Journal of Reading Behavior

1995, Volume 27, Number 1

PARTNER READING AND WRITING: PEER SOCIAL

DIALOGUE AND THE ZONE OF PROXIMAL DEVELOPMENT

Lisbeth A. Dixon-Krauss
University of West Florida

ABSTRACT

This classroom action research study investigated Vygotsky's concept of the zone
of proximal development using peer social dialogue integrated with teacher sup-
port to develop children's reading, writing, and abstract thinking in story reflec-
tion and sense of audience. Twenty-four first and second graders were paired for
a 6-week partner reading and writing activity to provide peer social dialogue
through partner storybook reading, discussion, and dialogue journal writing. A
class mini-lesson on verbal story reflection added teacher support to the partner
instructional activity. Data sources included student evaluations of their own class-
room literacy performance and preferences, observational notes collected during
the partner sessions, and students' dialogue journal entries. Students showed the
most improvement in word recognition, minimal improvement in fluency, accu-
rate evaluations of their own reading progress, and felt more positive about read-
ing aloud. Students' journal entry writing progressed from copying their partners'
statements to printed conversations about their stories. Teacher support influ-
enced students' written dialogue and the strategies they used to share text mean-
ing in verbal dialogue.

L. S Vygotsky's theory on learning and development has been a powerful force

in Soviet educational practice, and his work has become an important influence on
Western education. In the past decade, the Western view of early literacy develop-
ment has taken a decisive shift toward a social and functional perspective (Pearson,
1993). This perspective reflects the belief that most of what a person knows about
language is learned through use in the presence of others (Harste, 1990). Vygotsky's

45
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46 Journal of Reading Behavior

work has now become particularly applicable to our current view of reading and
writing instruction because it emphasized social interaction and the use of lan-
guage in mediating cognitive development and learning.
The most popular Vygotskian idea in Western education has been the zone of
proximal development. Vygotsky (1978, 1986) claimed that learning leads cogni-
tive development when the child is operating within his or her zone of proximal
development. This zone represents each child's potential for development beyond
his or her current level of independent functioning. According to Vygotsky, learn-
ing occurs as the child gradually internalizes higher level thought processes that
are activated through social interaction with an adult or in collaboration with ca-
pable peers. These higher level thought processes included logical memory, reflec-
tive awareness, and deliberate control by the learner which are important for learning
abstract concepts such as printed language (Vygotsky, 1986).
Vygotsky's theory stressed the social or communicative and functional use of
language during instruction (Vygotsky, 1986). This view is consistent with the
whole-language belief that children learn printed language by using it in meaning-
ful, communicative contexts (Edelsky, Altwerger, & Flores, 1991; Goodman, 1989).
It has also influenced recent research on peer collaboration which investigates how
shared meanings and goals are created through peer social interaction when stu-
dents are paired for instruction within their zones of proximal development (Tudge,
1990).
The classroom research study reported here was based on a Vygotskian per-
spective. It addressed the question of how to provide early reading and writing
instruction in communicative contexts that stress peer social interaction in a multi-
age classroom. It investigated how children's reading and writing improved and
how their thinking develops through peer social interaction during instruction. It
also examined what children think about their classroom reading and writing in-
struction.
The study was conducted in a three-step classroom action research design.
This design has been used to facilitate the convergence of educational research and
practice and to guide teachers in exploring instructional change within their own
classrooms (Dixon-Krauss, 1992). The three-step action research design included:
(a) identification of the action research instructional problems; (b) selection and
implementation of materials, methods, and organization for instruction; and (c)
evaluation of the action research study.
A teacher educator, classroom teacher, and graduate assistant collaborated on
all three steps of the action research design. The classroom teacher was in her first
year of transition from basal reader instruction in a second-grade classroom to a
multi-age classroom of 6- to 8-year-olds in which literacy instruction reflects the
social and functional use of language. She was enrolled in her first semester in an
Elementary Education Masters Degree Program. The graduate assistant was in her

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 Partner Reading and Writing Al

final semester of a Reading Education Masters Degree Program. The principle

investigator was a university faculty teacher educator in reading education.

