Metacognitive regulation of writing in the classroom

Linda Allal University of Geneva

ABSTRACT text for studying the operations of metacognitive regulation intervening in text roduction. Our research focuses on inferences about metacognitive regulation derived from the analysis of text transformations introduced by student writers between successive versions, of their texts (notes, draft final version). The results of three studies conducted with sixth-grade students are reported here. Study .1 shows that the mastery of basic written language skills affects the students' regulation strategies in three ways.A higher level of mastery allows anticipation of a wider range of transformations, encourages monitoring of problems of text organization and entails more complex means of adjustment. The different phases of text production appear to induce variations in regulation strategies: when students are transforming their notes into a first draft (Study 1), they tend to use higher-level strategies (more optional transformations, more complex adjustments affecting text structure) than those used when they are revising their drafts (Studies 2 and 3). Concerning the effects of instruction, the data from Studies 2 and 3 suggest that a sociocognitive approach, emphasizing writing in a context of communication, tends to encourage strategies of regulation focused largely on orthographic and textual conventions, rather than on semantic content. In-depth study of peer interactions in Study 3 indicates that for a given set of instructional conditions (such as dyadic co-production), there can be a wide range of ways in which students actually function. This variation could explain in part why the overall effect of an interactive instructional approach is weaker than might be expected. The implications of our findings for future research and classroom practice are discussed.
A situated cognition approach to writing instruction provides a fruitful con-

1 INTRODUCTION The search for continuity between learning in the classroom and knowledge acquisition and use in 'real-life' contexts, outside school, is a long-standing, and largely unresolved, educational problem. More than half a century ago, Dewey (1938/ 1963) called for an 'experiential continuum' linking the activities that take place in schools with their surrounding social and cultural contexts (p. 28). It is the absence of such a link, Dewey believed, that explains the widespread difficulty that people encounter when attempting to use the concepts and skills acquired in school.

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If exactly the same conditions recurred as those under which it [a concept or skill] was acquired, it would also recur and be available. But it was segregated when it was acquired and hence is so disconnected from the rest of experience that it is not available under the actual conditions of life.... Perhaps the greatest of all pedagogical fallacies is the notion that a person learns only the particular thing he is studying at the time. Collateral learning may be more important than the spelling lesson or lesson in history or geography that is learned (p. 48). Brown, Collins and Duguid (1989) present a similar perspective in their article on `situated cognition'. After criticising the still prevailing tendency of schools to treat knowledge acquisition in a compartmentalised and decontextualised manner, they summarise their position as follows: The activity in which knowledge is developed and deployed...is not separable from or ancillary to learning and cognition. Nor is it neutral. Rather, it is an integral part of what is learned.... Learning and cognition, it is now possible to argue, are fundamentally situated. (p. 32) Studies of learning activities in out-of-school settings (Rogoff, 1990; Rogoff & Lave, 1984) have helped to clarify the ways in which context becomes part of the content of learning.As Rogoff (1982) has stated, 'context is not so much a set of stimuli that impinge upon a person as it is a web of relations interwoven to form the fabric of meaning' (p. 149). The learner's activity is always embedded in a context and, at the same time, it contributes to creating the context.This phenomenon has been recognised for some time in sociolinguistic research, such as that of Cook-Gumperz (1977) showing how 'situated meaning' is constructed interactively in everyday settings (p.107). The instructional model of `cognitive apprenticeship' has been proposed to describe school learning situations that simulate authentic, out-of-school contexts of knowledge acquisition and use (Brown et al., 1989; Rogoff, 1990). This model emphasises the elaboration of contextualised competencies, which incorporate appropriate use of tools and forms of social interaction found in corresponding cultural practices. A simplified example would he children learning to write texts for a school newspaper using a word processor and working in collaborative editorial groups with other students. An important theoretical foundation of the model lies in the work by Vygotsky (1930-35/1978) on the social mediation of learning and, in particular, in the idea that interaction can open a 'zone of proximal development' within which the child learns to accomplish new tasks. The term 'scaffolding' (Greenfield, 1984; Wood, Bruner & Ross, 1976) is used to designate various forms of interactive guidance - teacher coaching, peer collaboration, appropriation of tools, interaction with computer environments - that foster the learner's progressive construction of new skills and strategies, as well as the internalisation of corresponding mechanisms of self-regulation. Certain implications of these ideas have been developed by Collins (1991), Moll (1990) and Salomon, Perkins and Globerson (1991), among others.

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Although self-regulation is an important feature of all learning, it is generally subordinated to systematic external guidance in traditional classrooms, where a constant stream of teacher instructions regulates the learner's activity (e.g. 'Put away your math sheets. Get out your geography book and turn to page 25. If you've forgotten your book, look at your neighbour's...). In out-of-school settings of knowledge production and use, social interactions with peers and with mentors are common and take on complex forms. Active participation in these interactional processes is important for individuals to acquire the ability to regulate - initiate, orient, assess, adjust - their own cognitive activity in a reflective, goal-oriented manner. School activities developed in a perspective of situated cognition therefore need to include a concern for 'situated metacognition'. This means an apprenticeship model geared toward promoting the acquisition of self-regulation mechanisms that are adapted to the contextual constraints of different tasks, that allow growing expertise in the integration of multiple skills needed to accomplish a task and that function with increasing autonomy and intentionality. This chapter is concerned with the production of written texts in authentic contexts of communication and, in particular, with the processes of metacognitive regulation intervening in text production. After a brief summary of selected research on writing and metacognition, we present three studies conducted with sixth-grade students (age 11-12) in public elementary schools of the canton of Geneva. 2 WRITING IN CONTEXT Resnick (1990) has defined several features of school environments which favour `literacy apprenticeships' comparable to authentic literary practices outside of school: Children work to produce a product that will be used by others...; they work collaboratively, but under conditions in which individuals are held responsible for their work; they use tools and apparatus appropriate to the problem; they read and critique each other's writing; they are called upon to elaborate and defend their own work until it reaches a community standard. (p.183) These basic concerns of situated cognition are present, more or less explicitly, in many contemporary approaches to writing instruction (e.g. Bain & Schneuwly, 1993; Englert, Raphael & Anderson, 1992; Graves, 1983; Milian Gubern, 1996; Needels & Knapp, 1994; Slavin, Stevens & Madden, 1988). In contextualised writing activities, rhetorical considerations which concern the relationships linking writer, audience and topic take on an importance not found in traditional academic tasks. Studies of writing in professional settings have shown that the ways of dealing with rhetorical factors vary depending on the writer's position and relationships to co-workers or supervisors (Brown & Hemdl, 1986; Odell & Goswami, 1982). In attempting to> create authentic communication contexts in the classroom, it is necessaryto use instructional strategies that i l

