Common Readings - Kucer Ch. 3 and B&M 9

Our blog with Dr. Beach this week was focused on activating knowledge for a few different concepts - phonological and phonemic awareness, concepts of print, alphabet and alphabetic principle knowledge, and word recognition and decoding. We posted about what we believed the definitions of each of these terms is and then we discussed some of terms more in detail during our online meeting. I want to focus part of this post on focusing on instructional techniques for these concepts and how we should go about teaching them in the classroom. 

Phonological and Phonemic Awareness: 
Phonological awareness (paired with alphabet knowledge) are the two most powerful predictors of early literacy achievement, according to the National Early Literacy Panel and the Barone and Mallet text. Activities that focus on phonological and phonemic awareness deal only with letter sounds and sounds that make up words, in other words, these are auditory activities. These awareness skills must be explicitly taught because most students will not learn phonological awareness on their own. The instruction needs to focus on the different parts of oral language, starting with the larger units such as words or syllables, and then moving to rhymes and beginning sounds, and then finally individual phonemes within words. Phonemes are the hardest sounds to isolate, and the difficulty can change depending on the speaker and pace of speech. 

Using pictures and encouraging the use of oral language in a game-like format can be a good activity to teach phonological awareness. This can also be a way to informally assess a student's knowledge. 

Alphabet and Alphabetic Principle: 
Knowledge of the alphabet and the alphabetic principle are important stepping stones in order for students to begin to decode words. Similar to phonological awareness, the alphabet needs to be taught explicitly in order for students to gain this important knowledge. Most alphabet instruction begins with learning the alphabet song, but it is important that students are exposed to the visual component of letters as well in order to separate the individual letters and not blend them. Letters in a child's name are usually a good starting place for talking about letters and letter sounds. The letters that give a clue to their sound (such as the letter b), are usually easier of children to learn. Children usually learn their upper-case letters first and then make connections when learning the lower-case letters. The writing of these upper-case letters (and some words, such as their name) is an opportunity for students to connect and use their knowledge of phonological awareness as well as the alphabet. Often, these words may be spelled using phonetic writing (or invented spelling). Children may use their partial phonemic awareness to spell words (such as using the first letter correctly). 

Instruction needs to include opportunities for children to write about various topics and use invented spelling. This can be an informal way for teachers to know if students are understanding the alphabetic principle and if they are starting to build a foundation for phonological awareness. Teachers can also play games with students where students are asked to match pictures with the same sound or rhyme or produce a certain letter-sound. 

Both of the chapters did not cover either of these concepts in detail. I look forward to reading about your experiences reading about these topics in the articles! 
Concepts of Print: 
These are important concepts to know before being able to read independently. These need to be covered and instructed each time a text is read aloud in the classroom. Informal assessments can occur during small group and independent reading time. 

Word Recognition and Decoding: 
The word recognition and decoding is a skill that will build over time. Learning letter sounds and exposure to language are vital to being able to decode and recognize words. We need to expose our students to words and books, and teach them techniques to figure out words during read-alouds. 

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I loved the "Insights from Ms. Gimm" on p. 171 (Barone and Mallette). I want to highlight her guidelines for effective and engaging instruction in an early literacy classroom. 

• She designs fun, engaging, and motivating instruction. 
• Drills are not fun. Making learning into a game helps students have fun while learning these important concepts. 
• She fosters word consciousness and interest in words and language. 
• Silly songs and playing with letters helps students to engage with the language. 
• She embeds instruction in a literacy context. 
• Read-aloud's, big books, and songs can all be helpful during literacy learning. Helping students make connections between oral and written language is important. 
• She scaffolds instruction to gradually release support. 
• Explanation by the teacher, recognition, identification, and then production by the student --  she makes sure the children understand the concept before moving on to the next step. 

Some students may need support than others. Teachers may need to modify task difficulty or change the task completely depending on the student. Asking a child to blend or segment a word is an easier task than having to sort and compare words. Along the same lines, choosing a specific letter out of a choice of 3 is easier than having to provide a letter name to a random letter of the alphabet. Instruction and assessment needs to be designed with all students' needs in mind. 

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Oral Language vs Written Language 
I learned a lot from reading Kucer Chapter 3. Writing is not just spoken language that is printed, as I have originally believed. It is much more complex than oral language. It also serves different purposes. Oral language comes and goes, and only lasts in memory (unless recorded), although it can be repeated if requested by the listener and granted by the speaker. Written language, on the other hand is usually more planned and has the potential to be read and remembered forever. Written language is usually more dense and detailed than oral language. 

Oral and written language do have components in common. Both forms of language are usually changed based upon the audience. You would usually write or speak to a friend in a different way than you would write or speak to your boss or an authority figure. Technology has certainly blurred the lines between the languages. Oral language can now be recorded and played over and over again, through the use of a phone, computer, or camera technology. Oral language can also be heard any where in the world if the language is through a tv or internet medium. These two features make oral language more similar to written language. The two language forms also have a tendency to overlap. I liked the comparison to thinking of a speech. If you or I was giving a presentation, many of us would probably have note cards or jotted down thoughts that we want to touch on. We might have even written a whole speech to recite.

English Spelling
This chapter clearly demonstrated (to me) the difficulties that arise for someone learning the English language. We have words that sound alike, but have different meanings (homophones), like to, two, too. We also have words that are spelled the same, sometimes pronounced the same, but have different meanings (homograph), like bow and bow. And for the last category, there are words in our English language that sound the same, are spelled the same, but have different meanings (homonym). These are still difficult for me to keep straight! Our language is alphabetic, which means our letters relate to the sounds in words. But these sounds can change based upon their position in the word and the other letters surrounding the letter. This is especially true in the case of vowel sounds, while consonant sounds are usually more consistent. When listening to a conversation in English, special attention needs to be paid to context in order to decipher meaning. When reading, one can pay attention to spelling as well in order to determine meaning. One of the great things about reading written text is that dialect does not matter, because spelling is the same for all dialects of English. 

QUESTIONS!!! 
1.  Do you believe that technology has made it more difficult to separate the differences between oral and written language (and what is appropriate for each)? Do you think this positively or negatively impacts the classroom?
2.  Are there any strategies that you remember being helpful to you learning your letters or sounds? Or if you are an early literacy teacher, what are some strategies you find effective? 
3.  What do you think is the best way to go about teaching homophones, homographs, and homonyms? This seems like a difficult task because of the similarity between the words. 
4.  What is your top (or couple top) take-aways from the chapters? 

Thank you ladies!! I look forward to reading and responding to you this week.