the “how-to” about PB&J, noticing the similarity between “butter” and “peanut butter.”

Rereading seemed to at least provide some momentum, which ignited another ingredient to the list, “eggs.” In this example, talking to his peers confused him, so he sought help from his teacher, who got him back on track.

Ms. Maddox’s Use of Writing Workshop. Ms. Maddox elected to use a writing workshop approach to instruction during the afternoon writing period. She began each workshop with a short minilesson followed by an extended period of writing practice, during which she

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conferred with students frequently, usually one-to-one. Even when she taught a workshop minilesson about a new genre's features, she usually allowed the children to choose the genre they would use and always allowed them to choose the topic. Finally, the children worked on their ongoing writing products and turned them in when they were finished. There was no common task given at the top of the workshop that was due at a given time; instead, Ms. Maddox required the children to write, complete pieces, and turn them in when they were ready. There did not seem to be a quota to fill or a common due date.

Several examples of Ms. Maddox’s minilessons have been provided previously. She used a variety of explicit instruction techniques, including brainstorming (e.g., “All About Topics”

Figure 5.3), using model texts (e.g., Seahorses [Corse, 2011], Polar Bears in Danger [Edwards,

2008]), and pair-talk activities (e.g., “Now I want you to turn to your partner... and tell your partner three things you know about your [topic].”). Ms. Maddox also taught the children the features of informational texts using two different sorting activities. She facilitated those discussions by using guiding questions. Finally, Ms. Maddox used graphic organizers, albeit less structured than the ones used in the literacy block, and she explained and modeled what to write on the lines (e.g., “All About Ice Skating). She also used a student’s storybook as a model to demonstrate the difference between her “All About Ice Skating” book and Jessica’s story about school. When she sent the children to write, she told them they could write in either genre, but they should decide ahead of time, choose the appropriate graphic organizer, and write using the features of the genre they chose.

During the extended writing practice portion of the workshops, Ms. Maddox circulated around the room and conferred with children about their writing. She had placed an upside-down plastic crate at each table, and when she came to the table to chat with the children, she either sat

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on the crate, found a vacant chair, or knelt on the floor next to the child with whom she was

speaking. One afternoon [1/16/2019], I observed Ms. Maddox talk with Arno about a game he

liked to play. From my vantage point at Rudy’s desk, I only heard her side of the conversation,

but the questions she asked to guide the conversation were an excellent example of the

conversations she had with students about their writing. She said:

Which game are you going to write about? …Awesome! What kind of things do you do

when you play that game? …On your mom’s phone? Think of one game. So, what’s your

favorite game? …OK. So, first, you have to download it. Then what happens? …What do

you have to do to play? …OK. So, here’s my thought. OK? So, first, I have to download

it. Then what do I have to do? …I have to turn it on. [takes out her phone to

demonstrate] …So, the first thing I have to do is I have to download it. Right? Is that

how your mom does it? So, that’s the one you play? …So, first, you download it. Then

you turn it on. Then what do you have to do? Do you just look at it, and you use your

eyes, and it makes it go? …Do you have to move your fingers, or do you have to move it

with some other part? What’s your goal? What do you want to do? What do you do to

win the game? What is the Pac Man guy doing …? …He’s eating the chips? …Wow!

So, first, you download the game; then you turn it on. Then, you use your finger to make

Pac-Man eat the chips. Then what happens? …If you win, do you go up levels? …Oh!

You can eat the ghosts? You can eat the big chips, and it turns the ghosts blue? Oh, my

goodness, you know so much about this! I can’t wait to hear this story. You better start

writing!

In this example, Arno was struggling to think of an idea and knowing how to put his idea into words, so Ms. Maddox asked him questions and repeated his responses, which eventually

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became a writing plan. Some exchanges were lengthy, such as this one, but others were quite brief, and she moved on to the next child. After stepping away from Arno’s desk, Ms. Maddox moved to Sylvia’s desk and asked, “What are you working on?” After a brief exchange, she moved to Mikko. “What are you working on, Mikko? Read it to me.” Mikko did so, and Ms.

Maddox moved on to Caleb and then Elian for similar, brief exchanges. “What are you working on there, Angela?” Ms. Maddox asked Rudy’s tablemate. “The talking grape? You know what, you do a lot of talking books. I like them, but maybe we can try something else. What else do you think we could try?”

Angela: A talking grape.

Ms. Maddox: You can finish writing this story, but what do you think you could write

about next?

Angela: A talking grape! …I’ll write about a talking paper and a talking grape.

Ms. Maddox: I want you to be thinking about it, OK? You don’t have to tell me about it

right now, but I want you to be thinking about it so that for your next step, I want

something that’s not a talking-something. OK?

Eventually, Ms. Maddox arrived at Rudy’s desk, who was writing a book about snow.

Ms. Maddox: What are you writing about here, Rudy? About the snow? Read it to me.

Rudy: "I wish I can do a big snowman."

Ms. Maddox: What do you know about the word “snowman”? Read it again.

Rudy: “I wish I can do a big snowman.”

Ms. Maddox: When your voice stops, what do you do?

Rudy: A period.

Ms. Maddox: I want you to look at this word. What word is that? What word is it?

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Rudy: A B?

Ms. Maddox: It is a B, but what word is it? Read the word for me.

Rudy: Big.

Ms. Maddox: What’s wrong? What do you have in there that shouldn’t be in there?

What about that letter? What’s wrong with it?

Rudy: Oh, it’s a capital!

Ms. Maddox: It’s a capital. Why is that a problem?

Rudy: It’s a first letter in a sentence.

Ms. Maddox: It’s a first letter. Is that a first letter? Is it a name? No. Should it be capital?

No. So, you need to fix it. Thank you. Good.

As demonstrated, Ms. Maddox’s student conferences varied in length and topic. She

began with the same question, “What are you writing about?” Depending on the child’s response

and what she saw on the child’s page, she tailored the conversation to assist the individual child

in front of her. Arno seemed to need significant help in generating an idea, thinking about the

idea, and putting the idea into English words before writing them on the page. Sylvia, Mikko,

Caleb, and Elian appeared to need a brief check-in, and they continued to write. Ms. Maddox commented to Angela that she liked her stories but encouraged her to add variety to her pieces.

Rudy had written a complete sentence about his topic, but Ms. Maddox noticed he had not

attended to some print conventions he had been taught. She asked him questions to guide him

toward identifying his errors, and he was able to fix them with her help. Ms. Maddox used the

writing workshop approach to check in with individual children and give them the help they

needed.

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Rudy’s Engagement with Writing Workshop. Rudy participated in the writing workshops by being attentive and contributing to the minilessons, as illustrated in a previous example [3/4/2019] when Rudy participated in the activity in which the children read sentence strips and sorted them into columns labeled “All About” and “Story.” Furthermore, he sat at his seat, facing his tablemates during extended writing practice times, and he interacted with other children and adults as he created his written products.

The following is one illustrative example of Rudy’s participation in the writing workshop

[3/14/2019]. As part of a minilesson, Ms. Maddox showed a video of ice skaters jumping, a video with which Rudy appeared to be captivated. When the skaters jumped, he widely opened his mouth and eyes, pointed at the screen, and exclaimed, “Whoa!” When Rudy came to his seat, he announced, “I’m gonna write about ice skating,” and he settled in for writing practice. After gathering his materials, on the line next to the word, “Title,” he wrote, “ice ca te ting,” and on the line next to the word, “By,” he wrote his name. Then, Rudy picked up a marker and began to draw an ice skater. He mumbled to himself, “I don’t know how to draw,” then he stopped to think, added a skate to the skater’s foot, then stopped again. “Ahh! I did it wrong!” he exclaimed.

Nelly, who sat next to Rudy, looked at Rudy’s drawing, and they had a short conversation about how to draw ice skates. “Do you do it like…” Rudy took out a blue marker and practiced drawing an ice skate in the margin. Nelly watched, then shook her head. Angela, who sat across from Rudy, saw what was happening and showed Rudy her picture. Rudy looked at Angela’s picture from across the table and traced her ice skate with his finger in the air, then he turned the page and eagerly got to work drawing on his paper.

When Rudy finished drawing an ice skater in a yellow dress wearing a skate, he sighed, leaned back in his chair, and said, “I might have done it too big. I don’t know how to draw.”

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Then, he took a deep breath, sat up, and chose a different marker. He added a blade to the skate, which turned out as big as the skate, and he immediately shook his head. “I’m gonna do another one. I’m gonna try and do it right.” Rudy chose another marker and began to draw a second skater and then a third. He looked up and grinned. “This one’s skinny.” When he finished, he sat back to examine his work. Nelly looked over and said, “Oh, the arms!” The two children stopped to chat about how to draw arms and hair on people, which led to a conversation and demonstrations about how they used to draw people “when they were kids.” Eventually, Nelly reached over and drew a line of purple hair on the first skater’s head. When I asked Rudy why he let her do that, he said, “Because I don’t know how to draw hair.” Rudy kept drawing, and after a third attempt, he put his hand to his face and said, “I don’t know. I’m just gonna do a….” Then, he picked up his pencil and wrote, “Isaw to ice caters / on the ice.”

When he finished writing, Rudy sat back in his chair and took a break. Something happening across the room caught his eye, and he spent about two minutes watching. Then, he sat up, turned the page, and began to draw. “I’m gonna do this ice skater big! It’s the statue!”

Rudy proceeded to draw a large ice skate in the middle of the page, and after a few brief distractions, he drew a tall rectangle beneath the skate. To understand what he was drawing, I asked him about it, and he explained:

Rudy: This is the thing that’s holding the big ice.

Researcher: Oh!

Rudy: This [points to the tall rectangle] is the thing that’s holding this [points to the

skate].

Researcher: OK, so this is like the shelf you're putting in now or the table? Or this is the

blade?

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Rudy: What’s the blade?

Researcher: It’s the blade. So, it’s the part that goes into the ice. The blade is the thing

that goes on the bottom of the foot. A blade is also, like, when you use a knife. [opens a

pair of scissors and runs her finger near the edge a few times] This is a blade, something

that is sharp and skinny. Metal like that.

Rudy: Sometimes you can use that [takes scissors from the basket] when you don’t know

how to make this [points to the bottom of the skate in his picture] you can like draw it

with a pencil like that [places the scissor blades underneath the ice skate and uses his

finger to pantomime tracing around the edge of the scissors].

Researcher: Oh, that's an idea. Yeah, because that's kind of the shape, isn't it? …So,

you're saying this whole purple thing is a blade that goes on the bottom of the boot?

Rudy: [shakes his head]

Researcher: No.

Rudy: It’s just the thing that is holding it.

Researcher: Like one of these things that you put it on [points to the cubbies that have

shelves]. Like a shelf?

Rudy: [nods and returns to his drawing]

Although I did not fully understand what Rudy was drawing, he seemed interested in finishing it, so I stopped asking questions. When he finished his drawing, he took a pencil from the basket and wrote a sentence on the lines beneath. “Thes is the Stachoo.” Rudy had said he would draw a statue before he started, but it was not until I saw the finished product, including the drawing and the text, that I understood he was drawing a giant statue of an ice skate, which sat atop a pedestal. Rudy’s story about ice skating is shown in Figure 5.9.

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Figure 5.9

Rudy’s Story About Ice Skating

This example demonstrates how Rudy participated in the writing workshops. He seemed captivated by ice skating video during the minilesson, so he decided he would write a story about ice skating. He began his book by drawing pictures, and as often happened, he was not satisfied with his initial drawings, and he sought help from his peers. Nelly and Angela offered feedback and suggestions to help Rudy improve his drawings. He persisted until he drew something he seemed to deem acceptable, and he wrote text matching his illustrations. The social interactions he had with his peers and I seemed to have contributed to his understanding and, ultimately, his final written product.

Summary of Ms. Maddox and Rudy’s Dialogic Relationship

The classroom community Ms. Maddox and the children in her class created was one

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where Rudy seemed to thrive as he learned how to read and write in English. The instructional

and participatory patterns I observed seemed to result in a dialogic relationship. Ms. Maddox

integrated multiple modes of meaning-making into her instruction by integrating visual and

linguistic modes of meaning-making and using books and other print to facilitate writing

instruction. Rudy also coupled visual representations with linguistic modes of meaning-making,

and he used books and other written texts as resources for his writing and drawing. Ms. Maddox

scaffolded instruction by using explicit instruction, making connections from students’ prior

knowledge and experiences to new learning and connections across the curriculum. She provided

structured and less structured graphic organizers as tools. Rudy responded to Ms. Maddox’s

scaffolding by incorporating her explicit instruction into his writing process and products,

making personal connections to new learning, and using the graphic organizers to follow the writing assignments' format. However, he sometimes seemed confused about what he should write on a given line. Finally, Ms. Hawkins created social literacy activities by creating opportunities for children to talk and incorporating a writing workshop approach to instruction.

Rudy engaged in oral language and other social interactions with peers and adults during literacy activities and actively participated in the classroom community's literacy activities.

Ms. Maddox’s Rationales for Instruction

Ms. Maddox created a classroom environment that was both rigorous and inviting. Her overarching goal seemed to be to provide as many varied experiences for the children in her classroom as possible and connect those past experiences to new experiences, so learning could occur. In this way, Ms. Maddox’s general teaching approach was to build connective networks of understanding.

Ms. Maddox also believed that children should be held accountable for what they had

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learned, but not for information they might not yet know. She explained that she continuously tried to balance challenging the children academically and pushing so hard they became frustrated.

I think there’s that real fine line between verve and rigor, and frustration. We want our

kids to be rigorous, and the things they have to do are difficult sometimes, and sometimes

trying to get that line between where it’s to really stretch them and make it work—

because it’s hard, even though they can do it—as opposed to this is just well beyond my

ability to do right now. So, it’s finding that line. And for different kids, it’s different

(interview, December 6, 2018).

Ms. Maddox understood that each of the individual children in her class, including those

who were young ELs, needed an approach to writing instruction that met her or his personal

academic needs. She incorporated her personality and teaching style into her literacy instruction.

She created activities to differentiate for the children in her classroom, particularly young

English learners. “I try to meet them where they’re at.”

Ms. Maddox’s Rationales for Integrating Modes of Meaning-Making

Ms. Maddox taught using multiple modes of meaning-making within literacy activities.

She understood that children, particularly those who were young ELs, needed many experiences

with meaning-making, in all its varieties, to become good writers. Integrating modes of meaning-

making was one way she was able to create those experiences for children.

Ms. Maddox’s Rationales for Integrating Visual and Linguistic Modes of Meaning-

Making. Ms. Maddox integrated visual and linguistic modes of meaning-making into her

instruction, in part, to create experiences for the children. She explained her belief that many of

the young EL children in her class, and children who came from low socio-economic

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backgrounds in general, tended to have a more narrow range of life experiences than children

who went to schools in wealthier neighborhoods. Ms. Maddox also believed that when learning

new information, children needed to tie what was new to an experience with which they were

already familiar, so she tried to create as many experiences as possible for children at school.

One way she did so was to pair familiar visual representations with linguistic modes of meaning-

making.

For example, I asked Ms. Maddox about the charts, pictures, and posters she had

displayed around the classroom. In one interview, I shared an experience I had had with Rudy

when he was writing his procedural text on “How to Make Cupcakes.” He attempted to write the

word “butter” three times and the word “batter” once, and he spelled all four words, “botter.” At

the end of the session, Ms. Maddox passed out cupcakes she had brought from home, and as I sat

with Rudy and his tablemates, we talked about the words butter and batter. Rudy pointed to a

picture displayed high on the wall above the smartboard of a baseball player holding a bat ready

to swing, which I had hardly noticed. This was the Reading Roots (Slavin & Madden, 2010)

Phonics Picture Card for the grapheme “er,” represented by a baseball “batter.”

I recounted to Ms. Maddox that Rudy knew the word “batter,” but he associated it with the picture, not with the “cupcake batter” they had read about in the associated Shared Story. I asked Ms. Maddox about the pictures and posters she had displayed around the room. She explained how they worked to help children associate new words with an object or visual representation with which they were familiar. Then she added:

I know they use the alphabet signs a lot, especially my reading group. The other day, my

reading group was talking about the difference between antonyms and synonyms,

and…they went over to the chart, and they're like, "Oh! A synonym. S means same." …

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[E]very once and a while, they'll come back to it for whatever reason, and they're like,

"Oh yeah, I remember that now." And they need just a quick little reminder to look up

and [they] go, "Oh yeah, Ms. Maddox, I got it now." (interview, March 14, 2019).

Ms. Maddox also explained why she brought the cupcakes to class after reading the

Shared Story Cupcakes (Rice, 2003a) and some other options she had considered. Her first choice was to make cupcakes with the class so those who might never have made cupcakes at home would have a new experience, but she could not gain access to the school oven in the morning.

The other thing I thought about is just bringing them in, and then they could have iced

them…and I could have also put it on their desks so they could have looked to see the

kinds of things that they have done (interview, February 4, 2019).

In the end, Ms. Maddox decided to buy cupcakes from the bakery and share them after they wrote, predicting that cupcakes on the desks during writing time would be too distracting for the first graders. Her goal for this activity was to use realia to connect to other experiences the children had had with cupcakes, which was the topic of their writing assignment. Although the circumstances were not ideal, she reminded the children of other things they had made in class previously (e.g., chocolate milk and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches) and create yet another experience for the children. She explained, “Hands-on [activities] and media are where

…[I] let them explore, let them figure out problems on their own.” The more exposure children had to realia and visual representations, the more experiences they would have upon which to build new learning.

