Blank interval as a sign in the process of appropriation of writing

This essay aims to put into debate the functions and importance of blank space or blank interval in children's literacy process, and understand their role as a sign in the process of appropriation of discursive enunciations. Arguments that question the strictly alphabetical nature of language and that are in opposition to the need of development of phonological awareness are presented. The article advocates the principle that there is a "screen thinking" culturally constructed by characters and signs, among which there are the blank intervals or the blank spaces. In order to show the creation of intervals without perceiving their functions, two figures collected from a book of a French school are analyzed. The arguments support the thesis that the child appropriates the discourse, and; therefore, the intervals gain important functions during the process of conceptualization of discursive units

literacy; reading; blank space; alphabetic writing.