The Effectiveness of Dialogue Journal Writing in Improving the Writing Skills of Young Deaf Writers Thomas N. Kluwin, Arlene Blumenthal Kelly American Annals of the Deaf, Volume 136, Number 3, July 1991, pp. 284-291 (Article) Published by Gallaudet University Press DOI: https://doi.org/10.1353/aad.2012.0436
For additional information about this article https://muse.jhu.edu/article/385072/summary
Access provided at 6 Jan 2020 23:19 GMT from Linköpings universitet
The Effectiveness of Dialogue Journal Writing in Improving the Writing Skills of Young Deaf Writers Thomas N. Kluwin and Arlene Blumenthal Kelly Various claims have been made for the usefulness of dialogue journal writing for improving the writing of less proficient users of English such as deaf writers of English or speakers of English as a second language. However, the bulk of the research has focussed on either student attitudes towards writing or very limited
samples of student writing. In a one year project involving the exchange of dialogue journals between 204 pairs of deaf and hearing students in 10 public school districts, the authors sought to evaluate the utility of dialogue journals for improving the writing skills of the deaf writers. The age of the correspondents ranged from 10 to 18 years old in grades 4 through 12. Among the deaf writers, the average hearing loss was 89 dB in the better ear with a range of from 45 dB to 120 dB. The journal entries of 153 of the deaf students were evaluated for both changes in content and syntactic complexity. When the pair of writers maintained a relationship over time,
there was an improvement in the quality of the writing of the deaf student and a change In the nature of the contents of the deaf student's entries. Results suggest that for some young deaf writers an exchange of dialogue journals with hearing
peers can both, improve the writing skills of the deaf writer and develop a relationship between the correspondents. Suggestions for implementing such a program are included. â– arious claims have been made for the
• an emphasis on either "real" or student selected or "familiar" topics;
Vibeneficial results of writing dialogue
journals, particularly in the writing of deaf students or other students with limited English proficiency (Gutstein, Baterman, Harmatz-Levin, Kreeft, & Meloni, 1983; Peyton
• a focus on meaning over formalism;
• writing to a specific audience; • a non-evaluative, private, or non-threatening cli
& Seyoum, 1989); but the results have not been established
mate; and • individualized feedback from the instructor.
across a large group of writers at one time (Yinger, 1985; Walworth, 1985; Peyton & Seyoum, 1989). The claimed benefits for dialogue journal writing include:
There has been some occasional mention of "modeling" correct forms, but this has not been stressed to any great deal (Kreeft, Shuy, Staton, Reed, & Morroy, 1984). Another general claim that has been made for journal writing is that it will produce greater fluency or a more positive attitude towards writing as seen in greater fluency (Kreeft et al., 1984). In other words, dialogue journal writing alone is seen as somehow improving the writer's attitude toward
Dr. Kluwin k a professor in the Department of Educational Foundations and Research and a research scientist in the
Center for Studies in Education and Human Development (CSEHD) at Gallaudet University. Arlene B. Kelly k a master's degree candidate in the Department of Linguktics and a research technician in CSEHD at Gallaudet University.
284
AAD
Vol. 136, No. 3
The Effectiveness of Dialogue Journal Writing
the writing situation. In this view, the greater willingness to
The bulk of the literature on dialogue journal writing is devoted to articles and books on how to do dialogue journal writing or on the supposed benefits of the process.
discussion of teachers adjusting their language levels to the skills of the students. However, overt teacher language behavior does not appear to be effective as Peyton and Seyoum (1989) would suggest in their study of teaching behaviors which facilitate dialogues. The current practice is for teachers to remain non-directive in order to promote interaction. Such a strategy would not appear to provide much weight to an argument for teachers providing systematic syntactic information. Frequency of input to the learner would be a possible explanation for changes in language skill from dialogue journal writing. Teachers who partici-
There is little substantive research on whether or not the
pated in an earlier study with us (Kluwin & Kelly, 1990)
process of dialogue journal writing does in fact change the writing skills of participants. For example, in one of the largest studies (Kreeft et al., 1984) only she students' work was studied out of a much larger pool of subjects. Other times only a single journal has been studied (Walworth,
reported that the deaf students began to use more "collo-
write is seen as a benefit in and of itself. Staton (1980) has
summarized dialogue journal writing as self-generated, interactive, cumulative, conversational, and functional. In none of these claims is any attempt made to direcüy link dialogue journal writing with improvements in the written product, although much is made of changes in the writing process.
quial" English expressions after writing to hearing peers. However, given the relatively short length of many interactions, (Kluwin & Kelly, 1990), it would be difficult to differentiate between simple maturation and frequent
1985).
input Finally, as Peyton (1986) remarks "morpheme sa-
The information on the process of dialogue journal writing is more extensive in its population base than the work on evaluating its specific outcomes (Bailes, Searls,
lience" is not a viable explanation for language change on the level of dialogue journal writing because of the larger units of language involved in the process. Earlier attempts to validate the use of dialogue journal writing as a device for improving the written language skills of less proficient users of English—deaf writers and speakers of English as a second language—may have failed because the researchers made inappropriate claims for the success of this method and because they selected inappropriate measures of success. Specifically, dialogue journal writing has been advocated on the basis of the claim that it will improve writing skills. However, the concept of "improved writing skills" has been left vague or simply ignored. Very seldom have any of the characteristics of writing, which are generally recognized as measures of quality, been used to evaluate dialogue journals in those rare instances where the process of writing dialogue journals has been evaluated in a formal fashion. The purpose of this study was to examine the claim that dialogue journal writing would improve the written English skills of a limited English proficiency population. To do this, we examined the dialogue journals shared by young hearing and deaf writers. We chose to vary the usual procedure of a dialogue between a teacher and student because we accepted the legitimacy of the arguments that dialogue journal writing provided access to a "realistic"
Slobodzian, & Staton, 1986; Walworth, 1985; Yinger, 1985). For example, Staton (1984) examined student attitudes toward dialogue journals. Her sample consisted of 182 deaf college age students who responded to a 22-item attitude questionnaire. Of the 10 statements with which 70% or more of the students agreed, 8 involved aspects of the student-teacher relationship. Less positive opinions (50%
to 60% agreement) were expressed for statements about the utility of the project in improving writing skill. The teachers who employed journal writing were uniformly positive about it. Staton elsewhere (Bailes et al., 1986) suggests that dialogue journal writing is a self-selection process for teachers which would account for the more positive teacher attitudes reported in her earlier research.
