Peer collaboration in early reading and writing teaching

Language which is the source of the communication among individuals and societies has the most effective role for individuals to adapt to the environment in which they live. Language skills which enable individuals to think, interact and express themselves are the basic skills to be provided for individuals. Language skills are provided first in family then at school. In the school environment in which language skills are provided and first language is taught after family, the interactions which children form with their peers and teachers help their language skills improve. Reading and writing which are among the language skills which improve through social interaction starts with the early reading and writing teaching at primary school. Children develop the skills of perceiving the world in which they live and expressing their feelings and thoughts through writing. It is ensured that children learn their mother tongue, increase their acedemic success improving their language skills and become qualified literate individuals with the early reading and writing teaching which forms the basis of Turkish teaching. The interactions with peers which are formed by the children within the context of early reading and writing teaching at the first grade contribute not only their social skill improvement but also reading and writing skills. Performing activities based on peer collaboration for early reading and writing teaching helps children gain learning experiences in their own environment. In this context, main purpose of this study is to reveal how peer collaboration is formed in the process of early reading and writing teaching. The study is performed with the naturalistic inquiry approach which is one of the qualitative research approaches. The natural inquiry approach is adopted due to the fact that early reading and writing teaching is a long process spanning one school year and in order to observe precisely the peer collaboration which takes place in this period in its natural environment. The study was conducted with a first grade classroom at a primary school in Eskişehir in 2013-2014 school year. The participants of the study include the students who were the first graders of the school determined for the study, their parents and classroom teachers. In the study, the classroom teacher and parents. The data of the study have been gathered through observation. The observations are supported with the data from the interviews with the teacher, parents and students; fieldnotes and documents. Observation data and semi-structured interview data have been gathered through video recording and tape recording, respectively. The observation data and fieldnotes; and semi-structured interview data obtained from the study are analyzed through induction analysis and deductive analysis, respectively. The documents are considered to be the supportive data for the study. Three themes have been obtained from the data of the study as the peer collaboration; peer teaching among students and the attitude of the teacher who provides adult support towards peer collaboration. Certain results based on the research findings are as the following: • The students have performed peer collaboration in the form of helping each other most frequently. The peer collaboration which occurred either on request for help or without asking enhanced the communication among peers. • The students have found and helped their peers correct the mistakes in reading and writing within the scope of peer collaboration which occurred in the form of addressing a peer's mistakes. • Students have done the early reading and writing activities with their peers. In this form of peer collaboration, the students interacted with the students whom they consider to be close to themselves. • The students have interacted with each other observing the activities which were done by their friends. The peers observed the others' activities in order to compare themselves with their peers or when they really had difficulty. • The students have completed the assigned activities within the scope of the early reading and writing teaching by discussing and sharing their knowledge. They reconsidered the subjects which they misknew in consequence of their interactions with the peers. • The students have shared their belongings after and before literacy activities. This played an important role in preparing for the assigned tasks and taking responsibility in learning. • The students have performed peer collaboration bringing forward suggestions to each other in the activities. Among them were the providing additional information and suggestions on how different the shared activities could be performed. • In the study, within the scope of reading and writing of peer collaboration, the students have performed such activities as trying to read the written materials and correcting the mistakes done in dictation activities. • During the breaks, the students have performed such activities as getting their friends to read what they wrote on the board in breaks, expressing the mistakes in the words and taking the teacher role to get their friend to read and write on the board. • During the study, competitive and conflictive manners which prevent peer collaboration have occurred as well. The peers competed with each other in certain literacy activities. Moreover, sometimes, they were in disagreement and quarreled when in interaction. • Interactions based on peer teaching have occurred among peers. The peers with different levels performed peer learning and gained learning experience. Within the peer learning, the classroom teacher made some students with sufficient literacy level to take teacher role. • In the study, the classroom teacher did not include the activities which encouraged peer collaboration while he provided an efficient adult support. • The adult support in literacy teaching has been provided by the parents in home environment. They provided adult support helping the students with their homework. Key Words: Peer Collaboration, Early Reading and Writing Teaching, Sound-Based Clause Method, Turkish, Primary Education