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as convincingly as possible, the rhetorical relationships that give writing meaning in real-life situations. Some approaches give priority to the production of texts addressed to well-defined audiences outside the classroom, and in particular to audiences which are likely to respond (Bain & Schneuwly, 1993; Florio-Ruane & Lensmire, 1989). Other approaches put more emphasis on voice: Students are encouraged to write about topics of their own choice and to refine a style of expression reflecting their personal and cultural identity, as a member of an ethnic group, or as a woman, for example. Still another approach adopts the idea of the classroom as a 'writing community'. In this case, the primary audience is composed of the class members, who read and discuss one another's texts, and the teacher or other mentor, who actively participates in writing, i.e. models writing in front of the students, and who writes extensive reactions to their texts (Heath & Branscombe, 1989). In addition to rhetorical concerns, contextualised writing implies creating links with other language skills and with activities in other subject-matter areas. Rather than restricting writing instruction to the classical literary forms of composition (e.g. narrative, interpretative essay, etc.), a variety of genres and types of texts, grounded in diverse cultural realities, are dealt with, e.g. letter-to-the-editor commenting on a recent political event, publicity tier a book or movie intended for young people, travel guide for visitors to the local area, leaflet for a scientific exhibit, recipe for a multi-ethnic cookbook. Before producing any given type of text, students read and analyse examples of 'authentic texts' which illustrate a range of existing practices in social contexts outside school (Bain, 1987). 'Reading-to-write' (Flower, Stein,Ackerman, Karatz, McCormick & Peck, 1990) is a way of acquiring information and generating ideas to be used in writing, as well as a means of discovering how different types of texts are constructed. In a complementary manner, 'writing-to-read', e.g. preparing an outline, or a rough draft of a text, provides a functional reference orienting subsequent reading toward more clearly targeted goals, such as search for in-depth information on a particular aspect of a topic, or expansion of the content to be covered.

3 SELF-REGULATION IN 'WRITING
There is increasing research on general processes of self-regulated learning (Boekaerts, 1997; Schur* & Zimmerman, 1994) and on the specific types of regulation that intervene in writing instruction (Schneuwly & Bain, 1993;Wegmuller, 1993). Learner self-regulation is affected by various aspects of an instructional setting. We distinguish the structure of the activity (goals to be achieved, content to be dealt with, task constraints, etc.), the ways in which the teacher intervenes, the forms of peer interaction that are allowed or encouraged, the types of tools that are provided or constructed during the activity (Allal, 1993). Procedures of formative assessment designed to foster reciprocal peer assessment and self-assessment also provide a framework for the development of selfregulated learning (Allal & Michel, 1993; Nunziati, 1990). Self-regulation in writing encompasses both cognitive and metacognitive regulations.Although it is not easy to establish a clear-cut boundary between the two levels of regulation, we find the following definitions heuristically useful. Cognitive regulations are involved in the construction of the conceptual, linguistic and

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metalinguistic knowledge required for writing and they intervene implicitly throughout the process of text production. Metalinguistic knowledge is knowledge about language, used either implicitly or explicitly during comprehension and production activities (Gombert, 1990). For example, knowledge about rules of noun-adjective agreement is likely to enhance the writer's ability to make appropriate corrections when rereading a draft. Metalinguistic activity is obviously central to increasing expertise in writing, but remains (as proposed by Gombert, p.27) a sub-domain of metacognition. Metacognitive regulations entail the active management of cognitive resources with respect to a given goal and, in the case of writing, the use of explicit strategies for articulating different bodies of knowledge (conceptual, linguistic; metalinguistic) needed for text production. Metacognitive regulations also assure the coordination of these bodies of knowledge with contextual factors or with affective and social processes which influence the way in which the writer carries out text production. For example, in classroom writing, teacher expectations and evaluation practices often affect the tendency of the student writer to take risks (e.g. write a long text with a relatively complex structure) or to play it safe (e.g. avoid using words which present orthographic difficulties). In the rest of this chapter, the term 'self-regulation' will refer to metacognitive operations affecting writing. Research on metacognition, and in particular the work by Ann Brown and her colleagues (Brown, 1978; Brown 1987; Brown & Palinscar, 1982; Campione & Brown, 1990), has led us to define metacognitive regulation as an interface which assures the coordinated functioning of two other components of the subject's cognitive activity: the representational network and the production processes mobilised to accomplish the task (Allal & Saada-Robert, 1992). Metacognitive regulations have a dual function:They orient the production processes in a manner compatible with the subject's representations, and they modify his representations to take into account the outcomes of production processes. We have identified three operations of metacognitive regulation, defined as follows (Altai & Saada-Robert, 1992). 1. Anticipation. This operation reflects the transposition of the subject's representations of the task and the context into goal orientations, defined with varying degrees of precision and intentionality. 2 Monitoring. This operation entails the comparison of the present state of advancement with respect to the task to an anticipated goal-state; in complex tasks, the comparison concerns multiple aspects of the present state and a multi-faceted goal-state. 3. Adjustment. This operation aims at reducing the discrepancy between the present state and the goal-state. If the feedback from the monitoring operation is negative (i.e. the goal-state is not attained, or progress in that direction is unsatisfactory), an adjustment is introduced in the production processes. If feedback is positive, the production processes continue without reorientation, or cease because the goal is fully reached. For any moderately complex task, such as writing, which requires the coordination of several production processes, the regulation of some processes is largely automatic (i.e. with practice become automated), whereas the regulation of other processes requires active, intentional cognitive resource management (Allal & Saada-Robert, 1992; Iran-Nejad, 1990).