Ms. Maddox also used a strategy of counting each word on her fingers with a one-to-one correspondence. She helped children orally plan their text, which was an integration of language

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and a physical gesture. I asked her why she did this, and she explained that it helped the children remember the words they had composed while writing them on the page and their revision and editing. “…[T]hey can go back and count their words, ‘Oh! I don't have enough. What did I really want to say?’” (interview, March 14, 2019).

Ms. Maddox’s Rationales for Using Books and Printed Texts. Ms. Maddox used books and printed texts in her writing instruction because, as she put it, “Kids need to see good writing to produce good writing” (personal communication, September 11, 2019). She believed that children need repeated exposure to books and other printed texts to see how language works.

“You know, it’s just giving them experiences to have to see different words in print lots of times” (interview, March 14, 2019). As young EL children have more exposure to English print and begin to learn what the language looks like, they will be more likely to produce good English writing independently.

Ms. Maddox also expressed her belief that exposure to print was significant for young EL children learning to spell to reproduce what they saw rather than only what they heard.

“Sometimes too, when they say it slowly, it gets dysmorphic. …What they're saying is what they're writing because they're not saying it correctly.” In other words, children who are simultaneously learning to orally produce the sounds and words of English as they are learning to write them might misspell words because they are also mispronouncing them.

Ms. Maddox’s Rationales for Using Scaffolding, Tools, and Strategies

Ms. Maddox scaffolded her literacy instruction, specifically writing instruction, by providing her young EL children with tools and strategies to become good writers. She believed explicit instruction was necessary to help them make connections from previous experiences to new learning. Ms. Maddox offered structured graphic organizers provided by the Reading Roots

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(Slavin & Madden, 2013) curriculum so children would know how writing in various genres should be structured. However, during the afternoon workshops, she preferred to use graphic organizers that allowed children room to explore.

Ms. Maddox’s Rationales for Explicit Instruction. Ms. Maddox explained that she used explicit instruction in her literacy lessons to help children make connections they might not make independently.

They know what they’ve been taught, but they don’t know how to apply—they can apply

what they’ve been taught, but they don’t necessarily like, have those experiences outside

of school to say, ‘Hey! I learned about this, so I can apply that to this!’ They just don’t

have those experiences to do that (interview, December 6, 2018).

Ms. Maddox believed it was her job to create experiences for the children and explicitly draw connections to them.

For example, in the culminating writing activity for the Shared Story Cupcakes (Rice,

2003a), Ms. Maddox explained that she explicitly distinguished ingredients, which were food items, and materials, which were pieces of equipment, or “stuff.” When they were brainstorming the lists of ingredients, she waited for a child to volunteer a piece of equipment before creating a second column labeled “materials.” I asked her whether she had intended to make the distinction, or it had naturally occurred in the discussion. She replied, “It was in my brain to do it that way, but I wasn't going to do it till they said it. I wanted to see if they would generate it before I brought it out” (interview, February 4, 2019). In this case, the children could make the connection on their own or for each other.

After the class had generated the lists, Ms. Maddox showed them the graphic organizer they would use, and she erased the brainstorming lists before sending them to their seats to write.

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I asked her why she chose to erase, and she explained that the children in her reading group were

at a high enough ability level to remove this piece of the scaffold. “If I would have had lower-

level kids or my next—like my homeroom, I probably would have left them up on the board, or I

would have written the ingredients on some of their sheets” (interview, February 4, 2019).

Ms. Maddox also believed it was necessary to teach children to make cross-curricular connections explicitly. “Because sometimes, our kids don’t realize that what they learn in one class can carry over to another class.” Mrs. Maddox explained, if she did not explicitly point it out, the children might not be aware that something they learned in math class could be applied in writing class. She offered an example of writing a “how-to” about solving a math problem.

“They don't understand; they need that explicit—saying you did it here, so you can use it here.

Even though you learned it someplace else, you can use it in other places.”

One of Ms. Maddox’s challenges was finding ways to make cross-curricular connections

for children she did not have in class for some portion of the day due to the leveled-reading

groups. “It is, it’s hard. And it’s like, if you don’t know if someone’s a reader, it’s hard to say

what they should be doing as a writer or what should they be doing as a mathematician?”

(interview, December 6, 2018).

Ms. Maddox’s Rationales for Making Connections. Ms. Maddox explained in more

detail why making connections from previous experiences to new learning was so meaningful.

She believed the more context children had about something new, for example, the topic of a

new book, the easier it would be for them to dive in and learn what the book had to offer.

Regarding Cupcakes (Rice, 2003a), Ms. Maddox supposed that the children had all, most likely, eaten, or at least seen a cupcake. Although they might not have made cupcakes, she was

reasonably sure every child had had experiences with cupcakes. “Sometimes, the stories that we

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have to use for our whole group lessons are not always things that they have a lot of context for.

So, we have to build that in” (interview, February 4, 2019).

According to Ms. Maddox, the children learned the vocabulary and comprehended

Cupcakes (Rice, 2003a) more easily and thoroughly than stories about which they were less

familiar.

I don't think the words were any easier or any less tricky than in any of the other

storybooks that we have. But they have context about this. So, they were really excited.

…When we first introduced the story, they were like, "That's one of our compound

words." So, they were getting it. They knew that (interview, February 4, 2019).

Another way Ms. Maddox tapped into previous experiences before having children write about Cupcakes (Rice, 2003a) was to find out if the children had ever made anything or watched an adult make something in the kitchen. They discussed how to make tortillas, something with which Ms. Maddox, herself, was unfamiliar. I asked her what she had intended in this discussion.

Well, I wanted them to go back and recall a time that they were making something with

their parents and/or what they had cooked. And that was a big thing that they were

talking about. They were really excited. Because I was really not understanding how they

were making their tortillas.

After the children took turns explaining the procedure, Ms. Maddox began to understand that masa, a type of treated corn flour used to make corn tortillas, was “…basically a mix, and they were mixing it together. So, I wanted to make sure they activated that prior learning, to make sure that they remembered.” Before the children wrote about making cupcakes, she reviewed the genre with the children using a similar example with which they were more familiar, how to make tortillas.

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Ms. Maddox’s Rationales for Using Graphic Organizers. Ms. Maddox chose to

provide graphic organizers when a structured writing assignment was part of the Reading Roots

(Madden & Slavin, 2010) curriculum. For example, she had the children complete the story map

to assess, Is There an Alligator in the Pond (Rice, 2003d) (Figure 5.8) and the graphic organizer

for writing the procedure for cupcakes as a culminating writing activity for Cupcakes (Rice,

2003a) (Figure 5.6). I asked her why she chose a story map for one and a “how-to” for the other, and she explained that the assignment was prescribed in the curriculum. “We’re supposed to do writing each time,” she said. “Since we have been writing about “how-tos” in our writing class, I wanted to connect that for their learning, especially with [the children from] my homeroom.”

Ms. Maddox explained her purpose for providing less structured graphic organizers in the afternoon writing workshop was to allow the children the freedom to explore what they had learned in the minilessons. She explained that through the course of a unit, she has the children complete at least two pieces in the genre they are learning (e.g., “All About” books), and after that, they are allowed to choose the genre and topic of their writing. She explained, “I think it’s fun to be able to write about what you want to write about.”

By providing less structured graphic organizers and allowing the children to choose their own topics, Ms. Maddox hoped the children would build stamina, so when they are required to write longer pieces about topics of less interest, they will be able to complete the tasks. She explained:

You want the kids to have stamina in their writing, so when they have to write about a

specific topic, they have the stamina. If they can’t even write about something they know

about or something they feel passionately about, they’re never going to write five

paragraphs on a test. They won’t have the stamina to do it (interview, December 6, 2018).

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Ms. Maddox also wanted the children to feel a sense of control over their own time.

“…[I]t gives them the opportunity to have a little bit of control in their day, and they love writing.” By creating a low-structure, workshop environment in which children were given choices, freedom to explore their learning, and graphic organizers that gave them a little structure without confining them to expected, predictable, and correct answers, Ms. Maddox hoped the children would enjoy writing. If they liked to write, they would write and build stamina when the writing task might not be quite as enjoyable.

Ms. Maddox’s Rationales for Providing Social Activities.

Social interactions and activities were at the heart of Ms. Maddox’s literacy instruction.

The only time children were not allowed to talk to each other or seek help was during assessments. In every other activity, including reading their books aloud with their partners, social interactions seemed to be occurring.

Ms. Maddox’s Rationales for Creating Opportunities to Talk. As she explained her rationale for creating opportunities to talk, Ms. Maddox described why she asked the children to speak English during the literacy block and afternoon writing times, why she asked children to read aloud, and how she selected volunteers to do so. Furthermore, Ms. Maddox explained how she asked the children to prepare for their conversations, so she could provide the assistance they needed.

As a mainstream teacher in a school where most of the population spoke a language other than English at home, Ms. Maddox felt very strongly that her job was to prepare children to participate fully in the larger community, which required them to speak, read, and write in

English. She explained that she told the children, “My job is to teach you how to speak English very well and how to read in English, so when we're talking in the reading group, I want you to

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speak in English.” She explained that if the children did not speak English, she would not be able to assess their English proficiency accurately, and she would not be able to prepare them for the state tests, which were given only in English. She went on, “Every once in a while, they'll roll out the Spanish if they're trying to really make a point, but they know that I don’t speak Spanish.

So, they're really good about always speaking in English to me” (interview, February 4, 2019).

Ms. Maddox also acknowledged that when children first arrived from another country and had no English, she tried to communicate with the little Spanish she had or asked other children to translate. She understood that children, especially newcomers, needed to use what language they had to participate in school. She also believed that other parts of the day, when language is not the central focus of the learning, should be set aside for children to speak in their native languages.

Ms. Maddox also had the children use oral language when they read aloud. She believed that reading aloud helped children recall their writing and recognize their errors because they could hear how the writing sounded and fix their mistakes. However, Ms. Maddox did believe that reading aloud in front of a group could be difficult for some children. For example, I asked her why she randomly drew wooden craft sticks with the children’s names to select children to read aloud. She explained that she wanted the selections to be random to avoid choosing those she was sure did not know the answer or those she was certain did know the answer. “I knew that

I wanted them to read it, and I would have probably picked the higher kids because I knew they would have been able to read it as opposed to just a random sampling of the kids.” She said that if she were trying to focus on a teaching point's content, and a child was struggling to decode the words while reading aloud in a group, the concept could get lost. As a result, Ms. Maddox sometimes chose the best readers when she wanted to emphasize a point of content.

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The point of the activity was to make sure that they could know the difference between it,

and I didn't want the struggle of the reading to be what got them confused between a true

fact and an opinion. I didn't want the decoding of it to be the issue of it.

As a way of checking herself and giving every child an equal chance to be called on, she randomly selected children. When the children struggled, she provided the necessary assistance and repeated the sentence so the continuity would not be lost.

Finally, Ms. Maddox explained how she asked the children to prepare before asking for her help with their writing. “I like them to try something before I have a conversation with them.

I want them to have something down, so we have something to talk about.” Ms. Maddox made it clear that she was always willing to help children. My observations confirmed that to be accurate, however, if she was confident children had enough background knowledge and ability to get started with their writing, she wanted them to try before asking for help. She said she told the children, “I don't know what's in your brain. You have to try something; you have to say something. I don't know how to fix it or how to talk about it if you don't try it.” In this way, Ms.

Maddox used her conversations with children about their writing to assess their understanding and determine the help they needed.

Ms. Maddox’s Rationales for Using Writing Workshop. Ms. Maddox was an avid proponent of the writing workshop approach. She used the minilessons to scaffold instruction as children learned to write in a new genre and described how she arranged tables and assigned groups to maximize the social learning environment's benefit. She further explained how extended writing practice allowed time for children to work at their own pace, so she was able to differentiate for each individual learner by assessing and providing the support he or she needed through either small-group instruction, individual conferring, or both. Ms. Maddox explained

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how she believed sharing children’s writing at the end of a workshop was important but admitted

she often sacrificed this part of the workshop for time’s sake.

As described previously, Ms. Maddox’s writing workshops began with a minilesson to

address a teaching point, which the whole class needed to learn or review. She used the time to

introduce a new genre or reteach something most children did not grasp the first time around. “If

I’m looking at everybody’s, although we’ve done it a bazillion times, I still need to do it a

bazillion more because 17 of the 20 kids didn’t have it in there in their independent writing”

(interview, December 6, 2018).

When the children went to their seats to practice writing, she had them grouped four to a table with two children on each side facing each other to invite social interaction. Each group included at least one strong reader and writer and one strong mathematician, so there would always be someone available to help. “When we do group activities, there's somebody who can help with the math and somebody who can help with the reading,” she explained (interview,

March 14, 2019).

During the extended writing practice portion of the workshop, Ms. Maddox provided additional assistance through small-group instruction. She purposefully selected children who

might benefit from extra instruction on a teaching point.

My lowest kids are still working on space between words. They’re still working on a

letter sound because if you say, “hat,” there’s three sounds, you need to have the three

sounds you hear in there. …Some of them are really still struggling with capital letters; it

might be I just pull them in a small group,” she explained. (interview, December 6,

2018).

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Small group instruction is one way she could differentiate for individual learners' needs, particularly those young EL children.

The bulk of the extended writing portion of the workshop seemed to be spent conferring with individual students, as previously described. When she sat with children to read and talk about their writing, one-on-one, Mrs. Maddox explained how she paid very close attention, indicating that children who were vocal, outgoing, and eager to share were much easier to assess and negotiate meaning with because they told her what they needed or easily engaged in a conversation, which gave her the information she needed to draw conclusions. “Some of the more vocal kids,” Ms. Maddox explained, “You really know where the line is because you can see it or feel it. You can see it in their face, or they’ll say, ‘This is too hard!’ You can see it in their emotions” (interview, December 6, 2018). Children who were not as vocal gave her more pause, and the issue was complicated more by spending less time with the children who left her for reading.

Some of those quieter kids are like, you don’t know how to do it, or if it’s like your quiet

or you don’t understand. I think that’s part of it, you know, I don’t necessarily know them

as a whole, grounded child. Like, I know those five or six kids who are with me all day; I

feel like I know them all the way around (interview, December 6, 2018). For children in

this camp, finding “that real fine line between verve and rigor, and frustration”

(interview, December 6, 2018) Ms. Maddox described was a challenge because they were

so difficult to read.

During our interview, I asked Ms. Maddox about a conversation I observed her conduct with Rudy in which they composed a sentence together and counted the words on their fingers as they said them aloud. She helped Rudy with his English syntax, so his sentence would be

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grammatically correct and convey the meaning he wanted to convey. “There are some kids I would never have changed their grammar, but he's a strong enough language kid, and a strong enough writer, that he needs to understand the difference.” She also explained that she never wrote on children’s work because that was their work, not hers. She carried post-it notes with her as she circulated the classroom to remind herself of children or topics she wanted to revisit. Her thinking behind this interaction reveals some of the criteria she used to make decisions about what individual children might need.

Finally, Ms. Maddox acknowledged the importance of allowing children to share the work they had been doing. She explained that, on occasion, she would try to fit in some sharing at the end of the day before the children go home, but unfortunately, sharing is a part that often loses priority when time is an issue. “Sharing is important. I understand the value and importance of it, but timewise it’s the piece that doesn’t always get the priority” (interview, December 6,

2018).

Summary of Ms. Maddox’s Rationales for Instructional Decisions.

Ms. Maddox taught the children in her class with care and consideration for the classroom community she created. She continually and intentionally tried to strike a balance between academic rigor and children’s current abilities to perform by paying close attention to their words, emotions, and even facial expressions as well as evaluating their work. Much of what she did in the classroom was done to create experiences onto which children could build even more experiences; thus, learning would occur.

Ms. Maddox approached writing as an independent activity the children could do together. In other words, they were accountable for their learning, but they were encouraged to use their peers as teachers and consultants. Ms. Maddox tried to meet the children at their level

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and helped them rise to the next, with one new concept at a time.

Rudy’s Writing Outcomes.

To evaluate Rudy’s writing samples, I used the OELPA scores from the assessments given in the Spring semesters of his kindergarten and first-grade years and the Amalgamated

Writing Rubric (Appendix C). After conducting a detailed analysis of Rudy’s writing products, I found his writing proficiency was most often developing or capable, except in the traits of

“voice,” “fluency,” and “conventions,” in which I found examples of experienced writing. The following description of Rudy’s writing outcomes is organized according to the writing traits: ideas, organization, voice, word choice, sentence fluency, conventions, and presentation.

Examples of Rudy’s writing processes, products, and results of the data analysis are used to support my descriptions.

Rudy’s Ohio English Language Proficiency Assessment (OELPA) Scores

Rudy was given the OELPA to measure his progress in English listening, speaking, reading, and writing (ALDS in Appendix A). In the Spring Semester 2018, his kindergarten year,

Rudy achieved Level 2 in listening, Level 2 in reading, Level 3 in speaking, Level 2 in writing, with an overall assessment of “progressing.” In the Spring Semester 2019, his first-grade year,

Rudy demonstrated progress. He achieved Level 3 in listening, Level 3 in reading, Level 5 in speaking, and Level 2 in writing. It appears that his receptive language grew, and his speaking advanced two levels; however, according to this assessment, his writing made less progress. This score may be inconsistent with my descriptive assessment of Rudy’s writing when I examined a range of writing attributes from 10 writing samples. Rudy’s overall assessment remained

“progressing.” The scores are summarized in Table 5.4.