In one of the few studies using a measure of change in writing skill through the use of dialogue journals, Peyton
(1986) mentions three factors often cited for language change in oral language:
1. semantic and syntactic complexity of the input (Brown, 1973; de Villiers & de Villiers, 1973);
2. frequency of occurrence in the input to the learner (Larsen-Freeman, 1976); and 3. perceptual salience of a morpheme in the input (Hakuta, 1976; Labov, 1969). However, it is difficult to reconcile these explanations of possible language change with the other claims made for dialogue journal writing. The logical choice would be
writing situation in a non-evaluative context, thus encour-
aging students to be more willing to write. Peers writing back and forth to each other seemed to be a less artificial
situation than the usual exchange between teacher and student and should provide an even more stimulating context for writing. Further, by using hearing and deaf peers with similar experiences—attending a local public school and living at home—we could provide a situation in which familiarity and newness would be combined to encourage even more communication. Such an exchange of dialogue journals between peers was intended:
semantic and syntactic complexity as an explanation for changes in writing skill, that is, there would be a normal language development process followed in which the
dialogue journal writing would provide the opportunity to access correct forms. In some of the descriptions of the dialogue journal writing process provided by other researchers (Peyton, 1986; Walworth, 1985), there is some Vol. 136, No. 3
AAD
285
The Effectiveness of Dialogue Journal Writing
1. to increase the written fluency of the deaf writer; 2. to expose the deaf writer to written English through a hearing peer; 3. to encourage a sense of audience in both the young
interests, writing ability, and general ability. However, the
age and gender of the writers were by far the most widely cited criteria for matching students. In the elementary grades, same-sex matching was the preferred arrangement. In high school classes, both same-sex and cross-sex pairs
writers; and
4. to provide an opportunity for both writers to explore
were formed.
a relationship with someone whose experiences will be both similar and radically different. Since we would be pairing hearing peers with no formal
Exclusion of some deaf students was done primarily on the basis of their writing ability, that is, the teacher of the deaf felt that it was too low. Pragmatic reasons such as schedule changes, students moving away, and failure to get parental permission were the next most frequent reasons for not including a deaf student. In general, blind matches were done, but in one instance a group meeting was held and students picked each other. Face-to-face contact occurred at some point in the process, but the timing and formality of this encounter varied. End of the semester pizza parties were a common solution to the desire to become acquainted.
language improvement agenda with deaf peers, and since previous research had failed to esublish the utility of
dialogue journal writing in promoting changes in language skill, we anticipated no significant improvement in syntactic skills. However, if dialogue journal writing is a process which promotes an interest in writing as an activity, we expected to see a change in the nature of the content. Method
Three-fourths of the teachers had the deaf students write
the first entry. The teachers usually were able to get the process rolling by supplying only the initial topic. After the initial topic suggestion, the students were able to keep up
Project Narrative
We conducted a one-year project involving 204 pairs of deaf and hearing students in 10 cities across the United States to implement and evaluate a dialogue journal program in which deaf and hearing peers would write back and forth to each other. Our project involved a written dialogue between two young people. It was not a dialogue with a teacher, but rather an exchange of interests, feelings, ideas, and experiences with an age.mate. It was personal and reflective writing which included narrations, explanations, and descriptions which were written at the language and interest level of the two young people involved. In our project, the role of the teacher was to encourage
the communication on their own. Less than half of the
teachers had to provide help to some students with topics after the first entry. The general reaction was that the dialogue journal exchange process was a self-sustaining activity once the exchange had been started properly. Sometimes topic suggestions were necessary, but regular involvement by the teacher other than monitoring the process was not.
The largest problem the teachers encountered in the
entire dialogue journal exchange process was in getting the journals from one classroom to another. One teacher reported that it would become quite chaotic once the students had finished. They all wanted to get the dialogue journals over to the other class so they could get them back again. The physical location of the corresponding classrooms could be a problem since the physical act of moving the dialogue journals from one location in the building to
the students to write and to provide opportunities for them to write and to share each others' writing. Rather than being a participant, the teacher was a monitor of the communication. Once the students began the process of writing to each other, the teacher did not participate directly in the process. This project took place during a single school year. The teachers of the deaf selected a person who was already known to them to be cooperative with the deaf program as the teacher of the class of hearing children with whom the exchange would take place. About half of the teachers of the deaf had had personal experience working with the individual. A default option was to use a class that some of the deaf students were mainstreamed into. Unfortunately, the feedback from the teachers revealed that very pragmatic reasons would often condition the selection process. For example, the right number of hearing students in a convenient class often decided who would participate. The majority of the teachers had no specific criteria for matching the deaf and hearing students. When a criterion was used, the most frequendy used criterion for matching
another was burdensome. At the end of the year or at the
end of the semester if the classes changed at mid-year, the completed journals were sent to the research team for evaluation.
Sample Two hundred and four deaf students exchanged dia-
logue journals with hearing peers. Of these 204 students, 153 journals were available for analysis. Twenty-seven journals were not analyzed because of frequent changes in the hearing correspondent which did not permit a relationship to develop between correspondents; 7 journals were not analyzed because frequent absences of the hearing correspondents did not permit the system to function; 17 journals were unreadable by the research team; 1 dialogue
correspondents was the sex of the writers. Additional but not universal criteria were the age of the writers, common
286
AAD
Vol. 136, No. 3
The Effectiveness of Dialogue Journal Writing
was terminated by a teacher because of the content of the Table 1. Journal Content Coding System
entries.
The average age of the correspondents was 13 and a half with a range of from 10 to 18 years old About one-third of the correspondents were in grades 4 through 6, one-third in grades 7 through 9, and one-third in grades 10 through 12. Among the deaf writers, the average hearing loss was 89 dB in the better ear with a range of from 45 dB to 120 dB. Only the entries written by the deaf students are included in this analysis.
CATEGORIES: Discourse Function
Salutation Question Declarative
Greetings, closings Direct question Request for information Statement involving new topic
Subject First Second Third
Instrumentation
Syntactic Analysis. Counts were made of the number of
words, the number of sentences, the number of clauses, both grammatical and ungrammatical, and the number of t-units in the first three and last three entries written by the
Writer talks about himself/herself
Writer refers to other correspondent Neither writer nor other correspondent
Topic Events
deaf student. Words and sentences were defined ortho-
Activities
graphically while t-units were defined as a main verb clause and any subordinate clauses. Grammatical clauses were defined as complete verbs with their subjects and subordinating or coordinating conjunctions if appropriate. If a group of words was functionally a clause in a sentence but lacked a major element such as a complete verb or an appropriate subordinate conjunction, it was counted as a
Relationships Possessions Issues Self Miscellaneous
semantic clause.
Five types of information were counted: total words, total sentences defined orthographically, total t-units, total grammatically correct clauses, and total semantic clauses. From these counts, several measures of syntactic complexity could be computed. Content Analysis. In the first three and last three entries written by the deaf students, the journals were coded using a discourse analysis approach. The t-units of individual entries were coded for the identity of the writer, the sequence of the entry, the topic of the entry, and the maintenance of the topic across entries. The journals were topically coded using a system that focused on the nature of the relationship that was developing between the correspondents by coding for the initiation or maintenance
An entry was defined as anytime there was a change of writer and date. Teacher comments were not counted as
entries; only student writing was counted. T-units were counted in order to have an operational definition of a unit of communication.
