Words and More: Critical Steps to Early Literacy

Lucy Hart Paulson, EdD, CCC-SLP

The University of Montana

Definitions • Early literacy learning is defined as

the time period from birth to six years of age (Robyak, Masiello, Trivette, Roper & Dunst, 2007).

• Early reading and writing occur in kindergarten into the early elementary grades.

• Early Childhood is the period from birth through age 8.

Early Literacy Foundations

• Oral Language – Speaking and listening

• Phonological Awareness – Conscious awareness and ability to

manipulate sound structures of words

• Print Knowledge – Concepts of print

– Alphabet knowledge

– Being a writer

Predicting Literacy Development

Oral and Written Language Connections

Oral Language Assessment

Best Practice in Oral Language Instruction

Agenda

National Education Goals Panel (NEGP, 1995)

• Based on the 5 dimensions of readiness described in Reconsidering Children’s Early Development and Learning: Toward Common Views and Vocabulary (NEGP, 1995).

– Research-based, peer reviewed document

describing dimensions of school readiness

– Includes aspects of children’s development that have been empirically linked with later school success

NEGP 5 Developmental Domains • Physical Well-Being and Motor Development

– Growth, physical health, and motor abilities • Social and Emotional Development

– Interactions and relationships with others and feelings toward self and others

• Approaches Toward Learning – Inclinations, dispositions or styles involved in learning

• Language and Communication Development – Oral and written language

• Cognition and General Knowledge – Physical, logico-mathematical and social-conventional

knowledge areas

Language and Communication Development

Verbal Language (6 Components)

1. Listening (increase ability to discriminate and identify sounds; process sounds to formulate words and meanings; attend to and follow directions)

2. Speaking (increase the ability to produce a broad range of sounds, gradually develop and apply grammatical rules; increase clarity of pronunciation and speech)

3. Social Uses of Language (use language as a tool to get services and objects, express emotions, get and give information; use language pragmatically and as part of social conventions and manners) (NEGP, 1995)

Language and Communication Development

Verbal Language (6 Components)

4. Vocabulary and Meaning (increase the number of meaningful words understood and used; explore and discover meanings of words and sentences; know relational terms of sequence and causality)

5. Questioning (develop questioning ability of what, where, when, why and how)

6. Creative Uses of Language (listen attentively to stories, songs, and poetry; play with rhyming sounds and words; develop and tell a story) (NEGP, 1995)

Emerging Literacy (Closely related to verbal language)

– Literature Awareness (show interest in various forms of literature; recall familiar stories)

– Story Sense (be aware of the sequence of a story and permanency of story sequence)

– Print Awareness (be aware of print permanency; be aware of the connection between the text and the telling of the story; assign verbal labels to familiar letters; assign sounds to letter combinations; recognize own name in writing)

– Writing Process (produce ordered scribbling; produce writing configurations) (NEGP, 1995)

Note: very little inclusion of phonological awareness

Language and Communication Development

National Early Literacy Panel (NELP, 2008)

• Oral language, phonological processing and print knowledge are strongly predictive of how well children will learn to read and write.

• Early literacy factors that lead to early reading

– Reading comprehension

– Basic concepts of print

– Name writing ability

– Alphabet knowledge

– Decoding skills

– Invented spelling

– Phonological awareness

– Rapid automatic naming

Print Knowledge

Oral Language

Phonological Processing

English Language Arts Common Core Kindergarten

• Reading literature • Reading Informational text

– Foundational skills • Print concepts • Phonological awareness • Phonics and word recognition • Fluency

• Writing • Speaking and Listening • Language

Predictive variables strongly correlated to later literacy skills (controlling for confounding factors such as SES):

phonological awareness (PA): the ability to detect, manipulate, or analyze the auditory aspects of spoken language independent of meaning

phonological memory: the ability to remember spoken information for a short period of time

rapid automatic naming (RAN) of a sequence of random letters, digits objects or colors

alphabet knowledge (AK): knowledge of the names and sounds associated with printed letters

writing or writing name in isolation on request or to write own name (NELP, 2008)

