Literacy Defined
Literacy embraces reading, writing, listening, and speaking. Integrating all of these into a literacy program is key. Teachers must provide endless and ongoing opportunities for their student to read, write, listen, and speak. There are many components that make up literacy. In order to effectively teach students these components the teacher must model the concept for the students. As teachers, we can't expect or assume that the student already knows what we expect of them. Modeling gives students a basis of what to go by. Modeling is the first and most important step in order for the students to gain mastery of a concept. A teacher must also undergo guided practice with the students. A teacher should always provide
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Phonics is for the purpose of learning to read and spell.
Comprehension is also an important factor when speaking of literacy. Students should be taught the many strategies that will help them with comprehension and word recognition. In my experience in a first grade classroom I used many of these strategies. Within my lessons I included the activation of prior knowledge to construct meaning, the use of context clues in a sentence, pictures clues, predicting, and drawing inferences about ideas or characters in the text. I always made sure that I modeled the strategy for the student before they set of to do it.
Components of My Literacy Program
The components of my literacy program will work together. I will incorporate shared reading and writing, guided reading and writing, independent reading and writing, read alouds and write alouds, and cooperative reading and writing within my classroom.
Motivation will be key for my literacy program. I know that if the students are highly motivated then they will learn more readily. I will build motivation in my classroom by having a positive, warm learning environment. I will have a variety of literature of different genres and of different levels within my classroom. I will also have a variety of areas and centers for the students to participate in.
I will design my lesson in such a way that each child can actively participate in the learning process. I believe in positive reinforcement
After this strategy is Interactive Reading and Guided Reading, where students are reading peer-to-peer, typically a proficient readers is paired with a less proficient reader, and more independent reading
Within my school teaching literacy takes place in everyday classroom. The format of this teaching varies to include different activities for each day. Certain aspects of literacy are taught every week. The teachers are to ensure that the work planned is appropriate for the age stage and ability of the children. They use strategies such as talk partners and small group work to allow children to develop their oral skills and ability to communicate and cooperate with their peers. Emphasis is placed on the acquisition of effective oracy skills in the early years and foundation phase. Role play areas are set up in partnership with the children so that they can practice speaking Listening and drama based activities within a meanful context.
I define literacy as being able to express my thoughts and emotions. I know everyone has different opinions and emotions. Therefore, everyone will write differently and read in a different pace. Also, everyone likes different types of books, for example fiction or nonfiction. As a result, everyone’s literacy journey is unique. Everyone has a different definition when it comes to literacy which is what makes it special. Some prefer to read and others prefer to write. It all depends on personal preference.
As a future teacher of a fast-changing generation that searches restlessly for new interests, I believe that old and new must meet to keep the basic values of a balanced literacy. Focusing on prior knowledge, collaborating with colleagues, peers, families, and community, creating connections with our surrounding, and empowering students’ learning style throughout the process of gaining knowledge of reading and writing. Foremost, my personal philosophy of teaching literacy is based on constructivism and sociolinguistic, where hands on experience and guidance are priority in an informational world. To facilitate a child’s acquisition of literacy skills , as I plan for literacy instruction for my future classroom, I will take into consideration
Literacy is fundamental to all areas of learning from an early age, as it unlocks access to the wider curriculum. Being literate increases opportunities for pupils in all aspects of life and lays the foundations for lifelong learning and work.
All students are unique. Individual students learn differently, acquiring different vocabulary and comprehension skills. Literacy incorporates many forms such as fictional and informational texts. Literacy requires students to use unique reading, vocabulary, grammatical rules, and sentence structure skills to achieve the goal of comprehension within content literacy. The “teachers. . . must help students acquire the unique skills required to read [these different forms of literacy]” (McPherson, 2007, p. 65). Students who struggle within grade-level vocabulary and comprehension will most likely have a hard time grasping the content within content literacy itself. Students’ vocabulary and six major knowledge structures – description, classification,
Effective teaching of literacy is developed through a deep understanding of the ways in which children learn, informing educators on the most beneficial pedagogical methods to utilise (Tompkins et al, 2012). Literacy pedagogy within the Australian context has changed drastically over time and has resulted in a myriad of pedagogical choices that influence contemporary literacy education (Kalantzis & Cope, 2012). By critically analysing the changing approaches to literacy teaching within the Australian educational context, the four major literacy pedagogies: didactic, authentic, functional and critical can be explored linearly to highlight the theories behind each approach, their positive and negative attributes and how subsequent approaches have been integrated to result in a balanced approach to literacy education.
What is literacy? Literacy is defined as the ability to read and write. Now, as most would take the term with a grain of salt and think its importance is slim to none,
One way that a teacher can make their classroom a successful environment for literacy is to have their classroom look like a book that the teacher will be teaching throughout the year or semester (The Access Center, 2007). When the
Literacy, apart from learning how to read and write, means to have the capability to pick up any piece of work read, understand, and comprehend.
Literacy is traditionally known as the ability to read and write. The term’s meaning has now been expanded to the ability to use language, numbers, images, and other means to understand the true beauty of the English language to show the power of written words. One of my favorite quotes is by B.B. King, “The beautiful thing about learning is that no one can take it away from you.”
Literacy development is very important in the early years of a child’s life. This means knowing about reading in prekindergarten and being prepared for kindergarten reading. To get children ready for kindergarten reading teachers must provide preschool children with developmentally appropriate settings, materials, experiences, and social support that encourage early forms of reading and writing.
When I began researching what the media was saying about the definition of literacy, I found the definitions to be limited. Most people that I spoke with said that literacy was reading and writing. Most places that I checked on the internet said the same thing. Google defines Literacy as “the ability to read and write”. Thisisliteracy.ca, a Canadian Literary agency goes into more detail and says that literacy is “the ability to identify, understand, interpret, create, communicate, and compute using printed and written materials and the ability to express thoughts feelings and ideas”. This seemed a little closer but still not getting right. When I began this assignment I wrote that literacy is
My philosophy of literacy is centered on providing a learning environment rich in authentic literature, instruction that is engaging, fun, and balanced, collaborative, and also involving families in the child’s education. My ultimate goal of literacy instruction is to help children become lifelong readers and writers by providing the skills necessary to comprehend, construct, and make meaning of text, speak, and write. (Torgesen, 2002). According to the National Reading Panel, there are five essential components that must be taught in effective reading programs: phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and reading comprehension. (Reading Horizons). According to Konza (2014), reading instruction should be changed to six foundational reading elements, adding oral language and early literacy. I also believe that early literacy should be
Literacy is one of the single most important aspects of a student’s elementary career. Literacy is a huge stepping stone for the real world, and it is vital to introduce students to different types of texts in order to familiarize them with different types of readings and build their confidence in order to prepare themselves for the real world. In order to reach full literacy, one must focus on four main aspects of balanced literacy instruction. These are reading, writing, oral language and assessments. Factors that also affect the success of students are classroom environment, and lesson delivery.