IDENTIFICATION OF THE ACTION RESEARCH PROBLEM

Classroom observations were collected, related to the professional literature,

and analyzed by the investigators. This process was used to identify the research
problem and specify the types of learning activities to use in the action research
project.
Two literacy instructional problem areas and two strengths emerged from the
classroom observations and collaboration sessions. Instructional strengths observed
were a high level of spontaneous, student initiated peer collaboration during indi-
vidual practice learning activities and positive student attitudes toward learning.
The first problem, identified by the teacher educator, was that each student spent
from 0 to approximately 5 minutes engaged in individual oral reading of authentic
children's literature. The students read orally for less than 30 minutes daily, and
this was usually organized as a whole-class activity in a round robin pattern. The
second problem, stressed by the classroom teacher and graduate assistant, was that
students did not use invented spellings to create individual writings in response to
children's literature they read. Students' compositions consisted of writing sen-
tences with their spelling words and lists of facts related to science and social
studies concepts from the thematic units the class was studying (e.g., facts about
insects, Australia, plants, etc.).
From the Vygotskian perspective (Vygotsky, 1986), the students in this action
research study were at the early stages of literacy development when reflective
awareness and deliberate control of their thoughts were just beginning to develop.
Because they had not yet reached a mature level of independent internalized think-
ing, the teacher educator suggested that these children would benefit from literacy
activities that included a high level of social interaction and cross-age peer col-
laboration.
Paired reading and dialogue journal writing activities were identified in the
professional literature as effective instructional strategies for increasing individual
storybook reading and writing while maintaining a high level of peer social inter-
action. The research on using paired reading has shown a high level of success in
both student achievement and attitudes toward reading by providing students with
self-selection of children's literature and a purpose for rereading their selected
books (Eldredge & Butterfield, 1986; Labbo & Teale, 1990; Topping, 1989). Dia-
logue journals have been recommended to help students learn printed language by
using it in natural written conversations (Gambrell, 1985; Shuy 1987). Dialogue
journals about students' individual reading material have also been effective in

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48 Journal of Reading Behavior

developing higher level thinking strategies as students reflect on the stories they
read, abstract the plot of the stories, and share their writings (Wells, 1993).

IMPLEMENTATION OF THE ACTION RESEARCH

Subjects
The action research project was conducted with 24 first and second-grade stu-
dents for a 6-week period beginning in January. All students had been adminis-
tered an Informal Reading Inventory (Ekwall & Shanker, 1993) by the teacher
educator and the graduate assistant in the Fall when they were placed in the multi-
age classroom. At this time, students ranged from average to below average in
reading. No students had instructional reading levels above their grade placement
levels, and only three first graders and three second graders had scored instruc-
tional on their grade levels. Three first graders were at the preprimer instructional
reading level and nine were below preprimer. Three second graders had instruc-
tional levels at second grade, one at first grade, four at primer, and four were at the
preprimer level. Three second graders had been recommended to repeat first grade
if they were not placed in the multi-age classroom, and three first graders were
recommended to repeat kindergarten. Six students met the criteria for special edu-
cation staffing as follows: three were learning disabled, two were on medication for
hyperactivity, and one was identified as gifted. One student was Afro-American
and two were Philippine.

Classroom Literacy Instruction

Classroom instruction prior to the study included teacher- directed whole-class
instruction organized around thematic units. Student desks were arranged in multi-
age groups of six, and students were encouraged to interact and help classmates in
their groups during individual work assignments. A total of 3 hours per day was
spent on literacy instruction. The teacher read aloud and discussed informative
texts, selections from the basal, or children's literature related to the unit of study.
Some of the students read the text back to the class in a round robin manner.
Students then wrote from one to three sentences of facts related to the concepts
presented in the texts. The teacher and parent volunteers edited these writings on a
computer for students to reread. This activity lasted approximately Wi to 2 hours
per day. Fifteen minutes was designated for sustained silent reading. Students re-
ceived 15 minutes of specific phonic skills instruction using word charts composed
by the class according to methods prescribed in the word study module of the Suc-
cess in Reading and Writing program (Capplemen, 1992). Thirty minutes per day
was spent on a teacher selected spelling list based on word families. Spelling ac-
tivities included writing each word in a sentence, alphabetizing the word list, and
making flip-books with the words.

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 Partner Reading and Writing 49

