The Literate EnvironmentLauren SchipperOctober 12, 2012Walden University

EDUC 6706: The Beginning Reader, Pre K-3Instructor: Dr. Bernice Gregory

The Literate Environment

A literate environment is one that promotes reading and writing by integrating foundational knowledge, instructional practices, approaches and methods, curriculum materials, and the appropriate use of assessments (International Reading Association,

2010).

Contents

Getting to Know Literacy Learners

Selecting Texts

Literacy Lesson: The Interactive Perspective

Literacy Lesson: The Critical & Response Perspectives

References

Getting to Know Literacy Learners“Effective teachers understand how students learn” (Tompkins, 2009, p.5)

A combination of cognitive and non-cognitive tools is key to accurately assess students’ literacy learning.

Cognitive Assessments – Tools focused on the skills and strategies used by students as they develop as readers. These skills and strategies are those that students use in decoding, understanding words, and constructing meaning (Afflerbach, 2007).

Non-Cognitive Assessments – Tools focused on assessing students’ motivation to read, the reader’s self-concept, reading attitudes, an reader attributions (Afflerbach, 2007).

Assessment ToolsConcepts About Print Test (CAP Test) is a cognitive assessment used to assess what children know about written language concepts (Tompkins, 2010).

Elementary Reading Attitude Survey (ERAS) is a non-cognitive assessment used by teachers to help them understand students’ attitudes toward reading at home and at school (Tompkins, 2010).

These assessment are equally important. Cognitive assessments like the CAP Test help teachers identify students’ weaknesses or areas of confusion. The non-cognitive assessments like the ERAS, help teachers to see what factors influence each child’s learning. They also reveal students’ interests which a teacher can capitalize on when it comes to literacy instruction.

Selecting TextsDr. Hartman’s Literacy Matrix simplifies the text selection. Teachers consider whether a text is narrative or informational. They also decide is a text is more linguistic (word oriented) or more semiotic (in which messages are conveyed heavily by pictures). Where a text falls on this matrix helps to determine its appropriateness for a particular group or individual (Laureate Education Inc., 2010a).

InformationalNarrative

Semiotic

Linguistic

Selecting Texts

When selecting texts, teachers must consider the following factors:

Readability – sentence length, number of syllables, and concept density

Length of text

Text Structure - Informational, Descriptive, Cause & Effect, etc.

Print size

Visual supports

Selecting Texts

I used these two assessment tools, the Literacy Matrix and the “Checklist for Choosing Informational Books for Young Children” (Stephens, 2008) to find appropriate texts for a small group of Kindergarten students. I learned that these students were emergent readers with very little knowledge of what words are. They also were unfamiliar with the format of a book. The ERAS revealed that the students all had interest or experience in gardening. Based on this knowledge, I chose the following texts:

Little Critter: A Green, Green Garden by Mercer Mayer

Farm Tractors by Matt Doeden

Pumpkin (online book found on kindersite.org)

Literacy Lesson: The Interactive Perspective

The ultimate goal of the Interactive Perspective is to teach students how to be literate learners who are able to navigate text independently (Laureate Education Inc., 2010c). We want to teach them to be strategic and metacognitive readers and writers. To do so, it must be a part of all five pillars of reading instruction:

Phonic Awareness

Phonics & Concepts about Print

Fluency

Vocabulary

Comprehension

Literacy Lesson: The Interactive Perspective

In a recent lesson, I utilized the book King Bidgood’s in the Bathtub by Audrey Wood to have students work on comprehension and word concepts.

Learning objectives: Students will practice critical thinking by predicting what would happen in the story by using the illustrations and a few word cues. They will also ask and answer questions about the text.

Strategies: Shared reading, grand conversation, picture walk, and teacher generated questions.

Literacy Lesson: The Interactive Perspective Analysis

The students successfully met my learning objectives for this lesson. Shared reading is a strategy widely used in kindergarten classrooms (Stahl, 2004). Accompanying this with a picture walk, teacher generated questions, prediction making, and grand conversations ensured that the students thoroughly comprehended the text.

