1. Emergent Literacy
Kylie Haworth

2. Overview What is Emergent Literacy? Historical Perspective Theories
The 5 Principles
Guiding Practices
Helping ELL Students
References

3. EMERGENT LITERACY: Emergent: Birth-K Beginner: Grade 1-2
Emergent – NOT YET READING
Emergent: Birth-K
Beginner: Grade 1-2
Transitional: Grade 2
Intermediate: Grade 3-5
(Ward, 2011)

4. What is “Emergent Literacy”?
Child already has some knowledge of language, reading and writing
Communication skills – (influences the other)
Begins early (at birth) – ongoing
Sociolinguistic
Social context for learning
Embedded
Instruction based on needs
Books – early!
Child centered and based on
problem solving (Morrow, 2009, Ch. 1)
-Chapter 1: Morrow, p. 24
-they come into school with already some knowledge of language
-communication skills: influencing the other, it all works together – reading, writing, listening, speaking
-beginning at birth: sociolinguistic – has to do with what they are surrounded by and what they pick up –
This is why it is a “social context”
-embedded – it is on signs they see, books around them, what they hear, when they talk,
-books introduced very early
-based on problem solving – exploratory

5. Reading Readiness (1900s-1950s)
Waiting until there is interest or “readiness”
Natural maturation
Formal instruction – school
Pre K and K – in the past had avoided reading instruction (passive)
Behaviorist
Teacher driven
Decoding – primary skills (Morrow, 2009), (Mason & Sinha, 2003)
Chapter 1: Morrow, p. 22
-only if a child looks like they are ready to pick up a book or if they are interested in books is when it should be taught, they need to be mature enough to being the reading
-school – sometimes if they child doesn’t look ready, they won’t begin – passive
-behaviorist – lecture, skill and drill, explicit
-primary skills – just decoding words – no comprehension “taught”
What are some pros and cons that you see in this “Reading Readiness” theory?

6. Before all this… The Historical Perspective
1700s and 1800s Philosophers of Education
Rousseau – “natural”, development and readiness, curiosity
Pestalozzi – learning through manipulatives
Froebel – play in learning, “kindergarten”
What was reading like?
An oral tradition
ABCs taught through gingerbread
Books with pilgrims in new schools, religious books
Instruction: memorizing
-Chapter 1: Morrow, p. 16
-Rousseau – reading readiness, curiosity formal instruction could interfere with their own development,
-no intervening from adults
-Pestalozzi- manipulations, sensory experiments
-Froebel – “play” coined the term kindergarten – a child’s garden
-oral tradition, stories, legends, fairy tales,
-gingerbread – first way to teach
-through reform movement, people learned,
-wanted to learn so that they could think for themselves
-memorizing, Hornbooks, no illustrations, Peter Rabbit, first picture book
(Morrow, 2009, p )
(Ward, 2011)

7. Before all this… The Historical Perspective
Twentieth Century Philosophers of Education
Dewey – progressive education, interest based
Skinner – “Behaviorism”, systematic, direct, structure
Montessori – mastering one skill, then another
Piaget – cognitive development
Vygotsky – schema and scaffolding
What was reading like?
Basal Readers: 1930s-1980s
IRI done by Betts: 1949
Look-Say Reading ex. “Dick and Jane”
Reading Wars: Whole Language vs. Skills Instruction
Controlled vocabulary?
Whole language– trade books
Balanced Literacy
-Dewey – built around interests of children, integrating content ideas, real life settings and play, agreed with Froebel, very constructivist
-Skinner- permanent change in behavior, systematic and direct, structure, routines, lectures, scripted teaching
-Montessori – early orderly, systematic training in mastering one skill after another. Modeled by the teacher and provides a source of learning for the child
-Piaget, cognitive, development through stages in life, “active participants in their own learning”
-Vygotsky – schema – make predictions and inferences, social relationships, a knowledgeable person needs to be able to help “scaffold” new information, modeling, then can do the work independently
-informal reading assessment, with a corresponding level
-look and say reading “Dick and Jane” “See Spot”
Reading wars – One way to teach better than the other? Whole lang vs. skills instruction
concerns over controlled vocab vs synthetic phonics
Whole lang. movement… trade books vs. basal readers
(Morrow, 2009, p )
(Ward, 2011)