Based on earlier experience with dialogue journal coding and contents analysis (Kluwin, Wismann-Horther, & Kelly, 1989), four general content types were defined: 1. Self-concerned topics were those in which the subject is the writer, the discourse function is a statement, and
the topics are events, activities, possessions, and self-concerns.
2. Other concerned topics were those in which the subject is the other writer and the topics are relation-
of topics, the type of topics written about, and the degree of interpersonal involvement of the two correspondents.
ships or issues or personal issues related to the correspondent. 3. Indeterminate topics were those which had a third-person subject and might not involve issues
The procedure only coded the writing of the deaf writer.
It coded for the location of the entry within the sequence of exchanges between the two writers, the discourse
related to the other writer.
function of the individual t-units of the entry, the subject of
4. Miscellaneous topics were generally related to greetings and closings.
the t-unit, and the topic. Two readers coded the journals. One reader was a deaf, native user of ASL who was completing a master's degree in linguistics. The other reader was a hearing woman completing a master's degree in deaf education. The
The number of self-concerned and other concerned t-units
per entry were totalled for each deaf writer. A ratio reflecting a general sense of other-directedness was computed by dividing the number of other directed t-units per entry by the number of other directed t-units and die number of self-concerned t-units per entry. This variable,
readers coded both the topical content and the syntactic complexity of the entries. Rater reliability was .908 based on Cronbach's alpha for the consistency of the readers
the ratio of the interest in the other writer to the total
across categories.
Vol. 136, No. 3
content, was called tone.
AAD
287
The Effectiveness of Dialogue Journal Writing
Figure 1. Number of Entries on the Basis of Participation 100
_c «0 Q.
'ü r (0
Q-
ω υ k-
φ
CL
Entry
Analysis
The dialogue journal exchange proces was not of equal
quenüy, these four types of relationships were used in the subsequent analysis. Rudimentary less than 5 entries
length for all of the corresponding pairs. The length of the relationships ranged from a single entry from each of the correspondents to relationships that ran to 46 entries from both participants. There are several clear breaking points for participation in the dialogue journal exchange process. The first major group consisted of the 31 corresponding pairs who between the two of them wrote five or fewer entries. Such a
A comparison of the four groups on the basis of age, sex, race, and degree of hearing loss of the deaf writer failed to detect any statistically significant difference among the four groups.
brief interchange represents only a rudimentary level of
The syntactic measures were factor analyzed to produce
contact since it means that at most the subjects could have only responded to each other's initial personal descriptions. The next breaking point came at 10 entries. Forty-six of the correspondent pairs had 10 or fewer entries. The gap between five and 10 entries means that a relationship is barely beginning. The length of a relationship is not that much more extended for 15 entries than for 10, but by the 15th entry, another quarter of the correspondences had ended, that is 38 pairs of writers. The long relationships were more than 15 entries and represent the last 38 pairs of writers. At more than 15 entries, each writer has had the
three factors measuring features of language length or complexity in the dialogue journal entries. Factor 1 is a measure of sentence length in that it consists primarily of the number of words per sentence, number of clauses per sentence, and the number of t-units per sentence. It is also a measure of sentence complexity in that it contains two measures of syntactic complexity. Factor 2 is a measure of entry length because it consists of the number of words, sentences, and t-units per entry. Factor 3 is a measure of clause complexity consisting of the number of words per clause, the number of words per t-unit, and the negative loading for number of erroneous 288
Brief Moderate Long
opportunity to get past basic introductory information and
begun to ask substantive questions if they wish to. Conse-
AAD
Vol. 136, No. 3
5 to 10 entries 11 to 15 entries more than 15 entries
The Effectiveness of Dialogue Journal Writing
Table 3. Repeated Measures Analysis of Variance
Table 2. Factor Analysis of Dialogue Journal Syntactic Codes Factor 1 # Words # Sentences # T-units
Words per sentence Words per clause Words per t-unit Clauses per sentence Clauses pert-unit T-units per sentence Percent incorrect clauses
Factor 2 Factor 3
.0714 .1743
.9610 .9589
.0475 .9729 .0089 .0832 .9905
.9885 .0209 .1292 .1625 -.0403
.1388 .9749 .0900
-.0016 -.0400 .0160
.2275 .0463 -.0045
DF
MS
Within Cells Effects Within Cells
235
.81
1
5.08
Length of relationship
.2108 .8595 .9069 -.1006 .1476
Point in relationship
1
.02
Length χ Point
1
1.69
6.26 .02 2.08
.013 .875 .151
.07 .29 .63 .12
.791 .593 .427
Between Cells Effects (Average effects) Within Cells
-.1261 -.6303
235
1.09
Type of Measure Length χ Measure
1 1
.08 .31
Point χ Measure
1
.69
Three way interaction
1
.13
.732
complexity and to the final tone of the relationship. Put
clause structures. The measure of syntactic complexity used in the subsequent analysis was Factor 1, the measure of sentence length and complexity since Factor 2 was a fluency measure and Factor 3 was a more specific measure of clause quality rather than overall sentence quality. A multivariate analysis of variance was computed for the two measures of journal entry quality: sentence complexity and tone. The two factors used were the length of the relationship and the point in the exchange. Length of relationship was described above as rudimentary, brief, moderate, or long. The dialogue journals where only rudimentary relationships developed were not included in this analysis because the beginning and ending of the relationship were the same point. Point in the exchange was defined as the first three entries written by the deaf writer and the last three entries written by the deaf writer. Which in the case of the rudimentary relationships included all of the material written by the deaf students. A repeated measures analysis of variance with 'a priori' contrasts to test the hypothesis that the group that had the longest relationship was different from the other two was computed.
simply, the students who started out with more complex sentence structures ended up with even more complex sentence structures after writing longer than the other students. Tone of entry changed little for those who wrote briefly. For those who wrote only briefly, their initial entries were more self-centered at the start and became more so
throughout the exchange. Those who wrote for a moderate length of time began with a greater interest in the other
person than those who wrote only briefly, but their later exchanges became more self-centered. The students who wrote the longest were initially the most "other oriented" and their entries became even more other oriented as the
relationship went on. The results suggest that in order to improve writing
quality in a dialogue journal exchange, a long-term relationship must be maintained. To ensure a long-term relationship, the correspondents must express an interest in each other.
