This is a study of classroom context and how it shapes children's beginning reading behaviors. Three first-grade children were observed and tape-recorded twice weekly during reading instruction for the first 10 weeks of school. Patterns of reading behaviors emerged through a constant comparison of conditions under which each of the behaviors occurred. The three children in this study learned to interpret the various classroom reading contexts and their responses reflected the conditions of each. The salient conditions included: (a) the instruction, (b) the implicit and explicit rules for functioning within that context, (c) the texts the children read, and (d) the physical and affective characteristics of the context. The differences in the contexts were often quite subtle, yet children followed instructional foci and read accordingly. It was evident that some behaviors occurred across contexts, whereas others did not. For example, children did not transfer many of the skills they were able to employ during the direct instructional settings to unguided reading time. Implications for theory and practice are offered to explain the reading behaviors of the young children.
