A study examined the hypothesis that if young children are immersed in a social and psychological setting appropriate for language learning they can learn to write simply by writing. Placed in a supportive classroom environment, 24 first grade students were expected to communicate in writing in any way they could from their first day at school. Teachers encouraged children to find their own strategies to solve problems with spelling and other conventions of written English. They accepted all representations and responded to the meaning of the children's work, rather than to its form. An analysis of the written work, collected daily over an 8-month period, was conducted in terms of R. L. Gentry's developmental stages (precommunicative, semiphonetic, phonetic, and transitional). The results indicated that children can discover the writing system for themselves, and in so doing produce writing that is fluent and comprehensible. Over time, the children demonstrated increasing control over all aspects of the writing process. Each child's writing exhibited characteristics common to those of other young writers, yet each was unique. (Examples of children's writing are appended.) (HTH)