Some teachers reported that mutual antagonism or high levels of discomfort led to a less successful project. Factors that teachers identified as reducing positive reactions were the mismatching of students, the maturity levels of devel-
In a model where the between cells effects take account
of the 'a priori' contrast, the F value for the interaction between length of relationship and type of measure is statistically significant. All of the other effects are not significant. For the longest relationships, there was a dramatic increase in sentence complexity and a change in the tone of the relationships toward more interest in the other person. For the moderate length relationships, there was not appreciable change in sentence complexity but the tone became much less cordial. Brief relationships showed little change for any measure. This is the interaction that the 'a priori' contrast detected. Several things can be seen in Figure 2 above which are supported by the ANOVA in Table 3. The eventual length of the relationship was related to the initial sentence Vol. 136, No. 3
Factor
opmental stages on either side, patronizing attitudes on the part of the hearing students, and inexperience with doing personal writing. Teachers reported that positive reactions were associated with the students' discovery of freedom to write what they wished, an expansion of their horizons, and an opportunity to write to a specific purpose.
Our project involving the exchange of dialogue journals between deaf and hearing peers showed promise for improving the writing skills of deaf students. Even over the
space of a single year, there was a demonstrable improvement in the sentence complexity of some of the deaf students. While having benefits for the deaf writers, dialogue journal exchanges between deaf and hearing students are not without some limitations and hazards. The
AAD
289
The Effectiveness of Dialogue Journal Writing
Figure 2.
Cell Means for Analysis of Variance, Language Complexity, and Tone of Entry Measures 0.4
Beginning Sentence Complexity 0.3 H
Ending Sentence Complexity Beginning Tone of Entry ——— Ending Tone of Entry
(U
0.2 H
O O
W Ό CO ■σ c CO
o.H
(f)
o.o H
-αϊ H
-0.2 Brief
Moderate
Long
Length of Relationship
ers, a "language gap" problem was identified and strategies for coping with it were discussed. The response of the teachers to situations where students would have difficulty understanding each other was to use a "conversational
results were not clear cut in that not all students benefitted
equally from the experience; nor were all students and teachers equally positive about the outcomes.
approach." If one writer did not understand the other, the
Conclusion
teacher would encourage that writer to ask more questions to clarify what the first writer had meant. This approach, based on teacher feedback, was generally successful. However, extreme differences such as deaf adolescents who cannot write coherent sentences within organized
There appear to be some pre-conditions for success. Particularly, the deaf students need some sort of minimal
writing level to begin with; both students must have a basic interest in other people; and the project should not be physically burdensome to the participants. Consequently,
paragraphs exchanging journals with peers who write on or near grade level should be avoided. This leads to the second recommendation for implementing such a system in a school: developing simple assessment devices for identifying compatible pairs. It is
future work with this kind of a system should:
1. emphasize the identification of the minimal skill levels required; 2. develop simple ways for assessing the suitability of students who might participate; and 3. facilitate the smooth physical transfer of the dialogue journals between classrooms.
apparent from our data that longer exchanges result in more desirable outcomes. Therefore, future work with this
kind of an exchange should focus on creating better matches between correspondents. Based on feedback
One way to consider minimal writing skills is to consider
questionnaires from both students and teachers, schools
the mismatch in syntactic complexity between the correspondents. Since the very youngest of the writers enjoyed the process as much as the oldest writers, minimal skill should be interpreted as the difference between the two correspondents. Based on early discussions with the teach290
that made a greater effort to match compatible individuals
reported more positive student responses. Such interest inventories could reflect the four general topic categories described earlier. In addition, open-ended questions such
AAD
Vol. 136, No. 3
The Effectiveness of Dialogue Journal Writing
Gutstein, S. P., Baterman, H., Harmatz-Levin, C, Kreeft, J., & Meloni, C. (1983, March). Using REAL Englkh: Writing a
as, "If I had a free Saturday morning, I would spend it..." or "If I weren't in school, I would be..." might elicit information about likely correspondents. A third recommendation would be that attention be paid to the physical and administrative aspects of the project before beginning it. When the project is successful, the students want rapid turnaround. They want to see what their partner wrote as soon as possible. Some considerations in promoting such a program are: 1. a cooperative and supportive general education administration including a supportive English department chairperson where applicable; 2. free time in the general education curriculum to allow participation; and 3. physical proximity or ease of movement between participating classes. If the school administration is not actively supportive of the deaf education program, and if there is not enough time in the general education curriculum to allow free writing, and if it is physically difficult to move from the deaf education area to the general education area, the project will not be
dialogue journal Paper presented at the Seventeenth Annual TESOL Convention, Toronto, Canada. Hakuta, K. (1976). Becoming bilingual: A case study of aJapanese child learning English as a second language. Language learning, 26, 321-351. Kluwin, T., Wismann-Horther, L., & Kelly, A. B. (1989, March). The
development of relationships between young deaf and hearing writers sharing journak. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association, San Francisco.
Kluwin, T, & Kelly, A. B. (1990). Application ofaprocess oriented
writing program for hearing impaired students in public schook (Final Project Report, Office of Special Education and Rehabilitation Services Grant #G008730147). Washington, DC: Gallaudet University.
Kreeft, J., Shuy, R., Staton, ]., Reed, L., & Morroy, R. (1984, December). Dialogue writing: Analysis of student-teacher interactive writing in the learning of English as a second
language (Final Project Report, National Institutes of Education Grant No. NIE-G-83-0030). Washington, DC: Center for Applied Linguistics. Labov, W. (1969). Contraction, deletion, and the inherent variabil-
rewarding.
Dialogue journal exchanges between deaf and hearing peers in local school programs holds promise both as a tool for improving the writing skills of the deaf students and for promoting greater understanding between deaf and hearing peers. Careful planning prior to beginning such a program as well as continued research into the appropriateness of the procedure will enhance its usefulness in the
ity of the English copula. Language, 45, 715-762. Larsen-Freeman, D. (197Θ. An explanation for the morpheme acquisition order of second language learners. Language Learning, 26, 125-134.
Peyton, J. K. (1986). Dialogue journal writing and the acquisition of English grammatical morphology (Tech. Rep.). Washington, DC: Center for Applied Linguistics.
Peyton, J. K., & Seyoum, M. (1989). The effect of teacher strategies
future.
on students' interactive writing: The case of dialogue journals. Research in the Teaching of English, 23, 3. Staton, J. (1980). Writing and counseling: Usinga dialogue journal. Language Arts, 57, 514-518. Staton, J. (1984). Student attitudes toward dialogue journak
References Bailes, C, Searls, S., Slobodzian, J., & Staton, J. (1986). It's your turn now! Washington, DC: Gallaudet University. Brown, R. (1973). A first language: The early stages. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, de Villiers, J. G., & de Villiers, P. A. (1973). A cross-sectional study of the acquisition of grammatical morphemes in child speech. Journal of Psycholinguktic Research, 2, 267-78.
(Dialogue Journal Project, Report #3) Washington, DC: Gallaudet College, Linguistics Research Laboratory. Walworth, M. (1985). Dialogue journals and the teaching of reading. Teaching Englkh to Deaf and Second Language Students, 3 (D, 21-25.
