What does literacy look like in my community and why should I care?

Literacy comes in many forms and serves many purposes. It could be a novel to provide entertainment, a poster that holds information about an event, or a letter mailed to a loved one. These forms and purposes will vary across individuals and even across communities. I can see this when thinking about my own community and how it is different from others. The literacy in my community looks like books, journals, calendars, television shows, music, movies, advertising, social media, photographs, notes, signs, posters, and conversations. The purposes they serve include entertainment, providing information, organization, communication, reflection, reminding, and relaxation. It is important to think about what literacy looks like in your community because it allows us to consider how it differs from other communities and individuals. As teachers, we can use this information and understanding in order to provide our students with experiences that are meaningful and constructive based on what literacy looks like in their communities. We can also help our students to make connections between home and school by understanding the types of literacy they are surrounded by in their communities.

Language Learners

Language acquisition is an important and unique process for everyone. As teachers, we need to understand this in order to provide the best opportunities and support for our students throughout this process. Getting to know and understanding what our students know is an important job for teachers. We can then investigate further and discover the interests and preferences of our students. This information will provide us with what we need to individualize the opportunities and support for all of our students. Teachers also need to understand what it is like for children who are in the early stages of language development. It can be frustrating and discouraging to be in a classroom that does not account for your level of language ability. We need to be sure that we are not making students feel this way by providing appropriate activities and supports so that they can actively participate and engage. When we, as teachers, take all of these things into consideration, it equips us to be effective teachers who can contribute to our students' language development.

Literacy Journies: How We Learn to Read and Write

As teachers, our personal experiences with literacy will affect our attitudes toward literacy and the way we teach it to our students. Maybe we have meaningful and positive memories of learning to write, or negative and painful memories of struggling with reading. Whatever our past holds, it has influenced the way we think about literacy. It is important to reflect on our experiences and remember the process of learning to read and write so that we can better understand how to provide opportunities for our students to have meaningful and positive experiences with literacy. In Pat Johnson's and Katie Keier's book, Catching Readers Before They Fall: Supporting Readers Who Struggle, there is a huge emphasis on the importance of children's construction of a reading process system. This involves a network of literacy strategies that are integrated with and supportive of one another. Some examples of these strategies include predicting, visualizing, and synthesizing. When a collection of these strategies is obtained by a child, they can then integrate them to construct a reading process system that will serve them as proficient readers. Some may think that reading is simply the ability to accurately recognize sequences of letters as words, but it is much more complex than that. "Reading is making meaning" (Johnson & Keier, 2010, 15). Those who have successfully constructed a reading process system are able to read text fluently and make meaning out of the text. By understanding what a reading process system is and how we have personally constructed our own, we can provide opportunities for meaningful interaction with literacy that will best support our students' constructions of their own reading process systems.

Essential Early Literacy Teaching Strategies

In the article, "The Essentials of Early Literacy Instruction," there are 8 instructional strategies listed that have been linked through strong research to early literacy skills. Although this article may have intended these strategies to be used by teachers in the classroom, there is no reason that they could not be incorporated into a child's home life as well. I will list the strategies accompanied with a brief description and some examples of how each can be used by your family at home.


1. Rich teacher talk
          Although the word "teacher" is explicitly used in the title of this strategy, any adult could engage in rich conversation with children. The goals of this strategy are to provide new vocabulary, extend children's language by adding onto their ideas, discuss cognitively challenging content, and listen and respond to what children have to say.
          This could be done at practically any time within almost any context. Seek out opportunities to engage your child in rich and interesting conversation. It might be most productive to begin with your child's interests or an experience that your child enjoyed. Remember to highlight new vocabulary and emphasize the importance of description.

2. Storybook reading

          This strategy is simply reading aloud to your child. The goals are to expose children to numerous enjoyable types of literature, provide supportive conversations, and build familiarity with books by repeated readings.
          Perhaps your child already has some favorite books or stories, and these are great choices for read alouds. Another option is to take a trip to the library with your child to explore and choose books that you could read together.


3. Phonological awareness activities
          Phonological awareness refers to the awareness of the sounds of language. The goal of this strategy is to provide experiences and opportunities to increase children's awareness of these sounds.
          These experiences and opportunities include games, stories, songs, and poems that involve rhyme, alliteration, and sound matching.



4. Alphabet activities
          The goal of this strategy is to engage children with materials that promote and support the identification of letters of the alphabet.
          This can be done with ABC books, magnetic letters, alphabet blocks/puzzles/toys, and ABC charts.



5. Support for emergent reading
          This strategy means to encourage children to attempt to read books and other types of print.
          At home, this can be done with favorite books, repeated readings, environmental print, and any other print that your child is either familiar with or interested in.

6. Support for emergent writing
          The goal of this strategy is to encourage children to use emergent forms of writing, including scribbling, random letters, and invented spelling.
          This can be done by providing fun writing materials, shared writing demonstrations, and writing down what your child says as they watch. Let your child watch as you write down a grocery list and then ask for their help.

7. Shared book experience
          Though it sounds similar to storybook reading (strategy #3), this strategy focuses on introducing and drawing children's attention to the basic concepts of print. These include the distinction between pictures and text, proper reading directionality, and book concepts/parts.
          This can also be done using favorite books or stories in which you are reading aloud and pointing out these basic concepts.