Predicting Literacy Development

We can determine with over 90% accuracy whether or not a child in kindergarten will be in the bottom 10% of readers in 2nd grade by looking at: (Wagner, 2001)

- phonological awareness

- semantics (vocabulary)

- orthographic knowledge

Early Language Indicators for Literacy Difficulties

2 ½ YEARS

3 YEARS

4 YEARS

5 YEARS

- produce only short, simple sentences

- less accurate word production

- receptive language problems

- difficulty naming items, objects, people

- may have phonological patterning problems

- word junction problems

- problems differentiating similar sounding words

- problems distinguishing and producing

complex sound clusters and complex words

- poor word recall

- poor rhyming

- poor letter and sound knowledge

- poor sound segmentation

Language and Literacy

Developmental Sequences

Language Development Literacy Development

1. Prelexic 1. Prelogographic

2. Lexic (whole word) 2. Logographic (visual)

3. Systematic simplification 3. Early Alphabetic (sound)

4. Assembly

(syllable combinations)

5. Metaphonological 5. Orthographic

(morphologic)

4. Later Alphabetic (sound)

Stage One: Before a symbolic relationship is established

Oral Language

Prelexic – before words

- Babies

Written Language

Prelogographic – before logos

- Toddlers to preschoolers

gagoobabada

Stage Two: Whole word representation Oral Language

Lexic –single words

- Toddlers

Written Language

Logographic – whole word or graphic recognition

- Toddlers to kindergarten

More

Stage Three: Simplified representations Oral Language Systematic Simplification – simple word combinations - Toddlers to Preschoolers

Written Language Early Alphabetic – simplified word

representations - Late preschool through kindergarten

Du pes!

Stage Four: Developing awareness of structures Oral Language

Assembly –word endings in combinations

- Preschool

Written Language

Later Alphabetic – more complete word representations

- Kindergarten to early elementary grades

I drawed

that gooder,

huh?

Oral Language

Metaphonological – words have meanings and structures

- Preschool

Written Language

Orthographic – structure and pattern recognition

- Elementary grades on up

I can say my name frontwards and

backwards!

Stage Five: Ability to manipulate structures

Classic Language Disorder:

Classic Learning Disability:

a child gets “stuck” at the

______________________________

a child gets “stuck” at the

____________________________

Oral Language • Listening

• Speaking

• Social uses

• Vocabulary and meaning

• Questioning

• Creative uses of language

• Creative expression

• Comprehension

• Story sense

Oral Language Skills

____ Uses speech that is understandable with only age-appropriate errors

____ Understands concepts such as top/bottom, under/over, first/last/next,

beginning/middle/end, before/after, one/all, more/less, same/not same

____ Uses word endings that indicate plurals, possessives, present tense,

past tense (e.g., -s, -ing, -ed)

____ Uses sentences with correct word order, of appropriate length, and

includes pronouns, verbs, and question forms

____ Relates a story with three to five events

Early Literacy Checklist (LETRS for Early Childhood Educators, Paulson & Moats, 2010)

Building Vocabulary

The number of words young children hear in their environments is significantly correlated to academic success.

(Hart & Risley, 1995)

There is a relationship between oral vocabulary acquisition and development of well-specified phonological representations.

(Sutherland and Gillon, 2005)

Language-Stimulation Techniques

• Parallel talk An adult describes what the child is doing.

• Self-talk An adult talks about what he or she is doing, using

short sentences.

• Expansion An adult adds more information to the sentences

that the child expresses.

Talk about Words by Category, Characteristics and Attributes

= carrot

= bus

Vegetables or Fruits

Types of Transportation

= apple Sort by Shape and Color

plane =

Song Cards and Finger Plays

The Wheels of the Bus Five Little Ducks

Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star Old MacDonald

If You’re Happy and You Know It Tiny Tim

The Itsy Bitsy Spider Five Little Monkeys

Pattern Books (to read with children)

Brown Bear, Brown Bear Polar Bear, Polar Bear

The Very Busy Spider The Very Quiet Cricket

Chicken Soup with Rice The Napping House

Dialogic or Shared Storybook Reading

Step 1 – Preview the book.

