Building on previous ethnographic research on middle school students' reading and writing activities, a study examined the continuity and change in students' use of, control of, and access to reading and writing resources from kindergarten through grade 8 in an elementary school, a middle school, and the community. Reading and writing resources were defined as physical resources (pencils, pens, paper, books, and erasers) and linguistic task framework resources (the set of constraints on what and how something is read or written). Findings were reported in five major areas: the locus of reading and writing resources; reading and linguistic task framework resources; economic philosophies underlying gaining access to the resources; sex differences in the use of, control of, and access to those resources; and nonclassroom reading and writing resources. Among the findings were the following: (1) as students progressed from kindergarten to grade 8, the location of physical resources increasingly became the individual student, whereas the location of linguistic task framework resources remained with the teacher and the curriculum materials; (2) linguistic task framework resources were characterized by text reproduction, short text-based answers, and cataloging; (3) the economic philosophies inherent in the distribution of the resources were derived from school district policies and influenced by classroom management issues; (4) in the middle school grades, female students brought more supplies to school than male students; and (5) relatives and friends were the major sources of books. (HOD)