Why Can’t Tyrone Write: Reconceptualizing Flower and Hayes for African-American Adolescent Male Writers

Using qualitative methods and a case study design, the perceptions and writing processes of three African-American eighth grade males were explored. Data were derived from semi-structured and informal interviews; and document analysis. The study concluded that the perceptions of the three participants’ writing processes did not adhere to the steps depicted by the cognitive process model of writing (Flower and Hayes, 1981) that has become a dominant model for describing the composing processes of students. Recommendations are made for altering the Flower and Hayes model to depict how these three, African-American eighth graders perceive school writing