Metacognitive Regulations, Peer Interactions and Revision of Narratives by Sixth-Graders

Abstract

This chapter concerns a study aimed at determining the effects of peer interactions on the regulation processes involved in narrative writing. The research is carried out in three sixth-grade classrooms (age 11–12 years) which have followed an instructional sequence designed to optimize processes of metacognitive regulation during narrative text production. The effects of two experimental conditions — (1) individual production, (2) dyadic production involving collaborative planning and revision of a joint text composed of individually drafted episodes — are compared with respect to the revisions introduced between the initial draft and the final text. Transfer effects from dyadic text production to subsequent individual text production are also analyzed. Relevant findings show that although more revisions are carried out during dyadic collaboration, this effect shows no transfer; on the other hand, the different types of revision observed under each condition do show significant transfer to individual production.