First‐graders' cognitive and strategic development in reading recovery reading and writing

Abstract The main purposes of the study were to investigate: (a) the development of two at‐risk students’ selected cognitions and strategies as they initially appeared in Reading Recovery reading and writing; and (b) whether such development was simultaneously evident in Reading Recovery reading and writing. The study employed case methodology. Main conclusions were: (a) In Reading Recovery reading and writing, the two boys demonstrated initial acquisition of cognitions and strategies in identical order, and the order could be characterized in three broad successions—Awakening to Print, Balancing Strategies with Concentrated Attention to Individual Visual Cues, and Homing in on the “Look” of the Whole Word. However, the boys differed in rate of acquisition of the cognitions and strategies, (b) There was a strong tendency toward initial emergence of cognitions and strategies in Reading Recovery writing before Reading Recovery reading.