Yinger, R. (1985) Journal writing as a learning tool. Volta Review, 87, 5, 21-33.
Vol. 136, No. 3
AAD
291
For additional information about this article https://muse.jhu.edu/article/385072/summary
Access provided at 6 Jan 2020 23:19 GMT from Linköpings universitet
The Effectiveness of Dialogue Journal Writing in Improving the Writing Skills of Young Deaf Writers Thomas N. Kluwin and Arlene Blumenthal Kelly Various claims have been made for the usefulness of dialogue journal writing for improving the writing of less proficient users of English such as deaf writers of English or speakers of English as a second language. However, the bulk of the research has focussed on either student attitudes towards writing or very limited
samples of student writing. In a one year project involving the exchange of dialogue journals between 204 pairs of deaf and hearing students in 10 public school districts, the authors sought to evaluate the utility of dialogue journals for improving the writing skills of the deaf writers. The age of the correspondents ranged from 10 to 18 years old in grades 4 through 12. Among the deaf writers, the average hearing loss was 89 dB in the better ear with a range of from 45 dB to 120 dB. The journal entries of 153 of the deaf students were evaluated for both changes in content and syntactic complexity. When the pair of writers maintained a relationship over time,
there was an improvement in the quality of the writing of the deaf student and a change In the nature of the contents of the deaf student's entries. Results suggest that for some young deaf writers an exchange of dialogue journals with hearing
peers can both, improve the writing skills of the deaf writer and develop a relationship between the correspondents. Suggestions for implementing such a program are included. â– arious claims have been made for the
• an emphasis on either "real" or student selected or "familiar" topics;
Vibeneficial results of writing dialogue
journals, particularly in the writing of deaf students or other students with limited English proficiency (Gutstein, Baterman, Harmatz-Levin, Kreeft, & Meloni, 1983; Peyton
• a focus on meaning over formalism;
• writing to a specific audience; • a non-evaluative, private, or non-threatening cli
& Seyoum, 1989); but the results have not been established
mate; and • individualized feedback from the instructor.
across a large group of writers at one time (Yinger, 1985; Walworth, 1985; Peyton & Seyoum, 1989). The claimed benefits for dialogue journal writing include:
There has been some occasional mention of "modeling" correct forms, but this has not been stressed to any great deal (Kreeft, Shuy, Staton, Reed, & Morroy, 1984). Another general claim that has been made for journal writing is that it will produce greater fluency or a more positive attitude towards writing as seen in greater fluency (Kreeft et al., 1984). In other words, dialogue journal writing alone is seen as somehow improving the writer's attitude toward
Dr. Kluwin k a professor in the Department of Educational Foundations and Research and a research scientist in the
Center for Studies in Education and Human Development (CSEHD) at Gallaudet University. Arlene B. Kelly k a master's degree candidate in the Department of Linguktics and a research technician in CSEHD at Gallaudet University.
284
AAD
Vol. 136, No. 3
The Effectiveness of Dialogue Journal Writing
the writing situation. In this view, the greater willingness to
The bulk of the literature on dialogue journal writing is devoted to articles and books on how to do dialogue journal writing or on the supposed benefits of the process.
discussion of teachers adjusting their language levels to the skills of the students. However, overt teacher language behavior does not appear to be effective as Peyton and Seyoum (1989) would suggest in their study of teaching behaviors which facilitate dialogues. The current practice is for teachers to remain non-directive in order to promote interaction. Such a strategy would not appear to provide much weight to an argument for teachers providing systematic syntactic information. Frequency of input to the learner would be a possible explanation for changes in language skill from dialogue journal writing. Teachers who partici-
There is little substantive research on whether or not the
pated in an earlier study with us (Kluwin & Kelly, 1990)
process of dialogue journal writing does in fact change the writing skills of participants. For example, in one of the largest studies (Kreeft et al., 1984) only she students' work was studied out of a much larger pool of subjects. Other times only a single journal has been studied (Walworth,
reported that the deaf students began to use more "collo-
write is seen as a benefit in and of itself. Staton (1980) has
summarized dialogue journal writing as self-generated, interactive, cumulative, conversational, and functional. In none of these claims is any attempt made to direcüy link dialogue journal writing with improvements in the written product, although much is made of changes in the writing process.
quial" English expressions after writing to hearing peers. However, given the relatively short length of many interactions, (Kluwin & Kelly, 1990), it would be difficult to differentiate between simple maturation and frequent
1985).
input Finally, as Peyton (1986) remarks "morpheme sa-
The information on the process of dialogue journal writing is more extensive in its population base than the work on evaluating its specific outcomes (Bailes, Searls,
lience" is not a viable explanation for language change on the level of dialogue journal writing because of the larger units of language involved in the process. Earlier attempts to validate the use of dialogue journal writing as a device for improving the written language skills of less proficient users of English—deaf writers and speakers of English as a second language—may have failed because the researchers made inappropriate claims for the success of this method and because they selected inappropriate measures of success. Specifically, dialogue journal writing has been advocated on the basis of the claim that it will improve writing skills. However, the concept of "improved writing skills" has been left vague or simply ignored. Very seldom have any of the characteristics of writing, which are generally recognized as measures of quality, been used to evaluate dialogue journals in those rare instances where the process of writing dialogue journals has been evaluated in a formal fashion. The purpose of this study was to examine the claim that dialogue journal writing would improve the written English skills of a limited English proficiency population. To do this, we examined the dialogue journals shared by young hearing and deaf writers. We chose to vary the usual procedure of a dialogue between a teacher and student because we accepted the legitimacy of the arguments that dialogue journal writing provided access to a "realistic"
Slobodzian, & Staton, 1986; Walworth, 1985; Yinger, 1985). For example, Staton (1984) examined student attitudes toward dialogue journals. Her sample consisted of 182 deaf college age students who responded to a 22-item attitude questionnaire. Of the 10 statements with which 70% or more of the students agreed, 8 involved aspects of the student-teacher relationship. Less positive opinions (50%
to 60% agreement) were expressed for statements about the utility of the project in improving writing skill. The teachers who employed journal writing were uniformly positive about it. Staton elsewhere (Bailes et al., 1986) suggests that dialogue journal writing is a self-selection process for teachers which would account for the more positive teacher attitudes reported in her earlier research.
