Emergent Literacy

I cannot fully classify myself as a digital native based on this quiz. Although I could define some of the more common words and phrases at the end of the quiz, I was not able to define the first few terms. The article claims that “Digital Natives perceive technology as their friend and rely on it to study, work, play, relax and communicate”. Although I do like to watch television and listen to music and relax, I do not rely on technology to live my life. I enjoy using instant messaging and exploring the internet, but technology is definitely not flawless. I often am frustrated with technology when things do not work as they are supposed to. Some examples of technology at its worst is when I am taking an online quiz and my computer freezes, I am signed off of instant messaging while talking to friends, or there is no wireless internet available when I need it. Emergent literacy and the term emergent in relation to digital literacy are different in many ways. I feel that emergent literacy learners obtain their knowledge by observing and listening to others. In other words, the children mainly learn by example. When using the term emergent digital literacy with my own personal experience, I know that I do not necessarily learn technology from others. I taught myself every piece of technology I had to use before I ever had to use it. Tompkins stresses the word “before” in his definition of emergent literacy because he wants to emphasize that concepts can be learned before the person ever develops and learns literacy skills fully. From this definition, emergent literacy and emergent digital literacy are alike because they both begin as basic concepts that can expand knowledge with practice and experience.

digital natives

After taking the quiz, I realized that I am not a digital native.  Although I could identify the terms IM, blog, and  online gaming, I was stumped on MOBS, smart MOBS, etc....  Although I definitely would not consider myself a master at all things technological, I can master a computer.  I have to admit I realize that in terms of knowing how to master creating a website, posting on YouTube, or composing music on a computer I am lacking in skill.  I believe that through this New Literacies project I will become more learned in the digital world, which is something that I have needed for a while.  In any terms, being emergent I believe is a great thing because you have so much ahead of you to learn and be able to grasp.  The world is at my fingertips when dealing with digital technology, I just need to figure out a way to introduce myself into this realm.  Emergent digital literacy and children's emergent literacy are connected, but obviously there are vast differences.  When dealing with children's emergent literacy, we have to remember that literacy encompasses a vast range of ideas, such as reading, writing, speaking, technological literacy, etc...  Children need to learn the basics of language before they can emerge from the emergent literacy to having mastered literacy.  Many adults that would not be considered a "digital native" are considered literate if they know how to read and write.  

digital native

After taking the digital natives quiz I found out that I am considered a digital native. Although I did not know all of terms, I knew more than half. For me, I learn technology rather slowly and the only types I know are the ones taught to me through school. For example I would know nothing about blogging if I did not have this assignment. I had to teach myself how and what blogging is. I consider myself to be an emergent digital learner. I think this because I am learning new digital literacies day by day. Tompkins talks about emergent literacy learners as “participating in a variety of literacy activities ranging from modeled and shared reading and writing, during which they watch as teachers read, write…” This reminds me of our literacy’s project. I will need someone to model the new technology for me to understand it. I feel that I am interested in new technologies, but without someone to teach it to me, I will never learn it. I think that it is important to teach both the “old” literacy as well as the “new” digital literacy. In today’s society more and more literacy is being produced digitally. Now I think children around the kindergarten age can be emergent in both types of literacy. It all depends on when you are subjected to the literacy.

Scaffolding

The hardest part for me about being a teacher is watching children get frustrated with a task. Scaffolding is a way of preventing frustration by assisting children in tasks they do not understand and allowing that student to grow from your assistance in other tasks. MSU professors and TAs use some strategies that ensure students are learning efficiently. Rather than writing on a black and white chalkboard, many professors create colorful and attention grabbing PowerPoint for their lessons to keep students focused. In Gibbons it states that “teacher-guided reporting is adopted to make more explicit the role of teacher in providing scaffolding for the learner” (34). This sort of scaffolding occurs in most of my classrooms at MSU. Students are consistently asked to report what they learned or how they solved a specific problem. I do like when the teacher-guided reporting is volunteer –based and open to anyone. However, the worst part of this guiding is being called on when you are unprepared to answer something and many students get frustrated.
I feel that the classroom setup is one of the most important ways to control the interaction between students-students and teacher-students. We experienced the difference hands on in our TE 401 class. In our usual Holden Hall classroom we sit in rows facing the front looking at PowerPoint slides and listening to Becky teach without interacting as much. However, in Erickson hall we were much more involved in discussion when the seats were arranged in a circle. I have also seen a difference in participation based on classroom setup in my kindergarten field placement class from TE 301. When I first started my field placement the children were seated in separate group tables. Although the children participated, the participation level increased greatly when the desks were arranged in a U-shape facing the board. In this formation, all of the children were looped around and they could see other students, the board, and the teacher. Personally, I always enjoyed the creative ways that teachers would rearrange the room to see which way students learn and interact the most and I plan to do the same.

