Writing in preschoolers: An age-related analysis

Abstract

We investigated the development in preschoolers' conceptualization of the written system from its graphic rendering and its mapping onto meaning by analyzing children's writings and readings of their writings. Forty-two Israeli children aged 3.4 -5.8 years were asked to draw, write, and interpret a number of utterances. By the age of four, children's writings became constricted in size relative to their drawings and were composed of linearly organized units separated by regular blanks. These units increased in their adherence to conventional Hebrew letters throughout the age range examined. Children's interpretations of their own writing were classified into five modes: Interpretation unrelated to the utterance; preserving the content of the utterance but not its verbal form; complete reiteration; dividing the utterance into phonetic units; and description of the written characters. These modes were related to age and to conventionality of characters used.

Early differentiation between drawing and writing in Chinese children

“…The use of referential color was fairly common in this study, more common than writing a word for a large object with more marks or larger marks than writing a word for a small object. Tolchinsky-Landsmann and Levin (1985) made similar observations among Israeli 3-to 5-year-olds, and Ferreiro and Teberosky (1982) observed that Argentinean children sometimes produced longer lines of scribble when writing words that stood for large objects than when writing words that stood for small objects.…”

“…In such cultures, children produce conventional or near-conventional versions of their names at a time when they produce primitive renditions of other words. For example, the Israeli 4-and 5-year-olds studied by Tolchinsky-Landsmann and Levin (1985) were more likely to use real Hebrew letters when writing their names than when writing other targets and were more likely to use correct letters. Levin, Both-de Vries, Aram, and Bus (2005) also reported that Israeli and Dutch children were more advanced at writing their own names than at writing other words.…”

Early writing development in L1 English speaking children

“…While researchers have differed in the number of discrete stages they identify, historically it appears that children follow a similar developmental pattern (see also, Hildreth, 1936;Luria, 1978;Ferreiro, 1978Ferreiro, , 1985. Iris Levin's numerous studies on Hebrew-speaking children's early literacy development include children from 3-6 years, generally before they begin to use conventional letters (e.g., Tolchinsky-Landsmann & Levin, 1985;1987). The belief that literacy should "be viewed as a system of representation of the deep lexicalmorphemic levels of language from the very beginning stages of acquisition" (Tolchinsky-Landsmann & Levin, 1987, p. 322) led this group of researchers to begin with 3-year-olds.…”

“…Tolchinsky-Landsmann and Levin (1985Levin ( , 1987also Levin, Landsman & Tolchinsky, 1989) showed that almost half the children used referential strategies when writing or reading. That is, children justified their responses based on size, shape, or color characteristics of the object the words represented, rather than on the basis of the letters composing the word (see also Olson & Pelletier, 2002).…”

E-books as support for emergent writing with and without adult assistance

“…The vast research on children's emergent writing shows constructive evolution which is based on the specific written system to which the children are exposed, including rich commonalities in this development between children exposed to different languages such as Hebrew, English, Spanish Italian and French (Tolchinsky-Landsmann and Levin 1985). This development moves from writing scribbles to symbolic writing (representing the word "sun" with a yellow color) to random letters and to conventional spelling.…”