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Models of writing generally include components of metacognitive regulation even though they may not necessarily be designated by this term. For example, in the well-known Hayes and Flower (1980) model, the components of planning, monitoring and reviewing regulate the central production process (translating). Research has begun to show how metacognitive regulation intervenes in successive phases of text production (Fayol, 1991). Studies of text planning and revision are particularly useful for understanding the multiple facets of self-regulation in writing, as reflected in pre-textual adjustments of plans prior to writing, in changes introduced while composing and in modifications carried out once a draft has been completed (Witte, 1985). Experimental studies of text revision (Hayes, Flower, Schriver, Stratman & Carey, 1987; Piolat & Roussey, 1991) have led to more detailed models of the mechanisms (task definition, evaluation, detection, diagnosis) regulating strategy selection. Research with school-related tasks has shown that children's metacognitive awareness of revision strategies can be enhanced by instructional aides (Bereiter & Scardamalia, 1987), by peer feedback (Englert, 1992; Milian Gubern,1996) and by computer-based guidance (Daiute & Kruidenier, 1985; Zellermayer, Salomon, Globerson & Givon, 1992). Studies of planning and revision in writing rely frequently on methods of verbalisation:`think-aloud' protocols recorded during the different phases of writing, interviews conducted before and/or after a writing task, transcriptions of peer interactions during joint planning or revision. Since all forms of verbalisation entail well-known biases (Ericsson & Simon, 1980), there is a need to develop alternative methods which provide a means of triangulation with respect to verbal self-report data.The approach presented in this chapter is to base inferences about processes of regulation on an analysis of the transformations introduced by writers between successive versions of their texts.Although this approach provides no information on processes of pre-textual revision taking place in the writer's head but leaving no traces on paper, it does allow inferences about other aspects of revision. On-line regulations during composition can be partly inferred from changes between an outline, a plan or a set of notes and an initial draft of a text. Regulations aimed at improving an existing product can be largely inferred from changes between one or more drafts and the final version of the text.Text transformations provide an indication of only the most salient aspects of metacognitive regulation. They obviously do not allow identification of implicit cognitive and linguistic regulations that are fully integrated within on-going production processes. We will now examine three studies in which the text transformations carried out by sixth-grade writers (age 11-12) are analysed and interpreted in terms of underlying processes of metacognitive regulation. The presentation of the first study includes a description and illustration of the system used for coding the transformations. 4 STUDY 1. TEXT TRANSFORMATIONS AND MASTERY OF BASIC
SKILLS

This study examines the text transformations carried out by four sixth-grade girls

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to be displayed on posters in a school exhibit on 'Childhood inAfrica'.The school is located in an urban neighbourhood characterised by a relatively large percentage of families of high socio-professional status.The analysis presented here concerns the text transformations intervening between the notes taken by the children from various reference books and the initial draft of their texts. The study was designed as an exploratory case study of individual differences in students' writing strategies (for more details see Allal & Michel,1993; Allal, Rouiller & SaadaRobert, 1995). Variations in text transformations reflecting metacognitive regulation of the writing process are likely to be influenced by the writer's mastery of basic written language skills. Research on individual differences in writing (McCutchen, Covill, Hoyne & Mildes, 1994) has shown that mastery of these skills is likely to reduce working memory load and thereby facilitate higher level processes of planning and revision. For this case study,we selected subjects with contrasting achievement levels, as indicated by their first term grades in French 'basic skills' (spelling, grammar, conjugation, vocabulary). The two 'high-achieving' subjects had grades of 6 (highest grade on a six-point scale); the two 'middle-achieving' subjects grades of 4 (minimum grade required to continue secondary studies in the academic section). We decided not to study children with lower achievement levels because of their lack of fluency in spoken French and/or other problems precluding their implication in the proposed activity. In the presentation of the results, the high-achieving subjects are identified as Eva and Fanny, and the middle-achieving subjects as Maude and Sonia (fictitious names).

4.1 A system for coding text transformations

We have developed a system for coding transformations occurring between successive drafts of a text (notes or outline, initial draft, subsequent revised drafts, final version). The basic principles of the system remain the same in each study presented in this chapter.The units of analysis are defined as all observable differences between two versions of a text. Each unit is identified and coded along four main dimensions: 1. the level of language affected by the transformation: word, group, t text;

2. the type of transformation: addition, deletion, substitution, rearrangement; 3. the object of the transformation: semantics (lexical variations, changes of meaning), text organisation (primarily operations of segmentation, connection, cohesion), spelling (both lexical and grammatical aspects); 4. the relationship to language conventions: conventional transformation correctly or incorrectly carried out, optional transformation not required by language conventions. For this fourth dimension, language convention is considered in a restrictive sense corresponding to rules of spelling, syntax, and punctuation for which no variation is accepted by authoritative references (Le Robert dictionary, Le bon usage de Grvisse).At the textual level, two major types of conventions are taken into account: correct signs of segmentation between sentences (capitalisation and final punctuation) and correct anaphoric referencing (The children...;