8. Integrated, content-focused activities
          This strategy calls for providing opportunities for children to investigate interesting and engaging topics. The goal for this strategy is for children to use oral language, writing, and reading to learn about the world.
          Some ways to use this strategy are to collect informational books about a topic that your child is interested in. You can then read these books and help your child to gather more information about the topic through observation, experiments, and research. You can also encourage your child to record their observations and the information that you collect. Dramatic play is another in which your child can consolidate and express what they are learning.

Using these strategies at home is a great way to support and extend your child's literacy development and build connections between home and school.

To read this article and learn more about the implementation and benefits of these strategies, follow this link:
http://www.naeyc.org/files/yc/file/200303/Essentials.pdf

#Kinderchat: February 10, 2014 - Helping families and children in need (North America)

The topic for the #kinderchat archive that I decided to read was "Helping families and children in need". It was explained that these could be any type of needs. Some teachers mentioned needs that they were currently wanting to address with their students, including a death in the family and a divorce. One of the initial ideas about the topic was that we have to know and understand the needs of families and children before we can help them. I think that this is a really good point because without fully understanding the needs, we are prone to make inaccurate assumptions which leads to unhelpful suggestions and ultimately results in a failure to meet those needs. I think open, honest, and frequent communication is a key part of supporting families and children and helping to meet their needs. Another teacher suggested that having a strong class community helps meet the needs of families and children in a classroom. I agree with this because I believe that it is easier to face and deal with issues together with others rather than alone. We can also teach our students the idea of empathy and compassion through building a strong class community.


During the #kinderchat, one teacher asked for any resources that could aid her in supporting one of her students whose father just passed away. A book, a camp called Comfort Zone, providing meals, and classroom discussion were all suggested as possible ideas for the teacher to use to help the child and family that is in need. I am glad that I got to read this because now I have a resource that I can go to when I am looking for suggestions related to teaching. By using #kinderchat, I would have the opportunity to hear from teachers all across the continent and receive a variety of diverse and interesting perspectives. I think that #kinderchat is something that I will be using in my future teaching career.


To view this particular archive/conversation, follow the link below:
http://storify.com/happycampergirl/kinderchat-north-america-feb-10-2014#publicize

Writing Development in Young Children

Learning how to write is a process that consists of multiple stages of development. In an article titled, "Let Me Tell You a Secret: Kindergartners Can Write!", one teacher uses the Gentry Writing Development Scale. This scale contains a series of five progressive stages: non-alphabetic (markings and scribbles), pre-alphabetic (letters without meaning), partial alphabetic (letters begin to represent sounds), full alphabetic (letter for every sound), and consolidated alphabetic (2/3 of words spelled correctly). It is important to be familiar with these stages and their progression in order to not only assess students' writing development but also to predict "the type and timing of instruction for literacy development" (Gentry). Both families and educators can effectively support writing development in young children by understanding the process and using strategies that help to scaffold learning about writing.

In the same article, the teacher incorporates writing lessons into the classroom to model and scaffold writing development. These lessons begin with a read aloud, followed by modeling and teaching how to write a response to text, and end with the students creating personal responses to the text that they will share with the class. When the students are writing their independent responses, they are divided into same ability groups and the teacher is available for assistance. The teacher assesses the students based on observational notes and a Writing Development Stage Recording Sheet. The structure of these lessons is advantageous for a few reasons. The article states, "Rosenblatt's theory (2005) on reader response suggests that student motivation is increased when teachers elicit a personal response from students."  Another advantage of the structure is that by grouping the students based on writing ability, the teacher is able to scaffold their writing in a way that is specific to the particular need of each individual student. The assessment in this structure is also beneficial because both components provide the teacher with a well-rounded picture of each student's writing development.

By understanding the stages of writing development and incorporating some of these strategies at home, families can support and extend their child's learning of writing outside of the classroom. This is yet another way to bridge the gap between home and school and effectively support children within the many contexts in which they live.

Additional resources:

Kindergartner Writing Milestones and Tips
http://www.pbs.org/parents/education/reading-language/reading-milestones/kindergartner-language-development-milestones/kindergartner-writing/

Extending Literacy Learning: Take-Home Literature Packs

It is of great importance to consider the whole child when thinking of children's development and learning. In order to best support children, we must not think of them in one specific context, such as student, son, daughter, etc. Each child lives within a combination of contexts with a variety of influences. If we can build relationships and connections between the contexts in which children live, then we can more fully support each child in their development and learning. A very significant connection that we can make is the one between school and home. This is especially true in regards to literacy, since a child will be immersed in it both at school and at home. One approach to creating this connection is to implement a take-home literature program, mentioned in Gretchen Owocki's book, Make Way for Literacy!

A program such as this would involve creating a variety take-home literature packs and sending them home with children based on a rotation schedule. Each pack includes a set of books that share a common theme along with materials and activities that extend the ideas of the theme. The intention is for children and their families to explore and interact with the literature together and share meaningful experiences through the activities and materials provided. Ideally, a take-home literature program benefits everyone involved. Children benefit from the experience of collaborating with members of their family to interact with literature and further their learning and development. The program allows families to directly support their children's learning in a meaningful and enjoyable way that is specific to the abilities, interests, and needs of their children. It provides a method for teachers to connect and work with families in order to share expertise and ideas that will benefit the learning and development of the children.

For further reading about the benefits of reading at home with your child, below is a link to an article on the website for Scholastic.

http://www.scholastic.com/parents/resources/article/reading-together/make-connection