In one of the few studies using a measure of change in writing skill through the use of dialogue journals, Peyton
(1986) mentions three factors often cited for language change in oral language:
1. semantic and syntactic complexity of the input (Brown, 1973; de Villiers & de Villiers, 1973);
2. frequency of occurrence in the input to the learner (Larsen-Freeman, 1976); and 3. perceptual salience of a morpheme in the input (Hakuta, 1976; Labov, 1969). However, it is difficult to reconcile these explanations of possible language change with the other claims made for dialogue journal writing. The logical choice would be
writing situation in a non-evaluative context, thus encour-
aging students to be more willing to write. Peers writing back and forth to each other seemed to be a less artificial
situation than the usual exchange between teacher and student and should provide an even more stimulating context for writing. Further, by using hearing and deaf peers with similar experiences—attending a local public school and living at home—we could provide a situation in which familiarity and newness would be combined to encourage even more communication. Such an exchange of dialogue journals between peers was intended:
semantic and syntactic complexity as an explanation for changes in writing skill, that is, there would be a normal language development process followed in which the
dialogue journal writing would provide the opportunity to access correct forms. In some of the descriptions of the dialogue journal writing process provided by other researchers (Peyton, 1986; Walworth, 1985), there is some Vol. 136, No. 3
AAD
285
The Effectiveness of Dialogue Journal Writing
1. to increase the written fluency of the deaf writer; 2. to expose the deaf writer to written English through a hearing peer; 3. to encourage a sense of audience in both the young
interests, writing ability, and general ability. However, the
age and gender of the writers were by far the most widely cited criteria for matching students. In the elementary grades, same-sex matching was the preferred arrangement. In high school classes, both same-sex and cross-sex pairs
writers; and
4. to provide an opportunity for both writers to explore
were formed.
a relationship with someone whose experiences will be both similar and radically different. Since we would be pairing hearing peers with no formal
Exclusion of some deaf students was done primarily on the basis of their writing ability, that is, the teacher of the deaf felt that it was too low. Pragmatic reasons such as schedule changes, students moving away, and failure to get parental permission were the next most frequent reasons for not including a deaf student. In general, blind matches were done, but in one instance a group meeting was held and students picked each other. Face-to-face contact occurred at some point in the process, but the timing and formality of this encounter varied. End of the semester pizza parties were a common solution to the desire to become acquainted.
language improvement agenda with deaf peers, and since previous research had failed to esublish the utility of
dialogue journal writing in promoting changes in language skill, we anticipated no significant improvement in syntactic skills. However, if dialogue journal writing is a process which promotes an interest in writing as an activity, we expected to see a change in the nature of the content. Method
Three-fourths of the teachers had the deaf students write
the first entry. The teachers usually were able to get the process rolling by supplying only the initial topic. After the initial topic suggestion, the students were able to keep up
Project Narrative
We conducted a one-year project involving 204 pairs of deaf and hearing students in 10 cities across the United States to implement and evaluate a dialogue journal program in which deaf and hearing peers would write back and forth to each other. Our project involved a written dialogue between two young people. It was not a dialogue with a teacher, but rather an exchange of interests, feelings, ideas, and experiences with an age.mate. It was personal and reflective writing which included narrations, explanations, and descriptions which were written at the language and interest level of the two young people involved. In our project, the role of the teacher was to encourage
the communication on their own. Less than half of the
teachers had to provide help to some students with topics after the first entry. The general reaction was that the dialogue journal exchange process was a self-sustaining activity once the exchange had been started properly. Sometimes topic suggestions were necessary, but regular involvement by the teacher other than monitoring the process was not.
The largest problem the teachers encountered in the
entire dialogue journal exchange process was in getting the journals from one classroom to another. One teacher reported that it would become quite chaotic once the students had finished. They all wanted to get the dialogue journals over to the other class so they could get them back again. The physical location of the corresponding classrooms could be a problem since the physical act of moving the dialogue journals from one location in the building to
the students to write and to provide opportunities for them to write and to share each others' writing. Rather than being a participant, the teacher was a monitor of the communication. Once the students began the process of writing to each other, the teacher did not participate directly in the process. This project took place during a single school year. The teachers of the deaf selected a person who was already known to them to be cooperative with the deaf program as the teacher of the class of hearing children with whom the exchange would take place. About half of the teachers of the deaf had had personal experience working with the individual. A default option was to use a class that some of the deaf students were mainstreamed into. Unfortunately, the feedback from the teachers revealed that very pragmatic reasons would often condition the selection process. For example, the right number of hearing students in a convenient class often decided who would participate. The majority of the teachers had no specific criteria for matching the deaf and hearing students. When a criterion was used, the most frequendy used criterion for matching
another was burdensome. At the end of the year or at the
end of the semester if the classes changed at mid-year, the completed journals were sent to the research team for evaluation.
Sample Two hundred and four deaf students exchanged dia-
logue journals with hearing peers. Of these 204 students, 153 journals were available for analysis. Twenty-seven journals were not analyzed because of frequent changes in the hearing correspondent which did not permit a relationship to develop between correspondents; 7 journals were not analyzed because frequent absences of the hearing correspondents did not permit the system to function; 17 journals were unreadable by the research team; 1 dialogue
correspondents was the sex of the writers. Additional but not universal criteria were the age of the writers, common
286
AAD
Vol. 136, No. 3
The Effectiveness of Dialogue Journal Writing
was terminated by a teacher because of the content of the Table 1. Journal Content Coding System
entries.
The average age of the correspondents was 13 and a half with a range of from 10 to 18 years old About one-third of the correspondents were in grades 4 through 6, one-third in grades 7 through 9, and one-third in grades 10 through 12. Among the deaf writers, the average hearing loss was 89 dB in the better ear with a range of from 45 dB to 120 dB. Only the entries written by the deaf students are included in this analysis.
CATEGORIES: Discourse Function
Salutation Question Declarative
Greetings, closings Direct question Request for information Statement involving new topic
Subject First Second Third
Instrumentation
Syntactic Analysis. Counts were made of the number of
words, the number of sentences, the number of clauses, both grammatical and ungrammatical, and the number of t-units in the first three and last three entries written by the
Writer talks about himself/herself
Writer refers to other correspondent Neither writer nor other correspondent
Topic Events
deaf student. Words and sentences were defined ortho-
Activities
graphically while t-units were defined as a main verb clause and any subordinate clauses. Grammatical clauses were defined as complete verbs with their subjects and subordinating or coordinating conjunctions if appropriate. If a group of words was functionally a clause in a sentence but lacked a major element such as a complete verb or an appropriate subordinate conjunction, it was counted as a
Relationships Possessions Issues Self Miscellaneous
semantic clause.
Five types of information were counted: total words, total sentences defined orthographically, total t-units, total grammatically correct clauses, and total semantic clauses. From these counts, several measures of syntactic complexity could be computed. Content Analysis. In the first three and last three entries written by the deaf students, the journals were coded using a discourse analysis approach. The t-units of individual entries were coded for the identity of the writer, the sequence of the entry, the topic of the entry, and the maintenance of the topic across entries. The journals were topically coded using a system that focused on the nature of the relationship that was developing between the correspondents by coding for the initiation or maintenance
An entry was defined as anytime there was a change of writer and date. Teacher comments were not counted as
entries; only student writing was counted. T-units were counted in order to have an operational definition of a unit of communication.