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tional transformations therefore include changes which may be considered as coherent with language conventions, but are not strictly dictated by rules of usage. Two examples will illustrate the coding system: Example 1. A student inserts the word 'African' in the expression 'the children' This transformation is coded as follows: level of language: group, type of transformation: addition, object: semantics, relationship to language conventions: optional. Example 2. A student changes a verb inflection to make it agree with the subject (in the expression it marchais rapidement, the s of marchais is changed to a t). This transformation is coded as follows: level of language: word, type of transformation: substitution, object: spelling, relationship to language conventions: conventional and correct. Coding of the four dimensions was based on a detailed guide which assured a high degree of interceder reliability (83-95% depending on the data set). The presentation of the results of Study 1 will focus on the differences in the students' transformations that appear to be linked to their mastery of basic skills. The differences between high-achieving and middle-achieving students arc interpreted in terms of the probable underlying operations of metacognitive regulation. Although each transformation dimension reflects the interplay among the three operations of regulation (anticipation, monitoring, adjustment), our interpretations focus on the operation(s) that can be most directly inferred from the available data. 42 Conventional vs. optional transformations An analysis of the relative proportions of conventional vs. optional transformations helps us to understand the way our subjects construe their role as author of a text. Is this role interpreted narrowly, as is the case for many beginning writers who aim at producing a correctly written text which is essentially a carefully executed transcription of passages copied from reference books? Or do they interpret their role in a larger perspective, which includes concerns of conventional correction, but emphasises the author's license to organise and compose a text as thought best? The subject's representation of what writing is, of what an author is supposed to do, provides a general orientation for the metacognitive operation of anticipation that guides composing activity. Our data show that all four subjects share a common representation of the general requirements of the writing task. Each student produced a sizeable number of transformations (43 to 61), and among these a substantial percentage of optional transformations (at least 42%), thereby demonstrating her comprehension that an author's role entails the selection and organisation of information, and not

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simply the production of correct sentences.There is, however, as shown in Table 1, a significant difference between high-achieving and middle-achieving subjects with respect to the relative frequencies of conventional vs. optional transformations (p < .0001).The high achievers carry out considerably more optional transformations (81.7%), than do the middle achievers (54.7%). Moreover, the conventional transformations carried out by the high achievers are rarely incorrect (3.7%), compared to those carried Out by the middle achievers (17.9%). Table I Conventional vs. optional transformations, by student achievement status.
Achievement Status High-achieving Middle-achieving Total 3.7 17.9 10.3 Conventional Incorrect Correct 14.7 27.4 20.0 Optional Total'

81.7 54.7 (i9.1

100.0 (109) 100.0 (95) 100.0 (204)

'Percentages are calculated by line on the number of transformations given between parentheses. 18.37, d.f. = 2, p < .0001.
)(2=

At least two interpretations of these findings are tenable, and potentially complementary. The first is linked to the problem of cognitive load during on-line processing. It is likely that high-achieving students are able to correct errors fairly automatically, while composing their text, and therefore devote greater attention and regulating capacity to the formulation and execution of optional transformations. A second explanation would be that the high-achieving students have more cognitive resources for the task at hand, i.e. a more detailed and differentiated representation of how informative texts can be structured, which allows them to plan overall organisational changes, rather than simply proceed on a sentence-by-sentence basis.

4.3 Object of transformation and level of language Preliminary analyses showed that the joint consideration of object of transformation and language level allowed more interesting interpretations than separate analyses of each dimension. The distribution of the objects transformed at each language level indicates the types of units on which the writers' attention is focused. This gives an idea of the aims that guide the writer's monitoring of the drafting process. To what extent is she concerned with improving or changing the semantic content of the text, as compared to that of her notes? At what language level are the changes carried out (expansion of nominal groups, addition of explanatory material from a new source, for example)? Is she searching for ways

of organising her text that differ from the existing organisation of her notes? Is she attentive to correct spelling when drafting her text? Although the transformation data do not provide detailed answers to these questions, they do suggest some interesting and plausible interpretations. In Figure 1, the transformations carried out by each subject are classified with respect to two crossed dimensions: object of transformation and level of language affected by the transformation. For each subject, two dominant categories, and several secondary categories are identified by the slashed lines. The two high-achieving students have one dominant category in common, transformations affecting organisation at the level of the text, whereas their second major category differs: For Eva, it is organisation at the sentence level, but for Fanny it is the spelling of words.A similar pattern is found for the middle-achieving students.They both have one dominant concern (the spelling of words), hut each has a second focal point: semantic content at the sentence level, for Maude; organisation of the sentence, for Sonia.

Figure 1 Objects of transformation and language level: individual Profiles.

In summary, high and middle-achieving students are differentiated primarily by the fact that the former share a common concern for text organisation, while the latter have a common preoccupation with spelling. Globally, this finding is coherent with the earlier analysis of conventional vs. optional transformations. It should be stressed, however, that achievement level is not linked to systematic, generalised differences.The transformation patterns in Figure 1 show marked individual differences, reflecting the specific aims of each child, her representation of what is important in the writing task, and the way in which she monitors her drafting activity.

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4.4 Type of transformation

Type of transformation concerns the means used to carry out the transformation (addition, deletion, substitution, or rearrangement). Analysis of this dimension allows us to specify the adjustments that result from the monitoring operations of the regulation process. How broad or narrow is the repertoire of transformation tools used by sixth graders? With what degree of flexibility are the tools used? In Table 2 the data for type of transformation are grouped into two categories: simple transformations (addition or deletion of an element) and more complex transformations (substitution of one element for another, or rearrangement such as transfer of elements from one location to another).These categories differ significantly according to student achievement status (p < .0157). For high-achieving students, complex transformations are as frequent as simple ones, whereas for middle-achieving students, two-thirds of their transformations are simple and only one-third complex.The individual data for the two types of transformations within each category show that additions are more frequent than deletions (except for Maude, for whom their frequency is equal), and that substitutions are much more frequent than rearrangements.

Table 2 Type of transformation, by student achievement status.

Achievement Status High-achieving Middle-achieving Total Type of transformation' Simple Complex 49.5 50.5 33.7 42.6 100.0 (95) 100.0 (204)
a Simple transformations = addition, deletion.