Class discussion and scaffolding

There are many types of “talk” that I see within my classes here at MSU. Typically each type of talk is centered on a specific kind of class. When there is lecturing, the professor does most of the talking, just giving time to answer questions prompted by the students. When in a smaller recitation of a lecture class typically these classes are more discussion based. Within the Goldenberg article, he talks about the importance of discussion based activities. He talks about how the teacher should be the mediator and the initiator, but not the dominant speaker within the discussion. The teacher should prompt meaningful questions and allow the students to dictate what the main points to consider are. Sophomore year I took an IAH class that had a recitation that used the ideas Goldenberg suggested. Our TA would prompt a question and let the class discuss until there were no comments left. Within a class in a university most if not all of the students have learned the scaffolding measures to make this mean of discussion influential. In an elementary school classroom, however, students may not have the previous scaffolding techniques to be able to understand how to withhold this type of talk. Students must learn how to ask meaningful questions, listen to their classmates in order to build upon their answers, and learn how to take the focus off of the teacher and on the class. Some types of scaffolding a teacher may use are asking open-ended questions to try and promote class discussion or have children work in small groups to become more comfortable interacting with other classmates.

Scaffolding

Scaffolding is an extremely important concept in terms of the classroom.  Teachers are able to aid their students by providing them with additional help if it is noticeable that they are struggling.  Once the teacher begins to aid the student, they will continue to help until the student feels competent in the task and is able to complete the task on their own.  Scaffolding is a type of help that the teacher can use to help to guide the child away from frustration while also providing a helping hand which many times is needed when children are trying to figure out higher-task problems.  In classrooms throughout my experience in the field, I have seen a lot of teaching strategies that are similar to scaffolding as well as seeing scaffolding taking place.  Such instances include in math centers, watching the teacher point to each object being counted, therefore making sure the children don't count a marble twice.  Once the student started to understand what was going on, the student was able to sort the objects so she did not count the objects twice.  Not only is scaffolding seen in math lessons, but it is also used to enhance literacy.  According to Tompkins, "Through active involvement with literacy materials, young children construct their understanding of reading and writing." This active involvement can be the teacher scaffolding for the student.  Other teaching strategies such as modeling have been implemented in my classrooms.  I have seen modeling occur in literacy lessons, where the teacher models how to hold a book, turn the pages from right to left and read the words off the page.  This modeling is how students learn to hold a book upright, turn the pages the correct way, etc.... Other teaching strategies can help us to teach children just like scaffolding can and it is important to recognize these other strategies as well.

In Michigan State classes, I have noticed some strategies that professors utilize in the classroom to attain maximum retention rates in their students.  It is obviously harder to see due to the shear class size and the little professor to student interaction, but strategies such as repeating information over and over again to make sure the students remember it, having office hours for the students so that they can come for help, and hopefully leave the office feeling reassured and able to finish the assignment on their own, etc... are strategies that we see in college classes.   

Diversity in Classroom

Having a diverse classroom environment is extremely important in order to allow children from diverse cultures and backgrounds to feel included, but also to introduce your students to different ways of life that they may not be familiar with.  Having a diverse classroom opens up your students eyes to the world around them.  Different ways to incorporate diverse cultures into your classroom is through making sure you practice an anti-biased perspective.  By doing this, as a teacher, you will not feel biased against any particular race or ethnicity, and make sure to give equal representation to all groups.  Having a diverse classroom environment can include doing and having many things.  Making sure that children have different colors of crayons that relate to skin color is important, because not everyone's skin looks like the tan from the Crayola box.  In terms of literacy, having diverse types of literature is important.  Some children do not have a standard nuclear family, and when they can only read about this family in your classroom, they begin to question why they are different.  In one particular instance, in my Fce320 placement, a children had two mothers.  She was very upset when reading a book about a mother and a dad because she could not relate to that family.  The teacher promptly placed a book about a child having two mommies, and the child felt included again.  Another way to have a diverse classroom environment is by placing posters around the room that represent different races and cultures.  A teacher may choose to have a bulletin board filled with different languages.  In a classroom for my FCE321 class, a teacher has how to say "hello" in different languages on a bulletin board.  Furthermore, when reading books to students, it is important for the teacher to engage conversations about the books.  'Book talks' are extremely important because, according to McGee, "through talk children fine-tune ways of thinking about and interpreting literature."  Therefore, when we use diverse literature, as a group, we can discuss this literature and begin to understand the different backgrounds that this book represents.  McGee also discusses "response centered talk" where he describes "readers can share their own understandings and insights" which is also important when discussing how to make a classroom diverse.  In this instance, children can discuss how their families and background are different or alike to the ones being discussed in the books.