Partner Reading and Writing Activity

During the study, a partner reading and writing activity that lasted from 20 to
30 minutes per day was added to the classroom literacy curriculum. Students were
grouped into 12 pairs by the classroom teacher who matched a more capable reader
with a less capable one. Each pair contained one first grader and one second grader.
In 3 of the pairs, the first grader was the more capable reader.
The partner reading and writing project was conducted in a 5-day cycle. The
teacher wanted this organizational structure to support her and her students in
transition from the teacher- directed literacy activities described above to the stu-
dent self- selection and partner collaboration activities used in the study. It also
insured that each student received the same amount of time, 20 minutes daily for 4
days, to practice their books. The 5-day sequence of reading and writing activities
was posted on a wall chart and reviewed daily with the students. Students went to
the school library and selected a storybook on the first day. They practiced reading
their books individually on the first, second, and third days. On the fourth day,
each student did a practice oral reading of her book to one or two classmates and
received peer feedback on how well the book was read.
The student pairs met on the fifth day for the partner reading and writing
activity. One student read her book orally while her partner listened to the story.
Following the book reading, the partners were allowed as much time as they wanted
to engage in discussions. The partners were not given any instructions on what to
discuss or whether the listener or the reader should initiate the discussions. The
discussions ranged from 3 to 8 minutes. When the discussion ended, students re-
turned to their desks, the listener wrote to the reader and the reader responded to
the listener in their dialogue journals. Each student made six entries in the dia-
logue journals. The partners were not given any instructions on what they should
write in their dialogue journals.
Observational notes were recorded by four observers, the classroom teacher, a
student teacher, the graduate assistant, and the teacher educator during the partner
book reading and journal writing sessions. Student engagement in the partner ses-
sions was staggered so that each student pair was observed for the duration of the
session. The observers recorded notes on the following behaviors: (a) readers' mis-
cued words; (b) fluency in the areas of hesitant/halting reading, punctuation mis-
cues, use of expression; and (c) excerpts of students' dialogue and notes on the
strategies students used to share text meanings, provide partner assistance, and
evaluate the partner activity.

Teacher Intervention Assistance

Teacher-assisted word recognition and story reflection components were added
on the fourth week of the action research project. The decision to add these compo-
nents came from a midpoint collaboration session among the teacher educator, the
classroom teacher, and the graduate assistant. The teacher expressed concerns that

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50 Journal of Reading Behavior

she knew the students were learning to recognize new words from reading their
storybooks, but she and the students had no tangible record to keep track of their
progress. The teacher educator pointed out that initial inspection of the observa-
tional records and journal entries revealed that students' interactions focused on
the novelty of the partner reading sessions, (i.e., students commented on enjoying
the activity, the book, or the pictures), instead of sharing the meaning of the stories.
Rationale for the teacher intervention was also based on the Vygotskian per-
spective. According to Vygotsky (Vygotsky, 1986), higher mental processes of vol-
untary memory, reflective awareness, and deliberate control were not absorbed in
their final form by the child; they developed through use during social interaction
when students were operating within their zones of proximal development. In or-
der to preserve the essential meaning of Vygotsky's zone within the context of
Sociohistorical theory, Western researchers have emphasized that in both adult-
child or peer social interaction, learning within the zone focused on creating novel,
shared understandings (Griffin & Cole, 1984; Tudge, 1990), rather than mecha-
nistic next-step progressions through prespecified learning tasks. The degree of
adult support for children's learning within the zone was flexible, ranging from
very explicit directives on extremely difficult learning activities to vague cues pro-
vided by the adult through dialogue (Wertsch, 1984).
The teacher used her daily storybook read-aloud sessions to conduct a word
recognition and a story reflection mini-lesson with the entire class. The teacher
used a form of mental modeling in which she externalized for the students the
mental processes involved in monitoring their learning in word recognition and
reflecting on the meaning of their stories. In word recognition, she used a high
degree of support including very explicit modeling and directives to lead the young
readers in the difficult task of independently self-monitoring their word recogni-
tion by detecting and maintaining a list of the unknown words they encountered in
their books. Teacher support in story reflection was less explicit and not intended
to train students in applying preselected comprehension strategies. Instead the goal
was to focus partner's social interactions on reflecting on the content of the story to
see what type of natural collaboration would unfold (i.e., how students interacted
to identify their partner's zones and provide spontaneous assistance in sharing text
meanings).
In the word recognition mini-lesson, the teacher selected and recorded a list of
difficult words on the chalkboard as she read her story aloud to the class. Students
were then directed to select and record a list of difficult words the first time they
read their self-selected books. On the first day they read their self-selected storybooks,
students were given a record sheet and instructed to list the difficult words from
their books under the heading, "Hard words for me." On the second and third days,
the adults helped the individual students find their listed words in their books and
identify them in context. Students were not drilled on the isolated words on their
lists.

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 Partner Reading and Writing 51

The mini-lesson on shared story meaning consisted of the teacher reflecting

on the story she read aloud by selecting and describing her favorite part of it. The
teacher began the reflection by stating, "My favorite part of this story was . . . " She
then elaborated with, "I remember..." Students were then encouraged to describe
their favorite parts of the read-aloud story in a class discussion. She prompted the
students to elaborate on their reflection by asking, "What do you remember about.
. . " Although the teacher modeled this story reflection strategy and prompted stu-
dents to elaborate on their reflections during the read-aloud class discussion, she
did not direct them to discuss or write about their favorite parts of their books
during their later partner reading and writing activity.

