Analysis Of The Literacy Helping Students Construct Meaning

One of the first things that this author would do is to teach students how to make connections while reading. When students make personal connections with what they are reading by using their prior knowledge, it helps them to retain information. There are three main types of connections we make while reading text; we can make connections to what we are reading and our own experiences in life, we can make connections from one book to another (like reading a Nancy Drew book and reading a Trixie Belden book), and we can make connections to what we are reading and things that are going on in the world around us. By helping Jose learn to make connections while he reads, Jose will be able to more readily remember what he has read and make sense of it (Comprehension Strategies, n.d.).

Starting from the parents, the child must inherit the instinct of wanting to learn to read, developing the curiosity that comes with the increase of knowledge, interaction with others and building positive memories, that motivate the child’s learning to read. An approach that Vygotsky supported promoting scaffolding, a guided process that adults use to teach students how to master a skill, in this case a reading and writing skills. Children begin from the womb recognizing parent’s voices, singing tone for then building connections through prints and letter sounds in an environment that promotes literacy with stories, songs, games, group activities with families, “All about me” share, and “Show and tell”, to display and build a sense of belonging in the class. Nevertheless, incorporating strategies or methods that facilitate learning to read stimulated by own personal learning style. Most young children learn kinesthetically and are visually-sensory prompted to hands on experiences, using appropriate materials in a different setting. Foremost, with an ongoing informal and formal assessment to evaluate students’ pre-knowledge at the beginning of the scholastic year, students’ way of learning, feelings, and connections through the year, and at every lesson, check for understanding, and ways to improve the next step. Ongoing assessment is part of the whole learning process, it will tell you how the students learn, and achieve appropriate reading and writing goals. A good reader promotes a good writer and vice versa, but a firm stepping stone during the developmental stages, in rich literacy environments, attempting to positive interactive experiences, and always monitored, influences the chances of the child sense of wanting to learn to

Why do pre-reading strategies that activate prior knowledge and raise interest in the subject prepare students to approach text reading in a critical frame of mind?

Content area teachers can implement strategies and scaffold learning when planning and designing instruction so that students will actively engage in literacy. According to Dobbs, content area reading instruction includes: the information present in the text, and the instructional plan teachers use to help students understand the content (2003, p.3). Vacca, Vacca, & Mraz explain that in order to plan instruction effectively, teachers must be aware of the explicit and functional dimensions of content literacy. The explicit aspect of content literacy involves the development of skills and strategies that enable students to comprehend what they are reading. Functional instruction focuses more on the application of strategies needed to derive knowledge from a variety of sources of information.” (2014, p. 134). Forget defined literacy as “listening, thinking, reading, and speaking in such a way that information and ideas are processed and communicated to the benefit of self and society” (2003, p. 5). Content area teachers need to plan and design lessons so that students will actively engage in literacy. Forget goes on to discuss that poor performance in schools can be do to a lack of basic literacy skills. Therefore, teachers need to implement the skills and strategies found to be successful in literacy to ensure

To immediately put the person at their ease I would first make a comment which is completely different to what the topic of our conversation needs to be. For example, how much I like their shoes, how did they do at football over the weekend or what good films have they watched recently. Once I believe I have asked enough questions that are personal to them and can see that they are starting to open up to me I would gradually start bringing up what the main purpose of our chat was meant to be. This could be anything from, what has caused arguments to be arising lately with certain individuals or why they are starting to struggle with certain activities. However, they must always understand that your are their teaching assistant and not their buddy or parent.

[ ] In order to build on the children’s understanding and content knowledge, lesson one’s purpose is to engage the children through making a prediction based on the text, pictures, and title. Lesson two builds on the language and literacy by continuing with using the mentor text, “Fancy Nancy” and using the rich academic language associated with the central focus of predictions. For example, each lesson has a distinct objective in which the activities are built on but all three lessons build on each other by incorporating similar academic language and literacy. The children start out in a whole group setting and are actively engaged through discussions and sharing activities. The children are then scaffolded into independent reading and activities to assess their understanding of the content objectives. They then use their prior knowledge and rich vocabulary to successfully complete the objective of each lesson through verbal discussions, independent work, and physical movement. In lesson one, the children are actively engaged through participating in a gallery walk. This gallery walk is done with the children’s table groups and encourages community and social interactions. During this activity, the children will work together to activate their prior knowledge of predictions and record through writing what they