8. Theories Behaviorist : Constructivist :
Construct meaning as you get you info.
Holistic and exploratory
“dirty learning”
*Dewey, Bruner, Piaget, Vygotsky*
Behaviorist :
Training, memorization, rote learning
Positive/Negative Reinforcement
Systematic, teacher directed, lecture
“clean learning”
*Skinner*
Schema Theory :
How much prior knowledge you hold
Prior info. + New info. = schemata
Schema must be built; helpful to have in school
*Vygotsky*
Transactional Theory :
(schema related)
Prior knowledge aids comprehension
“transaction” between reader and text
Set different purposes for reading
*Rosenblatt*
-quickly look at these to give us an idea
(Morrow, 2009), (Ward, 2011)

9. Theories Psycholinguistic: Sociolinguistic:
Cognitive processes govern language use
Biological/Neurological
Ex. Phonology, Morphology, Orthography, Syntax, Semantics, Pragmatics
Sounds, structure, letters, patterns, meaning, content
Sociolinguistic:
Society shapes language use
Models surroundings, influences
Norms, expectations, context
Code switching : different “talk”
Zone of Proximal Development:
Where they need to go – useful for instruction; “the staircase”
Scaffolding and modeling
*Vygotsky*
-look at these to give us an idea before we begin
(Ward, 2011)

10. The Five Principles 1. Phonological Awareness
-Sound awareness (units of sound) and putting sounds together
-Emergent:
-WORD, SYLLABLE and SOUND AWARENESS
1. Rhyme (“bat, hat, mat, rat”) and alliteration (Bill bakes brownies)
2. Words and syllable (clapping)
Activities:
Isolating: /m/ may Segmenting: /d/ /o/ /g/
Categorizing: picture sorts Deleting: “meat” without /m/
Blending: /pup/ / “Odd Man Out”
Manipulating: change /c/ in cat to /m/
Phonemic Awareness
-Spoken words and syllables can be a sequence of phonemes (the smallest units of sound)
Phonological has to do with SOUND – hearing syllables, rhymes, sounds. Etc.
Activities to help with phonological awareness – isolating, say /m/ in may
Categorizing with pictures
Blending – pup/ e/
Segmenting /d/ o/ g/
Deleting – say meat without /m/
Odd man out – all of these pictures have the same sound, ex. Bird, boy, bear, cat, which one doesn’t fit?
(Ward, 2011)

11. The Five Principles 2. Alphabetic Principle
-Sounds correlated to letters
-These are “graphemes” (letters) that correspond to sounds – the “phonemes”
Concepts about Print (CAP) and Books!
-Title, Author and Illustrator
-The print corresponds to the written story
-You read a book from left to right
Activities: Shared Reading, Dialogic
Reading, Interactive Writing,
Environmental Print, Books on Tape
Phonics
-Speech sounds all correlated with
letters, words, etc.
Ways to Teach Phonics
SYNTHETIC
Small parts – whole
Bottom up
ANALYTIC
Decoding, chunking
Whole word - parts
Top down
-the UNDERSTANDING that words are composed of letters - graphemes – that correspond to sounds
Ideas to help with teaching alphabetic principle and to encourage learning of concepts of print and concepts about books
Phonics- speech sounds, letters, words, all wrapped together
Synthetic – small parts to whole, at, rat, brat
Analytic – look at the whole word, see the parts, decoding chunking
Embedded – content base, discuss words as they occur
Analogy – whole comparing parts – you know cake, rake, bake, make
EMBEDDED
Not explicit, authentic
Discuss as it occurs
ANALOGY
Whole to part
Taught explicitly
Comparing – cake = bake, rake, make
(Ward, 2011)