Total!'

100.0 (109)

66.3
57.4

Complex transformations = substitution,rearrangement. bPercentages are calculated by line on the number of transformations given between parentheses x2= 6.53, d.f. = 1, p < .0157 In summary, our data show that all subjects make minimal use all four types of

transformations. However, despite this common repertoire of tools for making adjustments in their drafts, the high-achieving students show greater mobility in their deployment of these tools. This finding, combined with the results for optional vs. conventional transformations, suggests the following profiles of student functioning: High-achieving pupils vary the type of transformation so as to attain a wide range of optional transformations,whereas middle-achieving students carry out a relatively more conventional transformations using predominantly simple means.The more expert functioning of the high-achieving st dents might be e

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plained by several factors: Greater automation of the simpler tools could allow for increased use of the complex ones; greater ease in the cognitive 'management' of the multiple task requirements would also favour flexible use of varied tools.

4.5 Conclusions drawn from Study I

The main findings regarding the text transformations carried out by sixth-grade students when drafting short, informative texts based on notes taken from several reference books can be summarised as follows.Analysis of their transformations shows important similarities among the four subjects:All carry out a majority of optional (rather than conventional) transformations, their transformations affect all four levels of language (word, group, sentence, text), and all four means of transformation (addition, deletion, substitution, rearrangement) are used. Nevertheless, the high-achieving students can be distinguished from the middle-achieving students in three ways: (1) they carry out a relatively larger number of optional transformations; (2) they show greater concern for text organisation; and (3) they make relatively greater use of complex means of carrying out transformations (substitution, rearrangement), as compared to simple means (addition, deletion). These findings suggest that mastery of basic skills affects all three operations of metacognitive regulation: anticipation of transformations not dictated by convention, monitoring and adjustment at a textual level, use of more varied means of adjustment. Our interpretation of these findings is that the highachieving students' transformations reflect more powerful strategies of metacognitive regulation resulting from increased automation of sub-processes linked to mastery of basic skills.

5 STUDY 2. EFFECTS OF INSTRUCTION ON TEXT REVISION

The second study reported here examines the effects of two instructional approaches on sixth graders' production and revision of narrative texts.' A year-long field study was conducted in order to evaluate the effectiveness of an integrated socio-cognitive approach to writing (IS), as compared to that of a traditional componential skills approach (CS).The CS approach emphasises basic skill acquisition through specific activities focused on the various components of writing (vocabulary development, sentence construction, grammar, spelling, punctuation, etc.) using the exercises proposed in the official curricular material or material available in widely used teacher handbooks. The IS approach aims at integrating the acquisition of basic skills - in particular the morphological aspects of spelling which are quite difficult to master in French - within situations of text production oriented toward a meaningful communication goal. The IS activities which we developed were based on research in three areas: 1. The work on situated cognition (Brown, Collins & Duguid, 1989) which emphasizes knowledge acquisition in instructional settings that are similar to the 'real-life' contexts in which knowledge is subsequently to be used.

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2. Models of writing instruction which draw on Vygotsky's conception of social mediation of learning (Englert, Raphael &Anderson, 1992; Needels & Knapp, 1994). 3. Research on the `didactics' of French language instruction (Bain & Schneuwly, 1993, Pat', 1992). The IS approach involved eight activities of text production, each of which was designed to include two basic skill objectives. For example, in Activity 3, each student wrote a narrative text to tell a Canadian pen pal about a Genevan historical event (Escalade).The basic skill objectives concerned verb inflections for the imperfect and past definite tenses (third person), and complex cases of subject-verb agreement (e.g. intervening relative clause, subject-verb inversion). Figure 2 shows the phases of the text production sequence that was followed for each activity and the principles on which each phase was based. During the drafting and revision of each text, several forms of scaffolding were proposed: student-teacher dialogues guided by a sequence of progressively focused questions, structures of peer interaction (e.g. reciprocal revision), use of tools constructed in class (e.g. spelling checklist with individualised examples drawn from the student's texts). Provision of these means of support for regulating writing was designed to foster progressive internalisation of metacognitive strategies of regulation.

5.1 Analysis of text transformations

The data presented here pertain to a sample of 135 students attending eight sixthgrade classes (four of which followed the IS approach and the other four the CS approach). The classes were located in schools characterised by relatively high percentages of children from families of middle and lower socio-professional status, as compared to the overall population of the Geneva public school system. Periodic observations in class and discussions with the teachers allowed us to characterise the degree of implementation of the proposed IS approach (Allal, 1996). Analysis showed that the teachers encouraged peer interactions during writing, but sometimes failed to exploit the implications of writing a text for an outside audience.The links between the writing task and the basic skill objectives were generally well established, but the teachers did not always encourage sufficient use of available tools (whether standard references, such as the dictionary, or individualised spelling checklists). Teachers often seemed to assume that if these tools were present, students would make use of them, without realising that regular use needs to be fostered by active teacher intervention. At the end of the school year, the students participated in an activity developed by Rouiller (199G,1998), which allowed the appraisal of several aspects of their writing. Each student wrote a narrative text to accompany a set of 10 illustrations showing the story of a postman whose keys are stolen by a chicken while he and his cat are napping. After the students had revised their initial drafts, the typed final versions of the texts, accompanied by the illustrations, were formatted as storybooks to be given to second graders attending the same school.The presentation here focuses on the transformations the students carried out while revising their texts.The transformations were coded according to the system described in Study 1.Analysis of the dimensions of transformation provides i di i

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whether the type of instruction students received had an effect on their strategies
of revision.

Figure 2 Phases of the text production sequence and underlying principles of the Integrated sociocognitive approach.
Phases Prromplllal I. Before text production Define the communication setting: aim and audience, type of text (e.g. description, narration, dialogue, cooking recipe). Plan the content to be dealt with: Collective discussion enumerating ideas and lexical items likely to be used in writing the text. Create a functional communication situation b) defining the rhetorical constraints and tilt characteristics of the intended text.

