Parents Should Be Involved!
Becoming Literate in a Second Language: Connecting Home, Community, and School Literacy Practices
This reading for this week really focuses on how we can connect literacy practices from home into the school and vise versa. It goes into examples of many different children using literacy practices at home. One that stood out to me was the example about Nan. Even though Nan's parents weren't literate in any language they were still involved in her school work by finding other ways such as drawing to make up for it. It goes on to talk about how children start out developing their families literacy practices but eventually venture off into their own literacy practices.
My first question would have to be: What literacy practices do you see your children doing at home? If you don't have children, then what literacy practices do you see your students use in the classroom that aren't what you normally do at school?
How involved do you think your parents are in your classrooms to help the building process of literacy?
I work at a preschool here on campus and we have some students in our many classes that do not speak English and many that do speak English. The parents there seem to be pretty involved in the classroom and also actually enjoy being involved. Us as teachers, also make sure that we are there to support the students. We have them read books everyday. When they aren't playing, they are reading or scanning through books making up their own stories. We also enjoy reading to them and encourage them to write a lot by giving them a drawing station so they can write on papers to make their own sentences.
I then found a video that talks more about the involvement of parents in their childs life. A quote that really stuck out to me was "The best gift a parent can give their child is their time". I think this video relates more to younger children and also babies.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CleB0AEEq_A
Questions about the video?
If you have a child, how are you involved?
What is a big take away from this video?
There are ways for parents to get involved and also for the school to get involved in order to help the student with their literacy.
What is a way that the community could also get involved? Some parents could be stuck and not know what they could do if their child is not developing as they should be.
I am in another language class here on campus and right now we are learning about the connection with home literacy and school literacy. We are also talking about how we can incorporate their home literacy into school. Something that really stuck with me was the Third Space Theory.
The Third Space Theory is essentially a third space where children can bring their home life into school. In the book it says, "third space theory allows us to think about how children's meaning making often lies between school and home." ( Pahl & Rowsell, pg 66). There is also an activity in this book that you can use to make your own third space in your classroom. I will insert a picture below.
The top diagram gives an example of what third space is and what it looks like. The text is information on third space and the bottom is the activity.
My last question(s) would have to be:
This reading for this week really focuses on how we can connect literacy practices from home into the school and vise versa. It goes into examples of many different children using literacy practices at home. One that stood out to me was the example about Nan. Even though Nan's parents weren't literate in any language they were still involved in her school work by finding other ways such as drawing to make up for it. It goes on to talk about how children start out developing their families literacy practices but eventually venture off into their own literacy practices.
My first question would have to be: What literacy practices do you see your children doing at home? If you don't have children, then what literacy practices do you see your students use in the classroom that aren't what you normally do at school?
How involved do you think your parents are in your classrooms to help the building process of literacy?
I work at a preschool here on campus and we have some students in our many classes that do not speak English and many that do speak English. The parents there seem to be pretty involved in the classroom and also actually enjoy being involved. Us as teachers, also make sure that we are there to support the students. We have them read books everyday. When they aren't playing, they are reading or scanning through books making up their own stories. We also enjoy reading to them and encourage them to write a lot by giving them a drawing station so they can write on papers to make their own sentences.
I then found a video that talks more about the involvement of parents in their childs life. A quote that really stuck out to me was "The best gift a parent can give their child is their time". I think this video relates more to younger children and also babies.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CleB0AEEq_A
Questions about the video?
If you have a child, how are you involved?
What is a big take away from this video?
There are ways for parents to get involved and also for the school to get involved in order to help the student with their literacy.
What is a way that the community could also get involved? Some parents could be stuck and not know what they could do if their child is not developing as they should be.
I am in another language class here on campus and right now we are learning about the connection with home literacy and school literacy. We are also talking about how we can incorporate their home literacy into school. Something that really stuck with me was the Third Space Theory.
The Third Space Theory is essentially a third space where children can bring their home life into school. In the book it says, "third space theory allows us to think about how children's meaning making often lies between school and home." ( Pahl & Rowsell, pg 66). There is also an activity in this book that you can use to make your own third space in your classroom. I will insert a picture below.
