On understanding and fostering meaning-making

Drawing and mark-making came very naturally to me when I was little. I’ve always thought that there is a feeling that must go along with drawing; that is how you know where the lines go. I see lines in text and images—how they connect and intersect, and the shapes they make together. Perhaps this was a great advantage to me when learning to write. All of my memories surrounding learning to write involve the style of my handwriting. I do not remember being challenged by the direction of my letters, nor the sizes and heights in relation to one another, nor the technicalities of upper- and lower-case letters. For me, it was about the style. It was as though I could recall words based on the shapes their letters created together, and what the space looked like around them. I knew a word was right if it looked right, and felt right, just like drawing. As a student studying to become an elementary teacher, I am now trying to understand the early process of reading and writing as a form of meaning making for children.

I found it quite interesting to read that young children often do not distinguish between drawing and writing because they both convey meaning. It made me think back to my own early literacy experiences, where illustrating a picture was usually much preferred over writing a story. In the article by Kate Foley Cusumano, Every Mark on the Page: Educating Family and Community Members about Young Children’s Writing, she says that every mark is made for a purpose (2008). These lines, marks, and dots have meaning together, in a system, whether it is the conventional system that adults expect to be able to read or not. Young children are trying to figure out their language in written form, of course they will make mistakes on the way.

Adults, parents, and family members notice these spelling, letter, grammar, and punctuation mistakes before anything else. Perhaps it is because those are the only components that most people would think to look for, but what they are looking past is all of the brave progress the child has made by risking to write what she or he did in the first place. When a child creates something, they do it with a purpose. And there is a lot going on. They must structure what they are writing; they must make a decision in laying out the page, in choosing how to orient the letters and words. They choose how to convey a word, with invented spelling or even using the first letter to represent a word; and they choose how to begin a story. All of these critical decisions made by the student are evident in their work. These creative choices are what need to be celebrated and encouraged. Think about how much more exceedingly difficult a task becomes when you have people monitoring and analyzing you. I would bet it is even worse when they do not know what to look for in your work.

Cusumano said that 90% of children come to school believing that they can write (2008).  She also said that when children are not allowed to invent their own spelling, and are made to correct their spelling mistakes it can actually stunt the natural development of writing skills in these young children (Cusumano, 2008). As a future teacher, I see how communicating what we know about how children learn with the families and parents is incredibly important for the success of our students. Imagine the growth potential for our students if they can go home and practice the same skills they would at school, and be supported and praised by family members who understand their literacy journey, and can be proud of their hidden successes along the way. By communicating, we can make this a reality.

Digging for literacy? Donuts may be more helpful than you think.

Over the weekend I went on a “literacy dig” with some fellow pre-service teachers to find literacy in the community that our children are undoubtedly absorbing on a daily basis. It was interesting walking around a large shopping center to think about all of the sights, sounds, colors and ideas that children are taking in. They are continually exposed to literacy outside of school, and need it to communicate in the world, so why not use everyday experiences to teach your students about literacy?

On our literacy dig we were focused on the signs, surroundings, people, language, and printed text within the store. I was focused on the physical environment, noticing the bright white atmosphere, the rows of rectangular fluorescent lights dispensed across the ceiling, and the shiny black balls containing security cameras stuck in the ceiling everywhere. I thought about how a child might view this all too common space—everything organized, with red embellishments everywhere you look, pictures of happy people hang from the ceilings, red signs with white lettering are spaced out along the ceiling. What does all this tell a child? How do they receive this visual information? How does it make them feel?

There are red kiosks with red telephones, red shopping carts, red shopping baskets, and employees walking around all in red t-shirts. Naturally, red is known to make one anxious, and fluorescent lights never help such a matter. What is a child to make of this completely sense-overloaded environment? Will they point out the numbers and letters they know? Will those numbers and letters recall numbers or letters they have seen in other places? Will they try talking to anyone in the store? Is it a shopping experience they will reenact with other children? Will they talk about it after it is over?

In an article by Rebecca Powell and Nancy Davidson entitled “The Donut House: Real World Literacy in an Urban Kindergarten Classroom,” a kindergarten classroom practices literacy through all the efforts involved with creating a donut shop in their classroom. The article reinforced the idea that students have to want to understand. We can do this by posing the projects as real world literacy events—like taking your students on a field trip to a donut shop so that they can see for themselves how it is done, and then allowing them to create their own donut shop, by going through all the requirements you would in real life. Through taking notes on their field trip, making lists for supplies, brainstorming names for their shop, writing and reading letters and applications, and creating a big book documenting their experience to read and re-read later, they put their literacy skills to use. Every new step leading up to their “Grand Opening” was a new practice opportunity.

These are the skills that students will take away from school and apply to their lives. Powell and Davidson (2005) said that it is especially important for students living in high-crime and high-poverty areas to believe that they have the ability to transform their life circumstances. Perhaps you could agree that what goes on in the real world is often times far more interesting than learning spelling and practicing your grammar. This is precisely why it is important for students to get their literacy practice through means of more meaningful inquiry projects. In the example of The Donut House, the students engaged in reading and writing through a number of ways you would in your adult life. As Powell and Davidson (2005) put it, “Their literacy can be used for transformative ends.” Bringing real-world literacy into the classroom shows students how reading and writing skills they learn in school will be essential in their everyday lives, and how it can change their lives.

The beginning of ideas gathered

I have always liked the idea of learning centers. In my third grade classroom we had at least fifteen different learning centers, and I remember all of them being great.  I think that one of the best things about elementary school is that you get to explore a little bit of everything, and much of it is done through making things, playful activities, working with your peers, and using your imagination. There is something for everybody. All the activities children engage in have the power to teach them something—whether it is through greeting their classmates in morning meeting, listening to the way an advanced reader’s voice makes words flow together, or listening to their classmates share their ideas.

Anna Lyon and Paula Moore (2003) describe two learning centers in a preschool classroom in the book Sound Systems. Each center served as a multimodal response to a book their teacher had been reading aloud about farm animals. One station had a bucket of mud, a bucket of water, and plastic animals. Children could get the animals all muddy, and then wash them—just like in the story. This gave them the opportunity to physically engage in the task, play in the mud, and have a similar real-life experience. In another station they could paint paper animals, make puppets, and use them to act out the story—another great opportunity for preliterate students to show their understanding and respond to a text. I thought it was so wise of this teacher to have options for all kinds of learners. I liked how these activities used many senses and have the potential to reach all learners.

I also noticed that on multiple occasions the teacher in this particular text, Ms. Douglas, was so flexible to change her plan and use the students’ ideas, constantly teaching on her feet. By listening to what the children are thinking and ideas they have to offer, she is able to connect literacy lessons to her students. In one instance, a student suggested they make a list to prepare for their field trip the following day. As a group, they made the list beginning with Don’t forget your jacket, each student contributed what they knew about letters and sounds—an f here, and a j there—they found great successful working and learning as a community. This teacher’s pedagogy gave me many ideas to think about.

Another idea I found intriguing in Sound Systems was using the egocentric nature of children. I often imagine how children think, and I had never thought about this before. It makes sense that everything should be about them—it’s what they know about, it’s what they are comfortable with. Even as adults, we often find it easier to talk about and write about ourselves. This is a starting place. Children have a collection of sounds and words that are familiar, like their names, the names of their family members, and the words that they use in everyday speech. We can guide them in making connections to other sounds and words to make sense of the printed alphabet, and of language. I look forward to learning from more fantastic examples like these.