Every lesson is trial and error, and every group of students responds differently. This lesson worked for this group because it suited their literacy learning needs and their interests.

Literacy Lesson: Critical & Response Perspectives

The Critical and Response Perspectives are vital to literacy instruction. In the Critical Perspective, students critically examine and evaluate text through multiple perspectives (Laureate Education Inc., 2010b). The Response Perspective allows students to be thoughtful and reflective about texts.

In a recent lesson with kindergarten students, I was able to incorporate both these perspectives using the book Enemy Pie by Derek Munson. This book was chosen based upon a recent school-wide activity about bullying that the students participated in.

Literacy Lesson: Critical & Response Perspectives

Learning Objectives: Students will ask and answer questions about a text. They will react to characters and events in the story. The students will make connections between the story and their own world. They will also express feelings and opinions about the story. Finally, students will understand the different perspectives of the characters in the story.

Strategies: Shared reading, grand conversation, picture walk, and teacher generated questions.

Literacy Lesson: Critical & Response Perspectives Analysis

Overall, this lesson was a success. I feel that the students related to Enemy Pie, especially given their prior knowledge that they gained from their school-wide activity about bullying. They were able to connect the story to their own lives easily. It seemed that with each page read, the students had a story to tell or a question to ask. They also were drawn to the two main characters, and were empathetic toward them. At the end of the story, the students discussed what this story reminded them of and drew a picture to illustrate their thoughts. According to Dr. Vacca, writing (drawing being the equivalent of at the kindergarten level) lead to new discoveries about a text (Laureate Education Inc., 2010d). In this lesson, the student were able to critically analyze the text and their responses demonstrate what they learned.

References

Afflerbach, P. (2007). Understanding and Using Reading Assessment, K-12 (2nd ed.). Newark, DE: International Reading Association.

International Reading Association (IRA). (2010). Standards for reading professionals – revised 2010. Retrieved from http://www.reading.org/General/CurrentResearch/Standards/ProfessionalStandards.aspx

Laureate Education Inc., (Producer). (2010). Analyzing and selecting texts. [Video Webcast]. Retrieved from https://class.waldenu.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab_tab_group_id=_2_1&url=%2Fwebapps%2Fblackboard%2Fexecute%2Flauncher%3Ftype%3DCourse%26id%3D_1374068_1%26url%3D

Laureate Education Inc., (Producer). (2010). Critical Perspectives. [Video Webcast]. Retrieved from https://class.waldenu.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab_tab_group_id=_2_1&url=%2Fwebapps%2Fblackboard%2Fexecute%2Flauncher%3Ftype%3DCourse%26id%3D_1374068_1%26url%3D

Laureate Education Inc., (Producer). (2010). Interactive Perspective: Strategic Processing. [Video Webcast]. Retrieved from https://class.waldenu.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab_tab_group_id=_2_1&url=%2Fwebapps%2Fblackboard%2Fexecute%2Flauncher%3Ftype%3DCourse%26id%3D_1374068_1%26url%3D

Laureate Education Inc., (Producer). (2010). Response Perspective: Reading-Writing Connection. [Video Webcast]. Retrieved from https://class.waldenu.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab_tab_group_id=_2_1&url=%2Fwebapps%2Fblackboard%2Fexecute%2Flauncher%3Ftype%3DCourse%26id%3D_1374068_1%26url%3D

Munson, D. (2000). Enemy Pie. San Francisco, CA: Chronicle Books LLC.

Stahl, K.A.D. (2004). Proof, practice, and promise: Comprehension strategy instruction in the primary grades. The Reading Teacher. 57(7). 598-608.

Stephens, K.E. (2008). A quick guide to selecting great informational books for young children. The Reading Teacher, 61(6), 488-490.

Tompkins, G.E. (2010). Literacy for the 21st century: A balanced approach (5th ed.). Boston: Allyn & Bacon.

Wood , A. (1985). King Bidgood’s in the Bathtub. San Diego, CA: Harcourt Brace & Company.