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Table 5.1

Rudy’s OELPA Achievement Levels

Language Kindergarten First Grade Skills Spring 2018 Spring 2019 Listening 2 3 Reading 2 3 Speaking 3 5 Writing 2 2 Overall Progressing Progressing

Rudy’s Writing Rubric Outcomes

The following description of Rudy’s writing outcomes is organized according to the writing traits: ideas, organization, voice, word choice, sentence fluency, conventions, and presentation. Examples of Rudy’s writing (both process and products) and my analysis are used to explain my descriptor choices from the rubric. Many of the writing products discussed in this section have appeared in previously mentioned figures.

Rudy’s Ideas. The key question to be answered for the “ideas” trait is: “Does the writer engage the reader with fresh information or perspective on a focused topic?” (Education

Northwest, 2014, p. 1). The “ideas” trait was evaluated based on Rudy’s proficiency in conveying the main idea and offering details and support for that idea.

Rudy’s Main Idea. Most of Rudy’s writing contained clear ideas presented as a story or opinion. Although he attempted to write “All About” books, the attempts I observed were more consistent with the narrative (e.g., “All About Tigers”) or personal essay (e.g., “All About

School”) genres. Furthermore, the ideas he presented were not introduced with a topic sentence, but they did include a title when it was called for on the graphic organizer.

For example, Rudy’s book, “All About School,” began with the title “school,” written on the cover, and the rest of the pages read, “Ilik Scho ol because / We go outside inPlay. / Sch o

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olis better then / homebecauseWe cando / math. / I like e n trvechen / becauseWe Wreed / books

in We WOrK.” Although the book did not include a topic sentence per se, the first phrase he

wrote was “I like school,” and all the other sentences in the book were reasons he liked school.

Moreover, the drawings were also about school. On the second page of the book, which

contained the sentence about doing math, Rudy drew a picture of the table where he and his

peers sat to do math, represented by two large, adjacent rectangles. He drew four squares,

representing the chairs where he and his peers sat around the table, and on the table, Rudy drew

rectangles on which he wrote math problems, representing math worksheets. This example

illustrates the way Rudy included main ideas throughout his writing. He conveyed a clear idea, in

this case, through opinion, and his drawing was appropriate to the topic.

Rudy’s Details and Support. Rudy included a few written details in his pieces. He

included more detail in his drawings; however, Rudy often gave elaborate explanations when he talked about his writing, which included far more detail than what he put on the page. Also,

Rudy supported his opinions by offering reasons for each opinion given.

On January 16th, during the afternoon writing workshop, Rudy wrote a story called

“Snow.” On the first page, he wrote, “I WiSh I Can do / a big SnoWman.” He drew a picture of a

person driving a car on the road, and snow fell from the sky. On the first page, he drew a picture

of two people and two snowmen; one snowman was bigger than the other. Additionally, he drew

snow on the ground, and on the top of the picture, he drew several dark lines and two dark ovals,

which may have represented snow falling from the sky. When I asked him to tell me about his

book, he explained that the picture on the cover was of him driving a car in the snow, and the

picture on the first page was of a big snowman—which did not yet have “the face”—a little

snowman, him, and his brother (Figure 5.10).

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Figure 5.10

The Cover and First Page of Rudy’s Story About Snow

In this example, Rudy included detail about his snowman—that it was big. However, the pictures he drew contained far more detail than what was included in the text, such as snow falling from the sky, a car with a person driving, two people, a small snowman, a larger snowman, and snow on the ground. When Rudy spoke about his picture, he added details. He was driving the car, the two people in the second picture were him and his brother, and that the bigger snowman did not yet have a face, which may be interpreted as Rudy’s attempt at drawing action or a process. In other words, this was not merely a portrait of Rudy and his brother posing with two snowmen; it was an action shot of them in the process of building a big snowman. In any case, Rudy’s pictures and explanations of his pictures contained much more detail than the text.

Rudy also provided support for opinions by offering reasons. For example, on January

17th, Rudy wrote, “My faybrd Part of th e boCK / is WenTrosclair Steponthe / A ll igator because

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it / was funny.” In his book about school, written on March 6, Rudy wrote, “I like e n trvechen /

becauseWe Wreed / books in We WOrK.” In both examples, Rudy used the word “because” to give a reason for his opinion about his favorite part of the book, Trosclair and the Alligator

(Huggins, 2013; i.e., “because it was funny.”) and why he liked [English] intervention (“because we read books and we work”).

Rudy’s Organization. The key question posed for the writing trait, “organization,” was,

“Does the organizational structure enhance the ideas and make them easier to understand?”

(Education Northwest, 2014, p. 2). The organization trait was evaluated based on Rudy’s proficiency in including a beginning, middle, and end; his use of transitions; and his use of sequencing to convey meaning.

Rudy: Beginning, Middle, End. Rudy organized his writing according to the graphic

organizers provided by Ms. Maddox, some of which included space for a clear beginning,

middle, and end. Some of which were more open-ended. For example, on January 18th, when

Rudy completed the story map for Is There an Alligator in the Pond? (Rice, 2003b; Figure 5.8),

the graphic organizer included space for a title, the setting, and a list of characters. It also gave

space to retell the story according to its beginning, middle, and end. He wrote:

De en aaSK / her MoM / if She can / go to the / Alligato r Pond / Jim an d JaK / Deena

go t / scerdb eC ose / thy thot i twas / a All i gator. / Th yn oo it / w asa f o gin / t h y g o t

t o / eat / SageCheS

Although Rudy received assistance from both the paraprofessional and his teacher when writing this piece, the finished product included a beginning, middle, and end to the story's retelling.

Rudy’s own story, “Roblox,” written on March 6th, did not include a beginning or end.

He wrote, “thesetheWeners but theris / Stel Som PeoPle thatar / rasign. / Some people CraShed /

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now Some PeoPle / that are sad.” Rudy began the story in the middle of the action with no textual setup. Although the front cover included the picture of two cars racing in a stadium, the title was “Roblox,” rather than something more specific that would set up the story, like “The

Race,” nor did he include a sentence to provide exposition, such as “Two cars had a race.” The reader was left to infer the story was about a race.

Similarly, in Rudy’s story about ice skating, written on March 14th, after Ms. Maddox showed a video of ice skaters, he wrote, “Isaw to ice caters / on the ice. / Thes is the Stachoo”.

He started with a clear beginning, an expository sentence giving information about characters

(i.e., “I” and “two ice skaters) and setting (i.e., “on the ice”). He also included an opening event

(i.e., “I saw”). However, the next sentence (i.e., “This is the statue.”) bore little relation to the opening sentence, and it did nothing to move the story forward. As he wrote this book, he appeared to put much more thought and effort into drawing pictures about ice skating than writing a story about ice skating, possibly to recreate the images from the video. The workshop ended before Rudy had time to write a final sentence for this story, but the outcome of this day’s writing was a story with a clear beginning and an unrelated middle.

Rudy’s Transitions. Rudy used predictable transitions between ideas by using linking words (e.g., and, but, if, because) within the compound and complex sentences and temporal words (e.g., first, next, then, last) between sentences. Furthermore, Rudy’s drawings served to link ideas when the text did not.

Examples of compound sentences with coordinating conjunctions to link ideas include,

“Th yn oo it / w asa f o gin / t h y g o t t o / eat / SageCheS” [They knew it was a frog, and they got to eat sandwiches.] [1/16/2019] and “thesetheWeners but theris / Stel Som PeoPle thatar

/rasign.” [These are the winners, but there is still some people that are racing.] [3/7/2019]

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“And” and “but” link ideas in these sentences. Rudy also used subordinating conjunctions to link

ideas in complex sentences, such as “De en aask / her mom / if she can / go to the / Alligato r

Pond,” [1/18/2019] and “Ilik Scho ol because / We go outside inPlay.” [3/6/2019] “If” and

“because,” respectively, link ideas within these sentences.

In the “how-to” about making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches [1/11/2019], Rudy used

temporal words to introduce each new sentence, which linked ideas together. “First we ge t two /

Pees o f dr ed. / Nextwe Puton / the battr. / thnwe puton / the Jely. / last we ea t the / PB+J.” In

the other “how-to” about making cupcakes [2/4/2019], Rudy did not use temporal words to link

the sentences: “We Need Milck bo[u]tterthen / We M[n] ee deg gs. / We Need to / Mex the

bo[a]tter. / We eat i t.”

At times, it seemed Rudy’s drawings seemed to link ideas when the associated text did

not. For example, in the previous example regarding Rudy’s story about ice skating (March 14th),

the two sentences, “I saw to ice caters / on the ice.” Also, “Thes is the Stachoo” would seem

unrelated if the accompanying picture were not of an ice skate statue (Figure 5.9). In this case,

the picture communicated it was a statue of an ice skate, though the text did not, so the common

thread of ice skating ran throughout the piece.

Rudy’s Sequencing. Rudy usually used logical sequencing in his writing that could be

followed by the reader. When writing “how-tos,” a genre in which sequencing is essential,

Rudy’s written products made logical sense. When retelling a story and when composing his own story, Rudy seemed to understand the necessity of putting events in a particular order, although the events and their sequence changed as the story developed.

On January 11th, in Rudy’s “How to Make PB&J,” he wrote the sandwich-making process in the order it generally occurs. “First we ge t two / Pees o f dr ed. / Nextwe Puton / the

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battr. / thnwe puton / the Jely. / last we ea t the / PB+J.” Also, recall the previous example from

January 18th, when Rudy completed the story map of Is There an Alligator in the Pond? (Rice,

2003b; Figure 5.8), Rudy retold the story in the order the events of the story occurred.

In Rudy’s narrative, “Roblox,” written on March 7th and 12th, he wrote, “thesetheWeners

but theris / Stel Som PeoPle thatar / rasign. / Some people CraShed / now Some PeoPle / that are

sad.” Before Rudy wrote the story onto the page, he told Ms. Maddox the story he had planned.

Ms. Maddox: …What's going to happen in your story?

Rudy: It’s when two people are racing, they get into an accident.

Ms. Maddox: Oh, no. Does anybody get hurt?

Rudy: One fell—one get out of the other car, and one dies in the car.

Ms. Maddox: Oh, my goodness, that sounds very scary!

Then, Rudy drew a picture on the first story page (Figure 5.10) of people with happy faces and one with a sad face, and when he finished, as mentioned previously, he told me he changed his mind. He decided to add the clause explaining the drawing of the people, but he still wanted to include a crash. He said, “These are the winners, but there’s two more people racing, and they’re going to crash.” In the final product, without having had the benefit of the oral explanations, by looking at the picture and reading the text, a reader could infer the sequence of events: 1) There was a race, 2) someone won the race, 3) other races were occurring, 4) people crashed, and 5) people were sad. Although the events changed somewhat by adding the detail about the first race

with winners and removing the detail about someone getting out of the car and someone else

dying after the accident, the events of Rudy’s story still occurred in a logical sequence.

Rudy’s Voice. The key question to be answered for the writing trait “voice” is, “Does the reader clearly hear this writer speaking in the piece? (Education Northwest, 2014, p. 3). The

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“voice” trait was evaluated based on Rudy’s expression of feelings or mood, his individual

expression, and his engagement with or awareness of an audience.

Rudy’s Feelings and Mood. Rudy’s writing conveyed identifiable feelings and personal

opinions. The writing he did in the morning literacy block, when he was assigned a topic or

prompt, seemed to contain fewer feelings and opinions than the writing he completed in the

afternoon writing workshop. However, Rudy found a way to make the pieces his own. For

example, when asked to write his favorite part of Trosclair and the Alligator (Huggins, 2013),

Rudy gave his opinion that he thought it was funny when Trosclair stepped on the alligator. He

could choose the event in the story about which he would write, and he identified and conveyed

that he felt amused by the event. The prompt Ms. Maddox gave to write a favorite part of the

story inherently required the expression of positive emotion. The fact that Rudy chose an event that was funny instead of another positive emotion, such as happy, relieved, excited, or peaceful, says something about Rudy’s personality and sense of humor, which allows the reader to “clearly

hear [him] speaking” (Education Northwest, 2014, p. 3).

Rudy’s Individual Expression. The writing Rudy did in the afternoon workshop, where

he chose the topic and genre, expressed his individuality, and featured drawings highlighted his

voice even more. The clearest example of Rudy’s individual expression is the one previously

described when he wrote the story about “Roblox.” A race was held; there were winners; in

another race, some racers crashed; and they were sad. He chose a topic of interest to himself,

which told the reader something about his personality. For example, Rudy may like to play video

games, especially racing games. Rudy also seemed to enjoy stories with action, like car crashes

and fast tigers, as written in his “All About Tigers” book on Monday, March 4th. Although I did

not observe him write the rest of “All About Tigers,” he told me the tigers on the mountain were

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fighting, and the drawing included one tiger with a smile and the other with a frown. In the

“Roblox” book, the first race had winners and losers. The winners were depicted in his drawings

with smiles, while the loser was depicted with a frown. Although, in both examples, Rudy’s oral

language before, during, and after he wrote gave me more information about his thoughts

surrounding the stories, his individual expression still made it to the page in both words and

pictures.

Rudy’s Engagement With Audience. Even though Rudy’s writing contained rich

individual expression, his awareness of and engagement with the audience appeared unclear or

accidental. Rudy seemed to enjoy creating stories that he liked, but I saw no indication that he

was writing the stories for anyone but himself. The one exception to that was in his “All About

Tigers” book from March 4th. Recall that after he drew the picture of a mountain, he added a

yellow diamond in the middle of the mountain and invited me inside, “Do you wanna go in there

‘cause there’s a diamond!” Rudy did not tell me why he drew the diamond, and he probably did

not draw it with me in mind. However, after drawing his idea into existence on the page, he

made a bid for me to come and imagine with him. In any case, his stories seemed to be part of

his imaginative play, which was for him, not for an audience.

When Rudy drew pictures, however, he often expressed anxiety about his ability to draw,

which might have been a sign, in part, that he was aware others would see his drawings and

judge them critically. Recall from previous examples, comments Rudy made about his artwork.

On March 4th, he was unsure about tigers' color, which sparked much debate among his tablemates. Then he said, “I don’t know how to draw a mountain!” which led to his peers trying to teach him to draw a mountain. On March 7th, when Rudy was drawing the cover of his

“Roblox” book, he said, “Ah! This is gonna be hard!” On March 14th, Rudy had difficulty

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drawing ice skates. He said, “I don’t know how to draw!” “Ah! I did it wrong!” and “I might have done it too big. I don’t know how to draw.” Also, his peers were sometimes critical of

Rudy’s drawings and touted themselves as experts. For example, Nelly asked why Rudy’s tiger was drawn so high on the page, and it was her idea to draw a mountain. She also criticized his ice skater’s arms and lack of hair. Then, she too took Rudy’s drawing and added a line of long, purple hair to Rudy’s ice skater (Figure 5.9). It is possible that Rudy felt frustrated with the mismatch of the picture he saw in his head and the one he could create on the page. However,

Rudy’s apparent anxiety about drawing may have been magnified by the writing process's social nature because he was aware of others, or an audience may see it.

Rudy’s Word Choice. The key question posed for the writing trait, “word choice” was,

“Does the author’s choice of words convey precise and compelling meaning and/or create a vivid picture for the reader?” (Education Northwest, 2014, p. 4). The “word choice” trait was evaluated based on the quality of words Rudy chose and how effectively he used words to create meaning.

Rudy’s Word Quality. I evaluated Rudy’s word quality based on several factors. I assessed a) common or high-frequency words; b) vocabulary words from the curriculum (i.e., red words, green words); c) new, academic, or challenging words; d) descriptive words; and e) word variety.

According to the lexical analysis, Rudy used 172 total words and 94 unique words in the

10 writing samples. Of the total words, 94 (54.65%) were red words, 53 (30.81%) were green words, and one (.005%) was a challenge word. The words Rudy used most often were “we” (12 times), “the” (10 times), and “I,” “it,” and “because” (five times each). Rudy also used five descriptive adjectives (“glad,” “big,” “favorite,” “funny,” “sad”). Overall, Rudy seemed to be

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developing a personal lexicon of words he knew well enough to use in his writing. Most words

were general, common, or high-frequency words (i.e., red words) and new vocabulary, probably

learned at school (i.e., green words, challenge words). He experimented with descriptive words

and academic or challenging words (e.g., square, cylinder).

Rudy’s Word Usage and Meaning. The criteria used for word usage and meaning were

how informative Rudy’s writing was, whether he used original words or words in original ways,

and how effectively he used new, academic, or challenging words. Through a lexical density

analysis, I evaluated the number of Rudy’s words, which conveyed meaning or provided

information (i.e., content words) compared to the total number of words he used. Rudy used

slightly more content words (54.65%) than function words in his writing. Most of the words

Rudy used were either commonly used English words (e.g., “we,” “the,” “I”), vocabulary words

to which he had been introduced in a Reading Roots (Slavin & Madden, 2010) story, or a video

shown in class (e.g., “ice skating). Of the 127 unique red words and 450 unique green words

identified in Reading Roots (Slavin & Madden, 2010) stories, Rudy attempted to write 33 and

38, respectively.

Rudy’s Fluency. The key question posed for the writing trait, “fluency,” was, “Does the author control sentences, so the piece flows smoothly when read aloud?” (Education Northwest,

2014, p. 5). The “fluency” trait was evaluated based on his sentence structure and syntax, the

variety of sentence lengths and patterns, which created rhythm, and how Rudy used transitions to

link words, phrases, or clauses.