The top diagram gives an example of what third space is and what it looks like. The text is information on third space and the bottom is the activity.
My last question(s) would have to be:
- Do you do this in your classroom already?
- Do you think that this is a good literacy practice for teachers to use for their students?
- What literacy practices do you use in your classroom that incorporates home literacy also?
- Please leave your thoughts on this blog and reading below! Thank you!
I agree with all of the readings throughout this semester in that literacy starts at home, and would like to address the question of as a parent what do I personally do to promote literacy within my home. Parent and home engagement is important in all educational settings because a students home life is so closely linked to their personal identity and affects their learning, confidence and how comfortable they are within the classroom. I really hadn't thought about how important EVERYONE they are exposed to including friends and family are in their journey towards literacy, but I can see that within my own children. I grew up with a small library worth of books in my home and saw my parents read daily. Even with my struggles to learn to read this made me understand the importance of reading and I have carried that on with my children. They always have books at their disposal and we started visiting the public library at an early age. I also allowed them to choose books for their own online library on each of their tablets so they could read (or be read to) when I read at night. I think personal truth is so important in literacy and have always really encouraged my children to tell me their truth through stories, pictures or letters so they feel valued and that their voices are heard.
ReplyDeleteI think good teachers do these same things. My son (2nd grade) struggles horribly with reading and gets pulled out of class daily for additional help, but his teacher has always celebrated his reading and writing progress just as much as she does for the other students. She also encourages community building and storytelling in her classroom, allowing the students to celebrate the things they do over the weekends with their classmates and encourages parents to send in pictures of life events. My two oldest children are being adopted by their step dad on Wednesday and his teacher has already asked permission to allow Eli to share his story with his classmates throughout the week to celebrate at school as well. The way she encourages community gives the students confidence and embraces that they are each unique and even if one is not as good academically it doesn't change their value within their classroom.
Wow! Your sons teacher sounds amazing!
DeleteI had a similar experience growing up as you did. I grew up in a family that promoted reading. We would go to the library all the time as kids and were read to at night. Somewhere around 1st/2nd grade I began to not like reading. I have been thinking about it and I wonder if it was because reading longer/more challenging books was not modeled at home. Although my parents promoted us to read, they never read novels or books when we were growing up. I eventually loved to read but the time from 1-7th grade I was a reluctant reader. I am sure there is a number of things that could have contributed to that, but it makes me wonder if that contributed to it.
Amanda, I'm glad you shared the bit about your son's teacher. I would love to become this kind of teacher in the future. When reading this, I looked over at my mom and asked her if she ever read to me as a child. She turned to me and laughed and said that she tried many many times to read to me, but that I would never sit still long enough or care to listen to the story. I was more of a movie watcher or cuddler. This explains so much about why I'm still not much of a reader today. I have recently picked up on some reading for my own leisure in only the past few moths. I believe that making sure you or your child gets some reading in every night and the exposure to the library is a big step toward that.
DeleteMy grandpa would always take me and my sisters to do the summer reading program at the library every summer! I think that this might be great for students when they are out of school for the summer, especially if they don't have many books at home. I think this a fun and also educational way to get students involved within the community too.
DeleteAmanda, you are lucky your son has such a teacher! Since the students I teach are older, I can only comment about my experiences as a parent. Unfortunately, the teachers my son had were completely against having parents involved. In Carmel schools, parents become too involved, and the intensity of their expectations often makes even the most secure teachers rather uncomfortable. When my son was in elementary school, students were encouraged to share their cultures but not in an in-depth way. Typically, it was with food. What turned my son off of reading completely is the point system that was used to determine their reading "success". My son was (is) a pretty competitive kid, and although he liked to read non-fiction books about athletes, astronauts, & musicians, those types of books were not given significant point values. Books geared to girls, however, were given more points. As a result, to quickly get his points, he would read "Little House" books and books that did not interest him. Because of this, he quickly became disenchanted with reading.
ReplyDeleteI think if you are going to have parental involvement, it needs to be well defined ahead of time. Also, the teachers who plan to have this type of involvement need to be prepared to address not only the needs of parents but their expectations.
Very interesting insight! It is very unfortunate that they only talked about their cultures in a surface level way. I found that was the case when I was in school too.
