Agency and Interest in the Classroom

No student is the same, so why do some teachers try and teach them all the same way? After listening to the podcast interview between Dr. Rowe and Dr. Baker, I have thought of some ways we can work with the different "agencies and interests" in the classroom. Dr. Rowe refers to "agencies and interests" as the way we think about children and the way they seem to come to school and play and are interested in different topics and things in the classroom. Dr. Rowe works mostly with 2-3 year olds, which is a bit younger than the age group that I will be working with, but I love her idea of finding out the agencies and interests of each and every child to help promote more interesting and fun writing for the student.
Some children love to write, and some can't stand it. How do we make writing interesting? How do we, as teachers, find out the interests of our individual students? I think the best way is to talk to our students. To sit them down one by one and simply just ask what they are interested in. Do they like dinosaurs? Do they like cars? Do they like to play house? Once a teacher finds out their interests, he or she can use those interests to come up with topics for writing. Then, throughout the school year, the teacher can bring in different topics and ideas that are similar so the students horizons broaden and they want to write about more topics. For example, if a student likes dinosaurs, you can have him or her slowly read about how researchers say that birds today are the closest relation to dinosaurs. Have them work with the topic of birds. After that, you can bring them into the topic of birds/mammals/reptiles/etc. These topic changes can go on forever, and if done right, the student will continue to keep interest. The point here is to make writing interesting! When writing is interesting, children will want to write. Children who want to write will build literacy skills without knowing it.
Establishing literacy in each and every child in the classroom is every teachers dream. And establishing this literacy while the students are engaged and interested is something that every teacher wants. Roll that into establishing literacy while what the students are doing is worthwhile, well, that's something that every teacher strives to have in their classroom.

Engaging and Worthwhile literacy practices + every student in the classroom = Amazing

Kids Dig Literacy

Literacy is not only the ability to read and write, but it's being able to think critically about the written word. Literacy is a life long process, not something that can be mastered or finished in a day. Literacy really is all around us. It's everywhere we look. Dr. Guttierez has come up with a way to describe this and she calls it the Third Space. The Third Space is basically the talking and reading behavior that students are doing that is not directly going on in the teachers lesson plan. Students are using literacy without knowing it. 

As an experiment, a group of teachers and I went on a 'community literacy dig.' A literacy dig is where you go to a place where children go and observe literacy in action all around you. You can write down the words that you see, the phrases that you hear, new vocabulary that is unique to this place, or even bits of talk heard around you. We decided to go to a restaurant called Finch's Brasserie in Bloomington. Finch's focuses on serving food straight from the farm to table. Because of this unique concept, you can imagine the amount of words and phrases that are unique to this restaurant. To start off, a large portion of the menu is in French. This opens up a whole new type of literacy. Some words that are in English that are unique to a restaurant are server, hostess, waitress, gluten-free, whole-grain, produce, receipt, and coffee. Other words that are unique to this establishment are mussels, wood-fired, Bloomington vicinity, Finch, Brasserie, and Soup du Jour.

Finch's also offers a menu called Baby Bird Food. Not only is this a cute play on words, it is made specifically for Birds (children) 12 years old and younger. It offers selections like mac and cheese, penne with butter, cheese pizza, and baby bird soda. By having a menu like this, Finch's is giving children the chance to develop literacy without knowing it.

All around, you can see literacy in action. From street signs to advertisements. From bus schedules to grocery store coupons. I challenge you to go on your own literacy dig. To see the literacy world through a child's eyes.

"Writing can contribute to the building of almost every kind of inner control of literacy learning that is needed by the successful reader."

Chapters 5 and 6 in Catching Readers Before They Fall speak about building a comprehensive literary framework for the emergent reader and writer. The components used for reading are Read-Alouds, Shared Readings, Guided Readings, and Independent Readings. The components used for writing are Morning Messages, Community Writings, and Independent Writings.
In Interactive Read-Alouds, the teacher reads to the students, but also engages the students in conversation before, during, and after the reading. This helps students build connections, comprehension strategies, and delve further into the story. Another strategy is Shared Reading. This is where the teacher reads one-on-one with a student or in a small group. This is a strategy in which the teacher helps the student build an effective reading process system while fostering a sense of community learning. Guided Reading is another component used to help emergent readers. In Guided Reading, the teacher plays the role of an observer and records how the students put the previous strategies to use. The last strategy is Independent Reading. In this situation, the students are able to choose their own books, with the help of the teacher, to read alone. This gives students the chance to make mistakes and self-correct themselves while reading and to have a chance to read many types of stories. Johnson and Keier state on page 83, "If our ultimate goal is to have children become proficient readers then we must make sure that there is a great deal of time and choice within our independent reading time. Readers need to enjoy a variety of texts, choose favorites, and live the life of a reader." Not only are K-3 teachers helping emergent readers, they must also give attention to emergent writers. One of the components used to help emergent writers are Morning Messages. Morning Messages are a time for students to use a fill-in-the-blank type letter provided by the teacher to help build their writing skills. This is something that can be done every morning to help foster a love of writing. Another strategy to help emergent writers is Community Writing. This is where the class as a whole work together to write. Community Writing can be done over time so the students have a chance to think about what they have learned and think ahead. The teacher uses open communication during Community Writing. The third strategy used is Independent Writing. This is where the student can self-monitor to see if what they have written sounds right and looks right. Teachers can use Read-Alouds, Shared Readings, Guided Readings, Independent Readings, Morning Messages, Community Writings, and Independent Writings to help the emergent reader and writer.