Promoting Effective Teaching of Literacy & Language
When teaching language and literacy, effective teachers are guided by a set of principles:
- Explicitly teach children skills that research supports as key elements of reading, writing, and speaking.
- Provide children with a print-rich classroom environment.
- Read to children daily and encourage them to read books on their own.
- Demonstrate and model literacy events.
- Provide opportunities for children to collaborate and help each other learn about language and literacy.
- Support children’s experimentation with print.
- Provide opportunities for children to use language and literacy for real purposes and audiences.
- Link literacy and play.
- Know the nation’s and their state’s language arts standards and provide instruction linked to these standards.
- Use multiple forms of assessment to find out what children know and can do.
- Respect and make accommodations for children’s developmental, cultural, and linguistic diversity.
- Recognize the importance of reflecting on their instructional decisions and build partnerships with parents.
What are the major views on how language develops, and the influence of a second language?
There are four theories in which have been used to explain how children acquire language:
- Behaviorist view- emphasizes the important role of reinforcement in helping children learn the sounds, words, and rules of language.
- Nativists view- stresses the importance of children’s inborn capacity to learn language and suggest that a portion of the brain is dedicated to language learning. It explain how children ‘invent’ their own two- and three-word grammars and overgeneralize rules for past tense.
- Social-interactionist view- emphasize the importance of both environmental factors and children’s innate predisposition to make sense out of language and use it for practical purposes. This perspective explains how children learn about language by using it in social situations.
- Neurobiological view- new technology had allowed scientist to observe how the brain perceives, interprets, and expresses language. It also explains how the structural development of the brain in related to language acquisition. It helps explain why children’s experiences during infancy have such a crucial effect on later language learning.
How can the reading specialist or literacy coach best support children’s language development?
The reading specialist can best support children’s language development by encouraging parent literacy supports at home and by providing literacy and language supports and research-evident strategies to teachers.
What information from our readings can best support teachers and parents in assisting with language development?
Parents can promote their children’s oral language by scaffolding their language, encouraging them to tell personal narratives about their experiences, reading stories to them on a regular basis, monitoring their children’s TV viewing, and encouraging active TV viewing.
Teachers should provide opportunities for students to see lots of print and have easy access to books. Students should observe adult literacy usage in everyday situations. Adults can support children’s literacy development by answering children’s questions, pointing to letters, and initiating functional literacy activities. Providing a variety of literacy materials supports engaging children’s literacy development in early forms of reading and writing.
