2. ―Learning to read and write is one of the most
important and powerful achievements in life‖
(National Association for the Education of Young Children, 1998,
p. 11).
3. CREATING A LITERACY-RICH
ENVIRONMENT
Getting to Know Literacy Learners
Selecting Texts
Literacy Lesson: Interactive Perspective
Literacy Lesson: Critical and Response Perspectives
Final Reflections
4. GETTING TO KNOW
LITERATE LEARNERS
Learners are diverse and multi-faceted.
Cognitive skills, including phonics skills, phonemic awareness,
sight word recognition, fluency, and comprehension
Noncognitive factors, including motivations, self-concepts,
interests, and attitudes
Personal backgrounds and prior
literacy experiences
5. Teachers must understand personal, cognitive, and
noncognitive aspects of their learners, in order to create
differentiated learning experiences that meet the needs of
diverse students.
Benefits of getting to know learners:
match texts and instruction to student interests and abilities,
help students make connections to texts,
build confidence by allowing students to share expertise,
build rapport by showing personal interest in students
(Laureate Education, Inc., 2009b).
6. In the classroom . . .
Getting to know students – Casual conversations during play time
and observations of connections my students made during
discussions gave me insight into their personal lives and previous
literacy experiences.
Cognitive assessments – The Developmental Reading
Assessment (DRA; Beaver, 1997) allowed me to assess my
students’ skill levels in the areas of phonics, fluency, and
comprehension.
Noncognitive assessments - The Children’s Motivation to Read
Survey (Mazzoni, Gambrell, & Korkeamaki, 1999) allowed me to
gather information about my students’ reading activities, attitudes
about reading, and reading confidence.
7. At home . . .
Talk with your child, explore the library together, and share
experiences with your child to better understand your child’s
interests, to develop interests, and to build knowledge of the world
around them.
Write a letter to your child’s teacher sharing your child’s interests,
personal background, and perceived strengths and needs to help
the teacher better understand your child as both an individual and
a learner.
8. SELECTING TEXTS
Literacy Matrix
Classifying and
choosing texts in
order to ensure a rich Linguistic
Hard
and varied literacy
environment
Narrative Informational
Easy
Semiotic
(Laureate Education, Inc.,
2009c)
9. Teachers must provide access to texts that are filled with
both pictures and words, contain both information and
stories, and vary in levels of difficulty.
Choosing texts along the
continuum of each dimension of
the literacy matrix ensures
balance in instruction, helping
teachers to think about learning
goals and how texts can help
individual students reach these
goals (Laureate Education, Inc.,
2009c).
10. In the classroom . . .
When designing a unit on Harriet Tubman, I chose texts with both
learning goals and learners in mind.
Making text connections and building subject matter knowledge:
Harriet Tubman by Abigail Fitzwild (2006) is an informational text
containing facts and photographs of primary sources.
Understanding perspectives: The Patchwork Path: A Quilt Map to
Freedom by Bettye Stroud (2005), a book filled with colorful
illustrations, is a fictional account of a young girl’s experience on the
Underground Railroad.
Decoding skills and making connections: George Washington Carver
by Katherine Scraper (2002), Lend a Hand by Sue Graves (2005),
and Who Helps? by Judy Nayer (2000) are leveled readers; each
individual text was chosen according to the reading abilities of first
grade students reading below, on, or above grade-level.
Building background knowledge: Harriet Tubman and the
Underground Railroad is an informative website created by second
grade students (http://www2.lhric.org/pocantico/tubman/tubman.html).
11. At home . . .
When visiting the bookstore or library, encourage your child to
choose a variety of books:
Books with mostly illustrations, mostly text, and a combination
of the two
Story books and information books
Books that can be read independently, books requiring
support, and more difficult books that are great as read-alouds
Have a variety of reading materials around the
house, so your child can see you reading books,
magazines, newspapers, and resources on the
computer.
12. LITERACY LESSON:
INTERACTIVE PERSPECTIVE
With an understanding of learners and texts, teachers are
prepared to choose the instructional tools that connect texts and
learners, with the aim of developing important reading strategies
and skills. Goals of this perspective include helping students
become accurate and fluent readers and writers,
develop the ability to comprehend text,
become strategic, metacognitive readers and writers
(Walden, 2011).
13. Teachers want to develop readers and writers who can
navigate the literacy environment independently.
Students must develop cognitive and metacognitive strategies.
Cognitive strategies, like using sentence context or making text
connections, are the tools students use to understand and
comprehend text.
Metacognitive strategies, such as monitoring and evaluating, help
students think about their thinking and how to best use cognitive
tools to help them navigate text.
Students must develop both sets of strategies, if they
are to become proficient readers and writers (Tompkins,
2010).
14. In the classroom . . .
A unit on Harriet Tubman provided a vehicle for interactive lessons
that promoted students’ ability to decode and comprehend text and
grow as strategic readers.
Interactive read-aloud – I chose to read–aloud an above grade-
level informational text to allow all students access to important
facts and ideas about Harriet Tubman. I modeled making text
connections, explained the importance of these connections to
helping readers understand text, and provided opportunities for
students to make their own text connections.
