Parting Thoughts...

Studying emergent literacy has made me aware of the many stages that young readers and writers go through. In the past I have taken for granted all of the components of emergent literacy because I work with students who are for the most part independent readers and writers. Through this class I have learned many new strategies and instructional ideas that aid students with phonemic awareness, phonics, word study, and writing. While my students are not at the emergent level, the concepts can definitely be translated to improve instruction at the upper elementary level.

This class has also been valuable because of the various perspectives. We teach a wide range of grades and student populations, which give us all unique insights into best teaching practices. Learning about emergent literacy through the lens of an upper elementary teacher has made me truly excited about the stages of literacy learning. I feel that I am now able to recognize specific skills and needs within a group of students, and provide the differentiated support to help them reach their literacy goals. Having a background in emergent literacy concepts and theories should be required for all teachers, as it allows you to look at a child as a whole student and continuous learner, not just as a student of a specific grade.

Using Word Study to Enhance Reading and Writing

Many schools and teachers often use weekly word lists to teach spelling, however, this approach does little to support students’ efforts at exploring and understanding language. Word study is a great alternative for students to learn spelling in a meaningful context. Studying word and letter patterns helps children develop a working knowledge about language, which can help them with both reading and writing. Not all children create an immediate connection between reading and writing. Studying words should be incorporated into a literacy block in ways that build connections and provide children with strategies for both reading and writing. In the younger grades, interactive writing is a great way for children to understand how the words they study can be used to communicate ideas. Older students can go on word scavenger hunts and search for their words in environmental print or classroom texts.

Creating a successful word study program is a challenging, but rewarding process. I have found that in my own classroom the children truly enjoy doing our word work, whereas they roll their eyes and complain about spelling lists. Next year I plan to expand upon my use of word study in the classroom. One way to do this is by creating word work journals, where children keep an individual collection of the words they have learned. Children can also build individual word walls that correspond with the spelling patterns they have learned. In previous years, my classroom word wall has been more of a decoration. I am hoping to use it as a teaching tool, by changing the words depending upon our studies, and also allowing the students to interact with the wall.

Williams, C., Phillips-Birdsong, C., Hufnagel, K., Hungler, D., & Lundstrom, R.P. (2009). Word study instruction in the k-2 classroom. The Reading Teacher, 62(7), 570-578.

Involving Parents in Phonemic Awareness and Literacy Activities

This week in class we discussed how many parents want to help their young readers, but are uncertain about the best way to provide support other than reading aloud. One way to provide guidance to parents is to create a home-school connection and teach activities that translate between the two environments. Terry Kindervater is a literacy coach in Ohio, who developed a program for kindergarten teachers that taught phonemic awareness and alphabetic principle through the use of poetry and kinesthetic motions. Teachers introduce a poem that focuses on a specific sound. The class reads the poem a few times, and the teacher then adds a corresponding kinesthetic movement or hand gesture to match the sound. The movements were designed to match the articulation of the sound. For example because the /t/ sound is pronounced by flicking the tongue against the front of the mouth, the /t/ movement is produced by flicking the index finger against the thumb. Multisensory activities like this one engage emergent learners, and get them excited about demonstrating and performing their new skills.

By teaching the students a demonstrable skill, they were able to go home and perform for their parents. The teachers encouraged the kindergarteners to teach their parents the hand motions, and many parents reported back that they began using the hand motions when reading environmental print or when sounding out words in a read aloud story. The activity was simple and informal enough that families could do it in the car or out running errands. The teachers even created a short online video of the different hand motions and their corresponding sounds to help parents participate in the activity.

I think that this is a great way to informally create language connections between school and home. The children were proud of their ability to perform a sound, and the movement was also a great way to focus their energy. Parent involvement came naturally with little facilitation from the teachers. Because the task is short and simple and requires no additional materials, it is easy for busy, working parents to provide support. I think it is important to bridge the connection between home and school because it helps children to recognize that reading and language occur in all environments, not just school.

Kindervater, T. (2010). Models of parent involvement. The Reading Teacher 63(7), 610-612.

Spelling Challenges for Emergent ELL Students

In my last post, I mentioned that there are 26 letters and 44 phonemes in the English language. To make it even more confusing for emergent learners there are over 1,100 ways to spell the 44 sounds (Sousa, 2005). The poor correspondence between pronunciation and spelling is one reason why English is a difficult language to learn. According to David Sousa, this is called a deep orthography (2005). Deep orthography means that phonemes and graphemes do not have a direct relationship, as they do in other languages. Children must begin to recognize and remember a large number of patterns. For example, the “ough” in cough is the same spelling but a different sound than found in dough. Not only must children recall these differences when reading and writing, they must also consider the meaning of the words themselves.

