Outcome 1.2

Explains how young children’s literacy & numeracy learning can be socially conveyed through their behaviour, feelings or approach 

In week seven I discussed a boy who was acting as a text participant by reciting the story ‘Wombat Stew’ and making his own stew with toy materials set out on what has become the book activities table this term at the Kindergarten I am placed at. This is an excellent example of how children’s feelings, behaviour and approach can socially convey their literacy learning. This boy has recited and acted out many other stories at the book table this term including ‘Three Billy Goats Gruff’ and ‘The Three Little Pigs.’ By continually engaging in these book table activities this four year old boy is showing his positive feelings towards learning about literacy and reading. These positive feelings have been confirmed with statements such as ‘I like writing’, to his taking pleasure in showing teachers how to write both his name and his twin brother’s name, and his engagement in story time on the group mat. He can also be found in the reading corner frequently, and likes to ask teachers to help him read stories.

All of these examples show how children can convey their literacy and numeracy learning through their behaviours, and these behaviours are frequently examples of their underlying feelings towards literacy and numeracy. Children who spend little to no time engaging in books, writing, and reading, may be showing an aversion to literacy and reading, however, these children may engage with these sorts of activities more at home, or they may engage in literacy in other ways such as singing, dancing, and drawing.

Learning to read these signs portrayed by children is a significant part of educating and teaching, as it is these signs that help us follow through on children’s natural instincts in our teaching, including our teaching on literacy and numeracy. For example, in regards to the boy who likes books, reading, and writing described above, different activities surrounding reading, writing, books, and drawing could be created to stimulate his interests further. For example an activity including rubbing (lightly shading over a leaf, coin, or other material that has bumps and grooves to create a picture of that material) could be created with materials containing letters and numbers to stimulate excitement about creating new things while keeping with the literacy interests he has already shown (as well as adding numbers to stimulate numeracy interests). Knowing what children like, by reading the signs they convey through their behaviour and feelings, is an important part of teaching, and can be used to further stimulate children’s development in literacy and numeracy. 

Outcome 2.3

Sources further information; developing &/or collecting resources for literary & numerical teaching & learning

As educators we should constantly be looking for new and interesting resources for teaching young children. We should avoid using the same ideas over and over again. This is due to a number of reasons, mostly centred on the idea that ‘all children are different.’ The children you have in your class or kindergarten or childcare centre will all be different from one another, and they will be different from the children you had the term, semester, or year before. So activities that worked really well one year, may not work as well the next year, or they may not work with certain children, or they may work so well that you want to continue that theme or type of activity with the children in new ways. Without researching and finding new sources of inspiration you are limited to your own creativity and imagination, which will never be extensive enough to cater for all children and interest levels. This is why educators should constantly be looking for new sources of inspiration and ideas, to be the best teachers they can be, to have as many ideas, themes, and activities at their disposal as possible to create rich, exiting, interesting, and child appropriate learning opportunities as they can.

These resources can be found in a number of styles and formats, including internet related activities and information, books, YouTube clips, videos, government documentation, peer-reviewed articles, television shows, music, and many more. One other way to find new resources for teaching is through peer-inspiration, to ask and read about and experience what other teachers and educators are doing, and I believe that peer-inspiration is a very important method of finding new resources and ideas.

Which is why creating a blog for this topic was a good idea, because through each other’s blogs we can find new ideas, activities, and ways of thinking to help inspire our future educational careers. For example Sarah Maywald’s post about Outcome 2.3 is a very good resource for teaching literacy and numeracy using bottle caps. Kate Watters’ week 9 reading blog features a short but easily expandable idea about incorporating mathematics into other projects. Chelsea Rodda, in her Outcome 2.3 post used the code-breaking activity we participated in during class and explained how it could be turned into an activity for young children. Anna Roberts hasresearched and outlined the benefits of the ‘Play is the Way’ website and program. By searching other students’ blogs we have a myriad of peer-inspired resources at our fingertips, as well as an easy way to communicate with each other about these ideas, activities, and resources.

Outcome 4.2

Describes how parents, peers & communities may see, feel & shape young children’s early literacy & numeracy experiences    

Outcomes 3.1 and 2.2 can be used as examples of parents shaping children’s literacy and numeracy experiences. As the post on these two outcomes shows, by singing, dancing, and interacting with music, children are experiencing and developing literacy and numeracy concepts, skills, and ideas. By encouraging these types of experiences, parents are helping to shape young children’s literacy and numeracy experiences.

They may not be aware that they are doing so, however. The parents of Mini Warbler may just be thinking that they are encouraging his interest in a television show, in dancing, and in singing, as well as in dressing up and performing. These all have their own benefits for young children, including increasing confidence, motor skills, physical development and health, and creativity. Depending on the mindset of the parents they may think they are encouraging all or any one of these developmental benefits. They might not realise they are helping the development of their child at all, and may just encourage young Mini Warbler to continue his dancing, singing, Warbling activities because they think it is cute, or because it allows him to entertain himself without specific adult supervision. Similarly Drake Dixon’s parents, and the parents of the child dancing to Single Ladies, might not be aware of the many benefits, literacy and numeracy related benefits included, that these children are receiving from their involvement with music, signing, and dancing.