Rudy’s Sentence Structure and Syntax. Rudy wrote simple sentences, compound

sentences, complex sentences, and one compound-complex sentence. Rudy included one

sentence fragment, which was difficult to classify, but no other errors in syntax.

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Eight of the 20 sentences Rudy wrote were simple sentences with a subject, predicate,

and one independent clause. In both “how-tos,” “How to Make PB&J,” and “How to Make

Cupcakes,” written on January 11th and February 4th, respectively (Figure 5.7), all sentences were

indicative, simple sentences, not imperative as could be used in the genre. Also, on March 14th,

in his story “Ice Skating,” Rudy wrote two indicative, simple sentences, “Isaw to ice caters / on

the ice,” and “Thes is the Stachoo.”

Five of Rudy’s 20 sentences were compound sentences, which included two independent

clauses. Two sentences were joined by coordinating conjunctions (“Th yn oo it / w asa f o gin / t

h y g o t t o / eat / SageCheS” [They knew it was a frog, and they got to eat sandwiches];

“thesetheWeners but theris / Stel Som PeoPle thatar / rasign.” [These the winners, but there is still some people that are racing.]), and two were not joined by a conjunction (“Thy feel glad it

was a / fr o g.”; “I WiSh I Can do / a big SnoWman.”). One sentence in this category is an

erroneous construction because it uses “then” without a coordinating conjunction (“We Need

Milck / botterthen / We M ee deg gs. [We need milk, butter, [and] then we need eggs]).

According to the American Heritage® Dictionary (2020), “then” could be used with a comma to

link parts of a compound predicate (e.g., We need milk, butter, then eggs.), but when used to join

an independent clause as Rudy has done here, it must be paired with the coordinating

conjunction “and” (e.g., “…and then we need eggs.”)

One sentence, written on March 12th as part of the Roblox book, is technically complex

because it contains one independent clause (“Some people CraShed”) and one dependent clause

(now Some PeoPle / that are sad.). Consequently, it was counted as one sentence in the analysis.

However, when taken in context, it seems possible that Rudy meant to write two sentences and

forgot to add a period at the end of the first and a capital letter at the beginning of the second;

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then, the second sentence became a fragment when he added the word “that.” Another possibility

could be that Rudy meant to write one compound sentence and neglected to include a

coordinating conjunction, then erroneously added “that.”

Five of Rudy’s 20 sentences were complex and joined by the subordinating conjunctions

“if” and “because” (e.g., Ilik Scho ol because / We go outside inPlay.”; “Sch o olis better then /

homebecauseWe cando / math.). Finally, Rudy wrote one compound-complex sentence, “I like

e n trvechen / becauseWe Wreed / books in We WOrK. [I like intervention because we read

books, and we work.] “I like intervention” and “we work” are coordinate independent clauses,

and “because we read books” is a dependent clause; thus, it is a compound-complex sentence.

Rudy’s Sentence Variety. Rudy wrote only indicative sentences (e.g., “Thy feel glad it was a / fr o g.), even when, in one case, the sentence called for the subjunctive mood (e.g., “I

WiSh I Can do / a big SnoWman.). All of Rudy’s sentences began with a subject-verb

construction, but the words and sentence lengths varied. For example, he wrote, “I like e n

trvechen / becauseWe Wreed / books in We WOrK. [I like intervention because we read books

and we work.],” which includes three subject-verb constructions (e.g., “I like,” “We read,” “We

WOrK.”). He also wrote, “Isaw to ice caters / on the ice.” and “Thes is the Stachoo.” All three

sentences begin with a similar pattern, but the sentences' lengths vary, resulting in sentences

easily read aloud.

The two “how-to” pieces, however, “How to Make PB&J” and “How to Make

Cupcakes,” begin with the same words, follow similar patterns of construction, and are of similar

length. Both pieces are easily read aloud but have somewhat choppy or mechanical rhythms. For

example, “We Need Milck botterthen / We M ee deg gs. / We Need to / Mex the botter. / We eat

i t.” Every sentence begins with the words, “we need,” except the last one (i.e., “We it i t.”), and

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the short sentences result in a choppy quality. Also, in “How to Make PB&J,” (i.e., “First we ge t two / Pees o f dr ed. [piece of bread] / Nextwe Puton / the battr. / thnwe puton / the Jely. / last we ea t the / PB+J.”) when read aloud, the sentences take on a metered, mechanical rhythm, almost as if they could be set to music.

Rudy’s Conventions. The key question posed for the writing trait, “conventions,” was,

“How much editing is required before the piece can be shared as a final product?” (Education

Northwest, 2014, p. 6). Rudy’s use of conventions most often corresponded with the descriptions of a capable writer. I evaluated his use of conventions based on spelling, punctuation, capitalization, and grammar.

Rudy’s Spelling. Rudy’s spelling of red words (i.e., high-frequency words) was slightly more often correct (e.g., a, I, was, is, and, like, the, of, on, put, to, my, if, go, her, out(side), but, that, are, some, then, we) than incorrect (e.g., “in” [and], “she” [shee] “som” [some], “becose”

[because], “wreed” [read], “thot” [thought], thes [this], “wen” [when], “noo” [knew], wen

[when], ther [there]). Rudy consistently used the following letters to represent their corresponding sounds in his writing samples: m, s, d, t, n, p, g, c /k/, r, b, l, a /ă/, o /ŏ/, e /ĕ/, th, er, ir, and -es, which suggests he had appropriated them for his own use. Rudy inconsistently used the following letters to represent their corresponding sounds: i /ĭ/, u /ŭ/, k, and ue /oo/. This indicates he may still have been developing proficiency in the grapheme-phoneme relationships.��

Rudy misspelled the word “than” as “then.” The slight difference in the pronunciation of the two words may have been indistinguishable. He also misspelled the word “read” as “wreed.”

Because the letter “r” is present, this misspelling likely does not indicate a lack of mastery of r-/r/ letter-sound relationship, rather experimentation with the “wr” consonant digraph that appears in the word “write.” The related meanings of the words “read” and “write” and the fact that the two

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words often appear together in print may have played a factor. Similarly, there is one example of the word “when” being spelled as “wen.” A possible explanation is that Rudy had not mastered the sight word or the “wh” digraph, which had been introduced, rather than the letter-sound relationship of w and /w/.

Rudy misspelled the word “butter” twice; he spelled it once as “battr” and once as

“botter.” He seemed to be confused about the spellings of the words “butter” and “batter,” because “batter was also spelled “botter.” Furthermore, he spelled the word “funny” as “fonnee,” until his teacher assisted him with the correct spelling, and he spelled “cupcakes” as

“copckakes.” In later samples, he spelled “fun” and “but” correctly. Rudy also spelled the word

“milk” as “milck,” “book” as “bock,” and “Jack” as “Jak.” He seemed to be aware that “k,” “c,” and “ck” all make the /k/ sound but unsure about when to use which. There are several other examples of him spelling “c” and “k” words correctly, but there are no examples of “ck” words spelled correctly, and Jack was the only one attempted.

Rudy missed the /ĭ/ sound seven times in 15 attempts, most of which were later writing samples or longer words. Two of the misspellings were in invented spellings of multi-syllabic words (favorite and sandwiches). In four writing samples, he seemed to confuse the /ĭ/ sound with the /ĕ/ sound [mex (mix), entervechen (intervention), weners (winners), stel (still), thes

(this)], which is a close approximation for a child who is still developing mastery. He did replace the “a” in “and” with an “i,” as “in,” demonstrating an awareness that “i” represents /ĭ/.

The following blended sounds appeared in Rudy’s writing samples: st, sc, sk, nd, nt, cl, l(c)k, (d)br, tr, rk, and xt. When writing the words “ice skaters” and “ice skating,” he spelled them “ice caters” and “icecateing,” respectively, which may be because “c” and “s” both make the /s/ sound and both sounds are pronounced in these words. Also, the length of the words and

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the fact that there are two words used together may compound the confusion. He used the “sk”

blend correctly in the word “ask.”

When writing the word “sandwiches,” he wrote, “sageches.” He missed the “nd” blend

and /w/ sound and replacing it with a “g.” Although he could have used a print source, at the

time, he was hurrying to finish so he could join his peers at intervention. The teacher was calling

out warnings, so he quickly wrote the word sandwiches without much care. Because

“sandwiches” is a multi-syllabic word and requires more tracking to write, being in a rush may have influenced how he spelled this word.

Rudy’s Punctuation. Rudy put a period at the end of 15 of the 20 sentences he wrote. He

neglected an end mark of any kind in five sentences (e.g., “…because it was funny”; “…go to the

Alligator Pond”; “…they got to eat sandwiches”; “Some people crashed”; “This is the statue”).

Rudy did not add any extra end marks, nor did he experiment with other punctuation, such as

commas, exclamation points, or question marks. He did not add commas after the introductory

temporal words “first,” “next,” “then,” or “last,” nor did he include commas in the compound

sentences joined by a coordinating conjunction (e.g., “…we read books and we work”; “these the

winners but there is still some people…”).

Rudy’s Capitalization. Rudy capitalized all but three of the initial words in a sentence

(e.g., “thnwe puton / the Jely.”; “last we ea t the / PB+J.”; “thesetheWeners…”). He capitalized

the pronoun “I” in every case, and he capitalized all proper names—including the name

“Alligator Pond.” Of the five titles he included in his writing, the first two were capitalized (e.g.,

“[How To] Make PB&J”; “SnoW”). The last three (e.g., “[How To] Make cupcakes,” “school,”

and “ice skating”) were not appropriately capitalized.

At times Rudy added capital letters in unnecessary places (e.g., “I WiSh I Can do / a big

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SnoWman.”). Nevertheless, this usually occurred with letters in which the lower-case letters

were the same form as the uppercase letters, just smaller (e.g., “boCK,” “When”), or with lower- case letters that conventionally descended below the line (e.g., “Piece,” “Put,” “Jelly”). The one exception was when Rudy wrote the phrase, “…WenTrosclair Steponthe / A ll igator…” and capitalized “alligator.” He was using the book's title to spell the word alligator, so it seems he simply copied what he saw in print.

Rudy’s Grammar. According to the grammar analysis, Rudy used English grammar in

simple constructions, and he usually did so correctly. When he made errors, they did not impede

understanding. In some sentences, he attempted more sophisticated grammar patterns and usually

did so successfully.

Rudy used singular and plural nouns in both the subjective and objective cases. He made

one error in pluralization when he neglected the “-es” ending on the word “piece” in the phrase,

“…two / Pees o f dr ed […two piece of bread]”. He added the “-s, -es” ending on the words

“sandwiches,” “eggs,” “books,” “winners,” and “ice skaters,” so the error appeared to be an

isolated incident. Rudy used singular and plural pronouns in the subjective case (e.g., “I,” “we,”

“they”), but did not use pronouns in the objective case.

Rudy used a variety of transitive (e.g., “get,” “was,” “need,” “like,” “saw”) and

intransitive (e.g., “step,” “thought,” “knew,” “play,” “work,” “crashed”) verbs, and he used the

modal verb “can,” on three occasions; although, twice he did so incorrectly. In the sentence, “I

WiSh I Can do / a big SnoWman,” Rudy used the present tense; therefore, the verb “can” should

have been in the subjunctive case, “I wish I could….” In the sentence, “De en aaSK / her MoM /

if She can / go to the Alligato r Pond,” the whole sentence was miswritten in the present tense, so

“can” should have been in the past tense, “could.” Incidentally, “could” was a red word, and it

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was posted on the word wall. I observed that Rudy was able to read the word, but he commented

that it was a “hard word;” it seems he did not know how to use it appropriately in a sentence he

produced independently.

Rudy wrote mostly in the present tense, but he also used the simple past (e.g., “was,”

“thought,” “knew,” “crashed,” “saw”). In addition to the erroneous use of the modal “can,” he also neglected to use the past tense in the phrases, “Thy feel glad…,” “…Trosclair steponthe

Alligator,” and “De en a ask / her MoM….” He used one infinitive verbal, “…to eat,” and four past participles, “was” (occurred twice), “scared,” “knew,” and “saw.” Rudy’s subject-verb agreement was correct in all but two cases (“De en a ask…,” and “theris / Stel Som PeoPle…).

Rudy also used some more sophisticated grammar patterns. Adverbs of time were present

in his writing (e.g., “first,” “next,” “then,” “last,” “when,” “still”), and he used prepositions of

place (e.g., “put on,” “step on,” “on the ice”), instrument (e.g., of bread, of the book), and

movement, (e.g., to the Alligator Pond). Rudy used “the” and “a” on several occasions, but he

used “a” instead of “an” before the word “alligator.” As previously mentioned, Rudy used five

descriptive adjectives (e.g., “glad,” “big,” “favorite,” “funny,” “sad”), and he used one

comparative adjective in the clause, “Sch o olis better then / home…;” although he used “then”

instead of the preposition “than.”

Rudy’s Presentation. The key question posed for the writing trait, “presentation,” was,

“Is the finished piece easy to read, polished in presentation, and pleasing to the eye?” (Education

Northwest, 2014, p. 7). I evaluated Rudy’s presentation based on his handwriting, spacing, and

drawings.

Rudy’s Handwriting. Rudy showed some inconsistencies with letter shape and size, but

most letters were, nonetheless, identifiable. In a few writing samples, Rudy made errors and did

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not erase thoroughly or tried to squeeze letters into spaces they did not fit, making the writing difficult to read. For example, in the sentence, “Thy feel glad it was a fr o g.” taken from answers to comprehension question on January 16th, the uppercase “T” in “Th[e]y” is as large as the lower-case “e’s” in “feel,” and the “a’s” in “glad” and “a.” However, the “a” in “was” looks like an “o,” and the lower-case “o” in “frog” is very small and not on the baseline, and the tittle (i.e., dot; Valeanu, 2011) on the lower-case “i” is as large as the letter’s stem (i.e., the primary vertical stroke). Letters with descenders (i.e., the bottom part of lower-case letters that descend below the baseline) should descend below the baseline, the “y” in “Th[e]y” and the “g’s” in “glad” and

“frog,” do not. Also, the “d” in “glad” looks like an uppercase “O” because the bowl (i.e., the curve that surrounds the negative space in the “d” is disproportionately large. No room is left for the ascender (i.e., the vertical line along the letter’s back). Furthermore, the “a” in the word

“glad” looks as though Rudy wrote it backward at first, noticed his mistake, and tried to fix it; however, he either did not erase completely, or he did not erase at all, which left the letter difficult to read.

Figure 5.11

Rudy’s Answer to Comprehension Question for Is There an Alligator in the Pond? (Rice, 2003b)

Rudy’s Spacing. Rudy seemed to struggle the most with his spacing, despite Ms.

Maddox’s repeated reminders. In Rudy’s 20 sentences, there were 118 places where a space

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should have been; he omitted 27 spaces and added 37 spaces that did not belong, which made 64 total errors in spacing, or 46% correct. Despite the spacing errors, most letters and words were readable, and I was able to discern their meaning with little effort.

Rudy’s Drawings. Rudy’s drawings were placed in appropriate places in relation to the text, and in most cases, they reflected the logic and meaning of the text. Some of the drawings' elements were disproportionate in size to others (e.g., an ice skate blade larger than the ice skate;

Figure 5.9). Their placement within the drawing seemed illogical (e.g., a tiger at the top of the page; Figure 5.2). Nevertheless, the drawings did not interfere with the text nor impede its flow.

As noted in a previous example, in the book, “All About Tigers,” Rudy wrote the text before he drew the picture, on a day I was not present to observe, which said, “I like tigers because they run fast.” In drawing the picture, the content of Rudy’s idea changed, but he did not update the text to match the new idea. As a result, in this case, Rudy’s picture did not reflect the text; however, this was an exception.

Rudy’s Summary of Writing Outcomes

In all, although Rudy’s OELPA score for writing did not change from kindergarten to first grade, his writing outcomes, according to this detailed analysis, ranged from emerging to experienced. His pieces were focused on the main idea, and he provided some details to elaborate on the idea. He often offered support for opinions or reasons for events in stories by using the word “because.” Rudy’s writing products were developing structure, although, at times, the logic was hard to follow. When the graphic organizer called for it, with assistance, Rudy could retell a story’s beginning, middle, and end in writing, but his own stories lacked consistency on this point. When writing in non-narrative genres (e.g., “All About School”), Rudy failed to include a topic sentence to signal the beginning of the piece or introduce a focused main

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idea, nor did he write a concluding sentence to summarize what he had written. Nevertheless, neither topic sentences nor concluding sentences were part of Ms. Maddox’s instruction for writing informational texts.

Rudy wrote pieces that included his personal feelings and opinions, and his drawings worked together with the text to highlight his personality. Most of his writing, at least those pieces he wrote during the afternoon writing workshop, seemed to be an extension of his own pretend play, and he appeared to take pleasure in bringing his imaginings into existence on the page. As such, Rudy’s audience awareness appeared limited or unclear. However, his apparent frustration or lack of confidence in drawing, coupled with some criticism from his peers, may have been fueled by some degree of anxiety over other people viewing his creations.

Rudy demonstrated capability in choosing the right words to convey his message. He used high-frequency words (i.e., red words) correctly, and he also attempted to include more creative choices. He used descriptive adjectives to add details to his sentences, and he included a few academic or more challenging words. Rudy used more content words than function words, which is an indication that his writing was informative.