Guided reading lessons – Instructional level texts that shared
themes with the read-aloud text were chosen to support a below
grade-level lesson on short vowel patterns and on and above
grade-level lessons on using sentence context to decode
unfamiliar words.
15. At home . . .
Support your child when reading unfamiliar words, but encourage
them to use their knowledge of how words work, illustrations, and
story context to help them decode words independently.
Read-aloud to your child often, so as to provide a model of fluent
reading. Stop during reading to share what you are each thinking,
make predictions, and share connections to the story. The talk
that accompanies reading is just as to
After finishing a book, take the time important as the reading itself.
recall story details, share favorite parts,
identify new wonderings, and even
imagine new endings.
16. LITERACY LESSON: CRITICAL
AND RESPONSIVE
PERSPECTIVES
The critical and responsive perspectives ask students to connect
personally with text.
Critical perspective – Students critically, examine, judge and
evaluate text.
Response perspective – Students react to text and respond in
meaningful ways.
(Walden, 2011).
17. Teachers must give students opportunities to make
meaningful connections to text. Reading and writing are
active endeavors that allow learners to grow in their
understanding of both text and themselves.
The critical perspective values each individual’s personal
perspective and asks learners to question, examine, and debate
in order to make meaning of text and its potential impact on
their world (Molden, 2007). This generates deeper involvement
with the text.
The response perspective asks students to respond to text in
meaningful ways; the result is unique interpretations, as
students combine what they already know with new discoveries
(Laureate Education, Inc, 2009d). This leads to a deeper
understanding of both texts and the processes of reading and
writing.
18. In the classroom . . .
An exploration of a fictional text allowed students to examine
text from multiple perspectives in order to understand a
significant historical period and its importance in the readers’
lives.
Subtext strategy – While reading aloud a fictional account of
a young girl’s journey on the Underground Railroad,
students used drama to help them imagine what characters
might have thought or said. This activity, called the subtext
strategy, helps students make personal connections,
develop inferencing skills, and understand perspectives
different from their own (Clyde, 2003).
Written response – Students were asked to write a poem,
with each line prompted by a question word, that allowed
them to communicate both factual knowledge and emotional
responses to the material explored.
19. At home . . .
Literacy development is nurtured by responsive adults (Laureate
Education, Inc., 2009a). Engage children in discussions.
Respond enthusiastically to children’s prompts and invite them to
join you in conversations.
Encourage your child to keep a journal. They can draw pictures,
write words, and/or compose complete sentences to help them
remember special events or favorite times together.
When solving childhood conflicts, guide children in seeing the
situation from others’ perspectives.
Encourage your child to ask why; then have them predict why
before looking for an answer together, using resources like the
library and the internet.
20. FINAL REFLECTIONS
―One of the best predictors of whether a child
will function competently in school and go on
to contribute actively in our increasingly
literate society is the level which the child
progresses in reading and writing‖ (National
Association for the Education of Young
Children, 1998, p. 1).
Educators and families must work together to create
literacy-rich environments in which children are
surrounded by the support, activities, and materials that
will help them grow into confident, active, and
enthusiastic literate adults.
21. REFERENCES
Beaver, J. (1997). Developmental reading assessment. Parsippany, NJ: Celebration
Press.
Clyde, J. A. (2003). Stepping inside the story world: The subtext strategy—a tool for
connecting and comprehending. The Reading Teacher, 57(2), 150–160.
Fitzwild, A. (2006). Harriet Tubman. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
Graves, S. (2005). Lend a hand. Parsippany, NJ: Celebration Press.
Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2009a). 2: Perspectives on early
literacy [DVD]. The beginning reader, PreK–3. Baltimore, MD: Author.
Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2009b). 6: Getting to know your
students [DVD]. The beginning reader, PreK–3. Baltimore, MD: Author.
Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2009c). 10: Analyzing and selecting
texts [DVD]. The beginning reader, PreK-3. Baltimore, MD: Author.
Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2009d). 22: Response perspective:
Reading- writing connection [DVD]. The beginning reader, PreK-3. Baltimore, MD:
Author.
22. REFERENCES (CONTINUED)
Mazzoni, S. A., Gambrell, L. B., & Korkeamaki, R. L. (1999). A cross-cultural
perspective of early literacy motivation. Journal of Reading Psychology, 20,
237-253.
Molden, K. (2007). Critical literacy, the right answer for the reading classroom:
Strategies to move beyond comprehension for reading improvement. Reading
Improvement, 44(1), 50–56.
National Association for the Education of Young Children. (1998). Learning to read
and write: Developmentally appropriate practices for young children.
Washington, DC: Author.
Nayar, J. (2000). Who helps? New York: Newbridge Educational Publishing.
Scraper, K. (2002). George Washington Carver. Pelham, NY: Benchmark Education
Company.
Stroud, B. (2005). The patchwork path: A quilt map to freedom. Cambridge, MA:
Candlewick
Press.
Tompkins, G. E. (2010). Literacy for the 21st century: A balanced approach (5th
ed.). Boston: Allyn & Bacon.