DeleteWhen it comes to your son being discouraged with reading that makes me sad. I am a big supporter of allowing students choice in their books. In my English classes, we have independent reading for 10 minutes at the beginning of every class and my students can choose any book that interests them. Research shows that this can lead to higher reading levels. From experience, I can tell that it can make a student who doesn't think they are a reader into a more confident reader.
I would like to comment on your question about what we do for our children at home. I do not have children, but I plan to be the mother that takes trips to the local library to expose my children to the world of reading. I also will have a variety of books in my collection at home so that they have some right at hand. Another thing I would love to do for my children is read them bedtime stories . or create stories with them before falling asleep. This way, they will fall in love with storytelling altogether.
ReplyDeleteI would also like to talk about what I do in my classroom at the before and afterschool program/daycare I work for. After we have snack every day, I ask my students to sit on these rubber dots that I have in my classroom with their names on each of them. I also ask them to pick out a book and look through it carefully to try and figure out what is going on in the story, or to really pay attention to what they are reading. I ask them to pick out a favorite page in the book to show me. I call their names, they bring me the book they are reading to show me the page, and tell me what is going on in the story and then they are supposed to get in line from there. This routine that I have started seems to be enjoyable for the students. I have seen them begin to share with other students about what their book is about.
I think this is a great idea! I also work in a daycare where students are constantly reading. I think that it would be a great idea for me to start doing that in my classroom. So many of my students ask for me to read to them that i would never have time for anything else if i read that many books! I do believe that by letting them share a piece of their book, it would make them feel more important that we want to interact with them based on what they think is interesting.
DeleteI do not have my own classroom yet and I am not a mother but I do work in an elementary before/after school program. At work we do these things called clubs where the students can pick which one they want to attend near the end of the day. A lot of the time we determine what the clubs are based on the students interests. When I first started at this job I picked up on that a lot of the kids liked making comic books and reading so I suggested we make a comic book club. When this club is going on we really promote and encourage the kids to draw more, add color, and even make their comic longer. I think it is a great way to promote their literacy skills because this club isn't something they have to do. It is a choice for them and they pick it because they like to do it. When I get my own classroom I would like to know the interests of my students and then build literacy around their interests.
ReplyDeleteI totally agree Tori! I think that making comic books is a great way to let them explore their interests while also writing and drawing. I think that another great way might be to make blogs themselves and be able to write out their feelings.
DeleteTorri, what a great idea! I think that giving students choice is a powerful classroom motivator. There has been such a resurgence in comic book interest in recent years. I have also tried to use that to my advantage in my own classroom. When we talk about propaganda I try to find comic book examples from WWII and the Cold War to hook the student's interests. You're right though. All students are different. I think that it's important to get to know your students and provide variety of choice to really grab everyone in the classroom.
DeleteTorri, I loved this! Not only did you know what type of text the kids liked, but you used a type of text that is not commonly used in the classroom. I definitely think you should remember to do this when you get your own classroom. When students see that you care enough to know what type of books/text they like, you can provide those books/text for them and they'll be more appreciative. You can provide a reading interest survey to your students at the beginning of the year to gauge their reading interests and what they like to read.
DeleteTori I love that you brought up clubs! My after school program is switching over to that. We of course are going by interests of the students but you gave me an idea on how to incorporate literacy into it. It is always tough with after school programs because I feel like there is pressure on teachers to create lesson plans and make everything so academic. When really students do not want any part of that once the school day is over. I think with the power of using clubs it can be more activity/interest based and still throw in learning opportunities!
DeleteYour blog post made realize about my upbringing. Typically, my father encouraged us to read everyday. I can recall frequent trips to the library and he normally modeled reading for us daily. there were several instances where I would pick out a book and he would read a little bit everyday to my family over a period of several weeks. He was doing exactly what the parents were encouraged to do in your youtube video. Although I didn't read much for enjoyment as a teenager, however, in college it seems that those seeds he planted finally blossomed. Today, I enjoy reading and keep a yearly list of all of the books that I complete. At the end of the year I pick my top five and write a short review and publish it online. I couldn't imagine doing something like this if it was not modeled for me as kid.