Rudy’s sentence structure and syntax often met the criteria for an experienced English writer. He wrote simple, compound, and complex sentences, and he wrote one compound- complex sentence. He did not make any syntax errors, demonstrating his ability to compose well- constructed sentences, which made sense. All Rudy’s sentences followed a subject-verb sentence pattern, and they were all declarative, indicative sentences. When writing in the “how-to” genre, he repeated sentence patterns in a way that led to a metered, mechanical rhythm; nevertheless, most sentences were varied in length and included simple transitional words, so when read aloud, they were easily understood.

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Rudy applied English print conventions appropriately for his age and grade level. His spelling of high-frequency words was inconsistent, but when he used a spelling resource, he spelled words correctly. When Rudy used phonetic spelling for new or unfamiliar words, he made close approximations. He did not experiment with more sophisticated punctuation, but he added a period to the end of most sentences. Although imperfect, Rudy’s capitalization was sound, capitalizing most initial words in his sentences, all “I” pronouns, all names, and two of five titles. However, Rudy did add capitals that did not belong, which was probably due to inconsistent letter sizes rather than a failure to appropriate the use of the convention. His grammar was usually correct in simple constructions, and he used more sophisticated grammar patterns, such as possessive pronouns, prepositions, and adverbs.

Finally, Rudy produced readable writing products; though, his handwriting and spacing were still developing. His drawings included extra details, and they were placed on the page in a way that enhanced the meaning of the text and did not impede its flow.

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Chapter 6: Cross-Case Synthesis and Discussion

In Chapters 4 and 5, I presented the results of the analyses I performed for each case,

focusing on the dialogic relationships of each teacher and her respective young EL student in

relation to literacy practices and writing outcomes. In the final phase of data analysis, I

performed a cross-case synthesis (Yin, 2014). I aggregated the findings across both cases,

looking for similarities and differences between and among the participants. I began by

comparing Mario and Rudy’s writing outcomes and sought explanations from the findings

related to teacher decision-making and dialogic relationships. I also referenced the current

literature and theoretical framework on which I grounded my work, seeking possible

explanations. Given the complexity of learning in a social community, the insights I gained do

not necessarily reflect a one-to-one correspondence with each question’s answers; often, these

insights align with more than one question. Therefore, I present this chapter according to five

themes my synthesis yielded, which warrant further discussion.

First, I noticed a difference in how each student’s voice was evident in their writing, and I

discuss some possible explanations. Second, I connect legitimate peripheral participation to the

findings by examining the boys’ participation and interactions and how the differences may have influenced their writing outcomes. Third, I emphasize the importance of teachers’ professional knowledge and experience and their understanding of their students. I position teachers as the most important players in young EL children’s literacy learning. Fourth, I discuss the teachers’ use of graphic organizers as instructional tools and how I observed the children using the tools.

Finally, I draw attention to the paucity of asset-based pedagogies used in the classrooms I observed, given the wide range of research providing evidence for their effective support as young EL children learn to write. In the remainder of this chapter, I will take up each of these

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constructs in more detail.

Voice

In comparing Mario and Rudy’s writing, one stark difference I observed was how their unique voices came through in their writing. Mario expressed feelings in his writing on two occasions by adding the word “yay” to a picture of him picking out toys and including the word

“happy” with an exclamation mark to indicate his excitement about wishing for a lot of money.

On two occasions, Mario’s behavior, as he wrote, showed excitement at the notion of having a mailbox and receiving mail. Our conversation about his feelings of disgust surrounding toothpaste spit provided insight. Otherwise, Mario usually borrowed ideas from his teacher or peers when choosing topics (e.g., brushing teeth, wish for a tablet), and he wrote simple sentences that mirrored his teacher’s.

In contrast, Rudy’s writing included several expressions of feelings or opinions, as when he wrote about how funny he found Trosclair’s encounter with the alligator in the story. At times, the writing seemed to extend his pretend play, as in his stories about tigers fighting and cars crashing. Rudy developed both of those stories with more detail when telling them orally, but many of his unique thoughts were apparent on the page.

Several contributors may account for the difference in the two boys’ individual expression. First, they came to the table with two very different personalities—Mario, a “lone wolf,” and Rudy, “one of the gang,” according to their teachers. I interpreted Mario’s reluctance to share his feelings, in itself, an expression of individuality. His concentration, attention to detail, and close replication of his teacher’s models seem to communicate a desire to succeed by doing what he understood the teacher expected. I was reminded of one focal student, Luisa, in

Falchi’s (2014) study who “enacted the role of a ‘good student,’ followed what the curriculum

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demanded, and completed her work undistracted by her peers” (p. 353). Like Luisa, Mario followed the teacher’s instructions, met the requirements of the genre, and seemed more interested in getting the job done than in interacting with his peers as he did so. He concentrated, produced neat and legible work, and paid attention to the details of print conventions.

On the other hand, Rudy seemed much more playful and enjoyed being part of a group.

He interacted with his peers as he wrote, and he drew upon them for ideas to include in his stories. Rudy’s writing called to mind Ranker’s (2009) account of three boys co-authoring a text about baseball players and superheroes, casting themselves in the roles. Just as the boys in

Ranker’s study explored those roles through imaginative thought and later in writing, Rudy talked with his peers about tigers fighting and a Roblox™ car race that ended in a crash and sad people. When he drew a picture of a diamond inside a mountain, Rudy invited me to come in,

“…’cause there’s a diamond in there.”

Vygotsky (1987) theorized that children’s imaginative thought was rooted in reality. He wrote, “…any abstraction is at one and the same time a flight from life and a more profound and accurate reflection of life” (p. 78). This connection was apparent in Rudy’s writing process as he imagined fanciful events, like a diamond inside a mountain, and attempting to make connections to real people and situations by inviting me to come inside. Karpov (2014) explained the

Vygotskian view of sociodramatic play as a childhood practice meant to infiltrate the adult world, not escape it. Furthermore, imaginative thought and play are crucial for children’s development into fully participating, community members. Children cannot be baseball players, superheroes, or race car drivers, so they take on those roles in their play to explore adult experiences in their imaginations. It seems as though Rudy’s imaginative thought could have been enacted through play, but instead, it was enacted in his writing.

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Dyson (2006) invoked a Bakhtinian view of language use to describe children’s writing

as a conversational turn in their “voice-filled everyday lives” (p. 149). When given the freedom to draw upon the communicative spaces with which they are familiar, young children may move beyond writing to fulfill authoritative expectations toward authoring texts that represent their personal perspectives from childhood’s vantage point. In so doing, children produce more complex, meaningful texts, although attention to detail (e.g., spelling, print conventions, letterforms) may be less accurate. Dyson (2006) argued that inviting all aspects of children’s worlds into the classroom gave them access to a wide array of resources, not only linguistic but also social resources that they can use for their writing. Rudy’s writing reflected his imaginary worlds. Mario’s writing seemed to reflect his desire to follow the rules, stay within bounds, please his teacher or other adults, and produce what he perceived to be high-quality work. Both boys seemed to be taking conversational turns with their “voice-filled everyday lives,” but the voices that filled each boy’s life seemed to be quite different.

To extend the discussion of voice further, one aspect of voice that Mario and Rudy’s writing had in common was a lack of evidence in the texts of the authors’ audience awareness.

Moreover, I never observed explicit instruction about being aware of the reader. Although both children showed evidence of audience awareness in their writing processes and talk about their texts, I was unable to find evidence in the texts themselves. Durán and Henderson (2018) proposed the term linguistic flexibility to describe the range of language practices EL children used in classroom spaces that allowed them to move among home languages, varieties of

English, and linguistically diverse communities. Because young EL children straddle multiple languages, cultures, and communities, audience awareness is a skill they have already begun to master. Mario and Rudy both demonstrated linguistic flexibility but may have needed explicit

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instruction for this skill to come through in their writing. Durán (2017) described the ability to analyze a given situation and write in ways appropriate for its audience and purposes as rhetorical astuteness (Bawarshi, 2003). Researchers emphasized the need for young EL children to receive explicit instruction on audience awareness (Bauer, 2017; Durán, 2017; Durán &

Henderson, 2018). Moreover, educators should employ pedagogical strategies that require children to write for multiple audiences and adjust their writing as needed (Gebhard et al., 2007;

Gebhard et al., 2011; Martinez et al., 2010; Shin, 2014; Taylor et al., 2008), especially because they are straddling multiple languages, cultures, and communities.

Children on the Periphery

As I observed how the two focal students in the study engaged in the learning activities in their respective classrooms, I did so through the theoretical lens of Lave and Wenger’s (1991) notion of legitimate peripheral participation. They described peripheral participation as a positive term that does not imply disconnectedness. In fact, they described peripherality as an enabling position from which newcomers may gain access to the social organization. My original interpretation of the children’s engagement in the classroom literacy activities was that Mario was a peripheral participator, and Rudy was fully participating because Rudy spoke more. As I spent more time in the classroom, however, I began to question that interpretation. While it is true that Rudy engaged in much more oral language than Mario by asking and answering questions, chatting with his peers, and sharing his observations, Mario’s participation may have been less observable than Rudy’s.

Although Mario rarely spoke, I observed him reading coherently, listening attentively, and writing comprehensible messages. Researchers have observed young children using oral language to support their writing (Falchi et al., 2014; Gort, 2012; Kenner et al., 2004; Manyak,

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2006; Soltero-Gonzalez, 2009; Weber & Longhi-Chirlin, 2009; Yaden & Tardibuono, 2004).

Therefore, Mario’s lack of oral language use could indicate he was a less competent English

speaker than a listener, reader, or writer; however, his OELPA scores did not confirm that

assumption. Mario possibly used his cognitive resources on other linguistic skills necessary for

writing, such as translation and phoneme-grapheme coding (Berninger, 1999; Berninger et al.,

1992; Bourdin & Fayol, 1994). It may also be essential to remember that Mario spoke Spanish with his mother, a Guatemalan dialect with his father, and English at school. Researchers have argued that dual-language processing may produce a heavy cognitive load (Tokowicz et al.,

2004), which eventually leads to cognitive advantages (Bialystok, 2001; Vorstman et al., 2009;

Yang, 2017). As such, in addition to Mario’s cognitive resources devoted to the linguistic skills necessary to write, his third language may have also required resources, thus slowing him down.

When Ms. Hawkins described Mario to me, she said she was surprised by how much he knew when she spoke with him one-on-one. “He’s just so quiet, you don’t realize how smart he is, or you don’t realize what kind of a learner he is because he’s not really volunteering.” If Ms.

Hawkins had not taken the time to talk to Mario one-on-one, she could have misjudged Mario’s language abilities. However, by speaking with him alone and using multiple types of information to assess him, she understood that Mario was a capable learner. Children like Mario, who seems to be on the periphery orally, may fully participate with other linguistic skills.

Teacher Knowledge of Literacy Pedagogy, English learners, and Individual Students

Ms. Hawkins’ assessment of Mario as a capable learner despite his “lone wolf” status is an excellent example of another phenomenon I observed throughout the study. Both Ms.

Hawkins and Ms. Maddox had a thorough understanding of literacy learning principles for children, which researchers have suggested is vital in teaching young EL children how to write in

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English (Flynn, 2007; Flynn & Staithorpe, 2006). Moreover, the teachers had a deep

understanding of the needs of the children in their classrooms. Just as young EL children

continually assess contextual information in given situations to make linguistic decisions, the

teachers in this study continuously evaluated students and conditions. Their instructional

decisions were informed by their knowledge of these specific children (e.g., background,

language, past performance, personality) juxtaposed with their professional knowledge about

children’s literacy learning.

Ms. Hawkins and Ms. Maddox were able to flexibly use the scripted curriculum to tailor

instruction because they understood and articulated the principles upon which the curriculum

was built. They knew how to use the curriculum as a tool to teach. During the interview process,

both teachers explained why they made the decisions they made. Neither of them ever gave a

rationale indicating they made an instructional decision because the curriculum prescribed it.

They understood their charge to ensure the newcomers to English literacy learned the skills they

needed to participate fully in a broader English writer community. Their experience and training

taught them how to accomplish that task. In fact, both teachers expressed dissatisfaction with the

leveled-reading groups because so many of their homeroom students spent the literacy block with other teachers. They felt this aspect of the SFA (Slavin & Madden, 2001) program handicapped them because they did not have all the necessary information needed to make instructional decisions during other parts of their day.

Many districts have implemented scripted programs like SFA (Slavin & Madden, 2001) in an attempt to raise test scores (Reeves, 2010) because these programs tend to focus on lower- order skills, which are easier to test (Sawyer, 2004). Many scholars have criticized narrowly defined, scripted, or heavily mandated curricular programs because they can have the unintended

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consequence of suppressing teachers’ innovation and privileging dominant forms of

communication (Falchi et al., 2014; Gutierrez et al., 2002; Manyak, 2004; Ranker, 2009).

Sawyer (2004) called scripted instruction “teacher-proof” (p. 12) because of the implication that providing a script will negate teacher error. He argues that scripted programs ignore constructivist principles and effectively void teacher creativity, professional knowledge, and knowledge of their students.

Conversely, in a study documenting the professional development of two novice, high- school ESL teachers, who used a scripted curriculum, Reeves (2010) found the teachers

appreciated the tool. They had not yet established the ability to use the curriculum flexibly, and

they lacked the confidence necessary to do so. They depended on the script, and they were able

to glean an understanding of the principles of instruction upon which the curriculum was based.

The script seemed to scaffold professional learning for these teachers as they became more adept

at delivering instruction for EL children. Still, Reeves (2010) argued that the script provided

structure, which the teachers found helpful, but the curriculum was not designed to release

control gradually, as a scaffold should. The teachers still needed to learn to create an

“improvisational classroom” (Sawyer, 2004, p. 15) through in-depth content knowledge and

understanding of their students.

The teachers in my study had the necessary experience, pedagogical knowledge, and

relationships with their students to adapt the curriculum to fit their needs and their students’

needs. They had the freedom to maneuver within the curriculum and use it as a tool applied in

specific ways for their students. Teachers who understand the principles underlying a curriculum

and who have a thorough understanding of their children and their instructional needs are the

most qualified to make instructional decisions for those students.

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Graphic Organizers

Ms. Hawkins and Ms. Maddox used graphic organizers pervasively as an instructional tool in their classrooms. Graphic organizers are visual representations that can help children organize their thoughts and understand the relationships between and among concepts. They can also help teachers assess students’ understanding (Helman et al., 2012). As I observed the children’s use of graphic organizers, they seemed to fill them out as if filling out a form. If they saw a blank line, they wrote words, and if they saw an empty box, they drew a picture. They also used their teachers’ models for guidance when they were available, and neither child seemed to veer too far from what the organizer required.

Ms. Hawkins and Ms. Maddox accompanied their graphic organizers with explicit instruction and modeling. For example, in Ms. Maddox’s lesson about writing a “how-to” for making cupcakes, with the children’s help, she made a list of ingredients and a list of materials

(i.e., “stuff”) they had read about in their story about cupcakes. Ms. Maddox drew distinctions between the two lists. She displayed the graphic organizer and told the children what to write in each space, and she wrote the words “first,” “next,” and “last,” on the lines where she wanted the children to write them. Because this was a group of mid-level readers, she chose to remove the lists and scaffolds so the children would complete the work on their own instead of copying her model. As Rudy completed the assignment, he listed the ingredients on the lines next to the word

“Ingredients,” but he became confused when he saw the words “You Will Need” on the second set of lines. Ms. Maddox had explained that the children should list the needed “materials” on those lines, but the words on the graphic organizer did not match those of the teacher. Rudy did not seem to remember that instruction, so he made a judgment about what the form was asking and listed the necessary ingredients again, thereby answering the question posed on the graphic

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organizer rather than responding with the response his teacher sought.

Ms. Hawkins’ use of graphic organizers differed in that she always completed the model

and left it on display as the children wrote. When she had the children in her reading group write

about three wishes for an elf, she asked the children to give a reason by using the word

“because.” Twice before they wrote, the children participated in activities requiring them to state

a wish and give a reason, and in Ms. Hawkins’ model, she wrote “because” to justify her wishes.

Conversely, in the activity about three wishes from a leprechaun she completed with her

homeroom, she did not ask the children to give a reason for their wish, and her model did not

include a reason for each wish. This omission may have been because she had lower-level learners in her homeroom and her reading group was the highest in the first grade. Nonetheless, in Mario’s first piece about wishes from an elf, he included the word “because” and offered a reason, so he knew how to provide a supportive statement for an opinion. However, in the second piece about wishes from an elf, he did not offer a supporting statement, probably because his teacher did not ask for one, nor did the graphic organizer require it.

Graphic organizers have been recommended by many for use with ELs in general

(Casteel & Ballantyne, 2010; de Oliveira & Athanases, 2017; Helman et al., 2012; Pavlak,

2013b). Still, little research exists studying their use with young EL children’s writing instruction specifically (see Bauer et al., 2017; Lee et al., 2009; Pavlak 2013a). Researchers who have studied the use of graphic organizers with older ELs or with mainstream learners have recommended their use because they provide consistent scaffolding and visual clarity (Beck et al., 2020).

In a review of studies conducted across grade levels (elementary through university) investigating graphic organizers as instructional tools, Hall and Strangman (2008) identified

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several factors influencing graphic organizers’ effectiveness. Factors included student grade

level, point of implementation (i.e., before, during, or after encountering learning material), and

instructional context. The use of graphic organizers seemed to have the most significant effect at

the university level with more moderate effects for elementary-aged students. The researchers concluded that graphic organizers should include explicit instruction and modeling from the teacher, including connecting the visual tools and the learning goals.

