El proceso cognitivo de estructurar el contenido en la composición escrita de alumnos de Educación Primaria

Abstract

In the framework of a cognitive model of written composition (flower y hayes, 1981), a qualitative research was developed, aimed to know the cognitive process of content structuring in written composition of elementary School students. for this purpose some questions were posed: 1) do the students structure content of their written text?; 2) what are operations they carry out and what are the strategies they apply in this process?; 3) what are the difficulties they find in these operations?; 4) do they know this process and are they able to regulate it? Adequate response to these questions was done, applying both a multiple case-study (14 subjects, 6 of them male and 8 female, aged from 10 to 12 years) and two research strategies: an in-depth interview, for collecting data, and a content analysis for gathering the content of text (transcript of interviews). for the purpose of classifying and interpreting the data some categories, derived from cognitive model, were applied: 1. General strategies for content structuring; 2. Specific strategies for content structuring; 2.1. Knowing text structure; 2.2. Applying text structure. The study has revealed the cognitive and meta-cognitive strategies these students apply in content structuring of their written text. generally, students organize the content of their text, although how do they make it is not so evident or clear. finally, in accordance with the results gained in this investigation, some proposals are drawn here for developing this cognitive ability.