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Professional Development Resources |
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Professional
Development Literacy Topics
Professional development for those responsible for literacy education of birth through eight years of age should be comprehensive and address one or more of the topics identified below. Alphabetic code, phonics and decoding
Assessment is the process of gathering information about something, in this case, about aspects of literacy development. Evaluation is the process of judging that information. Assessment and evaluation must work together in the literacy classroom. One has no value without the other. Child development refers to the way a child develops across the physical, emotional, social and cognitive domains. Child development guidelines can assist parents, teachers and care givers to determine if a child is developing normally or if there are problems in his growth. Knowledge of the characteristics about particular ages and stages of development can guide the selection of activities, materials, interactions and experiences. Literature is the imaginative shaping of life and thought into the forms and structures of language. Children’s literature includes picture books, folk tales, fables and myths, fantasy, science fiction, poetry, realistic fiction, historical fiction, nonfiction, informational books, and biographies. Conversation is the vehicle through which children learn not only vocabulary, but also the structure and the function of our language, the sound patterns of words, the emotional tones and the interplay between the speaker and the listener. Both quantity and quality of conversation are important for the child’s language and literacy development. Family’s role in literacy development Families should involve children in a wide variety of play and everyday activities involving language, including talking to toddlers, sharing in making and using grocery lists, singing songs and telling stories. In addition, reading aloud to children and engaging them in conversations about the stories and pictures is a powerful tool. Fluent, automatic reading of text When fluent readers read silently, they recognize words automatically. Fluent readers read aloud effortlessly and with expression. Fluency provides a bridge between decoding and comprehension. Because fluent readers do not have to concentrate on decoding the words, they can focus their attention on what the text means. Language development refers to the stages in children’s acquisition of language, both expressive and receptive. Children are "hard-wired" to acquire language but they also require environments in which they experience language as it is used in meaningful contexts. Motivation is an important factor in being a lifelong reader. Students’ belief in their ability to read proficiently motivates them to want to learn how to read and to read more. It is the job of parents and teachers to expose children to books that are written on their reading level and are interesting and enjoyable to read. Phonemic awareness, letter knowledge, and concepts of print
Play serves many purposes in a child’s growth. Play helps a child learn to communicate with others and how to appropriately interact with others. Pretend play is a form of play in which children use one thing to represent something else. This symbolic play is necessary for literacy development where children need to substitute written symbols for objects and ideas. Through teacher facilitation and peer interactions in sociodramatic play, children use new language as they plan, negotiate, compare and carry out the script of their play. They also practice verbal and narrative skills that are important to the development of reading comprehension. Reading in the context of relationships Reading to a child by a parent or care giver effectively fosters the child’s development. Children who are read to show a greater growth in verbal interactions and thus vocabulary than children who are not read to or are read to infrequently. Being read to also provides a catalyst for the child wanting to read on his own. Safe, caring literacy-rich environments Environments, both in the home and in child care programs or preschools, should make the child feel safe and also expose him/her to many aspects of literacy. In the home, the time a parent spends in shared reading (reading and interacting with the child) has a great impact on the development of the child’s literacy development. In school/child care programs, a literacy-rich environment includes labeling of objects, many books, writing supplies, and opportunities for many conversation between children and teacher and child-to-child.
Comprehension is active and intentional thinking in which meaning is constructed through interactions between the text and the reader. It is the essence of reading. Vocabulary refers to the words we must know to communicate effectively. Learning, as a language based activity, is fundamentally and profoundly dependent on vocabulary knowledge. Learners must have access to the meanings of words that teachers or their surrogates (e.g., other adults, books, films, etc.) use to guide them into contemplating known concepts in novel ways. Written expression provides children with a new form of communication. Children begin with drawings and scribbles and later express themselves through notes, invitations, lists, cards, journals and responses to literature. Through the writing process they learn to expand their written skills in a variety of genres. |
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