Reading Works: Part 2: How Children Learn

Reflect on your earliest memory of reading. Who was there? Where were you? Do you enjoy reading now?
Many of the attitudes we hold toward reading and writing were formed when we were young. For some the love of literature was fostered early; for others, early experiences with reading and writing were frustrating and difficult. We want all children to have pleasurable experiences with reading and writing. In order to do this we must shift our focus from how we should teach reading and writing to how children learn to read and write.
According to Bill Martin Jr. (author of Brown Bear, Brown Bear), all children are language experts. All healthy children have need for food, care, and language. He explains that language is necessary for membership into the human community. The need for food and care is fulfilled for children, while, the need for language is satisfied by children themselves. Children are naturally motivated to learn. Learning to talk, in itself, is a remarkable feat. They learn about language through observing, interacting, and when there is a need to communicate for a specific purpose. (Baker, 2010).
Reading happens when it’s for pleasure or purpose. Children learn best when skills are being taught in context and are connected to meaning. (Baker, 2010)
Our role as adults is to be familiar with developmental trends, provide reading and print rich environments, and to be astute kid watchers. As we take into consideration a child’s development and our observations of individual children we can provide authentic learning opportunities that encourage a child’s natural inclination to learn.

Reading Works! Part 1: Memories that last a lifetime

Welcome to Early Childhood! Early childhood, birth to eight years, is an exciting and adventurous time in the life of a child. It is a time of new discoveries and abilities. Children are busy in the work of growing, learning, creating, and communicating. All of these processes build a foundation for learning how to read.
When I am around children I feel like I am on a tour of a distant country, so familiar yet so far away from my current status as an adult. It is important that we allow children to guide us on a tour of their world. Children will show us how and when they learn. In turn we will gain new insights into our roles as parents, teachers and caregivers.
Consider this newsletter a travel guide that will aid you on your journey. It contains a compilation of developmental characteristics, natural tendencies, and skills of each year of early childhood. This newsletter highlights recommended activities that will support growth and strengthen children’s desire and ability to learn, create and communicate.
Growing, learning, creating and communicating are very personal processes for each child. These are very general guidelines that will help individualize literacy activities for the particular child you are working with.
As we tour the world with our children as our guides, we will create memories that last a lifetime.

Reading Works! Child Literacy Project

I have been debating for a little while if I should post my child literacy project. I had to do a piece on parent/teacher education re: emergent literacy....so I will post it little by little...since it was a big project! I think it might be interesting to some of you since it has to do with developmental milesstones and recommended activities.

Classroom Management and Home Management

Fisher, B. (1998). Joyful learning in kindergarten. Portsmouth, New Hampshire, pp. 155-168
I was reading this chapter on Classroom management and had an "aha" experience while typing notes that I'm really excited about. Now some of you may laugh because I know this is something I should have already been practicing....but oh well! The stars have aligned for me today.....Here is the copy and paste of my notes:

A classroom management system is necessary to engage students in meaningful learning. (155)
• Predictable
• Specific procedures for moving to from one area or activity to another
• Relaxed atmosphere that allows and encourages risk taking
• Clear understanding of expectations
• Meaningful methods of accountability.
At home this is what I’m lacking. Our overall schedule is the same everyday but it could use some fine tuning.
When moving from one activity to another a cleanup procedure should be in place. Handwashing before meals, clean up after meals. This simple procedure would eliminate a lot of problems in our home. It will take a lot of work but now is the time to do it. Once we are consistent it will become predictable. We need to be clear and consistent with our expectations. A source of confusion and frustration for us as parents is the methods of accountability. How do we make them accountable? A natural consequence would be not to move on to the next activity. And with refusal and tantrums respond, "That’s fine but you need to think about what you should do."
I also love the idea I read in the Glazer text to brainstorm with the kids. I really want to try this with regards to the problem of cleaning up their room. I want to make them part of the process and have it be a family process of finding a solution to the problem of picking up after themselves.
I am amazed so much how much what I learn at school applies to what I do at home. I love it!

How do children learn?

This question was posed to us in my emergent literacy class and has made me reflect quite a bit. Some of the ideas that were new and insightful to me is that children learn new things when they are "in context", "attached to meaning" and for a "specific purpose". In terms of literacy (reading and writing) children learn to read and write when letters and letter sounds are taught to them in the context of a story when they can see how the letters, sounds, and words fit into the big picture. They also learn about the functions of reading and print when they see us model it for them in our daily routines (grocery lists,etc.) Babies learn to communicate for the purpose of getting their needs satisfied. Another example that I love of how children will learn things if it has a specific purpose has to do when I was trying to teach Lani how to use tongs. I set up an activity with two tupperware bowls, tongs, and pom poms. I wanted her to use the tongs to transfer the pom poms from one bowl to the other. Lani was totally bored with this idea and wasn't much interested in this. So we abandoned that idea. Then after learning this principle I decided that I was going to stop dishing the kids dinner up for them and they would serve themselves at dinner time. I placed the tongs by the salad for serving purposes and sure enough she picked them up like a champ and figured out how to use them for the purpose of eating some yummy salad. It was one of those aha moments. Teaching kids to do things in context with meaning and purpose really does work!

A quote that inspired me...

"Education is not a race, its about who sticks with it the longest."

Reading and Writing

I am taking an emergent literacy class right now and it has been fascinating. I think most of us have read a pamphlet, heard a radio commercial or been exposed to the importance of reading to our children in one form or another. This class is letting me dive deeper into the topic and I'm loving it. It's teaching me how to enhance my children's reading comprehension by asking them simple questions during our reading time. For example, I never thought about doing this before but I'll show the kids the front of the book, read the title and show the back cover and ask them, "What do you think this book is about?" It teaches them to start learning predicting skills and then after you read the book talk about their orginial prediction and what the book was actually about.
Another "aha" experience I've had is that scribbling is to writing as babbling is to talking. I'm learning the importance of letting our kids write......that writing and reading go hand and hand. It's not just tracing, etc. but keeping paper and pencils, etc. accessible so they can write, draw, scribble to their hearts content. I am also learning to model everyday uses of print. Grocery lists, to do lists, writing checks, etc. By modeling this and providing paper and pencils for our children to use at will we can encourage them to incorparte these things into their "pretend play." When they pretend to go shopping they can "write" their lists or write their "recipets". Or when they are pretending to go to the doctors they can "write" their doctors recommendations.
This class has been so interesting to me! I'm excited for the next two that build on this one!