ReplyDeleteAs a teacher, I have a few opinions on literacy in school. In my estimation, I think that the current model for promoting literacy is broken. I think that curriculum is over-stressed and this does not "plant the seeds" for literacy that is encouraged in the video. We are forced to provide reading analysis problems that are similar to those of standardized tests but these only make kids hate reading. One of my favorite quotes of all time is "education is not the filling of a bucket, but the lighting of a fire." As an education system, I believe we are just filling their buckets with standardized literacy that does not plant the seeds for their future. If instead we encouraged them to read what they want and "light their fire" I think it could promote literacy on a much wider level.
Jacob, I was also lucky to have parents who encouraged us to read modeled reading for us. I remember sitting at the breakfast table with my father while he drank coffee and read the newspaper. Each Halloween he would dim the lights and read Poe's The Raven to us by the fire. My grandfather was an avid reader and had a passion for the Civil War. He died when I was twelve and left me all of his books on Abraham Lincoln.
DeleteI love that quote about education. I think that you're right about the pitfalls of the current education system. One of my goals as a teacher is that I spark their curiosity and help create life long learners. This is far more important to me than their standardized test scores.
I want to address the ways that I try to promote reading at home. I have gone through phases as someone who is a voracious reader to someone who doesn't pick up a book for years (and back and forth). I had always pictured bedtime with young children as a time where we would snuggle in the rocker and read books while my children fell asleep in my arms. I quickly found out that this was not my reality. I have two high spirited boys who often struggle to sit still. For about the first two years of my oldest son's life I didn't think that I'd ever get through an entire book with him, even the shortest board book. Eventually I figured out that he has a longer attention span in the morning when he is not too tired from the day. He is only 4 but loves to look at books quietly by himself after I put him to bed. One of the take-aways from the video was all of the ways to encourage literacy outside of just reading to your children. I had never considered talking to your children as a way to encourage literacy but it makes sense. I understand that children whose parents converse with them have a much larger vocabulary than children whose parents only give orders and direction.
ReplyDeleteParents are not especially involved within my classroom. I think that this is probably a function of teaching high school. Unless a child is struggling and their parents are trying to help get them on the right path, I generally don't hear much from parents. When I first started teaching I tried to reach out to parents more about the positive things that I saw in my classroom but unfortunately I've let that practice slide. Thinking back to the readings throughout the course, I realize that inviting parents in to the classroom to share their knowledge and culture could serve as a major classroom community builder.
I totally agree! I think that many parents are involved in elementary school because there is much more for them to be involved in. I think that when they do get up into middle and high school that it might be more difficult for the parents to get involved because there isn't as much for them to do. They also might not know what they are learning in school. I feel like in high school it is preparing the students more to be on their own and do things alone.
DeleteVery deep blog post!! It really made me think about my son's literacy practices and being in the second grade. We read at home every night before bedtime. Now that he is in the second grade and can read pretty well, I usually make him read to me three night a week. In my school, I find parents to be completely involved with their child's school work and involvement. Parents are also very helpful with the building process of literacy. I generally like to stay involved with my son's literacy process through constant communication with his teacher and focus on staying abreast with his reading goals and process. I really agree with my son's teacher making them log reading minutes each week. He has to read 30 minutes each night on top of the reading we do together and write a small summary about what he read.
ReplyDeleteI once student taught at a Reggio Emilia preschool and one of my big assignments was to create project work for my preschoolers. They had a huge interest in literacy and so I expanded their curiosity into many different learning opportunities. They started off with liking classic Disney stories being read to them. Then you would see the children bringing those characters to life in house or block area. As their curiosity grew the experiences turned into learning about traits, symbols, vocabulary, rhymes and so on. Towards the end, they had many displays of their work on what they learned through out the project for others to see. This is important for project work! The end goal was to plan a trip that included families to see a play for a real life experience. Although the project had so much to it, I think it was a great way for children to contribute to their own learning at their own pace. It allowed families to be involved and for children to bring their own prior knowledge of what literacy meant to them and add to it. I've seen a lot of young children enjoy books and reading but it was great to see how invested they got!!
ReplyDelete