Riddle Me This, Riddle Me That: Email Dialogues with Third-Grade Writers.
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| Title: | Riddle Me This, Riddle Me That: Email Dialogues with Third-Grade Writers. |
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| Language: | English |
| Authors: | Britsch, Susan J. |
| Peer Reviewed: | N |
| Page Count: | 12 |
| Publication Date: | 2001 |
| Document Type: | Reports - Research Speeches/Meeting Papers |
| Descriptors: | Childrens Writing, Communication Skills, Electronic Mail, Grade 3, Literacy, Primary Education, Student Reaction, Writing Research |
| Geographic Terms: | California |
| Abstract: | For a project, a university researcher and a group of education graduate students in literacy and language education at Purdue University exchanged e-mail with 32 third graders in two classes at a northern California elementary school. The overall aim of the project was to build the children's literacy and communication skills by involving them in scaffolded written discussions with a more capable writer. An additional pedagogical aim was to help the children explore the content knowledge they were acquiring in their classroom, thus extending their ability to write about this official curriculum through collaborative discussions with adult writers. During the first year of the project the primary research questions were: (1) What is the nature of written response for these children? and (2) What sorts of patterns emerge in the types of questions that the children originate for the researchers? Although the researchers tried to explore the curricular topics, children in one group began to preface their letters with riddles, and riddling extended to two of the writing groups. The riddlers also began to structure dialogues in which they designated both a topic and a method of exchange that would assure a return for their riddles. It could be said that riddling dealt with child-centered topics in which the children maintained interest because the riddles were: (1) fun; (2) child-initiated; (3) interesting to the children; or (4) generally part of children's culture. However, such a reductive analysis would give short shrift to something that the children maintained for 4 months. They opposed another discourse--the curricular discourse the researchers had initiated--by controlling it. (Contains 3 tables and 25 references.) (NKA) |
| Entry Date: | 2001 |
| Accession Number: | ED452554 |
| Database: | ERIC |
| Abstract: | For a project, a university researcher and a group of education graduate students in literacy and language education at Purdue University exchanged e-mail with 32 third graders in two classes at a northern California elementary school. The overall aim of the project was to build the children's literacy and communication skills by involving them in scaffolded written discussions with a more capable writer. An additional pedagogical aim was to help the children explore the content knowledge they were acquiring in their classroom, thus extending their ability to write about this official curriculum through collaborative discussions with adult writers. During the first year of the project the primary research questions were: (1) What is the nature of written response for these children? and (2) What sorts of patterns emerge in the types of questions that the children originate for the researchers? Although the researchers tried to explore the curricular topics, children in one group began to preface their letters with riddles, and riddling extended to two of the writing groups. The riddlers also began to structure dialogues in which they designated both a topic and a method of exchange that would assure a return for their riddles. It could be said that riddling dealt with child-centered topics in which the children maintained interest because the riddles were: (1) fun; (2) child-initiated; (3) interesting to the children; or (4) generally part of children's culture. However, such a reductive analysis would give short shrift to something that the children maintained for 4 months. They opposed another discourse--the curricular discourse the researchers had initiated--by controlling it. (Contains 3 tables and 25 references.) (NKA) |
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