EVALUATION OF THE STUDY

Evaluation of the action research study included an analysis of a pretest and

posttest attitude survey and a posttest preference survey to examine students' evalu-
ations of their own reading and writing performance and of the project. Observa-
tional notes collected during the partner activity and the student dialogue journal
writing entries were analyzed by the teacher educator, the classroom teacher, and
the graduate assistant to identify: (a) trends in students' reading and writing progress,
(b) the quality of students' verbal and written social interactions, and (c) how teacher
support and peer collaboration affected the development of their thought processes
in the areas of reflecting on and sharing story meaning and self-monitoring of their
learning in word recognition.

Student Evaluations
A pretest and posttest attitude survey was administered to reveal changes in
student's self-perceptions about their reading and writing preferences and perfor-
mance. The children marked positive or negative smiley and sad face responses to
nine items related to their feelings about oral reading, book selection, rereading,
discussion, and writing. A summary of the results are reported in percent of posi-
tive responses in Table 1. The high percentage of total positive responses to all
items on the pretest (Total=82.01) confirm the multi-age classroom observation
that students had a generally positive attitude toward learning prior to the study.
Although differences in the pretest and posttest scores showed students did not
recognize improvement in their oral reading fluency when asked how well they
read aloud (difference=O), they did feel more positive about being asked to read
aloud (7.11) and more positive about how their peers felt when listening to them
read aloud (21.43). In the area of book selection, children showed improvement
toward choosing more difficult or hard books to read (21.43). This trend was veri-
fied by teacher observations. Books in the library were organized into sections by
the school media specialist corresponding to kindergarten/first-grade repetitive and

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52 Journal of Reading Behavior

picture books, first/second-grade beginning reading books, third/fourth-grade in-

termediate, and fourth/fifth-grade préadolescent categories. By the third week, all
of the students had selected books from the beginning reading and intermediate
sections. Students showed an increase in positive attitudes toward discussing books
they read (9.53), but they showed a decrease toward practicing rereading (-11.91)
and writing (-7.15) about books they read.
Students evaluated the project on a six-item preference survey (see Appendix
A). Results of the 24 individual students' choices were reported in Table 2. More
students liked reading their books (18) better than listening to their partners read
(6), and writing in their journals was the least preferred activity. They also enjoyed
reading their books to their partners (18) more than practicing reading their books
(6). Students felt they improved more in learning new words (16) than in reading
aloud (8), and felt they improved more in learning new words (17) than writing
about their books in the journals (7).

Dialogue Journals
The dialogue journal entries were analyzed to detect differences between the
first and second graders' writings, trends in the changes in students' thinking, and
the quality of written social interaction between partners. Although the first grad-
ers wrote more entries than the second graders (three of the second graders did not
write a response to their partners in the first partner session), their writings showed

Table 1

Reading and Writing Survey in Percent of Positive Responses

Activities Pretest Posttest Difference

Book Self Selection

Library Check-Out 97.62 97.62 0
Hard Books 54.76 76.19 +21.43
" Easy Books 83.33 76.19 -7.14
Oral Reading
Asked to Read Aloud 71.43 78.54 +7.11
How Well You Read Aloud 90.48 90.48 0
How Friends Feel When You Read Aloud 76.19 97.62 +21.43
Comprehension
Discussing Book You Read 83.33 92.86 +9.53
Rereading Book 92.86 80.95 -11.91
Writing
Writing About Books You Read 88.10 80.95 -7.15
Total 82.01 85.71 +3.75

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 Partner Reading and Writing 53

Table 2

Final Evaluation Student Preference Survey

Item Choices

Did you like being . . . Reader Listener

18 6
Did you like reading to . . . Peer Group Partner
7 17
Did you like . . . Reading Listening Writing
12 9 3
Did you like . . . Practice Reading Reading to Partner
6 18
Did you learn . . . More New Words To Read Out Loud better
16 8
Did you do best a t . . . Learning New Words Writing about Books In Journal
17 7

Note. M=24.