Overall, I believe having a diverse environment, particularly when it comes to literature is extremely important to allow each child to feel represented, and included in the classroom. 

It is imperative for teachers to explore the backgrounds of students in many different ways to help them learn to their best ability. There are many different ways for students to connect personally and culturally to reading. In Triplett’s article she discusses the importance of book talks as a way of getting to know students and their backgrounds in an experience-text relationship (ETR). She states “ETR is an instructional conversation strategy meant to help teachers integrate cultural relevance into comprehension instruction” (64). I like this statement because from experience in the classroom as a student and as a future teacher in the College of Education, I have seen many scenarios where students share experiences during book talks and connect to the story in many different ways when they would not be given the chance to discuss otherwise. She mentions that it is important to get children thinking and connecting to the book before the book is even opened by asking prompt questions. For TE 301, my CT always asked questions before reading the text to get the children involved and motivated before they knew what the title of the book was. I always liked listening to the stories and answers that the kids produced from the questions she asked because they could tell you a lot about the culture and home life of students. Although it is hard to make time for book talks in the classroom with the required material and tests that students are given nowadays, teachers have to understand that book talks are very important. Students can connect to the book and also connect with other students who share some aspects of their diverse culture, while also learning to become better readers. Whether small groups or large book talk discussion, children can connect to the book and discuss their personal connections with each other.
Another way to learn about students and their cultural experiences is to have a diverse selection of books. I know that when I was in elementary school we did not have that many diverse books for the few diverse students that attended my school to relate to. Having a diverse selection of books will allow every student to connect to books differently and having book talks about diverse books allow for different experiences to be shared for the whole class to learn about. To better understand every individual backgrounds you could always have every student create their own stories about themselves. I always enjoyed the Young Author books that we worked on in elementary. We were given blank books and a topic for which we could go about creating in any way possible. Some topics that could help me as a teacher learn more about students would be “All About Me”, “My Culture”, “My Favorite Personal Memories” and even “What People Do Not Know About Me”. These topics would allow the students to reach into their memory bank and past experiences so they can share with the class diverse literature created by students.

Learning about the diversity within a classroom is essential for quality learning. To do this the teacher within the classroom must decide how to best find out the background of their students. There are many ways a teacher can find out information about their children’s background. In the preschool I work at, the head teacher goes on home visits to her new students home. One can find out a lot of information about a child by looking at the environment they are growing up in. Another option would be to meet with parents and discuss the importance of diversity in the classroom and ask if they have any background to disclose with the teacher. Besides taking out of class time to learn about diversity in the classroom, the teacher could do “get to know you” activities. One such example of this is what we did during class last week, by making poems. The about me poems help show the class as well as the teacher what aspects of the writer’s life is important to them. The different important factors within a child’s life are what makes the classroom diverse.

In terms of English language learners, Lenski came up with different categories to place her students. The four categories are as follows, Newly arrived students with adequate formal schooling, newly arrived students with limited formal schooling, students exposed to two languages simultaneously, and long-term English-language learner. By categorizing ELL students into these groups it helps the teacher begin to understand the types of literacy the children have been exposed to. Although a teacher is subdividing ELL students into these groups for assessment does not mean that they all have the same skills. Lenski makes it known that each student even if they speak the same language have different skills in terms of literacy. With that in mind it is important to know each student individually to best know their strengths and weaknesses.

literacy

Literacy is a very complex idea with many elements added.  although we may think we have a true grasp of literacy, the concepts of literacy are at many times difficult to pinpoint, and integrate thoughtfully into the classroom environment.  When asked to come up with a definition of literacy, I immediately thought of reading.  Although I know that literacy is not subjected to only reading, my initial thought processes drew me to consider a child reading a book as being literate.  After going through classes that educated me about literacy, I found out that being literate also dealt with fluency in reading and writing, but as we grow as a technological society, literacy also deals with being fluent in the technological world, meaning computers, television, and the radio.  When a child is capable of doing complex tasks while reading and writing, they are considered literate.  Literacy has changed in many ways from what it was once thought of in earlier years.  While literacy used to only entail reading, it now deals with many other aspects of society, such as technology.  The advancement of computers, televisions, etc... have lead children of today to be in need of learning these machines from a young age in order to be able to function in society.  This idea was unheard of only a mere decade ago when computers were starting to become mainstream. 