Based on earlier experience with dialogue journal coding and contents analysis (Kluwin, Wismann-Horther, & Kelly, 1989), four general content types were defined: 1. Self-concerned topics were those in which the subject is the writer, the discourse function is a statement, and
the topics are events, activities, possessions, and self-concerns.
2. Other concerned topics were those in which the subject is the other writer and the topics are relation-
of topics, the type of topics written about, and the degree of interpersonal involvement of the two correspondents.
ships or issues or personal issues related to the correspondent. 3. Indeterminate topics were those which had a third-person subject and might not involve issues
The procedure only coded the writing of the deaf writer.
It coded for the location of the entry within the sequence of exchanges between the two writers, the discourse
related to the other writer.
function of the individual t-units of the entry, the subject of
4. Miscellaneous topics were generally related to greetings and closings.
the t-unit, and the topic. Two readers coded the journals. One reader was a deaf, native user of ASL who was completing a master's degree in linguistics. The other reader was a hearing woman completing a master's degree in deaf education. The
The number of self-concerned and other concerned t-units
per entry were totalled for each deaf writer. A ratio reflecting a general sense of other-directedness was computed by dividing the number of other directed t-units per entry by the number of other directed t-units and die number of self-concerned t-units per entry. This variable,
readers coded both the topical content and the syntactic complexity of the entries. Rater reliability was .908 based on Cronbach's alpha for the consistency of the readers
the ratio of the interest in the other writer to the total
across categories.
Vol. 136, No. 3
content, was called tone.
AAD
287
The Effectiveness of Dialogue Journal Writing
Figure 1. Number of Entries on the Basis of Participation 100
_c «0 Q.
'ü r (0
Q-
ω υ k-
φ
CL
Entry
Analysis
The dialogue journal exchange proces was not of equal
quenüy, these four types of relationships were used in the subsequent analysis. Rudimentary less than 5 entries
length for all of the corresponding pairs. The length of the relationships ranged from a single entry from each of the correspondents to relationships that ran to 46 entries from both participants. There are several clear breaking points for participation in the dialogue journal exchange process. The first major group consisted of the 31 corresponding pairs who between the two of them wrote five or fewer entries. Such a
A comparison of the four groups on the basis of age, sex, race, and degree of hearing loss of the deaf writer failed to detect any statistically significant difference among the four groups.
brief interchange represents only a rudimentary level of
The syntactic measures were factor analyzed to produce
contact since it means that at most the subjects could have only responded to each other's initial personal descriptions. The next breaking point came at 10 entries. Forty-six of the correspondent pairs had 10 or fewer entries. The gap between five and 10 entries means that a relationship is barely beginning. The length of a relationship is not that much more extended for 15 entries than for 10, but by the 15th entry, another quarter of the correspondences had ended, that is 38 pairs of writers. The long relationships were more than 15 entries and represent the last 38 pairs of writers. At more than 15 entries, each writer has had the
three factors measuring features of language length or complexity in the dialogue journal entries. Factor 1 is a measure of sentence length in that it consists primarily of the number of words per sentence, number of clauses per sentence, and the number of t-units per sentence. It is also a measure of sentence complexity in that it contains two measures of syntactic complexity. Factor 2 is a measure of entry length because it consists of the number of words, sentences, and t-units per entry. Factor 3 is a measure of clause complexity consisting of the number of words per clause, the number of words per t-unit, and the negative loading for number of erroneous 288
Brief Moderate Long
opportunity to get past basic introductory information and
begun to ask substantive questions if they wish to. Conse-
AAD
Vol. 136, No. 3
5 to 10 entries 11 to 15 entries more than 15 entries
The Effectiveness of Dialogue Journal Writing
Table 3. Repeated Measures Analysis of Variance
Table 2. Factor Analysis of Dialogue Journal Syntactic Codes Factor 1 # Words # Sentences # T-units
Words per sentence Words per clause Words per t-unit Clauses per sentence Clauses pert-unit T-units per sentence Percent incorrect clauses
Factor 2 Factor 3
.0714 .1743
.9610 .9589
.0475 .9729 .0089 .0832 .9905
.9885 .0209 .1292 .1625 -.0403
.1388 .9749 .0900
-.0016 -.0400 .0160
.2275 .0463 -.0045
DF
MS
Within Cells Effects Within Cells
235
.81
1
5.08
Length of relationship
.2108 .8595 .9069 -.1006 .1476
Point in relationship
1
.02
Length χ Point
1
1.69
6.26 .02 2.08
.013 .875 .151
.07 .29 .63 .12
.791 .593 .427
Between Cells Effects (Average effects) Within Cells
-.1261 -.6303
235
1.09
Type of Measure Length χ Measure
1 1
.08 .31
Point χ Measure
1
.69
Three way interaction
1
.13
.732
complexity and to the final tone of the relationship. Put
clause structures. The measure of syntactic complexity used in the subsequent analysis was Factor 1, the measure of sentence length and complexity since Factor 2 was a fluency measure and Factor 3 was a more specific measure of clause quality rather than overall sentence quality. A multivariate analysis of variance was computed for the two measures of journal entry quality: sentence complexity and tone. The two factors used were the length of the relationship and the point in the exchange. Length of relationship was described above as rudimentary, brief, moderate, or long. The dialogue journals where only rudimentary relationships developed were not included in this analysis because the beginning and ending of the relationship were the same point. Point in the exchange was defined as the first three entries written by the deaf writer and the last three entries written by the deaf writer. Which in the case of the rudimentary relationships included all of the material written by the deaf students. A repeated measures analysis of variance with 'a priori' contrasts to test the hypothesis that the group that had the longest relationship was different from the other two was computed.
simply, the students who started out with more complex sentence structures ended up with even more complex sentence structures after writing longer than the other students. Tone of entry changed little for those who wrote briefly. For those who wrote only briefly, their initial entries were more self-centered at the start and became more so
throughout the exchange. Those who wrote for a moderate length of time began with a greater interest in the other
person than those who wrote only briefly, but their later exchanges became more self-centered. The students who wrote the longest were initially the most "other oriented" and their entries became even more other oriented as the
relationship went on. The results suggest that in order to improve writing
quality in a dialogue journal exchange, a long-term relationship must be maintained. To ensure a long-term relationship, the correspondents must express an interest in each other.