By preliminary content planning, decrease the cognitive load required for the generation of ideas during writing, and thereby facilitate the student's focus on text organization and or basic skills of spelling, punctuation, etc.. Establish reference criteria for the regulation: intervening during text production.

Present the targeted basic skill objectives and specify the corresponding reference tools.

2. During text production Implement different means of regulating writing (during drafting and revision), based on the student's interactions: with the teacher, with other students, with instructional tools. Foster the development of spelling skills that are integrated in the processes of drafting anc text revision. Enhance (across 8 successive production situ ations) the progressive internalization of self regulation strategies for drafting and revision

3. After text production Carry out various text-based activities: analysis, classification and reflection based on excerpts from student texts and on other supplementary material (specific exercises if needed).
Adapted from AAllal (1997).

Use deferred and detached follow-up activities to consolidate students' basic skills; differenti ate the tasks accdifferenti-student needs.

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On the whole, the effect of instructional approach on text transformations was much less pronounced than we had expected. No significant differences between the IS and CS approaches were found for the relationship of transformations to language conventions and for type of transformation. Under both conditions, the students carried Out a relatively small percentage of optional transformations (approximately 25%); among the large majority of transformations concerned with the respect of language conventions (75%), approximately 65% were carried out correctly and 10% incorrectly. Regarding the type of operations used to carry out the transformations, the students in both IS and CS classes used relatively simple operations (addition and substitution) for the majority of their transformations (approximately 65%); more complex transformations consisted primarily in substitutions (around 35%) and only rarely in rearrangements. With respect to the object of transformation a modest but statistically significant difference was found between the two instructional approaches.The data in Table 3 show that the integrated socio-cognitive approach tended to encourage relatively more transformations linked to spelling and to text organisation,whereas the componential skills approach led to a relatively larger percentage of semantic revisions (p < .0000). It should be noted that there was no significant difference between the degree of conventional correctness of the initial drafts produced in IS and CS classes. The greater attention paid to spelling by IS students can not therefore be attributed to the fact that their drafts contained more errors. It appears that the instruction provided in IS classes led students to acquire a greater awareness of the conventions (both textual and orthographic) that enhance text comprehension. It is also worth noting that two thirds of the IS spelling transformations concerned features of grammatical orthography (verb inflections, noun group agreements, punctuation added to already segmented sentences) which contribute to text organisation. This suggests that IS instruction may help students make the transition from a 'knowledge telling' to a 'knowledge transforming' strategy of text production and revision Bereiter & Scardamalia, 1987). Table 3 Objects of transformation, by instructional approach".
Object Semantics Text Organization Spelling CS 18.8 32.7 48.6 IS 11.7 34.0 54.3

a Percentages calculated on total number of transformations by instructional approsocio-cognitiveential skills) approach: n = 943 transformations. IS (integrated sociocognitive) approach: n = 1047 transformations. x2 = 20.204, d.f = 2, p <.0000.

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5.2 Conclusions drawn from Study 2

Our analysis of the effects of instruction on text transformations allows the following interpretations regarding the operations of metacognitive regulation that characterise students' revisions. 1. The integrated socio-cognitive approach to instruction, as put into practice in our field study, did not have a discernible effect on the students' conception of the writer's task when revising a text. Under both instructional conditions, students seemed to consider revision primarily as a proofreading task. They corrected their texts but made few optional transformations reflecting author's voice and posture. Moreover, both IS and CS students used relatively simple means to carry out their transformations (primarily additions).These findings suggest that instruction had little effect on the metacognitive operation of anticipation and on the ways in which adjustments were carried out. 2. The integrated socio-cognitive approach to instruction had, on the other hand, a limited but significant effect on the selection of the components of the text to transform. Relatively greater importance was given to transformations of spelling and of text organisation than under the CS approach. This suggests that IS instruction, with its emphasis on producing texts in a communication context, enhanced students' monitoring of the features that facilitate text comprehension. 3. Comparing the results for Studies 1 and 2, we can note one important difference.The transformation of notes into a first draft (Study 1) elicited a higher level of metacognitive regulation (more optional transformations, more complex means of transformation) than the revision of a draft (Study 2).This suggests that students tend to use different strategies of metacognitive regulation in different phases of text production. 6 STUDY 3: DYADIC INTERACTIONS AND TEXT REVISION This study was conducted by Rouiller (1996, 1998) in order to examine the effects of a dyadic cooperative structure on students' strategies of revising narrative texts. In contrast with the two preceding studies, Rouiller's research provides an in-depth look at the relationship between students' verbal exchanges and the transformations they carry out. Her experimentation was designed on the basis of previous research on peer collaboration in writing, and in particular on the findings showing that: (1) dyadic structures foster sustained thought and activity on the part of each student (Higgins, Flower & Petraglia, 1992); (2) working on a common task enhances the quality of collaboration (DiPardo & Freedman, 1988); (3) when students individually compose different parts of a joint text, this increases critical distance and favours collaborative revision (Zammuner, 1983); (4) joint planning can increase the involvement of each student in the subsequent phase of collaborative revision, which implies coordination of viewpoints to attain a common goal (Saunders, 1989).