a lower level of control of their thinking. Second graders used fewer words and
were more explicit in conveying their thoughts in print, whereas first graders showed
that they often lost track of their thoughts by repeating words, phrases or entire
sentences.
In the first three entries written before the teacher's read aloud mini-lesson on
story reflection, only four of the 12 student pairs wrote about the story. In these four
pairs, it was the second graders who initiated the written story discussions by sum-
marizing or abstracting a part of the story. When the second graders initiated a
written discussion of the story, the first graders' written responses to their second-
grade partners were also related to the story content. In every journal entry follow-
ing the teacher support mini-lesson, all 12 student pairs reflected on the story,
abstracted their favorite part, and wrote about it to their partners. The journal
excerpts in Figure 1 show three examples of how students' entries progressed from
a simple evaluation of the reader, the book, the pictures, or the reading activity in
Week 2 to a retelling of part of the story on the sixth week.
An interesting trend occurred related to the quality of social interaction in the
written dialogue. In four of the pairs, the first graders moved from simply copying
the second graders' entries to actually responding to their second-grade partners in
written conversations, and this movement toward dialogue followed a specific pat-
tern. When the second graders evaluated the book or the pictures, the first graders
simply repeated the second graders' evaluations (e.g., I like the book, I like the
pictures). However, when the second grader evaluated the first grader's reading

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54 Journal of Reading Behavior

Tf-~t:Utl-ï I : t
T hfc/n ^c* ev *-ryrn¡r>

ik -f he
Se CíMJe Í T ,

Dear

/(<y qood. Uear hope.

//a
I Und the back
qood. yetí. l?H q g°od book'
X Im- the. bot win It Jail
book. Lofe is p'iklnaf flowers -Cor

Figure 1. Three student's dialogue journal entries from Weeks 2 and 6 of the
partner reading and writing activities.

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 Partner Reading and Writing 55

performance or book selection, the first grader responded directly to what the part-
ner had written. The following two transcribed excerpts showed how the first grad-
ers responded in dialogue with an answer to the peer feedback about their
performance:
1. Second grader: "I like your book
But you led prcettice."
First grader: "I will prakts some more.
I am gled ti you like it."
2. Second grader: "Dear Niclas
I liked the submren dude.
He was cool but plesaes get
a longer book. You did a good job."
First grader: "Dear Aaron
I liked the one with the submarine
to an I new you would say tat."

Observational Notes
During all partner storybook reading sessions, the observers recorded notes on
each student pair in the areas of word recognition miscues, fluency, and postreading
discussion. Notes on each pair were analyzed individually from the first through

Transcriptions of Figure 1
Example 1
Week 2: Dear Brandon
You did good and practiced.
Week 6: Dear Brandon
You did good. I like the part where the dragon shot fire wood. Because
the dragon cooked hot dogs.
Example 2
Week 2: Dear Jonathan
I love it all. I like the pictures the mice everything. Thank you a lot.
Week 6: Dear Jonathan
I like the whole book. I hope you get it next time. I like the part where
he almost sat on the tortoise. Because it is funny.
Example 3
Week 2: Dear Hope,
I like the story. You did good. I liked the pictures. It was good. It was
good when we talked about it. I liked the book.
Week 6: Dear Hope
I liked the book. You picked a good book. I liked the part when it said
love is picking flowers for Mom and Dad.

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56 Journal of Reading Behavior

the sixth week to determine students' improvement in word recognition and flu-
ency. Notes across all 12 pairs were then analyzed week-by-week to determine
increases in partner story discussions and trends in peer assistance through social
interaction.
In the area of word recognition, the number of observer recorded miscues de-
clined from 29 on the first week of the partner reading sessions to 18 on the sixth
week. All of the miscues recorded by the observers on Weeks 4, 5, and 6, which
followed the teacher's vocabulary mini-lesson, were compared to the individual
students' lists of unknown or difficult words compiled the first time they read their
stories (see Table 3). Word lists were compiled by 6 of the first graders and 10
second graders. The remaining 8 students were unable to self-monitor their initial

Table 3

Unknown Words And Recorded Miscues

Student Recorded Observer Recorded

List of Words on Words Not on
Unknown Words Student List Student List

First Graders
Student 1 15* 2 6
Student 2 1 0 0
Student 3 1 0 0
Student 4 0 0 0
Student 5 10* 0 0
Student 6 32* 5 5
Total 59 7 11
Second Graders
Student 7 0 0 0
Student 8 9* 0 0
Student 9 0 0 0
Student 10 1 0 1
Student 11 0 0 4
Student 12 0 0 0
Student 13 3 0 0
Student 14 3 0 0
Student 15 2 0 4
Student 16 0 0 0
Total 18 0 9

»Student self-selection of very difficult books.

