This article presents an analysis of ethnagraphic data from a first grade c
lassroom within which the social context for. literacy learning allowed bot
h the teacher and the students to come to know one another as interested an
d engaged partners in literacy learning. using Goffman's concept of the par
ticipation framework as a linguistic structure that organizes and is organi
zed by talk? and interaction, this article describes the role of the partic
ipation framework in mediating co-authorship in writing activity Specifical
ly, analysis of classroom discourse illustrates how the teacher and student
s shifted roles in the participation framework of writing activity among te
acher; author, co-author; and overhearer to facilitate the co-construction
of written texts. The purpose of this article is to show how one teacher ex
plicitly modeled her own authorship processes and how students took up thos
e processes in their own writing through shifts in participation roles.