“Knowledge and beliefs about reading and learning to read are wedded in ways that influence almost every aspect of a teacher’s instructional decisions and practices” (Vacca

To assist students to “read with purpose and anticipation,” Vacca et al. (2014, p. 173) suggests, in their book Content Area Reading: Literacy and Learning Across the Curriculum, that teachers need to “create an instructional context” that activates their students’ “prior knowledge” and helps them to become interested in a lesson. Throughout chapter six, “Activating Prior Knowledge and Interest,” Vacca et al. (2014, pp. 172-173) explain instructional strategies that can lead students to “read with purpose and anticipation.” This chapter presents the reader with a plethora of instructional strategies and means for applying them, along with example for real educators. As I journeyed through this chapter, I discovered many instructional strategies,

Make introductions. Show appreciation for the whole person; go beyond their role and responsibilities. Add tidbits that are unique to the individual. Use the language of belonging: “This is Sara — she is part of our research team.” The word our really adds the feeling of

Recently, according to Lucero & Montanero (2012) in their article Rhetorical structure and graphic organizers: effects on learning from a history text research on reading comprehension has evolved from not only strategy teaching to the analysis of activities to promote constructive learning (Lucero & Montanero, 2012). In order to comprehend an academic text, readers are required to consistently evaluate, elaborate and review text information. These types of inferential activities will promote an active role in the student 's task and in turn improve the quality of the process. This aligns perfectly with the basic definition of inquiry learning. Again, this supports how teaching nonfiction reading strategies early on to elementary students will help them be successful within an inquiry based learning system. Lucero & Montanero (2012) suggest that some of these engagement activities teachers could use are summarizing, asking and answering text-based questions , thinking aloud during reading and designing graphic organizers to aid student comprehension (Lucero & Montanero, 2012).

In Chapter 3, “Focusing the Reader” of Deeper Reading, Kelly Gallagher provides pre-service teachers with a greater understanding of the importance of frontloading students with background knowledge of readings. She explains through an anecdote that prior knowledge leads students to be “better prepared to read more, to comprehend more, and to learn more” (26). Without prior knowledge, students are unable to understand and retain information as well because, as Gallagher explains, it “helps you attach meaning when reading the passage” (27). Teachers should gauge students’ prior knowledge to the text before beginning with a unit to understand how to teach their students in a more meaningful manner. There are two key elements that Gallagher points out, through the reading of David Sousa, in how to frame information for students: “…be certain that today’s curriculum contains connections to their past experiences, not just [the teacher’s]… [And] how a person feels about a learning situation determines the amount of attention devoted to it” (28-29). These two points mean that: a teacher must connect students to personal experiences in order to bring to light universal issues in a text that they may not necessarily connect with on their own, and a teacher must be able to show purpose in the text that is “valid and worthwhile” (29) for the

Educators are charged with not only teaching the content of their subject, but also responsible for creating a learning environments that fosters communication, engagement, and reflection so that the students will be prepared for their future careers and learning. Creating a classroom that fosters reading and writing is one way to engage students while promoting that they reflect on the material and communicate their understanding or misconceptions of the content. In order to form a literacy-rich classroom educators need to increase the amount of time students interact with all forms of print and literacy and the classroom environment is an essential key to setting the precedent and model behaviors that will make students more successful and capable of high level learning. (Tyson, 2013)

Since I was young, my parents made reading a priority for me. When I was in kindergarten at my preschool, I had a reading teacher who worked one on one with me to increase my level. As a result, I was confident in my reading ability and excited for the first day of first grade at my new red-bricked elementary school. As I briskly walked through the main entrance and to my classroom the morning of the first day, I squeezed my parents’ hands tightly with butterflies in my stomach. I had only been inside the school

“My name is Mrs. Sorun and I’ll be your professor for Relationship Development I. Nice to meet you all.”

Addressing the barriers with research-based strategies is the way to improve literacy. According to the U.S. Department of Education, “Many content-area teachers do not realize the importance of teaching the reading strategies and thinking processes that skilled readers use in different academic disciplines and do not recognize the beneficial effects of such instruction on students ' ability to engage with their learning” (U.S. Department of Education, n.d.).