12. The Five Principles 3. Fluency -Transition from decoding to reading
-Greater exertion on decoding – less attention to meaning
-Comprehension is the main goal
-Using prosody shows understanding of meaning
IMPORTANT:
-Accuracy in decoding
-Automatic word recognition
-Appropriate prosodic elements (stress, pitch, phrasing)
Activities:
-Repeated Readings
-Choral and Echo readings
-Readers’ Theatre
-Buddy and Paired Readings
-flow! Changes from decoding words to actually “reading”!
-less exertion on decoding… can pay more attention to what you read – comprehension
-then you will have… accuracy in decoding
-recognize words automatically
-prosody – expression, pitch, stress, phrasing, etc.
(describe activities)
(Barone and Morrow, 2003)

13. The Five Principles 4. Vocabulary
-Word recognition: not just sight words!
-“Academic English”
GOAL: enhance understanding, encourage expression
-Tiered words
Tier 1 – ex. “nice” while a Tier 3 would be content words
Activities:
-Only teach 2-4 purposeful words at a time
-They should be contextualized in conversation and books
-Techniques:
Semantic webs or semantic gradients
List, group, label… now write a paragraph
“Four Square”
Every person response – thumbs up!
Word Walls
Word recognition – sight words are important, but vocabulary is consisted of more than that!
We speak in academic english meaning that we use formal and proper english (Relates sociolinguistic) “teacher talk”
Tiered words – nice = tier 1, content words are a tier 3
Four square – draw a pic, use a synonym, write in a sentence
(Ward, 2011)

14. The Five Principles 5. Comprehension -Main goal of reading 
-Readers make meaning of what they read or hear
-Has to do with:
Prior knowledge and experience
Social interaction
Reading or listening ability
8 strategies: Predicting, Summarizing, Using Prior Knowledge, Imagery, Using Graphic Organizers, Recognizing Text Structure, Generating and Asking Questions and Monitoring Meaning/Metacognition
Many Activities: Directed Listening and Thinking Activities, Shared Book Experiences, Repeated Readings, Small Group and One-on-One Readings, Answer Questions (by students and teachers!), Graphic Organizers and Reading Response Groups 
Comprehension – readers make sense and find meaning of what they read and hear
-Has to do with…
-8 strategies – how we teach, but many different activities to teach these 8 strategies!
(Ward, 2011)

15. *Brainstorm Activity!*
Directions:
With a person or two you are sitting with, choose one of the “5 Principles”
On each Sticky Note, please brainstorm some activities that you have done in your classroom or plan to do in your classroom
Post them up front! Let’s see if we can give each other new ideas or talk about ones that we all see working!

16. Guiding Practices Concept of Word Writing Reading the “white spaces”
Tracking
Oral vs. print
Can they identify words?
Writing
Letter-sound awareness
Phonemic Awareness – putting sounds together
Phonics – using patterns they know
Where are they? Shows what they know! (Encoding)
“C.O.W. LADDER”
1. Scribbles
2. Some symbols- “letter like”
3. Random letters and numbers
4. Beginning/salient sounds
5. Beginning and some endings
6. Spelling by letter name
It’s oral and print – do they have it all together? Go hand in hand?
1. Scribbles – pretend writing
2. Some symbols – “letter like” (some are letters or numbers)
3. Random letters and numbers
4. Beginning or salient sounds (strongest sound)
5. Beginning and some endings “Semiphonetic” – showing some word boundaries
6. Spelling by letter name
Must have a letter-sound awareness, the alphabetic principle
Putting sounds together – like sounding out
Phonics -Using spelling patterns that they know
Writing is a good activity to actually see what students at the emergent stage know
Encoding – tells us what is in their memory… can they pull it out and use it
(Ward, 2011)
(Morrow, 2009)

