[The initial stages of learning to write: age and socioeconomic differences].

OBJECTIVES Establishing similarities and differences between the performance of children from higher socioeconomic strata (4 and 5) attending kindergartens and those from low socioeconomic strata (1 and 2) concerning writing, notation, mode of production and style of speech. METHODS A set of initial and emergent writing assessment (IEWA) tasks were compared to evaluate three aspects of knowledge regarding writing with 223 children aged 3, 4 and 5 years of age from four kindergartens dealing with children from socioeconomic strata 4 and 5 (high ) and three kindergartens taking children from level 1 and 2 (low) in Bogotá. Performance was compared in terms of age and high and low strata. RESULTS Writing as notation was correlated with children's age; writing and speaking styles revealed differences between high and low strata and writing as a mode of production was correlated with age and socioeconomic status. CONCLUSIONS Writing as a style of discourse (notation) was richer in higher strata children and varied between kindergartens taking high strata children because of language comprehension being dealt with as a system. Such differences were due to children's unequal access to the significant meaning implicit in writing.