An idea literacy environment would encompass aesthetically pleasing posters that would catch the children's eyes.  These posters would not only hold words that describe the pictures, but they would teach the children about what happens in everyday life.  An ideal literacy centered environment would place emphasis on reading and writing centers. These centers would be the center of the classroom, and would occur on a daily basis.  Starting off in small groups, the children would read stories and write together.  As the children became more comfortable with each other, joining in large group to discuss their work would occur.  This would promote fluency and literacy skills, because the children are using their communication skills to inform the class of their accomplishments in the centers.  Teachers would stress the importance of reading aloud to the children, and make read aloud a part of every day.  The classroom would also have a quiet reading area, adorned with comfortable pillows to provide an oasis for children to escape to enjoy their favorite books.  According to our book, Literacy for the 21st Century it is also important to include "basal reading programs, literature circles, and workshops" into a successful environment centered on literacy.

Literacy is an important concept when dealing with children in the elementary school levels especially, which is why it's especially detrimental to take the ideas of literacy to heart. 

Literacy

Literacy

I had a really hard time creating one definition of literacy because it seems impossible to combine so many ideas and thoughts into one definition. Every time that I think I created a good one, I think of another idea that I want to add and the length of the definition keeps growing. The best definition that I can come up with is that literacy is a compilation of speaking, writing, listening, viewing, and reading. Being able to understand, practice, and teach literacy is also very important. Although I have created this definition, I do believe that it can be altered as I learn more and think of new ideas to add to this. My definition changed after our class discussions because I used to think that literacy was just speaking, reading and writing. I seemed to omit the important elements of literacy such as listening and viewing. I feel that the perfect environment for literacy includes a comfortable place where children are eager to learn and teachers are eager to teach. I liked the video we watched in class with all of the literacy centers. I feel that having these stations in a classroom allows for imagination, creativity, and learning. I plan to provide children with the choice of how they would like to practice and learn literacy whether that means providing them with books they are interested in, puppet shows, or group work. I have seen that children are more responsive and open to learning when they are given choices related to a topic that needs to be taught. Cambourne stresses that teachers should practice underdeveloped skills to prompt other ideas and discussion in order to make sure that students engage and comprehend to their full potential (189). I feel that it is difficult at times to keep children engaged and I enjoyed the chart titled The conditions of learning: the model of learning as it applies to literacy that Cambourne provided in his article. This chart mentions the different ways of learning and how these methods keep students engaged. I see this chart as being helpful in the future in applying learning conditions to teaching literacy to students.

What is literacy...?

Literacy is the knowledge of reading, writing, listening, viewing, and speaking.Within the knowledge of these aspects of literacy, one must understand how to do these things, be fluent with them, and be able to incorporate them into daily life. In Cambourne’s article he discusses many conditions of learning. These conditions of learning are reflected in terms of making sure children are comprehending what is being taught, as well as making sure that literacy is being explained in multiple ways. In relation to understanding what is being taught, the use and response conditions help convey that goal. To use the information in daily life one must understand the fundamentals behind how to do the literacy aspect. Response helps children to understand what is being taught by forcing them to see what their classmates did or did not do and give them feedback. By looking outside of what one did, the children are learning different methods of learning literacy taught by others as well as defining themselves as learners and teachers. The other goal of Cambourne’s article is to ensure children understand the material by teaching lessons in multiple ways. The conditions of immersion and demonstration help with this goal. Immersion helps to make sure the students are familiar with multiple texts, and the demonstration helps make sure the students are seeing how the texts are used.