17. Metacognition Motivation
Guiding Practices: Helping Students Become Actively Involved in Literacy
Metacognition
Actively involved in the construction of their own literacy
Motivation
“Initiating and sustaining a particular activity”
For reading… they read on a regular basis for a variety of reasons
Intrinsic “for me” vs. Extrinsic (a positive reinforcement – reward)
Four ideas help motivate students
Choice, Challenge, Social Collaboration, Success
Classroom activities that motivate students
Literacy Centers, Classroom Library, Read alouds, Storytelling, Independent reading and writing, Technology
Metacognition – they know how their learning is going, actively involved… helps with…. Motivation!
Important to be motivated – what is it?
Intrinsic: just being motivated for themselves, they want to do well, it is important to instill this at an early age… HOW do we do this?
Extrinsic: We use rewards or positive reinforcement- this gets them in the routine of completing work/ putting effort/ working hard and we hope they learn to eventually be “INTRINSICALLY motivated”
Choice – have control and take responsibility for their learning
Challenge – students like to be challenged, too hard or too easy, they will lose interest
Social collaboration – enjoy socializing and learning with their peers and the teacher rather than working alone
Success – if they see themselves as successful, they will be more inclined to continue
(Morrow, 2009, p. 285)

18. Helping “English Language Learners”
What is “first language acquisition”?
-Learning the “first language” or the native language
What is “second language acquisition”?
-Learning a second language
-Easier to teach a second language to children
-Instruction needed
*These are the students that we teach*
-First language acquisition: the child’s first language… “native” it is natural, hearing, speaking, since the beginning
-Learning a second language, bilingual,
-Instruction needed whereas with first language, not necessary
This is where we as teachers come in.
Next slides are where we will talk about HOW to help these English Language Learners! (second language acquisition)
(Morrow, 2009)

19. Helping ELL Students Make students feel comfortable in the classroom
Give student a “buddy” / peer assisted learning
Tasks should be active (can be nonverbal)
Activities – maximize the use for language
Modeling and direct instruction
Practice! (with guidance and then independently)
-someone that speaks the same language, makes them feel comfortable, peer assisted learning
-active tasks that are nonverbal, watering plants, passing out folders, etc.
-modeling and direct instruction – show how to do everything, explicit examples
-practice! Over and over again, first with guidance, then independently
(Morrow, 2009, p. 79)

20. Helping ELL Students
Encourage students’ language and literacy development
Classroom library: English and also primary language of all students (also examples)
Provide daily extensive vocabulary lesson – visuals!
Teach basic greetings and expressions
Have students make their own “word books”
Use high interest picture books
-variety of texts in English as well as books in the primary lang. of all students
-have examples in the room, newspapers, songs, signs, menus
-not too many words at a time, words should come from key concepts, use visuals when teaching words, very helpful
-word books with English as well as their language
-high interest picture books – predictable books, discuss vocabulary, use pictures
Can you think of any ideas that might help the ELL students in your class?
(Morrow, 2009, p. 80)

21. Helping ELL Students… more ideas!
Encourage students’ language and literacy development
Buddy reading and writing
Repeated Readings of a story
All manipulatives! Games, puppets, visual figures, etc.
Cloze activities – fill in the blank
Cut up sentence strips to sequence
-buddy – build on language and the ideas of their other classmates
-hands on and visuals will help vocabulary development
-cloze activities… see which words will fill in the blank
-manipulating sentence strips to make a sequence
Turn to someone next to you! Which of these suggestions are you going to put into place in your classroom tomorrow? 
(Morrow, 2009, p. 80)

22. References
Barone, D. M. & Morrow, L. M. (2003). Literacy and young children: Research based practices. (pp ). The Guilford Press. New York, NY.
Mason, J. M., & Sinha, S. (1993). Emerging literacy in the early childhood years: Applying a Vygotskian model of learning and development. In B. Spodek (Eds.), Handbook of research on the education of young children (pp ). New York, NY: Macmillan.
Morrow, L. M. (2009). Literacy development in the early years: Helping children read and write. 6th edition. (pp ). Pearson Education, Inc. Boston, MA.
Ward, A., (6/9/11, 6/14/11, 6/16/11, 6/21/11, 6/28/11, 7/7/11, 7/12/11). [PowerPoint slides]. George Mason University. EDRD 630.