Abstract English title: The child´s conception of writing – a qualitative study of how pre-school children speaks about writing. Author: Elin Truks, spring term of 2017 Supervisor: Anna Malmbjer The aim of this essay is to describe how children speak about writing. I´ll also compare how children speak about their writing today compared to Dahlgren and Olssons studie from 1985. To achieve the aim have two questions been formulated: What is writing for pre-school children? Which similarities and differences is there today compared to Dahlgren and Olssons study from 1985? The study is based on interviews with eight pre-school children to get answers for the aim of this study. The questions for the interview has been proposed by Gösta Dahlgren, Karin Gustafsson, Elisabeth Mellgren och Lars-Erik Olsson (2013) which they have used for research purposes. The results showed that children in pre-school are aware about what writing is and can express it in a creative and detailed way. They have many conceptions of writing, what it is and for what purpose writing is used. The results also showed that pre-school children are at different levels in their writing development. Results showed that there are similarities and differences today compared to Dahlgren and Olssons study from 1985. The similarities showed that pre-school children describe reading and writing as a mental act (metacognition) and that they see possibilities of it. They mean that reading and writing can be used as a means of communication and they describe the reading and writing of the text based on the structure of it. They also express an external requirement as a motive of reading and writing. The differences showed that children in Dahlgren and Olssons study express reading as external observable behaviors and as a process expressed with their bodies. The pre-school children in my study speak about writing with digital tools. Keywords: pre-school pupils, writing, metacognition, conceptions of writing

The aim of this essay is to describe how students in third grade speak about writing. I want to investigate what ideas and awareness children has about writing. I want to compare the results from third grade with pre-school children. I also want to find out how it is in other countries and over time. To achieve the aim, have four questions been formulated: What is writing for children in third grade? What similarities and differences are there with children in other countries? Has there been any change regarding children´s conceptions of writing compared with a 1985 study? Has there been any development in children´s conceptions of writing between pre-school and third grade? The study is based on interviews with ten students in third grade to get answers for the aim of this study. The questions for the interview are from a previous study The Mind is Not a Black Box: Children´s Ideas about the writing Process where Nora Scheuer, Montserrat de la Cruz, Juan Ignacio Pozo, Maria Faustina Huarte and Graciela Sola (2006) used four questions with picture cards. Each card represents a child in the writing process (anticipating, writing, revising, rereading). The results showed that students in third grade have come further in their development and have a more complex knowledge of what writing is than pre-school children. The students in third grade can describe which cognitive processes they process when they write. The results also showed that students have been formed by the formal teaching. They describe writing based on the criteria’s school puts on them. Students in third grade want to develop a fully spoken text that meets the language requirements that school or adults place on them. The Portuguese children speak about a concern about cursive witch Swedish children don´t do. This is probably because cursive is not a requirement in the Swedish curriculum.