Step 2 – Read the book to the children pointing out things they may not know.

Step 3 – Reread the book in a small group using general questions to engage the children. Build upon what they say.

Step 4 – Reread the book many times expanding on what the children know.

Dialogic Reading Techniques • Ask “what” questions and follow answers with more

questions.

• Ask open-ended questions.

• Repeat what children say and help as needed.

• Follow children’s interests.

• Ask children to say more.

• Expand what children say.

• Keep your explanations short and simple.

• Have fun!

With repeated readings, children:

• use more language

• respond to questions in more complex ways

• gain more control of the reading process

Use the story We’re Going on a Bear Hunt by Michael Rosen and Helen Oxenbury. Create your own bear hunt or simulate the events in the book. Have the children draw a picture and narrate to you what they saw or where they went on their bear hunt. Make a book of their drawings.

Going on a Bear Hunt

The Mitten by Jan Brett A snowshoe rabbit came hopping by. He stopped for a moment to admire his winter coat. It was then that he saw the mitten, and he wiggled in, feet first. The mole didn’t think there was room for both of them, but when he saw the rabbit’s kickers he moved over.

Next a hedgehog came snuffling along. Having spent the day looking under wet leaves for things to eat, he decided to move into the mitten and warm himself. The mole and the rabbit were bumped and jostled, but not being ones to argue with someone covered with prickles, they made room.

As soon as the hedgehog disappeared into the mitten, a big owl, attracted by the commotion, swooped down. When he decided to move in also, the mole, the rabbit, and the hedgehog grumbled. But when they saw the owl’s glinty talons, they quickly let him in.

The Mitten by Jan Brett A snowshoe rabbit came hopping by. He stopped for a moment to admire his winter coat. It was then that he saw the mitten, and he wiggled in, feet first. The mole didn’t think there was room for both of them, but when he saw the rabbit’s kickers he moved over. Next a hedgehog came snuffling along. Having spent the day looking under wet leaves for things to eat, he decided to move into the mitten and warm himself. The mole and the rabbit were bumped and jostled, but not being ones to argue with someone covered with prickles, they made room. As soon as the hedgehog disappeared into the mitten, a big owl, attracted by the commotion, swooped down. When he decided to move in also, the mole, the rabbit, and the hedgehog grumbled. But when they saw the owl’s glinty talons, they quickly let him in.

In 3 paragraphs of “The Mitten”

Basic concepts and vocabulary 23 potentially unfamiliar words Speech intelligibility Complex word structures Sentence structure Longest sentence is 23 words Narratives Several events in each paragraph

Show and Tell Book During a show and tell activity, write the words a child is

saying to describe the show and tell item. The sentence

structure and speech production can be scaffolded so

the words on the page are grammatically correct. Have

the child draw a picture of the item. This activity can be

used as a wall story, an “add on” book, and individual

pages to go home.

Have the audience members ask “Who” “What” and

“Where” questions of the Show and Teller.

National Early Literacy Panel Results

• Oral language, phonological processing and print knowledge are strongly predictive of how well children will learn to read and write.

– Systematic and sequential

• Targeted practices are more likely to be effective than non-targeted practices.

– Direct instruction

• When many unrelated skills are targeted simultaneously, the learning outcomes are not as strong as compared to interventions that focus on a one skill or a set of inter-related skills.

– Explicit instruction

Developmentally Appropriate Practice

• A hallmark of developmentally appropriate teaching is intentionality. Good teachers are intentional in everything they do—setting up the classroom, planning curriculum, making use of various teaching strategies, assessing children, interacting with them, and working with their families. (NAEYC, 2009)

Contact Information

• Lucy Hart Paulson, Ed.D, CCC-SLP

Communicative Sciences and Disorders

The University of Montana

32 Campus Drive

Missoula, MT 59812

lucy.hartpaulson@mso.umt.edu