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6 1 Research design The experimentation involved two writing sequences aimed at the production of narrative texts. The first production sequence (P1) allowed comparison of the effects of two experimental conditions: dyadic co-production (two students produced a joint text) vs. individual production. The second production sequence (P2) allowed verification of the persistence of the effects of dyadic co-production when each student individually produces a new text. The sample was composed of fifteen dyads and fifteen individuals from three sixth-grade classes.A counter-balanced design was applied in each class to assure an equivalent achievement level in French between the five dyads and the five individual subjects.The classes were located in Genevan elementary schools with a student population close to the canton average in terms of the families' socioprofessional status. The instructional sequences proposed an authentic communication goal: the production of storybooks - narrative texts accompanied by illustrations - to be read by younger students attending the same school. Each sequence included five phases: 1. presentation of the writing task and elaboration of a production guide that remained available to the students throughout the sequence; 2. planning the story to write based on the 10 illustrations; 3. composing a draft of the story; 4. revising the draft; and 5. transmission of the storybooks to the intended audience. The first and last phases were conducted with all students in the class (dyads and individual writers). The students working in dyads carried out phases 2 and 4 together, i.e. joint text planning and revision, but in phase 3 each student wrote half of the draft, corresponding to five of the 10 pictures. Students in the individual production condition carried out phases 2, 3 and 4 alone.

62 Two patterns of dyadic functioning

The results presented here focus on a small part of the data collected by Rouiller, i.e. the relationships between dyadic interactions and text revisions in phase 4. An initial analysis showed that the students of some dyads carried out a much larger number of transformations during the collaborative sequence at P1 than they did individually at P2, whereas other dyads made approximately the same number of transformations at P1 as made by each individual at P2. It is worth noting that there were no cases of fewer transformations at P1 than at P2. In order to understand how dyadic interactions affect revision, an in-depth analysis was conducted of the verbal exchanges and the transformations recorded for five dyads. Dyads Alpha and Beta,whose members made an equivalent number of transformations at P1 and at P2, are designated subsequently as DE (E for equivalent) dyads. Dyads Gamma, Delta and Epsilon, whose members carried out a considerably larger number of transformations together at Pl than each did individually at P2, are designated as DS (S for superior) dyads.

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Each dyad's interactions were divided into sequences of utterances defined by the topic under discussion.The data presented here pertain to two relationships. First, we examine the relationship between verbal fluidity, i.e. the number of utterances recorded during a dyad's interaction, and the number and density of text transformations carried out. Second, we report the relationship between the topics of the dyads' verbalisations during text revision and the object of their transformations. Interpretation of the data will be based on descriptive indicators for each dyad rather than on the results of statistical tests grouping DE and DS data.

62 Number of verbalisations and transformations

Table 4 shows the number of transformations made by each dyad, the density of the transformations (i.e. number of transformations expressed as a percentage of the number of words in the draft) and the number of oral utterances recorded during the revision activity at P1 .There is a clear relationship between all three indicators:The DS dyads carry out more transformations (in absolute terms and when text length is taken into account) and their interactions involve a much larger number of utterances than those of the DE dyads.

Table 4 Number of text transformations, density of text transformation? and number of oral utterances, by dyad at P1.
Dyad DE D S Alpha Beta Gamma Delta Epsilon Number of transformations 17 20 47 58 69 Density of transformations 13.8 10.6 27.8 22.7 28.4

Number of utterances
29 73 757 474 387

a Density of transformations = (nb. of transformations / nb. of words in the draft) x 100%. However, as Rouiller (1998) points out, the direction of causality underlying these results is open to question. Do students who carry out more transformations of their text have a tendency to verbalise more about their actions? Or do dyads with a higher level of verbalisation tend, as a result, to make more changes in their text? These questions suggest different interpretations of the role of metacognitive regulation in revision.The first interpretation implies that regulations-in-action stimulate verbalisation which then increases metacognitive awareness and reflection about revision.regulation. Althoughetation suggests that verbalisation provokes increased metacognitive awareness of potential directions of revision which is then translated into actions of regulation.Although it is likely that both types of processes occur in a cyclical manner, a qualitative analysis of the dyads' global revision strategies indicates that other factors may affect both verbalisation and transformation. Rouiller's analysis shows that the DS dyads reread their drafts more times than the DE dyads, and that specific goals are often assigned to each of the successive

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DS readings. When one member of a DS dyad is rereading, the partner is often called upon to take part in solving the problems that are identitied.The DS dyads also make greater use of reference materials (e.g. dictionary).The members of DE dyads, on the other hand, tend to divide up the task of revision (e.g. each rereads what the other wrote) and to carry out their work in a parallel manner. Their verbalisations appear to be essentially a way of coordinating individual activities. In summary, Rouiller concludes that multiple rereadings accompanied by joint problem solving influence both the quantity of the utterances produced during the interaction and the number transformations actually carried out.

6.3 Topics of verbalisation and objects of transformation

What do interacting students talk about during text revision? Table 5 presents the distribution of each dyad's utterances (expressed as percentages of the total number of utterances given in Table 4) for the following three categories: (1) general aspects of task management (e.g. suggestions such as: You read the first part, I'll read the second.), (2) specific topics (semantics, text organization, spelling) which correspond to objects of potential text transformations, and (3) other utterances (reading of parts of the draft out loud and occasional remarks not linked to the revision task). Since the interactions of the DS dyads are considerably longer than those of the DE dyads (see Table 4), the members of the DS dyads discuss each aspect of text revision to a much larger extent. The distribution of the utterances in percentages shows, however, that the DS dyads formulate relatively more utterances about spelling, whereas the DE dyads' verbalisations show a relatively more concern for the semantic content of the text. For both types of dyads, the percentages of utterances concerning text organisation are quite low.

Table 5 Topics of verbalization as percentage of total utterances, by dyad.

Dyad DE DS Alpha Beta Gamma Delta Epsilon General task 17.2 25.3 17.7 19.5 12.9
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Semantics 34.5 28.0 15.1 12.1 11.6

Text organization 0.0 13. 3 8.6 5.5 11. 3

Spelling 27.6 29.3 47.7 46.7

Other' 20.7 4.1 10.9 16.2

45.6

18.6

a Other includes out loud reading of sentences of the draft and occasional remarks not
linked to the task.

A qualitative analysis of one of the most interactive DS dyads (Alan and Tony) shows three characteristics of their exchanges. 1.They often verbalise the steps of their co-constructed verifications: A What verb is that? To reject? T Past indefinite tense. A Wait.

