Excellence In Literacy Instruction In The 21 st Century

1. Excellence In Literacy Instruction In The 21st Century Reading Recovery Council of Michigan Detroit, Michigan November 17, 2008 W. Dorsey Hammond

2. Minds Needed For The 21st Century Howard Gardner • The Disciplined Mind (deep knowledge, expertise) • The Synthetic Mind (organize and interpret) • The Creative Mind • (problem solving) • The Respectful Mind (open to consideration) • The Ethical Mind ( fair & principled)

3. Reading Recovery In a Culture of Competing Theories • Is learning to read natural or unnatural? • Is learning to read a sequential act? • Issue of phonics instruction-what kind, how much & when? • Text types-predictable or decodable or…? • When does comprehension instruction begin? • The Role of Writing in Early Literacy?

4. Reading Recovery Has Survived and Thrived Through Major Pendulum Swings of Literacy • Whole language movement • Natural & predictable texts • Strong emphasis on writing • Construction theory • Metacognition • Miscues, Qualitative Assessments • Decodable texts • Phoneme segmentation • Early writing delayed • Fluency • “Scientifically Based” • Quantitative Assessments 1980’s 1990’s-2008

5. Why Has RR Survived & Thrived? • Carefully defined and monitored • Strong network across schools and universities (A Professional Learning Community) • Theoretically Framed • Research Based • Attracts Competent Professionals • Exemplary Model of Training and Educating • Targeted Population of Learners • Impressive Literacy Achievement Results

6. Theories and Practices Impacting Today’s Literacy K-5 • Eight Major Trends Relatively Long History Represents Individuals and Schools of Thought

7. Concept of Emergent LiteracyReading Readiness vs. Emergent Literacy • 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 • Listening to stories---------------------- • reconstructing familiar stories----> • constructing (new)stories---> • writing---------------- • print awareness------- • Reading Texts • predictable • dictations • natural

8. Emergent Writing • Early And Learned Concurrently With Learning To Read • Moves through stages or phases • Invented spellings lmtgftxxcdgyy MBEWWMLNT (My baby was with me last night) KylBsh.sKar. I have some daysees. They are flowrs. They growe in the Spreing. Today I gathered beries. The men brought back tons of fish. That ment I had to cook alot of fish.

9. Construction TheorySchema/ Prior Knowledege • Concept of constructing meaning with interaction of existing knowledge and information suggested by text • Michigan Definition of Reading • Explains multiple interpretations of text. • Foundation for Reader Response Theory • Justifies accessing of prior knowledge before reading selected texts • Using the known to understand the unknown • Much of teaching and learning is about making connections !

10. Making Connections 1st Scenario: A general wishes to capture a fortress. There are many roads leading out from the fortress. All are heavily mined, a large force will detonate the mines. General’s solution is to divide his army into small forces, each going down a different road and converging on the fortress simultaneously.

11. Transfer 2nd Scenario: You are a doctor who has a patient with a malignant stomach tumor. It is impossible to remove the tumor surgically. There is a potent ray or beam that can destroy the tumor but will kill too many healthy cells. Lower intensity rays are harmless. What type of procedure might be used? Gick & Holyoak, 1980

12. Metacognition • Knowing About Our Own Knowing.Thinking About Our Own Thinking. The ability to monitor one’s current level of understanding. • Bransford identifies metacognition as one of three most important principles of human learning! • Fundamental to word learning, comprehension, writing

13. Why Comprehension Instruction In Early Stages of Literacy • Builds on disposition of young children to make sense of their world • Establishes the habit of “meaning making” in reading • Builds knowledge • Facilitates word processing and word learning • Facilitates fluency • Rewarding and aesthetically pleasing to young learners

14. Celebration of Children’s Literature • Incredible number of new and diverse books for children published each year. • Celebration of children’s authors • Authors as part of the literacy community

15. Study of the Process • Automaticity models • Multiple cueing models-meaning, language and visual • Interactive compensatory models • Miscue Analysis and Running Records Provide Insight Into The Process

16. The Nature of The Young Child As A Learner • A meaning maker from the earliest weeks & months of life. • Young Children learn language and use language to learn (see Gordon Wells, The Meaning Makers) • Questioning & Wondering from ages 1-5 & beyond. • We now know the impact that parents & significant others have on this process. (See Hart & Risley, Meaningful Differences)

17. The Disposition of Young Children To Work Hard And To Learn-A Cautionary Tale • At the beginning of the year Karen (pseudonym) is a model of organization. With a minute by minute schedule on the board she carefully walks the class through her rules and expectations. She constantly gives children feedback and posts the students’ percentage grades each week. The importance of work and completing assignments on time is stressed. Although this is a worthwhile message, at times it seems to eclipse any effort students might make to develop understanding. The result is a classroom in which students complete work rather than learn. Ritchhart, 2002

18. Eight Principles • The Concept of Emergent Literacy • Emergent Writing as Critical Part of Emergent Literacy • Construction Theory, Prior Knowledge and Schema • Metacognition • Comprehension at Earliest Stages of Literacy Development • The Celebration of Children’s Literature • The Nature of the Process of Reading • The Nature of The Learner *********************************** Reading Recovery draws from each of these!

19. Challenges For Reading Recovery • Maintain the theoretical & pedagogical integrity. • Continue to develop the nuances of the pedagogy. • Politically sell Reading Recovery to underserved populations. (The Economy of Success) • Help transfer the enduring theory of Reading Recovery and yet modify the applications to classroom teachers who are working with groups of students and with students at later grade levels. ( Picture walks, running records, dictation and writing, Guided Reading Models, for example.

20. Personal Connections To Reading Recovery-Making A Difference • Personal Narratives-Bob, Lee, Judy, Michal • Your personal narrative • Impact of Reading Recovery • Locally • Nationally • Internationally Making A Difference Churchill- Success is never finished.