Second graders sharing writing: The multiple social realities of a literacy event

The purpose of this study was to examine one type of literacy event in a second grade classroom—“free writing” and, especially, its sharing time phase—from the perspectives of the classroom teacher and selected class members. The study was based on data collected over a 14-week period in a second-grade classroom. Data gathered included observation notes, audiotaped recordings of the children's talk while writing, written products, and child interviews. The study's findings suggest a social fact or dynamic operating in classrooms that has implications for both researchers and practitioners concerned with school writing; that dynamic is the individual child's social life within the classroom itself and, particularly, his or her social interpretations of school writing tasks (what each is trying to do, for whom, and why).