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 Partner Reading and Writing 57

reading of their books at a level required to detect and record a list of their un-
known words, although they were given explicit directions to do so. The first grad-
ers listed 59 unknown words the first time they read their books. During the partner
reading sessions, they misread 7 of the words on their lists and 11 words that were
not on their lists. None of the 18 unknown words listed by the second graders were
later miscued during partner reading, and nine miscued words were not on their
lists. The first graders learned to recognize more words than the second graders
(52 and 18 words, respectively), but both first and second graders did not detect
and list some unknown words the first time they read their storybooks.
The teacher confirmed that the four students who listed nine or more unknown
words (Students 1,5, 6, and 8) had selected books that were very difficult for them
to read. Although the teacher encouraged these four students to select easier books,
the students chose to keep the difficult books because they had a personal purpose
for making their selections. For example, Student 8 chose a very difficult book on
water safety. When the teacher suggested he select an easier book, he replied that
he knew the book was hard, but he and his cousins were going to the beach on the
following Saturday and they needed to know about water safety.
The observational notes on fluency showed only four second graders and one
first grader improved. The rereading and the practice oral reading with peer feed-
back did little to improve students' use of expression or punctuation observed dur-
ing the partner reading sessions. The observational notes on fluency were also
compared to the listeners' evaluations of their partner's reading performance writ-
ten in the journal entries. Student entries (e.g., you need to practice, you need to
read your book more) matched the adult recorded observations of fluency prob-
lems, but most students' fluency did not improve in successive partner reading
sessions. Journal excerpt two transcribed above was the first entry by a first grader
who did show improved fluency in his later partner reading sessions. This student
"sensed" that he was reading too fast for his partner to enjoy the story, but he still
did not have enough control of his reading behavior to slow down and read flu-
ently.
In the area of story reflection, the observers recorded a total of 28 story discus-
sions between the partners following book reading out of 72 possible partner read-
ing opportunities, although all listeners seemed attentive to their partner's storybook
reading. There was an increase from 5 (14%) student story discussions during the
partner reading sessions before the teacher mini-lesson to 23 (63%) partner story
discussions following the teacher's mini-lesson with her class.
It was interesting to compare how both partner verbal social interaction and
teacher-class verbal social interaction focusing on story reflection influenced stu-
dents' written and verbal dialogues. The five student discussions observed prior to
the mini-lesson occurred in the same four student pairs who had written about their
stories in their journal entries prior to the mini-lesson. The four second graders
who initiated the written story discussions in the journals also led the verbal

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58 Journal of Reading Behavior

postreading discussions by asking their first grader partners questions about the
story after they read it. Although the teacher-class story discussion in the mini-
lesson had some influence on increasing later partner discussions (from 14% to
63%), it had had more influence on students' written dialogue. Her verbal story
reflections influenced students' written social dialogue in 100% of the journal en-
tries following the mini-lesson.
In summary, the observational data confirmed the students' self-evaluation of
improvement in word recognition and the students' self-evaluation of minimal
improvement in fluency. Although student evaluations showed an increase in their
attitude toward discussing the books they read, observational data showed little
increase in student initiated book discussion following the partner reading activity
until this behavior was modeled by the teacher in the class mini-lesson. The teacher-
class verbal social interaction had more direct influence on students' story reflec-
tions in their written dialogue than in their verbal dialogue during the partner
reading and writing sessions.

Partner Social Interactions

The observers' recorded notes and peer dialogue excerpts of peer interactions
focused on strategies students used to share text meaning and provide reading and
writing assistance to support their partners. Four of the readers turned their books
to their partners and requested assistance to recognize a word. Three of the listen-
ers told the words to the readers, but one of the more advanced second graders
guided his partner in applying strategies to figure out unknown words. He helped
the first grader sound out the word phonetically. When the reader tried unsuccess-
fully to sound out the next unknown word he encountered, "light," the second
grader told him to "just look at the picture."
One second grader, identified as a special student with a learning disability,
continuously hesitated and lost his place as he read. His first-grade partner inter-
rupted the reading and suggested, "I'll point to the words, and you read." After a
few lines, the first grader relinquished control, "Now you point." The first grader
repeated this pointing assistance two times during the reading session.
The partner discussions about the books showed an interesting trend consis-
tent with Vygotsky's idea about the zone of proximal development (Vygotsky, 1986).
When the storybooks were very difficult for the students to read, the readers used
the following three strategies to assist their partners in understanding and discuss-
ing their books:
1. Three of the readers stopped reading and led an ongoing discussion throughout
the story. For example, the student who had selected the difficult book on water
safety stopped when he came to the statement about swimming lessons and asked
his partner, "Do you know how to swim?" and "Did you have swimming les-
sons?"