Ms. Hawkins used more structured graphic organizers (e.g., Draw a Pig and Write and

How to Brush Teeth) during the afternoon writing workshops than did Ms. Maddox (e.g., All

About School and Roblox). Given that the children did not seem to depart from the graphic

organizers, the highly structured graphic organizers Ms. Hawkins used with Mario might have contributed to formulaic writing, including unsophisticated sentence structure and variety.

Conversely, Ms. Maddox used more open-ended graphic organizers, which may have contributed to Rudy’s creativity and playfulness in his writing because he was more concerned with content rather than filling in the correct answer. Open-ended graphic organizers may have also contributed to more sophisticated sentence structure and variety. The nature of the graphic organizers each teacher used is certainly not a singular factor in these findings; the difference in the children’s participatory patterns, language backgrounds, and the amount and quality of conferencing each child received may have also played a part.

Asset-Based Pedagogies

Finally, researchers broadly agree on the supportive nature of asset-based pedagogies

(Durán, 2017). These pedagogies include native language support (Araujo, 2002), translanguaging practices (Alvarez et al., 2018; Axelrod & Cole, 2018; Bauer et al., 2017;

Canagarajah, 2013; Durán, 2017; García, 2009; García et al., 2011; Machado & Hartman, 2019,

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2020; Zapata & Laman, 2016), hybrid literacy practices (Kennedy, 2006; Manyak 2001, 2002;

Soltero-Gonzalez, 2009), interliteracy (Gort, 2006, 2012), and multimodal (Falchi et al., 2014;

Hong, 2019) or multiliterate practices (Taylor et al., 2008). Despite nearly two decades of research building a case for using these pedagogies, districts, schools, and teachers are slow to implement their use on a broad scale (Durán, 2017).

In this study, the teachers differed slightly in their opinions and practices regarding native language use during the English language arts block. Ms. Hawkins believed that any language use was beneficial to young EL children’s positive writing outcomes. She worried that children without much English would stop talking altogether if she prohibited them from using their native languages. During the English language arts block, Mrs. Maddox believed that children should use as much English as possible because the purpose of that time was to strengthen their

English skills. Also, as a monolingual English speaker, she felt limited in assessing children’s

English abilities if they did not communicate in English.

Both teachers also shared some obstacles they faced when incorporating native languages and cultures into their classroom instruction. Although the school had a yearly world heritage celebration, Ms. Hawkins shared her failed attempts at inviting parents to her classroom as guest speakers or volunteers. Parents often worked long hours or did shift work and slept while children were in school. Many were also unable to read or write even in their native languages and lacked confidence in their ability to contribute to children’s learning. It was also Mrs.

Hawkins’ experience that many immigrant parents, who had not had opportunities for schooling as children themselves, did not fully understand the vital role they played in their children’s education. They felt grateful for the educational opportunities afforded to their children. Still, they resisted being too involved and counted on the school and teachers to provide their children

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with a good education.

Ms. Maddox concurred with Ms. Hawkins when she explained that her goal was to

connect children’s new learning to their interests and experiences. She asserted that many of the

ideas Americans typically hold regarding cultural connections are connections to the children’s

parents, not the children themselves. Ms. Hawkins pointed out that Latin American countries

vary widely in their foods, customs, and languages in ways that she did not fully comprehend.

She felt it was inappropriate for her to project her understanding of another culture onto the

children in her classroom and make that projection part of her instruction.

Finally, although neither teacher shared it as an obstacle, the fact remained that they

taught in a school and district in which English was the dominant language of instruction. Their

objective was to teach the children English. As such, asset-based pedagogies were not part of the program. SFA (Slavin & Madden, 2001) offered EL support suggestions, but those supports did not include asset-based pedagogies. The teachers were trained in SIOP strategies (Echevarria et

al., 2017), which do not include explicit, asset-based strategies to the extent recommended in the current literature corpus.

Like many teachers, Ms. Hawkins and Ms. Maddox did not speak many of their students’

home languages. I do not suggest they held negative views about their students’ languages or

cultures. Still, the teachers operated within a school, district, and national culture where children

who speak languages other than English at home are not taught with pedagogies that tap into

their vast repertoires of linguistic and cultural resources. This omission seems to be, at the very

least, a missed opportunity on the part of U.S. schools in the education of a large portion of the

population. At worst, schools’ failure to incorporate asset-based pedagogies may be educational negligence, feeding the range of social injustices endured by the non-majority other.

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Chapter 7: Conclusion

In this multiple-case study, I explored the dialogic relationships of two mainstream

teachers and two young EL children in relation to literacy practices and writing outcomes.

Specifically, I sought to answer the following research questions:

1. How did two first-grade students and teachers interact in the context of classroom

literacy practices?

2. Why did the teachers make the instructional choices they made as they taught the

young EL children to write in English?

3. How did the two focal students demonstrate their writing processes and products, and

how might the teacher-student dialogic relationships have influenced those outcomes?

Using a multiple-case study design and qualitative methods, I identified patterns in the

teachers and young EL children's dialogic relationships. The patterns included integrating modes

of meaning-making; the use of scaffolding, tools, and strategies; and engaging in social activities. Data from stimulated-recall interviews provided insight into the teachers’ decision-

making processes and their rationales for the observed instructional patterns. Finally, I evaluated

the young EL children’s writing outcomes related to processes and products. I considered

possible explanations of those outcomes by aggregating the data in a cross-case synthesis (Yin,

2014).

From the cross-case synthesis, I identified five themes that warranted further discussion.

First, I found differences in how the children manifested their unique voices in their writing, and

I connected this finding to sociocultural perspectives about children’s play and imaginative lives.

Furthermore, although the children demonstrated linguistic flexibility in their oral language and

writing processes, based on their interlocutors, I did not find evidence of audience awareness in

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the writing products themselves. Second, I discussed how young EL children might choose not to use oral language or lack oral English skills, but this should not necessarily be interpreted as disengagement with the classroom’s material or activities. Legitimate peripheral participation

(Lave & Wenger, 1991) is a useful sociocultural construct to explain how Mario interacted with the instruction. Third, I emphasized the value of knowledgeable, experienced teachers who interact with children and use curricular tools flexibly to tailor instruction for their students’ needs. I posited that highly systematic scripted programs could not replace a teacher and child's dialogic relationships. Fourth, both teachers used graphic organizers pervasively throughout, and

I described how the children interacted with these tools, including how they may have influenced writing outcomes. Finally, I drew attention to the lack of asset-based pedagogies I observed in the classrooms and recounted obstacles these mainstream teachers faced in their attempts to make home-school connections. Moreover, the teachers are situated in a cultural, educational climate that has not adequately heeded the call to incorporate asset-based pedagogies into the literacy instruction of young EL children.

In this chapter, I first respond to each of the three research questions I posed and offer a panoramic view of my interpretations of the study’s findings. Then, I describe the study limitations. Next, I share methodological and theoretical insights from the five themes I identified in the cross-case synthesis. Then, I offer practical implications for educators and policymakers. Finally, I recommend areas for future research.

Overview

How did two first-grade students and teachers interact in the context of classroom literacy practices?

Ms. Hawkins’ instruction was highly scaffolded. She seemed to focus on providing

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young EL children with models and tools necessary to produce the writing she envisioned for

their success. Ms. Hawkins also offered children opportunities to learn in multiple ways,

including oral language and listening activities. Mario, who Ms. Hawkins described as a “lone-

wolf,” rarely took advantage of the oral language activities afforded him, and he interacted with

others only minimally. Mario seemed to put his energy into meeting what he perceived to be his

teacher’s expectations. He used the scaffolding his teacher provided and produced neat,

structured, and mostly mechanically correct writing that usually resembled his teacher's models.

Although he did spend time thinking about what to write, he rarely went beyond the model or

graphic organizer's requirements.

Ms. Maddox also scaffolded the young EL children’s writing instruction, but she did so

in a more open-ended way. She provided open-ended graphic organizers and allowed children to

choose their topics and the genres in which they wrote. Ms. Maddox’s scaffolding seemed to be

guided by the children’s responses to the previous day’s instruction rather than front-loading

based on how she anticipated the children would respond. Ms. Maddox helped the children make

speech-to-text connections by orally composing and rehearsing as she conferred with them

during writing practice. Rudy’s response to Ms. Maddox’s instruction was to extend his

imaginative play into his writing, even when his chosen genre did not allow it. As “one of the

gang,” Rudy collaborated with peers and wrote elaborate stories, which evolved with the

conversations, his drawings, and his peers’ commentary on his illustrations. Although he used sophisticated language and sentence structures to express his ideas on the page as he would say them orally, he paid little attention to his print presentation.

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Why did the teachers make the instructional choices they made as they taught the young EL

children to write in English?

Ms. Hawkins believed that every child learned in ways unique to them, so her overarching instructional goal seemed to be to find ways to help as many of them be as successful as possible. By providing clear objectives and modeling writing processes and

products, she showed the children precisely what she expected and the “baby steps” necessary to

succeed. Her goal was to give the children time to think about and practice one new concept at a

time.

Ms. Maddox’s overarching instructional goal seemed to be for the children to enjoy

writing and write more, eventually developing writing stamina. She believed that the more

control children had over their writing, the more fun they would have, and the more motivated

they would be to write. She could then use the children’s own writing to teach the details of how

language works to make meaning.

How did the two focal students demonstrate their writing processes and products, and how

might the teacher-student dialogic relationships have influenced those outcomes?

Mario’s writing products were well-structured, neat, and easy to understand. He provided

few details and limited self-expression. Furthermore, he used mostly common vocabulary and

simple sentence structures; although, he demonstrated knowledge of academic vocabulary (e.g.,

cylinders) and the ability to use more sophisticated sentence structures (“I wish for money. / So

can. / be happy!”). Mario’s dialogic relationship with Ms. Hawkins likely influenced his writing

outcomes by sending the message that matching the teacher’s model defined his writing success.

In contrast, Rudy’s writing products were often messy and contained several mechanical

errors, especially spacing errors. However, he wrote more sophisticated sentences that resembled

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his speaking abilities, and he expressed his mood, feelings, and individuality. Rudy’s writing

invited the reader into his make-believe world of play, even though the genre did not call for it.

Rudy’s dialogic relationship with Ms. Maddox likely influenced his writing outcomes by making

space for exploration and experimentation of ideas that did not necessarily match the

minilesson’s specific writing objective.

Summary of Overview

In sum, all participants in this study seemed to meet their goals. If Ms. Hawkins aimed to make sure Mario was successful in writing according to her model, she created conditions for him to accomplish just that. If Ms. Maddox aimed to teach the children to enjoy writing so they would write, she accomplished that as well. The children approached their participation in different ways according to their unique personalities and language abilities. What was true of both boys, though, was that they each met their teacher’s expectations. Mario did so by following his teacher’s model and producing text that would meet with her approval. Rudy did so by extending his play into his writing, having fun, and learning to enjoy the process. In so doing, he created comparatively imaginative, sophisticated texts. This finding underscores the critical role teachers play in dialogic relationships with their students as young EL children learn to write.

Study Limitations

This study was limited in several ways. First, as a multiple-case study of two teacher- student dyads in one school, this study’s results may add to the theoretical understandings of young EL children’s writing and literacy instruction. Still, it is not meant to be generalized to a larger population in any other way. Furthermore, the data were collected in a short time during one single quarter of an academic year. Consequently, I took a mere snapshot of the classroom literacy practices, and my interpretations of the findings should be considered with this in mind.

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My position as a novice researcher may have also influenced my interpretations. Moreover, I

must acknowledge the influence my presence may have had on the study participants,

specifically Mario, who seemed less comfortable being observed by an unfamiliar adult. His teacher and I were both aware of this and did our best to, first and foremost, mitigate any adverse effects this may have had on Mario. This circumstance may have negatively affected the quality of the data collected.

Methodological and Theoretical Insights

Using a multiple-case study design allowed me to compare and contrast two teacher-

student dyads’ dialogic relationships. Through stimulated recall interviews, I gained insight into

the details of the teachers’ decision-making processes and factors they considered when making instructional decisions about writing for young EL children. By coupling interview and observation data, I constructed and described each teacher-student dyad’s profiles and used that

information to inform my evaluation of student writing outcomes.

Although multiple-case studies of young EL children’s writing and writing instruction

have been conducted in the past, I have not found other studies with this population using

stimulated-recall interviews in conjunction with other qualitative data collection methods in this

way. Direct data from experienced, knowledgeable teachers “thinking aloud” as they viewed

themselves teach, provided a unique insight into the “improvisational classroom” (Sawyer, 2004,

p. 15), a construct that may seem somewhat elusive.

Moreover, the study design and methods provided theoretical insights into writing’s

sociocultural nature, particularly young EL children’s writing development. Mario and Rudy

each approached writing and participated in their classroom communities in different ways.

Mario seemed to find a sense of satisfaction from working alone, “ticking the boxes,” so to speak

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and completing his assignments in the way he believed his teacher expected. On the other hand,

Rudy brought a sense of playfulness to his writing by putting his imaginings onto the page

instead of acting them out through pretend play. Understanding why different children privilege

one approach to writing over another, what sociocultural factors may play a role, and how

teachers can foster both children’s practices is a fascinating topic for further exploration.

Finally, Mario’s lack of oral language use in the classroom provided an object of study

regarding young EL children who may seem to be learning on the periphery. Due to the interdependency of language skill development (Graham et al., 2018; Shanahan, 2016), it seems feasible to conclude that children who choose not to participate in expressions of spontaneous

oral language, which is observable, are still participating in other language skills, like listening,

reading, and writing. The four language skills do not necessarily develop at the same rate

(Ortega, 2009). Therefore, when considering language learning through the lens of legitimate

peripheral participation (Lave & Wenger, 1991), it may be helpful to reframe our thinking of

how young EL children participate by their varying levels of involvement in each language skill.

Implications for Educators

This study, when positioned within the current body of literature regarding writing and

young EL children, may provide new insights for educators. First, researchers have suggested the

importance of teaching young EL children to write with an audience in mind (Durán, 2017),

which is one element of voice. Ample research points to young EL children’s ability to

differentiate among audiences in their spoken language (Axelrod & Cole, 2018; Bauer et al.,

2017; Kennedy, 2006; Manyak, 2002; Machado & Hartman, 2019, 2020; Ranker, 2009; Taylor

et al., 2008; Zapata & Laman, 2016). Still, they may need explicit instruction about how to write

for different audiences. Some pedagogies showing promise in this area include genre studies

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(Durán, 2017; Gebhard et al., 2011; Pavlak, 2013; Shin, 2014), blog-mediated units of instruction (Gebhard et al., 2011; Shin, 2014), and dual-language identity texts (Taylor, 2008).

This list is not all-inclusive; educators should continually seek new ways to teach children about the purposes and audiences for writing.

In addition to explicit instruction of audience awareness, teachers may need to help young EL children find their voices and increase individual expression. Because most children are already naturally imaginative and playful, extending their creative stories and play into their writing seems to be a natural ingress into a broader community of writers. For some children, like Rudy, making the transition from acting out stories into writing stories may be more intuitive. Moreover, Ms. Maddox made space in the writing workshop for Rudy to make choices about genre and topic, talk about his writing, collaborate with others, and explore his creative ideas. Like Mario, other children may need explicit instruction, conferring with the teacher, oral rehearsal, and explicit permission to include whimsy and playfulness in his writing.

Mario was an example of a child whom a teacher may assume is learning on the periphery because of his lack of oral participation. Young EL children may remain quiet for various reasons (Krashen, 2003; Ortega, 2009), but they may be engaging other linguistic skills

(i.e., listening, reading, writing), which are harder to see. Thus, teachers may need to dig deeper to check for understanding. Taking time to have one-on-one conversations and using multiple assessment methods is how teachers can evaluate young EL children’s linguistic competency.

Additionally, children need opportunities to talk about print (e.g., think-pair-share, partner reads, role-plays, sharing written texts). For those children who do not speak in group spaces, teacher intervention may be especially needed. Activities like these could provide children like Mario critical practice with oral language.

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Evidence in this study also brought to the fore the vital role of teachers in young EL

children’s learning processes as writing instruction is differentiated. These teachers had the

knowledge, experience, and freedom to use systematized, scripted curricula flexibly as a tool to

serve their particular students’ needs. Past researchers have indicated teachers are not always

given this flexibility to maneuver within the curriculum (Falchi et al., 2014; Manyak, 2004;

Soltero-Gonzalez, 2009). Teachers who have professional knowledge of literacy learning and

instruction with young EL children and personal insight into students’ abilities and backgrounds

are critical resources (Flynn, 2009) that could be underutilized if principals or districts are too

rigid with curriculum fidelity requirements. Less experienced teachers may need the script and

systematized lessons to continuously assess student learning and utilize the necessary

instructional tools in the moment (Reeves, 2010). However, the goal for young teachers should

be to grow their assessment abilities and their capacity to provide essential instruction in the

moment. The curriculum cannot replace a classroom teacher’s dialogic relationships with a child.