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Yeah, wait. "He felt re, rejjjjj- rejected,".... He was feeling, he was feeling rejected.Where's that? To reject, to reject, .. 2. They remind each other of the need for joint monitoring of the revision processes: T Benjamin... A ...he told them the story, and... told them the whole story.That's better, isn't it? No, but you have to say if you agree, it isn't me who has to... T Yeah, but I was thinking about it! 3. They confront differing viewpoints before agreeing on a change: T We should take away a "sad". A Why? That's the story. T "He was sad, but so sad, so sad." A "He was sad, but sad, so sad".... sounds stupid. T He was sad, so sad that he wanted.... These excerpts illustrate the emergence of operations of metacognitive regulation as explicit objects of peer interaction. To further understand the relationship between verbal interaction and text transformation, Rouiller verified the degree of correspondence between the specific topics of the utterances formulated by each dyad and the objects of the transformations actually carried out by the dyad. The major results can be summarised as follows. 1. Text organisation. As noted above, text organisation is the topic that gave rise to the least amount of verbalisation. When the number of interaction sequences concerning this topic are compared with the number of transformations carried Out, it is found that there are always fewer, sometimes far fewer, verbal sequences than the number of actual transformations. In other words, students in all the dyads make changes of text organisation without having talked about the transformations. Rouiller suggests that a possible explanation lies in the influence of the school curricular materials.At the time the study was conducted, curricular activities concerning text organisation were generally much less developed that exercises concerning spelling and vocabulary. Students may therefore have acquired few concepts and terms for discussing text organisation, as compared to the references they have for talking about spelling and lexical choice. A

2. Semantics. For this topic, the results show no clear trend for either type of

dyad. Some semantic transformations occurred without having been discussed, but some exchanges, especially about lexical choice, did not result in text transformations. 3. Spelling. There is a clear difference between DS and DE dyads in this area.The interactions of DS dyads involve a much larger number of verbal sequences about spelling than the number of spelling transformations actually carried out.The exchanges that did not result in transformations included a sizeable number of verification sequences leading students to the conclusion that no adjustment was needed. The data for the DE dyads show the opposite tendency. The interactions involve fewer verbal sequences about spelling than the number of transformations actually carried out. This result reflects the

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global revision strategy of the DE dyads whose members tended to have relatively few verbal exchanges while they carried out largely individual proofreading of different parts of the text.

65 Conclusions drawn from Study 3

The research conducted by Rouiller (1996, 1998) shows that a dyadic structure of co-operative text production is translated into different patterns of peer interaction which arc associated with differences in text revision. Some dyads (DE) divide up the task of revision and carry it out in a largely individual manner. They therefore have little opportunity for confrontation of different viewpoints or for co-construction of solutions, and they make relatively few transformations of their drafts. This pattern of interaction implies minimal coordination of the students' existing strategies of metacognitive regulation, but is unlikely to provoke any significant changes in their levels of functioning. A much more dynamic pattern of interaction is shown by other dyads (DS). These dyads engage in lengthy exchanges organised around multiple rereadings of their draft, leading to a large number of text transformations.Their exchanges include numerous confrontations between the participants' viewpoints, as well as substantial instances of joint problem solving. Exchanges concerning spelling are particularly important occasions for the use of metalinguistic knowledge (especially about grammatical categories and rules) and for metacognitive reflection on how to solve the problems under consideration.This synergetic form of interaction, which is characterised by explicit co-construction of regulation strategies, provides a context that is likely to foster the acquisition of higher-level strategies by each participant.
7 GENERAL CONCLUDING REMARKS

The results of the three studies presented in this chapter lead us to several concluding remarks regarding the factors that affect sixth-grade students' strategies of metacognitive regulation, as reflected in their transformations of successive versions of their texts. 1. As shown in Study 1, the mastery of basic written language skills (linked to knowledge of spelling, grammar, vocabulary, etc.) is a factor that affects the students' regulation strategies in three ways. A higher level of mastery allows anticipation of a wider range of transformations (including rewriting and restructuring, and not just proofreading and correcting); it encourages monitoring of problems of text organisation and use of more complex means of making adjustments (substitution and rearrangement, rather than only addition and deletion). 2. The different phases of text production appear to induce variations in students' strategies of regulation. When students are transforming their notes into a first draft (Study 1), they tend to use higher-level strategies (more optional transformations, more complex adjustments affecting text structure) than those used when they are revising their draft (Studies 2 and 3). 3. The effects of instruction on metacognitive regulation are not easily demonstrated.The data from Studies 2 and 3 suggest that a socio-cognitive h

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emphasising writing in a context of communication, tends to encourage strategies of regulation focused largely on orthographic and textual conventions, rather than on semantic content. But other aspects of regulation - anticipation of optional transformations, means used to make adjustments - are generally unaffected.The in-depth study of peer interactions in Study 3 indicates that for a given set of instructional conditions (such as dyadic co-production), there can be a wide range of ways in which students actually function.This variation could explain in part why the overall effect of an instructional approach is weaker than might be expected. In future research and classroom practice, greater attention needs to be given to such factors as differentiation of teacher interventions, and student appropriation of cooperative learning techniques. These factors can increase the chances that scaffolding and social mediation do in fact function in a manner that fosters the progression of writing skill and the acquisition of more powerful strategies of metacognitive regulation. AUTHOR NOTE Study 2 was supported in part by grant no. 4033-035811 attributed to Linda Allal, Dominique Btrix-Kohler, Laurence Rieben, Madelon Saada-Robert and Edith Wegmuller by the Swiss National Scientific Research Foundation. The study was conducted in second and sixth-grade classes. Only a small portion of the sixthgrade data is presented here. More detailed presentations of this research are found in Allal, Btrix-Kohler, Rieben and Rouiller (1998) and in Allal, Rouiller, SaadaRobert and Wegmuller (1999).