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 Partner Reading and Writing 59

2. One of the first graders and two of the second graders used the book's illustra-
tions as a strategy to help their partners retell a part of the book. The first grader
asked his partner, "What did you like best?" When the second grader replied, "I
don't know," the first grader instructed, "Look at the pictures and find it."
3, In two of the pairs, the second-grade readers led their partners to an understand-
ing of the main point of their books. One reader who had selected The Little Red
Hen asked her partner, "Why didn't she give the animals some bread?" She then
explained, 'They didn't help her make it so they don't eat." Her partner replied,
"They could eat if they helped her." The other second-grade reader who had
selected an alphabet book pointed out how the words on each page matched the
corresponding letter of the alphabet.
Observational notes recorded during dialogue journal writing showed that so-
cial interactions focused on the students seeking peer or teacher assistance in spell-
ing an unknown word. Teacher assistance included telling students to spell it the
way it sounded or to make a guess and go on with their writing. Students who knew
how to spell the word wrote it on paper or spelled it orally for the writer. Most of
the students who did not know how to spell the word told the writer to ask another
student or the teacher. Three students helped the writers look the words up in their
books, and two helped the writers spell the words phonetically.
The writers often lost their thoughts about what they were writing when they
sought peer assistance in spelling. The following is a transcription of student dia-
logue and recorded notes on one example of peer social interaction in which sev-
eral strategies were attempted to help a first-grade writer in spelling:
Writer: (Turns to first grader sitting next to her) How do you spell they!
First Grader: (Writes there on a sheet of paper) That's how you spell it.
Writer: That isn't it.
Second Grader: (Gets up and comes over from the other side of the table) I can
spell it.
(Writes Thay and stops. Erases and writes Th) I don't know it.
We can look in your book.
(Looks through the book) I can't find it. Ask your partner.
Writer: No. This writing's for him.
Second Grader: Just put t-h-a.
Writer: (writes tha and looks up) I forgot what to say.

CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

Evaluation of this partner reading and writing action research study was inter-
preted to reflect Vygotsky's perspective on instruction within the zone of proximal
development (1986). This includes his ideas that teacher assistance or peer col-
laboration augments the student's ability to perform highly challenging learning
tasks by providing support through social dialogue, and social interaction during

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60 Journal of Reading Behavior

instruction aids in developing students' higher level thought processes. Specifi-

cally, the evaluation data was used to interpret how the amount and type of teacher
assistance and peer collaboration affected the development of students' thinking
and their reading and writing progress. Student evaluations of their own perfor-
mance and their preferences in classroom literacy instruction added to the inter-
pretation of students' awareness and control of their literacy learning and thinking.
In the area of reading development, students improved in word recognition,
and they were aware of their progress in learning new words. They felt that they
improved most in learning new words and felt more confident in selecting hard
books to read. Students' improvement in the area of word recognition was consis-
tent with previous peer tutoring and partner reading studies (Duff & Swick, 1974;
Epstein, 1978; Labbo & Teale, 1990; Olsen, 1974). The improvement in word
recognition was probably due to students rereading their books several times since
unfamiliar words were only listed and identified once in the context of their stories
instead of drilled in isolation for memory.
Western research on the zone of proximal development has focused on an adult
scaffolding learning activities from providing very explicit directives to vague cues
so the student receives varying amounts of support and strategy training in the
thought processes associated with reading (Brown, Campione, & Day, 1981;
Brunner, 1986). In this partner reading and writing study, adult support was pro-
vided in the teacher's read aloud mini-lesson using a form of mental modeling to
externalize the thought processes involved in reflecting on and sharing story meaning
and self-monitoring of word recognition. The adult support had more influence on
students' social interactions in their partner story discussion and dialogue journals
than on their independent self-monitoring of word recognition. The increase in
students' positive responses to discussing their books indicates their awareness of
their increased performance in reflecting on and sharing story meanings. Although
students felt they improved most in learning new words, some of these young read-
ers were unable to independently self-monitor their reading enough to detect and
list unfamiliar words and others did not detect all of the unfamiliar words they
encountered. These students needed a higher level of individual guidance from the
teacher or more capable peers in detecting unfamiliar words the first time they read
their books.
More recent studies of student collaboration within the zone of proximal de-
velopment (Tudge, 1990) stress the need for research to focus on how students
build shared meanings through peer social interaction, rather than simply assum-
ing the benefits of pairing a student with a more competent peer for instruction.
Results of this study in both fluency and building text meanings through peer so-
cial interaction tend to support this idea about the zone. Pairing students had mini-
mal benefit in the area of fluency. Students showed the least improvement in fluency
development, and they were aware of their lack of improvement in this area. They
were able to detect and provide feedback on good or poor fluency when listening to

