Lecture 15 - Literacy

Question 1

Importance of literacy

Answer 1

print is everywhere much of vocab comes from reading (misled, awry, infrared) new knowledge (esp. in school) comes more and more from reading

Question 2

Literacy achievements emergent literacy

Answer 2

can’t yet read but can recognize form and function of text can’t “read” logos, brands left to right reading, spaces separate words what family members use reading for: FUN! or Bills :( influences diff attitudes toward literacy

Question 3

preparing for literacy at home

Answer 3

engage in reading activities - alphabet games - reading books together - implies to kid that there is value in being literate, talking about the not-here-and-now ((do better in school)) - reading also affords the opportunity to talk about things that aren’t in the here and now

Question 4

different ways of reading books

Answer 4

• describers (describe, encourage labeling) - comprehenders (emphasize meaning, inference) - performers (read straight thorugh) biggest gains in reading: describer style but for kids with big vocabs already: performer style

Question 5

reading books across cultures Melzi and Caspe 2005

Answer 5

• read wordless picture book to kids - in Peru= storytelling style = one where the Mom is a narrator and the kid doesn’t participate - in the U.S. = storybuilding style = interact, create story with kids

Question 6

among immigrant moms in NYC, most did storytelling style…

Answer 6

…this produced better outcomes

Question 7

Socioeconomic status variability

Answer 7

• lower income kids get less book reading time - also don’t do as well in literacy at school - not true across the board

Question 8

SES variability vs. positive influences

Answer 8

• writing is better if good relations w/parents • reading is better if school provides structured practice (e.g. workbooks) - reading not affected by home variables in this study - more recent work: parents should support literacy activities, use advanced words, engage in extended discourse

Question 9

Tabors, Dickinson, Snow experiment: preparing for literacy preschools

Answer 9

• above average home literacy, bad preschool: did poorly • below average home literacy, good preschool: did well so get your kid into a good preschool!

Question 10

Necessary skills to read:

Answer 10

• detect visual features of letters • know grapheme-phoneme correspondence rules • recognize words • know semantics • comprehension, interpretation

Question 11

Recognizing letters

Answer 11

• Very different versions of same letter – e é – Q q • Very similar versions of different letters – E F – Q O

Question 12

graphemes to phonemes

Answer 12

okay, you’ve recognized the letters. Now let’s convert them to sounds!

• Tough though thought
• Defiance fiance
• Garage outrage
• Now know
• Get gel

Question 13

grapheme

Answer 13

is the smallest semantically distinguishing unit in a written language, analogous to the phonemes of spoken languages. A grapheme may or may not carry meaning by itself, and may or may not correspond to a single phoneme. Graphemes include alphabetic letters, typographic ligatures, Chinese characters, numerical digits, punctuation marks, and other individual symbols of any of the world’s writing systems.