Now consider a child whose first language is Spanish. The Spanish language has approximately 35 phonemes, but only 38 different ways to spell those sounds. There is a direct correlation between sound and spelling. While the Spanish language shares the same written alphabet system as English, the enormous difference between sounds and spelling presents a challenge for ELL students. When working with young ELL students we are faced with a double challenge. Building their vocabulary and background knowledge, but also providing them with the phonics skills to successfully express themselves in written language.

Sousa, D. (2005). How the brain learns to read. Thousand Oaks, California: Corwin Press.

Using Names to Teach Symbol/Sound Relationships

While searching for information about the alphabetic principle, I stumbled upon an article about using children’s names when teaching letter and sound correspondence.

The following is an excerpt from the article by Elizabeth Kirk and Patricia Clark, “That’s my name!” calls 3 year old Jason as he points to the letter “J” in an alphabet book. “It’s my name too!” asserts Jessica who is sitting next to Jason. Neither child seems concerned that they have chosen the same symbol to represent two different names. They do not yet know that their names each contain a distinct set of letters. However, both children recognize that “J” is the beginning letter in their names; this recognition is a beginning understanding that written symbols can be used to represent names and words” (2005).

Young children who are just learning to recognize letters and their sounds, tend to learn the letters of their own names before recognizing other words. As educators, we can use this recognition to help children make connections to other symbol/sound relationships. Research suggests that educators or parents can start with phonemic awareness activities. Asking children to clap out loud the sounds they hear in their name helps them to isolate different phonemes. Other activities to help children identify letters and sounds include using manipulatives such as sand, cereal, or blocks to spell out names, singing songs that include children’s names, and associating other words or movements to the initial sound in their name.

Making the connection between symbols and sounds is a complicated process. There are 26 letters in the alphabet, yet these letters can produce approximately 44 sounds (Kirk & Clark, 2005)! By associating symbol/sound relationships with one’s own name children feel a special connection and are more eager to learn. Other familiar names can also be used such as Mom, Dad, and the names of pets, friends, or special toys. The alphabetic principle is a valuable concept that helps children begin to make sense of their world and develop the skills necessary to begin reading and writing.

Kirk, E. & Clark, P. (2005). Beginning with names: Using children’s names to facilitate early literacy learning. Childhood Education. 81 (3), 139 -145.

Concerted Cultivation vs. Natural Growth: The Impact of Poverty on Developing Children

http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2010/06/08/35child_ep.h29.html?tkn=XYLFseQYQvKCZGKMnj9s%2BjKrr4z8bSCRoYpK&cmp=clp-edweek

This article in Education Week discusses the impact of the recession on families with young children. The recession is not just impacting families and children economically, but socially, emotionally, and academically. It is predicted that almost “15.6 million children will be living in poverty” by the end of 2010. This is a startling number, which has grown by 3 million in the past 4 years. Young children who come from impoverished homes are at risk both academically and emotionally. Parents of poor household spend their time trying to meet the family’s basic needs of shelter, food, and clothing. The intellectual needs of developing children tend to fall by the wayside. Children from a lower socioeconomic class are at a disadvantage entering school, compared with peers from wealthier households where time and energy is spent reading and exposing the children to literacy. In Malcom Gladwell’s book “Outliers,” he discusses the differences between how wealthy and poor families raise their children. Wealthy and middle class parents practice what he calls “concerted cultivation.” In other words, they expose their children to many things in the hopes that they will be successful at one. They instill a sense of entitlement and accomplishment that allows these children to be successful academically and socially. Lower class families practice what is called “natural growth” – they assume that their children will grow into whatever talents or skills they might possess. These children tend to be submissive and apathetic towards education.

It is important to note that both of these sources point out that socioeconomic differences – not race or culture, have the strongest impact on a young child’s development. As teachers we need to cultivate in our student’s, whether rich or poor, an appreciation and understanding of literacy. The achievement gap, that we so often focus on, exists on part because of class differences. Rather than allow impoverished children to fall behind, we need to expose them to print and literacy prior to school age so as to counteract the negative effects poverty has on their educational development. Many school systems are cutting early childhood programs such as Head Start due to lack of funding. Rather than cut these programs, we should be funneling money into them to provide students with the support and exposure to literacy that can prevent them from falling behind in elementary, middle, and high school.

Welcome!

As a third grade teacher, the majority of my students are fluent readers. Our reading block tends to focus more on reading to learn, rather than learning to read. By taking this course I hope to gain a wider knowledge base about emerging readers and the process of learning language expression. By understanding where my students are coming from before they reach third grade, I hope that I will be able to help them as they continue to explore and appreciate literacy.