The Biliterate Writing Development of Bilingual First Graders: A Path Analysis of Relationships Between Writing Skills

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Abstract

From a holistic perspective of bilingualism, this study used path analysis to examine the relationships between skills in the biliterate writing of 25 Latinx bilingual children. Nearly 400 bilingual writing compositions were collected during one school year and coded for various aspects of writing development: ideas expressed, spelling, punctuation, and grammar. Findings indicate that the quantity of ideas expressed in writing is predicted by children’s punctuation attempts, grammar incongruencies and spelling. When disaggregated by language, punctuation attempts only predicted children’s total ideas in English, not Spanish, and grammar incongruencies loaded more strongly for English than Spanish. This work is significant as it illustrates that writing approximations are not deficiencies, but rather a process in children’s progression to biliteracy.

Authors

• Eleanor Rodríguez

• Courtney Donovan, University of Colorado - Denver

• Sandra A. Butvilofsky, University of Texas at El Paso

• Adriana Alvarez, University of Colorado - Denver