Graphic organizers were prevalent in teachers’ instruction and children’s participation in

writing. Although they can serve multiple purposes (e.g., scaffolding, assessment), the young EL

children in this study used the graphic organizers primarily to “fill in the blanks.” This

observation serves as a reminder for teachers to align their use of tools with their instructional

goals. That is to say, teachers should begin with the end in mind, asking themselves questions such as: What elements of the genre being taught should be included at the end of the unit? Are those elements contained in the graphic organizer? If not, when will they be added, and how will

they be communicated to the children? Some evidence in this study also suggested that open-

ended graphic organizers may have contributed to a more significant individual or emotional

expression. Children may perceive more freedom to write what they want to write instead of

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what they must write when space exists on a graphic organizer. This insight may help teachers remember to work with students to increase individual expression and other voice elements in their writing.

Finally, the overwhelming consensus among researchers is that using native language as support in young EL children’s writing activities allows them to build upon existing linguistic resources as they acquire new ones (Axelrod & Cole, 2018; Bauer et al., 2017; Gort 2006;

Kennedy, 2006; Machado & Hartman, 2019, 2020; Manyak, 2002; Ranker, 2009; Taylor et al.,

2008; Zapata & Laman, 2016). Monolingual, mainstream teachers must overcome obstacles and incorporate asset-based pedagogies with young EL writers. However, this responsibility does not fall squarely on the shoulders of teachers. School, district, state, and national curricular foci must include asset-based pedagogies that incorporate the cultural and linguistic resources young EL children bring to the table. Teachers must be given the training and resources necessary to overcome the obstacles they face to make these pedagogies a priority. Preservice teacher-training programs, professional development, curricular recommendations for EL differentiation strategies, and other like resources must be made pervasively available to teachers. In this way, teachers can provide the most supportive instruction possible for young EL children.

Recommendations for Future Research

The results of this study suggest areas to explore through future research. First, additional studies coupling classroom observations with stimulated-recall interviews could potentially provide valuable insight into teachers’ decision-making processes and lead to a clearer understanding of the knowledge and skills making up the “improvisational classroom” (Sawyer,

2004, p. 15). These techniques could also be paired with quantitative methods on a broader scale.

In an Explanatory Sequential Mixed-Methods (Creswell & Plano Clark, 2011) study, for

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example, quantitative survey research could be used first to identify an array of teachers with varying characteristics, such as linguistic backgrounds, years of experience, level of education, and amount of training received in the education of young EL children. Classroom observations and stimulated-recall interviews could then be used to explore the range of decision-making processes for young EL writers’ teachers. A research design like this may make a decisive contribution by tapping into the vast depositories of knowledge teachers in the field have developed over time.

Additionally, more research about teaching young EL children about the purpose of writing and for whom they are writing is needed. Specifically, how can teachers help young EL children to manifest their existing ability to differentiate among languages and registers for a range of audiences in their writing (Axelrod & Cole, 2018; Bauer et al., 2017; Kennedy, 2006;

Manyak, 2002; Zapata & Laman, 2016)? Furthermore, how can teachers foster children’s natural inclination for whimsy and play into imaginative expressions in writing while still maintaining academic rigor?

Next, no research I reviewed in preparation for this study explored how teachers or young

EL children used graphic organizers as tools for writing instruction or writing. Researchers who have examined the use of graphic organizers with other populations and literacy learning, more generally, have found them to be highly effective when used in particular ways (Frey et al.,

2016). Research is needed for teachers to understand the best graphic organizers to use with young EL writers and the instructional purposes for which they are best suited. Finally, the teachers in this study offered legitimate obstacles to incorporating suggested asset-based pedagogies into their classroom writing instruction. They were teaching in a school where learning English was the goal and the only approved instructional language. In this context, the

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teachers may not have had the freedom to incorporate asset-based pedagogies. The research community’s consensus unequivocally acknowledges pedagogies connecting prior cultural and linguistic knowledge to benefit young EL children as they learn to write in English. Researchers need to understand the reasons these pedagogies have not yet become pervasive throughout the educational landscape. Research involving educators’ and policymakers’ (not just teachers’) beliefs about using asset-based pedagogies with young EL children might elucidate why these

practices are not mainstream. Research in this area would be of interest to those who study the

literacy learning of EL children and those who study educational policy and educational change.

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Appendix A

Table A1

OELPA ALDS for Listening in Kindergarten

Level 1 Level 2 Level 3 Level 4 Level 5 Beginning Early Intermediate Intermediate Early Advanced Advanced When listening, the When listening, the When listening, the When listening, the When listening, the student at Level 1 is student at Level 2 is student at Level 3 is student at Level 4 is student at Level 5 is working on: working on: working on: working on: working on:  responding to short  responding to short  responding to  responding to  responding to conversations conversations conversations and conversations and conversations and  recognizing and  recognizing and identifying key words identifying key words, identifying key words, identifying the identifying the meaning and phrases from read- phrases, and details phrases, and details meanings of a few of some key words and alouds and oral from long stories and from longer stories and frequently occurring phrases from read- presentations presentations informational words in read-alouds alouds and oral  answering questions  answering questions presentations and simple oral presentations about the meanings of and evaluating key  answering questions presentations  responding to yes/no words and phrases; vocabulary using and evaluating key  responding to simple and wh- questions making inferences and details from long details from long yes/no and wh-  following simple and comparisons stories and informational questions some multi-step  responding to yes/no conversations presentations  following simple directions without and wh- questions  demonstrating multiple  demonstrating multiple directions. picture support  comprehending details step thinking. step thinking.  discriminating some and following longer details in longer directions. conversations.

Note: Ohio English Language Proficiency Assessment (OELPA) Achievement Level Descriptors (ALDS) Kindergarten (ODE,

2018)

337

Table A2

OELPA ALDS for Reading in Kindergarten

Level 1 Level 2 Level 3 Level 4 Level 5 Beginning Early Intermediate Intermediate Early Advanced Advanced When reading grade- When reading grade- When reading grade- When reading grade- When reading grade- appropriate text, the appropriate text, the appropriate text, the appropriate text, the appropriate text, the student at Level 1 is student at Level 2 is student at Level 3 is student at Level 4 is student at Level 5 is working on: working on: working on: working on: working on:

338

Table A3

OELPA ALDS for Speaking in Kindergarten

Level 1 Level 2 Level 3 Level 4 Level 5 Beginning Early Intermediate Intermediate Early Advanced Advanced When speaking, the When speaking, the When speaking, the When speaking, the When speaking, the student at Level 1 is student at Level 2 is student at Level 3 is student at Level 4 is student at Level 5 is working on: working on: working on: working on: working on:  responding to short  responding to  responding to  responding to  responding to conversations and conversations and conversations, conversations, conversations, questions questions, following questions, and questions and prompts questions and prompts  describing objects commands commands by by identifying multiple on a variety of topics using frequently  describing actions and describing details and items and explaining by identifying items occurring nouns and objects using actions using nouns, choices and explaining choices verbs frequently occurring verbs, and prepositions  answering questions  answering questions  communicating simple nouns, verbs, and short  communicating about a variety of about key details on a information about a phrases information and topics using supporting variety of topics topic.  communicating simple expressing an opinion details  expressing an opinion information about a familiar topic  expressing an opinion or a preference about a  retelling and  making inferences to about a variety of variety of topics sequencing a story answer questions topics  retelling stories and  using prepositional  retelling and  demonstrating correct multiple step directions phrases to describe sequencing an oral use of prepositions in an event using location presentation.  describing an object's sequencing.  categorizing location vocabulary  retelling and  forming questions sequencing an oral related to prompts. presentation.

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Table A4

OELPA ALDS for Writing in Kindergarten

Level 1 Level 2 Level 3 Level 4 Level 5 Beginning Early Intermediate Intermediate Early Advanced Advanced When writing, the student When writing, the student When writing, the student When writing, the student When writing, the student at Level 1 is working at Level 2 is working at Level 3 is working at Level 4 is working at Level 5 is working on: on: on: on: on:  recognizing and using a  recognizing and using  recognizing and using  recognizing and using  recognizing and using small number of frequently occurring frequently occurring frequently occurring frequently occurring frequently occurring nouns and verbs in nouns, verbs, and short regular plural nouns, regular plural nouns, nouns and verbs in writing phrases in writing verbs, and prepositions verbs writing  writing and completing  writing and completing in writing  prepositions, and  creating words by words by filling in a words with missing  writing common grade question words in filling in a missing missing letter letters level words writing letter  expressing an opinion  using question words to  writing sentences with  writing common words  using a small number about a topic in writing create simple questions few errors and accurate grade- of frequently occurring and giving a reason for  expressing an opinion  expressing an opinion level sentences nouns and verbs in that opinion or preference with a reason  expressing an opinion written text  responding to simple  creating complete  creating complete or a preference,  responding to simple questions about simple sentences by sentences by placing including a reason for questions about familiar topics placing words in the words in the correct that opinion familiar topics. correct order. order.  creating complete sentences by placing words in the correct order.

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Table A5

OELPA ALDS for Listening in Grade 1

Level 1 Level 2 Level 3 Level 4 Level 5 Beginning Early Intermediate Intermediate Early Advanced Advanced When listening, the When listening, the When listening, the When listening, the When listening, the student at Level 1 is student at Level 2 is student at Level 3 is student at Level 4 is student at Level 5 is working on: working on: working on: working on: working on:  identifying the main  identifying key words  identifying the main  identifying the main  identifying main topics topic in oral and phrases in oral topics and answer topics, answering and key details in oral presentations presentations of texts questions about some questions about an presentations of literary  determining meaning  participating in short key details in oral increasing number of and informational texts of words and phrases conversations about presentations of texts key details in oral  participating in  participating in familiar topics and  participating in short presentations of literary extended conversations conversations and responding to simple conversations and and informational texts and discussions and discussions. questions and wh‐ discussions on familiar  participating in answering questions on questions topics and answering conversations and a variety of topics and  gathering information simple questions discussions on a variety texts and identifying  gathering and of topics  gathering, summaries of summarizing  gathering, summarizing, and information from oral information from oral summarizing, and answering questions sources sources answering questions about information from  identifying a reason a  identifying one or two about information from oral sources speaker gives to reasons a speaker gives oral sources  identifying reasons a support a point to support a main point.  identifying reasons a speaker gives to  determining the speaker gives to support the main point. meaning of frequently support the main point. occurring words and phrases.

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Table A6

OELPA ALDS for Reading in Grade 1

Level 1 Level 2 Level 3 Level 4 Early Level 5 Beginning Early Intermediate Intermediate Advanced Advanced When reading grade‐ When reading grade‐ When reading grade‐ When reading grade‐ When reading grade‐ appropriate text, the appropriate text, the appropriate text, the appropriate text, the appropriate text, the student at Level 1 is student at Level 2 is student at Level 3 is student at Level 4 is student at Level 5 is working on: working on: working on: working on: working on:  determining the  identifying key words  identifying key words,  identifying main topics  identifying main topics meaning of words and and phrases in read‐ phrases, and main in texts and read‐alouds in texts and read‐ phrases in read‐ alouds alouds of texts and topics in texts and  asking and answering alouds of texts and dialogues dialogues dialogues questions about key  asking and answering  responding to simple  responding to simple  responding to simple details in written texts questions about key yes/no and wh‐ yes/no and wh‐ questions about key and read‐alouds details in texts and questions about questions about details; retelling some  retelling stories and read‐alouds familiar topics familiar topics information, details, or information  retelling key points of  identifying main topic  identify a reason an events  identifying reasons an stories and information in read‐aloud sentence author gives to support  identifying reasons an author gives to support  identifying reasons an  recognizing the the main point author gives to support a main point author gives to support meaning of some  determining the a main point  answering questions a main point frequently occurring meaning of frequently  answering questions to about a variety of  summarizing words in read‐alouds. occurring words and help determine the topics to determine the information from phrases in read‐alouds. meaning of some less meaning of words, provided sources frequently occurring phrases, and simple  answering questions on words and phrases. idiomatic expressions. a variety of topics to determine or clarify the meaning of words  phrases, and idiomatic expressions.

342

Table A7

OELPA ALDS for Speaking in Grade 1

Level 1 Level 2 Level 3 Level 4 Level 5 Beginning Early Intermediate Intermediate Early Advanced Advanced When speaking, the When speaking, the When speaking, the When speaking, the When speaking, the student is working on: student is working on: student is working on: student is working on: student is working on:  responding to short  participating in short  participating in short  participating in  participating in conversations and conversations; discussions and discussions and extended discussions questions responding to simple conversations conversations and conversations  describing objects yes/no and wh‐  asking and answering  delivering short simple  delivering oral using frequently questions about simple questions about oral presentations about presentations with a occurring nouns and familiar topics familiar topics a variety of topics few descriptive details verbs  communicating simple  delivering short simple  expressing opinions about a variety of  communicating simple messages about oral presentations about about a variety of topics information about a familiar topics familiar topics topics  expressing opinions topic  expressing an opinion  expressing an opinion  summarizing about a variety of  expressing an opinion. about a familiar topic; about a familiar topic information and topics summarizing some key and giving a reason answering questions  summarizing information from  summarizing from provided sources information and sources information from  recounting multiple answering questions  retelling an event and sources events in sequence and from sources present simple  retelling a simple presenting simple  recounting a more information using some sequence of events and information about a complex sequence of frequently occurring presenting simple topic events and providing linking words information.  producing and some facts  producing simple expanding simple and  producing and sentences. some compound expanding simple and sentences. compound sentences.

343

Table A8

OELPA ALDS for Writing in Grade 1

Level 1 Level 2 Level 3 Level 4 Level 5 Beginning Early Intermediate Intermediate Early Advanced Advanced When writing, the student When writing, the student When writing, the student When writing, the student When writing, the student at Level 1 is working at Level 2 is working at Level 3 is working at Level 4 is working at Level 5 is working on: on: on: on: on:  responding to simple  responding to simple  participating in short  participating in written  participating in yes/no and wh‐ yes/no and wh‐ written exchanges exchanges about a extended written questions about questions about  asking and answering variety of texts and exchanges of familiar topics familiar topics simple questions and topics information  creating words by  communicating simple composing short  composing written  composing written filling in a missing messages about written text about texts about a variety of texts about a variety of letter with or without a familiar topics or familiar topics topics topics provided example objects  expressing an opinion  answering questions  expressing opinions  using a small number  expressing an opinion about a familiar topic expressing opinions about a variety of of frequently occurring about a familiar topic and giving a reason about a variety of topics nouns and verbs when  retelling an event and  retelling a simple topics  recounting a more writing. presenting simple sequence of events and  recounting multiple complex sequence of information using some presenting simple events in sequence and events frequently occurring information presenting simple  producing and linking words  producing and information about a expanding simple and  producing simple expanding simple topic some compound sentences using sentences.  producing and sentences. frequently occurring expanding simple and nouns, verbs, some compound prepositions, and sentences. conjunctions.

344

Appendix B

Semi-Structured Teacher Interview Protocol

1. Tell me about your education and experience as related to teaching kindergarten as

well as English learners.

2. Is English your native language? If not, what is your native language? When and

how did you learn English? Have you studied any other languages? What level of

proficiency have you achieved?

3. What is your teaching philosophy?

4. How do you view the English learners in your classroom, and what is your approach

to teaching them?

5. Tell me about your own experience with writing and writing instruction in school.

How do you view yourself as a writer?

6. What is your instructional approach to teaching writing? Why do you use that

approach (is it mandated)? In what ways is it useful or not useful? How do you

differentiate that instruction for the ELs in your classroom?

7. Tell me what you know about the child’s languages and background? Interests?

English ability?

8. How does he perform in literacy tasks in comparison to the other children?

9. What communities does the child participate in?

10. What are his social roles? How is he positioned in the classroom culture?

11. How would you describe is social identity? How do others define him/react to him/

say about him during literacy events?

