Research on the writing of young beginning L2 writers over the last 25 years has been characterized by its consistent portrayal of these writers as capable, usually able to do more with writing than might be imagined. Unlike descriptions of the wrenching disruptions and loneliness of many teen L2 writers, the story of younger L2 writers has generally been hopeful, more often reporting success and increasing power, self-confidence, and flexibility in writing. (See, however, darker pictures of how schooling is experienced by young L2 learners in Toohey, 1998, 2000, and Hawkins, 2005, and the influence of school programs on beginning writers in Edelsky, 1996.)

Researchers of the 1980s were well aware of the differences between early L1 writing and early L2 writing among children. First, unlike L1 writers, L2 writers may have little oral language to draw upon in developing literacy, and thus are not and cannot be moving from oral to written forms in their writing development, an analysis often offered in discussing L1 beginning writers. The second significant potential difference is that L2 beginning readers and writers may already be literate to some degree in L1 and can therefore potentially rely partially on that literacy both to create texts and to advance their developing L2 literacy (Edelsky, 1986).