I thought the article by Cambourne was very interesting in terms of changing my definition of literacy. Originally I thought of literacy as mainly reading and writing. The conditions he provided helped me understand the importance of the units of literacy. As we discussed in class, many times only the reading and writing aspects of literacy are focused on in teaching. The importance for reading and writing is critical in learning literacy, but the other pieces of literacy are just as important as well. Another aspect of the Cambourne article that made me change my definition reflects the idea of relating literacy in our daily lives. This concept is also explained within the Leland article, where she reads her students books without “happy” endings. The books she read were more personally connected to her students because they resembled situations of everyday life. It is important for children to relate to literacy. The majority of literacy one will engage in throughout life will not be sitting at a desk in school. It will be in daily life. To be able to draw connections to life is necessary.

The ideal learning environment for literacy would consist of a place with many different genres of books. The variety of books will help engage students into reading as well as give them options to want to read further. In terms of writing, multiple genres would be able to be explored, to promote options as well as to help keep children interested in writing. Some people may say they “hate” writing, but when you ask them to write a letter or email to a friend they are more than willing to oblige. It is important to help keep an open mind to students about literacy and by exploring many genres of books and writing there is a higher chance in succeeding. My learning environment would also consist of a lot of listening and response to other children’s ideas on literacy. This would help promote listening and speaking skills as well as help generate a greater understanding for the topic being discussed.

Goals

In order to become competent and learned in the area of children and their studies, it's very important to take the necessary precautions, such as courses aimed at children's literacy, in order to make sure children of  the generations to come are adequately prepared for their studies in the future, and their lives.  Hence, Te401 is aimed at those necessary measures to ensure our own success in teaching children.  

When reading over the syllabus, I noticed a large portion of it devoted to the Teaching Standards that we as teachers will be obligated to fulfill.  It is important for us to learn those standards, and how to incorporate them into our classroom in order to be sure we are competently teaching our students.  A goal for me in this course is to become familiar with those goals, and learn adequately how to incorporate them into meaningful lessons with which my children will learn about literacy and reading.  Another goal I have for myself is to become familiar with different ways to teach diverse learners.  Classrooms nowadays are filled with children from all backgrounds, thinking styles and ethnicities, making it extra important for the teachers of our time to become familiar with these diverse learners, and learn how to cater to each style.  This goal will only help me be more comfortable in the classroom, and allow me to cater to each child depending on the child's own needs.  Furthermore, another important goal for this course is to understand, and be able to carry out my own pedagogy of teaching.  Since the syllabus makes it sound so important, I believe that learning my own teaching reportoire, understanding the importance of assessments, and understanding children as learners is important in order to be the best teacher I can possibly be.  Another goal is learning the importance of self-assessment, in order to make sure I can accurately assess  my own findings, teaching practices, etc... to ensure I am carrying out my role as teacher as best as I can.  Self-assessment is extremely important in the classroom, and until I can understand myself as a learner, and a colleague, I will not be able to effectively integrate into my own classroom. 

Overall, this course is aimed at helping all of us become successful teachers, and while reading the syllabus, I have come to understand the aims of this course.  

Goals

I really agree with the goals of the classroom and hope to get a grasp on each individual one fully. Throughout the syllabus there are many mentions of how teachers have to cater to the different learning abilities of each individual. I feel that this is very important because no matter what lesson we teach or activity we do, every child will catch on and perform differently. In my TE 301 class my teacher always stressed the importance of being patient and flexible. These two qualities are a must because every child comes from a different background, learns different ways, and learns at different speeds. Therefore in the syllabus under Understanding Children and Adolescents as Learners hits the jackpot on how I feel when it says “You will learn to adapt your planning to the learning needs of individuals and groups”. My main goal as a teacher is to help each individual in every way possible to keep up and learn to the best of their ability. I also like the fact that the syllabus and all Teacher Education classes focus on the fact that teachers are all learners as well. Even though we are hired to teach and instruct it is important to keep learning every day as well so we can grow as individuals and be the best teachers. I hope to continue to learn well beyond my TE courses through experiences, whether good or bad, to get closer to creating the best learning environment.
I feel that the hardest part of being a teacher that I found in the syllabus will be to know all of the standards, using them correctly, and making sure that all of the necessary standards are covered. The syllabus has a helpful table in it that shows what standards we focus on during what assignments throughout the course. I just hope that it becomes less difficult separating state, district, subject, and grade standards throughout this course. Another worry that I have is keeping up with technology. The syllabus states that in this course we will “examine ourselves as a learner in English language arts and as a technology user”. With the new inventions and wider range of technological advances, I think it may be difficult to keep up with modern times and invent knew ways that children can learn using technology. My goal is to have an open mind and learn any new type of technology that comes my way and can be helpful in the classroom.