345

Appendix C

Table C1

Amalgamated Writing Rubric: Ideas

Qualities Beginning Emerging Developing Capable Experienced Exceptional Main idea  Features  Features some  Attempts to convey  Conveys a clear  Conveys a focused  Conveys a markings that recognizable letters main idea with main idea main idea focused, imitate letters or words words  Drawing relates to  Drawing supports complete, and  May write letters  May include line  Meaning is not main idea main idea fresh or original randomly forms that imitate entirely clear idea  May dictate text  Drawing may or  Drawing enhances ideas or labels  Drawing may be may not relate to focus for pictures labeled but may not writing relate to writing

Details  Features drawing  Features no written  Features a few  Features several  Features many  Features specific, and or writing that details simple written written details specific written interesting, support lacks detail  Details in drawing details related to main idea details important details do not support  Does not develop  Drawing related to  Details develop or  Details develop or main idea details main idea. support the main support main idea  Drawing limited idea and demonstrates connection to  Drawing provides understanding writing additional detail  Drawing adds meaning

346

Table C2

Amalgamated Writing Rubric: Organization

Qualities Beginning Emerging Developing Capable Experienced Exceptional Beginning,  No sense of  Beginning sense  Begins developing Includes a  Beginning, middle,  Has an inviting middle, end beginning, of structure in a structure beginning, and end work beginning middle, or end writing or  Organization is middle, and end together to  Middle has  Drawings may drawing hard to follow  May not flow communicate appropriate details appear random  Structure  Experiments with together smoothly consistently  Developed ending and/or incomplete or out a beginning or be entirely  Includes lead and that is effective, disconnected of order and/or a middle clear concluding interesting, or  Includes no clear sentences thoughtful ending

Transitions  Does not order or  Attempts to group  Includes limited  Often predictable  Uses varied  Connects ideas in group words like words and/or transitions transitions transitions to logical, interesting and/or drawings drawings  Relies primarily  Drawing may link connect main ideas ways  May attempt on simple words ideas and details  Uses variety of limited transitions  Drawing may  Drawing builds transitions  Drawings do not attempt to link connections  Drawing link ideas ideas among ideas and elaborates details connections

Sequencing  No sense of  Sequencing seems  Includes attempts  Uses logical  Puts writing in an  Uses structure and sequencing in random in writing at sequencing in sequencing that order that clarifies sequencing writing or and/or drawing writing and/or can be followed meaning enhances or drawing drawing by reader  Sequence of extends meaning  Sequencing is  Drawing may also drawings extend  Sequencing confusing or reflect logical meaning clarifies main idea seems out of order sequencing or  Drawing enhances placement meaning

347

Table C3

Amalgamated Writing Rubric: Voice

Qualities Beginning Emerging Developing Capable Experienced Exceptional Feelings or  Expresses little or  Offers hints of  Features  Features personal  Elaborates  Intentionally mood no feeling or feelings or mood predictable feelings personal feelings expresses variety mood  Feelings or mood feelings  Drawing supports  Drawing of emotions not clear  Feelings may be personal feelings elaborates on  Drawing enhances repetitious personal feelings emotional appeal

Individual  Does not show  Appropriates  Occasionally  Expresses  Elaborates on  Takes risks that expression personal others’ shares individual individual individual enhance perspective perspectives as perspective perspective perspective commitment to through writing or own  Shows some  Shows moderate  Shows strong perspective drawing  May lack personal connection to or connection to connection to topic  Conveys  No sign of connection to or interest in the topic  Drawing adds individual, personal interest in the topic  Drawing conveys meaning about original connection to topic  Drawing may individual individual perspective topic  Drawings not relate to perspective perspective  Drawing related to individual heightens individual perspective commitment to perspective perspective

Engagement/  Has unclear  Writes to serve  Attempts to  Connects with  Connects with  Fully engages audience response to task in own purposes connect with reader in some reader in an reader awareness writing or  Audience reader but is places engaging treatment Shows a clear drawing awareness appears unsuccessful  Conveys of topic sense of audience  Shows no unclear or  May express a awareness of  Drawing enhances throughout audience accidental general awareness reader connection with  Drawing awareness that work will be  Drawing supports reader contributes to seen by someone connection reader’s full else engagement

348

Table C4

Amalgamated Writing Rubric: Word Choice

Qualities Beginning Emerging Developing Capable Experienced Exceptional Word quality  No descriptive  Words are  Most words are  Common, general,  Precise and  Words create words comfortable, common, general, or ordinary words accurate words vivid, detailed  Drawings stand in simple, or or ordinary words  Some precise and create variety images for words and recognizable  May attempt to accurate words  Descriptive words  Includes figurative phrases use descriptive  Descriptive words create multiple, language  Strings of letters words provide detail or vivid images  Precise, accurate,  Letters are  May experiment create images fresh, or creative inconsistent with new,  Includes new, words academic, or academic, or  Variety of words challenging words challenging words

Word usage  Copies  Functional or  Uses a mix of  Uses more content  Words chosen for  Rich, and meaning environmental content words functional and words than accuracy and to fit sophisticated print or does not appear alone or in content words in functional words specific purposes language write groups groups in sentences  Uses domain-  Words enhance  Writing does not  Words are  Words or phrases  New, academic, or specific description, make sense repetitive may be repetitive challenging words vocabulary, precision, and  Relies on  May rely on used correctly to usually correctly accuracy environmental environmental convey meaning  Used precise print print domain- specific  Some  New, academic, or language to environmental challenging words demonstrate print used may or may not understanding of correctly convey meaning topic  Words may precisely impede meaning

349

Table C5

Amalgamated Writing Rubric: Fluency

Qualities Beginning Emerging Developing Capable Experienced Exceptional Sentence  Shows writing  Includes one word  Simple, indicative  Simple, indicative  Mix of simple and  Correct, varied structure and that mimics letters or sentence sentences sentences more sophisticated sentence structure syntax and words fragments  Some sentence  Some varied, sentence patterns  Words and  May string marks  Writing may be fragments more  Words and phrases phrases are or letters across decodable  Some sentences sophisticated arranged in ways arranged to the page, moving  Meaning may be arranged in ways sentence patterns that do not impede enhance meaning left to right unclear that impede  Few sentences meaning meaning may be arranged in ways that impede meaning

Sentence  Contains no  Short, repetitive  Sentences begin  Sentence  Sentence  Varied sentences variety sentences or patterns the same way beginnings and beginnings and enhance meaning sentence  No rhythm  Sentence lengths lengths vary lengths vary  Natural rhythm fragments  Difficult to read similar  Rhythm mostly  Rhythm and flow and  Produces random aloud  Choppy rhythm even, but choppy even, which  Easy and markings that  May be  Difficult to read in places enhances meaning pleasurable to cannot be read as incomplete aloud  Easily read aloud  Feels natural to read aloud writing read aloud

Connecting  Conjunctions are  Some  Coordinating  Coordinating  Subordinating  Varied words and accidental among coordinating conjunctions link conjunctions may conjunctions other conjunctions sentences other random conjunctions in sentence link clauses than because  Words, phrases, words sentence elements  Subordinating  Conjunctive and clauses fragments  May be repetitive conjunction adverbs linked smoothly “because” may  Conjunctions be used enhance rhythm and readability

350

Table C6

Amalgamated Writing Rubric: Conventions

Quality Beginning Emerging Developing Capable Experienced Exceptional Spelling  Uses letter strings  Phonetic spelling  Inconsistent  Mostly correct  Correct spelling of  Spells nearly all  Emerging print initial, middle, spelling of high- spelling of high- high-frequency words correctly sense and ending sounds frequency words frequency words words accurately  Some simple  Phonetic spelling  Phonetic spelling of  Some correctly words spelled of less frequent less frequent words; spelled less correctly words some spelled frequent words correctly

Punctuation  No punctuation  Some random  Some end  End punctuation is  End punctuation is  End punctuation punctuation punctuation usually correct usually correct  More advanced  Adds unnecessary  Some more punctuation punctuation advanced  Punctuation for punctuation style and effect

Capitalization  No purposeful  Inconsistent  Some inconsistent  Mostly consistent  Consistent  Consistent capitalization capitalization capitalization capitalization capitalization capitalization  Frequent  Occasional  Unnecessary  Creative unnecessary unnecessary capital capital letters are capitalization for capital letters letters rare style Grammar  No use of basic  Attempted  Some simple  Simple grammar  Simple and more  Consistent and grammar grammatical standard patterns complex grammar correct use of constructions grammar  Nouns, subject  Object nouns and grammar (subject-verb) pronouns pronouns,  Grammatical  Some uneven,  Simple verb tenses possessive constructions for simplistic, or used correctly pronouns style and effect missing parts  Attempts at more  Advanced verb  Simple verb advanced verb tenses and forms tense, sometimes forms or tenses mostly correct used incorrectly  Subject-verb  Adjectives; agreement adverbs; prepositions

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Table C7

Amalgamated Writing Rubric: Presentation

Beginning Emerging Developing Capable Experienced Exceptional Handwriting  No consistent  Some correct  Inconsistent letter  Consistent letter  Letters well-  Handwriting can shape to marks or letterforms form and size form; most letters formed and easy be read easily letters  Some letterforms  Many letters and words to read  Handwriting is  Alphabetic difficult to identifiable readable  Letter size usually attractive and awareness may be recognize or  Letter size may be consistent shows style incomplete inaccurate inconsistent

Spacing  Strings together  Some random  Inconsistent spacing  Mostly consistent  Consistent spacing  Consistent, even letters and words spacing between between words spacing  Indents first line spacing without spacing words  Margins are evident,  Margins are  Margins are  Margins frame  No margins  Some margins on but not always usually honored honored the piece page honored  Some letters are  Letters are  Consistently  Many letters disproportionate proportionate for indents disproportionate for for the space the space paragraphs the space

Drawings  Drawings placed  Drawings break up  Drawings reflect  Drawings reflect  Drawings reflect  Drawings placed randomly on the the flow of text meaning of text meaning of text meaning of text creatively to page  Disproportionately and add detail and link ideas effectively  Drawings do not sized drawing may  Proportionately  Effective use of enhance meaning relate to print impede the flow of sized drawings do space  Use of space text not impede the extends or flow of text enhances meaning

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Appendix D

Table D1

Summary of Ms. Hawkins and Mario’s Integrated Modes of Meaning-Making

Patterns Ms. Hawkins Mario Visual  Group discussions about storybook  Drew illustrations and illustrations  Gestured to others’ illustrations or linguistic  Gestures and pantomime pictures  Visualization  Used printed illustrations or pictures as models in his own writing  Used gestures and pantomime to extend meaning during the writing process  Used circumlocution in text with drawing  Wrote first, then drew

Use of  Repeated exposure to text before  Wrote about books when assigned books and writing  Used book as a spelling resource other  Used books to model print concepts  Used book as a resource for answers to print  Read together as a shared activity for comprehension questions resources writing  Used classroom posters, teacher models, and own print as resources for writing  Not observed using the word wall  Used resources without being prompted

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Table D2

Summary of Ms. Hawkins and Mario’s Engagement with Scaffolding, Tools, and Strategies

Patterns Ms. Hawkins Mario

Explicit  Modeled writing process  Closely followed teacher’s model for Instruction  Thought aloud while writing spelling, ideas, and structure  Model belonged to the teacher  Re-read own writing  Children’s products belonged to them  Self-corrected  Displayed model during practice  Took time to think  Oral commentary while drawing  Posed questions to self while writing

Connections  Connected students’ prior knowledge  Rushed through or drew out and experiences to new learning assignments on less engaging topics  Listened to the children’s talk  Enthusiastic about engaging topics  Attended to children’s interests, not  Waited for others’ responses during parents’ large group activities  Differentiated learning for  Level of connection difficult to individuals discern  Stayed focused on writing tasks and ignored distractions Graphic  Provided structured graphic  Followed the structure of graphic organizers organizers organizers  Used book tests as a final assessment

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Table D3

Summary of Ms. Hawkins and Mario’s Social Activity and Engagement

Patterns Ms. Hawkins Mario Opportunities  Question/response to spark discussion  Looked toward the speaker for talk  Pair-talk activities  Read aloud during independent and  Read aloud partner reading  Seating arranged in groups  Engaged in pair-talk activities  Allowed chatter during writing  Responded when called upon practice  Amount and quality of talk varied  Encouraged children to ask peers for with partner help  Rarely responded to questions posed  Allowed children to speak in their to group language of choice  Spoke little but did so in English, although peers spoke Spanish  Usually waited for others to give answers  Spoke softly  Rarely raised his hand to volunteer  A leader in paired activities  Occasionally corrected other children  Occasionally annoyed by others

Writing  Minilessons  Wrote at his seat during practice workshop  Extended writing practice writing time  No observed mid-workshop  Paid attention during minilessons instruction  Did not volunteer to share writing  Conferred frequently  Avoided the mob  Spent little time on student sharing  Little interaction with peers while  Helped children orally plan text writing  Children chose genre and topic  Little interaction with teacher or  Children turned in products as they researcher while writing were completed—no quota and no  Highly focused limit

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Appendix E

Table E1

Summary of Ms. Hawkins’ Instructional Patterns and Rationales

Patterns Rationales Integrated Multiple Modes of Meaning-Making Visual and linguistic  Exposure to visual modes helps children translate to linguistic modes  To reach every type of learner  Helps with recall

Using books and  Seeing and hearing words in print helps children learn word meaning, printed texts usage, sounds, pronunciation, not just decoding.  Listening to themselves read aloud strengthens ability to self-correct.  Reading books together provides a shared experience the children can connect to and write about. Scaffolding, Tools, and Strategies Explicit instruction  A model provides a resource for children as they write  Thinking aloud while modeling the writing process is a way to be explicit about the steps and decisions involved  Children know exactly what to do when they have a model for reference  When children see the teacher makes mistakes, notice them, and fix them, they are more likely to self-correct

Making connections  Children are more engaged when new learning is connected to topics of interest  Helps children make sense of the unfamiliar

Using graphic  Helps children visualize how writing products are structured organizers  Providing necessary tools reduces frustration and are more likely to try  Provides a scaffold for a new genre  When offered with increasing levels of complexity, allows children time to practice one new thing at a time Social Activities Opportunities for talk  Children can express their own thoughts and ideas in English  Children can listen to their peers’ thoughts and ideas in English  Allows time to translate ideas into language and from home language to English  Allows think time to generate ideas  All language use builds linguistic repertoire, no matter the language  Children who are not confident in English can still speak  Language use to negotiate school systems, use voices, and meet needs  Children can help each other when cannot communicate with teacher

Writing workshop  Allows for individual learning needs to be met  Allows children time to talk—helps develop language skills.  Allows children freedom to talk and move about as needed, if they are learning and not disruptive.

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Table E2

Summary of Ms. Maddox’s Instructional Patterns and Rationales

Patterns Rationales Integrated Multiple Modes of Meaning-Making Visual and linguistic  Pictures, charts, and realia create experiences to which children can connect  Helps with recall

Using books and  Children need to see how language works to translate ideas into writing printed texts  Children need to see print to reproduce correct spelling Scaffolding, Tools, and Strategies Explicit instruction  Makes connections to experiences children may not make on their own  Makes cross-curricular connections children may not make on their own Making connections  Creates context, which helps them learn new material easily and thoroughly  Children were more engaged when new learning was connected to topics of interest to them.  Children perform and recall better

Using graphic  Prescribed in Reading Roots (Slavin & Madden, 2010) curriculum organizers  Helps make cross-curricular connection from morning literacy block to afternoon writing workshop  Less structured graphic organizers in writing workshop allows freedom to explore  More freedom helps children feel a sense of control over their day  More freedom and control make writing fun, which helps build writing stamina Providing Social Activities Opportunities to talk  Gives children a chance to express thoughts and ideas in English  Prepares children to participate in larger community of English speakers  Time allotted for language instruction should be used for English practice  Allows for informal assessment of children’s English proficiency  English is the common language they can all use to negotiate meaning  Students need to gain academic English to pass test  Home language should be saved for newcomers or when language is not central focus of instruction (e.g., math class)  Reading aloud helps recall and self-correction, but content can get lost for children who struggle  Helps her understand children’s thinking so she can help

Writing workshop  Minilessons can be used to scaffold new genres and repeat teaching  Arranging tables and creating student groups intentionally maximizes benefits of social literacy activities  Children work at own pace; teacher can differentiate and support  Children who are more vocal are easier to assess  Writes on post-its, not children’s work because it is theirs, not hers  Sharing is important, but there is seldom time

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Appendix F

Table F1

Summary of Ms. Maddox and Rudy’s Integrated Modes of Meaning-Making

Patterns Ms. Maddox Rudy Visual  Group discussions about storybook  Drew illustrations and illustrations  Gestured to illustrations or pictures linguistic  Gestures and pantomime  Used printed illustrations as models  Used gestures and pantomime to extend meaning about writing  Usually drew first, wrote later  Composition of text changed while talking about or drawing illustrations

Use of  Repeated exposure to text before  Wrote about books when assigned books and writing  Used book as spelling resource other  Read together as a shared activity for  Used book as resource for answers to printed writing comprehension questions text  Used books as a model for concepts of  Used classroom posters, teacher print and genre models, and own print as resources for writing  Used word wall as spelling resource  Used resources after prompting first, then on his own

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Table F2

Ms. Maddox and Rudy’s Related Patterns of Scaffolding, Tools, and Strategies

Patterns Ms. Maddox Rudy

Explicit Instruction  Paired modeling with other explicit  Re-read own writing instruction  Self-corrected  Asked guiding questions during  Took time to think modeling process to make writing  Used teacher’s model as a guide decisions explicit  Did not provide a model when introducing a new genre  Model belonged to the teacher, not co-created with the class  Legitimized children’s products as their own  Covered model during writing practice

Connections  Made connections from students’  Enthusiastic about engaging topics prior knowledge and experiences to  Level of connection easy to discern new learning  Smiled, laughed, and talked about  Shared personal experiences engaging topics  Listened to the children’s talk  Made cross-curricular connections

Graphic organizers  Provided structured and less  Followed the structure of graphic structured graphic organizers organizers  Used story maps as final  Occasionally became confused assessment of story comprehension about what was required

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Table F3

Ms. Maddox and Rudy’s Related Patterns of Social Activity and Engagement

Patterns Ms. Maddox Rudy

Opportunities  Read aloud  Read aloud during independent and  Guided questions to spark discussion partner reading for talk  Pair-talk activities  Engaged in pair-talk activities  Seating arranged in groups  Responded when called upon  Allowed chatter during writing  Amount and quality of talk varied practice with partner  Encouraged children to speak English  Usually responded to questions posed during writing activities to group  Helped children orally plan text  Eager to chat with most people  Asked children questions about their  Often raised his hand to volunteer writing  Talked with others about drawings  Talkative during writing instruction and practice  Initiated conversations with adults for assistance

Writing  Minilessons  Wrote at his seat during practice  Extended writing practice writing time workshop  No observed mid-workshop  Paid attention during minilessons instruction  Did not volunteer to share writing  Conferred frequently  “One of the gang”  Spent little time on student sharing  Interacted with peers and adults  Children usually chose genre and during writing practice topic  Easily distracted  Children turned in products as they  Orally planned text before writing were completed—no quota and no limit

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