Developing Reading (CLA) Flashcards
Features to think about:
• Many children’s books are based around themes or topics, often using HYPERNYMS (weather, clothes, animals) to teach children HYPONYMS (rain, sunny, socks, shoes, dogs, cats, etc)
• NOUNS & ADJECTIVES are the most common word classes in early books.
• Early story books are designed to be read TO children, not BY them. They often contain complicated vocabulary and grammatical structures that children can understand even though they can’t read them or even use them in their own speech (children’s understanding of words and structures is ahead of their ability to use them).
Children become independent readers around the age of 8.
What do young readers need to know?
They need to understand that texts:
• Reflect the relationship between written symbols (graphemes) and sounds (phonemes)
• Have cohesion (parts interconnect)
• Are organised in certain ways (have chapters, subheadings, page numbers etc)
• Are organised differently according to their genre
• Represent the culture they are written in, following its rules and conventions (eg. English is read L to R etc)
Analysing Early Books
ANIMALS rather than humans are often the focus of fictional narratives. This can be a useful tool for distancing children from distressing issues. It can also help to break stereotypes and suggest morals to children (eg - in the tortoise and the hare, the slow tortoise wins the race and this can be used to illustrate a message to young children.
PHONOLOGICAL devices such as rhyme, rhythm, onomatopoeia, alliteration etc are often used to help young children remember words and increase their enjoyment of the text.
REPEATED structures help children to predict what might come next and emphasise phrase structure which can help children extend their vocabulary and grammatical understanding.
DIALOGUE is used a lot in children’s books. Direct speech allows experimenting which different voices and becomes a grammatical and rhetorical patterning device.
GRAPHOLOGICAL features are used such as placing pictures on the left of the page, which draws the child’s attention to the images before they look at the text. This helps them with decoding the text as they have an idea what it is about before they’ve read it.
TYPOGRAPHICAL features such as using different fonts, italics, different sizes etc is aimed at the adult reader as it signals a different voice, tone, pitch, volume is needed.
How are children taught to read?
The TWO main approaches to reading haven’t changed:
LOOK-AND-SAY or WHOLE WORD approach:
- Children learn the SHAPES of words, don’t break them down phonologically.
- Children learn to recognise whole words or sentences rather than individual phonemes.
- Flashcards are used for this method with individual words written on sets of cards, often with a picture illustrating the word.
PHONETICS APPROACH:
- Children learn the different SOUNDS made by different letters and letter blends. Emphasis is on PHONOLOGICAL AWARENESS, on hearing, differentiating and replicating sounds. TWO approaches to teaching phonics:
1. Analytic phonics - children BREAK DOWN whole words into phonemes and graphemes & look for patterns. They DECODE words by separating them into smaller units.
2. Synthetic phonics - children memories phonemes and learn to put sounds together to BUILD words.
The cues children use
• Graphophonic - look at shapes of words, link these to familiar graphemes/words to interpret them.
• Semantic - understanding meanings of words & making connections helps decode new words.
• Visual - looking at pictures to help interpret new words.
• Syntactic - applying knowledge of word order to work out if a word seems right in the context.
• Contextual - looking for understanding of the situation of a story - comparing to own experience & pragmatic understanding of social conventions.
• Miscue - errors made when reading, omitting words/substituting words/guessing from the pictures.
Stages of Reading Development (Jeanne Chall)
- Pre-reading/pseudo-reading (up to 6):
- ’pretend’ reading (turning pages & repeating stories)
- Some letter & word recognition (esp letters in own name).
- Predicting words or next stage of story. - Initial reading & decoding (6-7):
- Reading simple texts containing high-frequency lexis.
- [Understand approx 600 words] - Confirmation and Fluency (7-8):
- Reading texts more quickly, accurately & fluently, paying more attention to meanings of words & texts
- [Understand approx 3000 words] - Reading for learning (9-14):
- Reading for knowledge & info becomes motivation. - Multiplicity & complexity (14-17):
- Respond critically to what is read - analysing texts - Construction & reconstruction (18+):
- Reading selectively & forming opinions about what is read.
Reading Schemes
Graded to help development staged through difficulty.
Familiarity established through using same characters throughout.
Often help develop pragmatic understanding by modelling good behaviour, politeness etc.
Use multicultural and gender representation led to counteract stereotypes.
Key features of Reading schemes:
• Lexical repetition - esp new lexis
• Syntactical repetition of structures - usually subject-verb-object and simple sentences
• Simple verbs - single verbs rather than verb phrases
• One sentence per line - helps children to say complete phrases
• Anaphoric referencing - pronouns refer to the names of characters already used
• Limited use of modifiers - different from imaginative stories written for children where adjectives add detail and description.
• Text-image cohesion - the picture tells the story of the text.