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 Partner Reading and Writing 61

their partners read, but they did not use the peer feedback to improve their own
fluency. These students at the early stages of reading needed a higher level of direct
support in fluency such as modeling fluent reading through echo or choral reading.
Students in this study needed teacher support to move them into reflecting on
and sharing text meanings with their partners. Prior to the teacher's story reflec-
tion mini-lesson, there were only five incidents of partner discussions or journal
entries in which the more competent second graders led the first graders in reflect-
ing on the books read. Following the mini-lesson, several of the readers used spe-
cific strategies to assist their partners in sharing the meaning of their stories when
the stories were very difficult to read. These strategies included picture cues, relat-
ing text to prior knowledge and experiences, ongoing questioning, and highlight-
ing the main point of the story.
Results of this study supported the recommendations of using dialogue jour-
nals to help children move toward the development of abstract thinking and a
sense of audience (Gambrell, 1985; Shuy, 1987; Wells, 1993). The first graders
moved beyond simply copying the second graders' entries to actually responding to
their partners in writtencsnversations about their books or their reading perfor-
mance. The observational notes confirmed that students did not hesitate to write to
their partners, stayed engaged^in their writing until they finished their entries, and
seemed to enjoy conversing with their partners in print.
Students evaluated writing about books they read as their least preferred activ-
ity and sought assistance from their peers to spell words correctly despite the teacher's
ongoing encouragement for them to invent their own spellings. These findings
were most likely due to students' lack of experience in using invented spellings to
create their own writings about stories they read and their frustration from making
the transition to using invented spelling. Classroom instruction prior to the partner
study focused on correct spelling with the teacher editing their writings or students
copying the teacher's words or sentences from the chalkboard. Invented spelling
has been recommended to help young students develop greater skill in spelling and
write any word they need rather than just words they know or can find how to spell
(Clarke, 1988). Further research is needed on how young writers make a transition
from classroom instruction focusing on correct spelling to using invented spellings
to create their own writings. The teacher in this study decided to continue with the
partner storybook reading and writing, but replace the teacher editing of students
writing in her classroom instruction with process writing to facilitate her students'
transition to using invented spelling.
In conclusion, the use of a partner reading and writing activity is recommended
to improve students' word recognition, writing, and higher level thought processes
involved in reading. The partner reading and writing collaboration activity seemed
to provide an added purpose for students' engagement in rereading and writing
about their books, although rereading and writing were their least preferred class-
room literacy activities. It is also recommended that for students at the early stages

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62 Journal of Reading Behavior

of literacy development, teacher support in the form of mental modeling through

mini-lessons and peer support in the form of echo or choral reading be added to the
partner activity. More investigation is needed to clarify how the degree and type of
adult or peer support affects the development of the thought processes (e.g., reflec-
tion, self-monitoring) involved in various literacy tasks.
Further research in authentic classroom situations is needed to investigate how
to apply Vygotsky's zone of proximal development to literacy development by inte-
grating peer social dialogue with varying amounts of teacher assistance during
instruction. The action research design (Dixon-Krauss, 1992) is recommended as
an effective method for guiding teachers in the transition from classroom literacy
instruction that focuses on independent student performance and achievement to a
social or communicative perspective. Implementing the social perspective includes
both designing classroom literacy activities to facilitate social interaction and con-
tinuously analyzing students' written and verbal social interaction to determine
how children learn, how their thinking is developing, and how to adjust the amount
of teacher and peer support they need in this development.

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MA: Harvard University Press.
Capplemen, H. G. (1992). Success in reading and writing (2nd ed.). Glenview, IL: Scott, Foresman.
Clarke, L. K. (1988). Invented vs. traditional spelling in first graders' writing: Effects on learning to spell
and read. Research In the Teaching of English, 22, 281-309.
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APPENDIX A

Final Evaluation Student Preference Survey

Directions: Circle the answer as I read each question and answer to you.

1. Did you like being the listener or the reader?

listener reader
2. What did you like better, reading to your peer group or reading to your partner?
peer group partner
3. What did you like doing best, reading, listening, or writing about the story?
reading listening writing
4. Which part did you like better, the practice reading of your book or reading it to your
partner?
practice reading reading to partner
5. By reading to your partner, did you learn more new words or did you learn how to read
out loud better?
more new words read out loud better
6. What do you think you did the best at, learning more new words or describing your
favorite part of the book in your journal?
new words journal

Manuscript submitted: March 4, 1994

Revision requested: May 14, 1994
Revision received: June 20, 1994
Accepted for publication: July 1, 1994

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