Some teachers reported that mutual antagonism or high levels of discomfort led to a less successful project. Factors that teachers identified as reducing positive reactions were the mismatching of students, the maturity levels of devel-
In a model where the between cells effects take account
of the 'a priori' contrast, the F value for the interaction between length of relationship and type of measure is statistically significant. All of the other effects are not significant. For the longest relationships, there was a dramatic increase in sentence complexity and a change in the tone of the relationships toward more interest in the other person. For the moderate length relationships, there was not appreciable change in sentence complexity but the tone became much less cordial. Brief relationships showed little change for any measure. This is the interaction that the 'a priori' contrast detected. Several things can be seen in Figure 2 above which are supported by the ANOVA in Table 3. The eventual length of the relationship was related to the initial sentence Vol. 136, No. 3
Factor
opmental stages on either side, patronizing attitudes on the part of the hearing students, and inexperience with doing personal writing. Teachers reported that positive reactions were associated with the students' discovery of freedom to write what they wished, an expansion of their horizons, and an opportunity to write to a specific purpose.
Our project involving the exchange of dialogue journals between deaf and hearing peers showed promise for improving the writing skills of deaf students. Even over the
space of a single year, there was a demonstrable improvement in the sentence complexity of some of the deaf students. While having benefits for the deaf writers, dialogue journal exchanges between deaf and hearing students are not without some limitations and hazards. The
AAD
289
The Effectiveness of Dialogue Journal Writing
Figure 2.
Cell Means for Analysis of Variance, Language Complexity, and Tone of Entry Measures 0.4
Beginning Sentence Complexity 0.3 H
Ending Sentence Complexity Beginning Tone of Entry ——— Ending Tone of Entry
(U
0.2 H
O O
W Ό CO ■σ c CO
o.H
(f)
o.o H
-αϊ H
-0.2 Brief
Moderate
Long
Length of Relationship
ers, a "language gap" problem was identified and strategies for coping with it were discussed. The response of the teachers to situations where students would have difficulty understanding each other was to use a "conversational
results were not clear cut in that not all students benefitted
equally from the experience; nor were all students and teachers equally positive about the outcomes.
approach." If one writer did not understand the other, the
Conclusion
teacher would encourage that writer to ask more questions to clarify what the first writer had meant. This approach, based on teacher feedback, was generally successful. However, extreme differences such as deaf adolescents who cannot write coherent sentences within organized
There appear to be some pre-conditions for success. Particularly, the deaf students need some sort of minimal
writing level to begin with; both students must have a basic interest in other people; and the project should not be physically burdensome to the participants. Consequently,
paragraphs exchanging journals with peers who write on or near grade level should be avoided. This leads to the second recommendation for implementing such a system in a school: developing simple assessment devices for identifying compatible pairs. It is
future work with this kind of a system should:
1. emphasize the identification of the minimal skill levels required; 2. develop simple ways for assessing the suitability of students who might participate; and 3. facilitate the smooth physical transfer of the dialogue journals between classrooms.
apparent from our data that longer exchanges result in more desirable outcomes. Therefore, future work with this
kind of an exchange should focus on creating better matches between correspondents. Based on feedback
One way to consider minimal writing skills is to consider
questionnaires from both students and teachers, schools
the mismatch in syntactic complexity between the correspondents. Since the very youngest of the writers enjoyed the process as much as the oldest writers, minimal skill should be interpreted as the difference between the two correspondents. Based on early discussions with the teach290
that made a greater effort to match compatible individuals
reported more positive student responses. Such interest inventories could reflect the four general topic categories described earlier. In addition, open-ended questions such
AAD
Vol. 136, No. 3
The Effectiveness of Dialogue Journal Writing
Gutstein, S. P., Baterman, H., Harmatz-Levin, C, Kreeft, J., & Meloni, C. (1983, March). Using REAL Englkh: Writing a
as, "If I had a free Saturday morning, I would spend it..." or "If I weren't in school, I would be..." might elicit information about likely correspondents. A third recommendation would be that attention be paid to the physical and administrative aspects of the project before beginning it. When the project is successful, the students want rapid turnaround. They want to see what their partner wrote as soon as possible. Some considerations in promoting such a program are: 1. a cooperative and supportive general education administration including a supportive English department chairperson where applicable; 2. free time in the general education curriculum to allow participation; and 3. physical proximity or ease of movement between participating classes. If the school administration is not actively supportive of the deaf education program, and if there is not enough time in the general education curriculum to allow free writing, and if it is physically difficult to move from the deaf education area to the general education area, the project will not be
dialogue journal Paper presented at the Seventeenth Annual TESOL Convention, Toronto, Canada. Hakuta, K. (1976). Becoming bilingual: A case study of aJapanese child learning English as a second language. Language learning, 26, 321-351. Kluwin, T., Wismann-Horther, L., & Kelly, A. B. (1989, March). The
development of relationships between young deaf and hearing writers sharing journak. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association, San Francisco.
Kluwin, T, & Kelly, A. B. (1990). Application ofaprocess oriented
writing program for hearing impaired students in public schook (Final Project Report, Office of Special Education and Rehabilitation Services Grant #G008730147). Washington, DC: Gallaudet University.
Kreeft, J., Shuy, R., Staton, ]., Reed, L., & Morroy, R. (1984, December). Dialogue writing: Analysis of student-teacher interactive writing in the learning of English as a second
language (Final Project Report, National Institutes of Education Grant No. NIE-G-83-0030). Washington, DC: Center for Applied Linguistics. Labov, W. (1969). Contraction, deletion, and the inherent variabil-
rewarding.
Dialogue journal exchanges between deaf and hearing peers in local school programs holds promise both as a tool for improving the writing skills of the deaf students and for promoting greater understanding between deaf and hearing peers. Careful planning prior to beginning such a program as well as continued research into the appropriateness of the procedure will enhance its usefulness in the
ity of the English copula. Language, 45, 715-762. Larsen-Freeman, D. (197Θ. An explanation for the morpheme acquisition order of second language learners. Language Learning, 26, 125-134.
Peyton, J. K. (1986). Dialogue journal writing and the acquisition of English grammatical morphology (Tech. Rep.). Washington, DC: Center for Applied Linguistics.
Peyton, J. K., & Seyoum, M. (1989). The effect of teacher strategies
future.
on students' interactive writing: The case of dialogue journals. Research in the Teaching of English, 23, 3. Staton, J. (1980). Writing and counseling: Usinga dialogue journal. Language Arts, 57, 514-518. Staton, J. (1984). Student attitudes toward dialogue journak
References Bailes, C, Searls, S., Slobodzian, J., & Staton, J. (1986). It's your turn now! Washington, DC: Gallaudet University. Brown, R. (1973). A first language: The early stages. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, de Villiers, J. G., & de Villiers, P. A. (1973). A cross-sectional study of the acquisition of grammatical morphemes in child speech. Journal of Psycholinguktic Research, 2, 267-78.
(Dialogue Journal Project, Report #3) Washington, DC: Gallaudet College, Linguistics Research Laboratory. Walworth, M. (1985). Dialogue journals and the teaching of reading. Teaching Englkh to Deaf and Second Language Students, 3 (D, 21-25.
Yinger, R. (1985) Journal writing as a learning tool. Volta Review, 87, 5, 21-33.
Vol. 136, No. 3
AAD
291