It is unlikely that the parents of these children disapprove or find their interest annoying (due to their appearance in YouTube clips), however some parents, siblings, other family members, friends, and peers could find a child’s interest in signing, dancing, and performing to music and videos annoying, repetitive, loud, irritating, or intrusive to their own lives. These sorts of parents might discourage their children from engaging in these sorts of beneficial activities.

Additionally early childhood educators in childcare, kindergarten, or early school years could fail to see the benefits of these types of activities, or they could place too much emphasis on these activities and fail to notice children’s lack of interest (which could have many negative side effects to development or future interest), whether this lack of interest is there from the start or grows due to continual force participation.

Parents, educators, peers, siblings, friends, and other members in children’s lives have the ability to shape the literacy and numeracy experiences of children. The way that these people shape these experiences depends on how they see and feel about activities such as singing, dancing, and interacting with music. Encouraging these sorts of activities, whether because they are aware of the literacy, numeracy and other benefits of singing and dancing, or whether they just believe it is cute, can help children’s literacy and numeracy development through something that they enjoy and wish to engage in naturally. Forcing this sort of activity on children due to the benefits may have negative side effects on children, creating mental barrier against these sorts of activities in the future. Discouraging children’s interest in singing and dancing could also have negative effects on children’s future participation, as well as their literacy and numeracy development. 

Week Twelve Readings

Week Twelve’s Theme

How can we encourage very young children's critical literacy and numeracy skills? By modelling or guiding their questioning? By reflecting on and challenging the texts or numerical issues (e.g. fairness) they encounter?

Key to this focus is the educator's role in supporting the child's development of theory-of-mind in order to understand that these texts or numerical issues are not neutral, as they represent certain points-of-view and silence others.

This week’s theme is about children being literacy and numeracy analyst, and analysing their literacy and numeracy experiences to search for issues of social justice or to use literacy and numeracy to expand on their understanding and show their ability to understand issues of social justice. These social justice issues should differ depending on the age and interests of the children. For example, children in the four and under age group could focus on relatively simple examples of fairness and equality and how this relates to them inside their classroom or family setting.  Teaching for social justice and educating open minded, inclusive, fair, and just citizens is something I will strive to do during my career, so this week’s theme is particularly interesting to me. Being able to read about how to teach for social justice in literacy and numeracy with young children was good for furthering my understanding about teaching things such as fairness, difference, equality, and racism.

Reading One

Murphy, Shaun. (2009). Mathematics and Social Justice in Grade 1: How Children Understand Inequality and Represent It. Young Children, May, pp. 1-6.

This reading was chosen due to its focus on teaching young children about social justice issues using mathematics, which turned out to be an incorrect assumption about the reading. This reading was actually about engaging children in discussion about issues such as equality and racism, and letting them express their ideas through basic numeracy activities. The article was eye opening and showed me how complex and insightful young children can be when faced with issues as complicated as the colonisation of Australia.

The article was based on researching a Canadian Grade 1 class that had been read The Rabbits written by John Marsden about the colonisation of Australia, with Kangaroos representing Indigenous Australians, and rabbits representing the colonisers. The book shows not only the colonisation but also the effects of destroyed culture as well as the Stolen Generation. After reading this book, and revisiting it a number of times throughout the year, Murphy prompted discussions about the issues of equality and fairness represented by the book.

During these discussions and activities the children in Murphy’s class expressed their ideas using Cuisenaire Rods. What was amazing about some of these expressions was the complexity of the ideas about power and how more number does not always represent more power.

Murphy emphasised the need for open-ended questions with multiple entry points for discussion and room for a variety of interpretations.  In this way children were able to think about, discuss, and express through the Cuisenaire Rods any particular aspect of the story that interested them the most, and take ownership of their own learning and development.

Murphy also focussed on teaching the students to identify as mathematicians, and to be aware that math is everywhere, which links with previous week’s discussions (week nine as well as a general theme). This, I thought, was an important point as he focussed on the students being aware that math is everywhere. Previously I have discussed the importance of educators being aware of this fact, and using it to their advantage when planning numeracy rich experiences and activities. But children should be aware of this too, and should be able to see numeracy or maths as not just equations and numbers, but also in everyday activities and a way of expression. This point was reinforced when Murphy discussed the need for children to be aware that there are many different forms of math, just like there is many different forms of literacy and that these forms and skills should be taught simultaneously and used to expand on each other.

Reading Two

Wood, Jeffrey. (2005). Moses’s Story: Critical Literacy and Social Justice in an Urban Kindergarten. Voyager: National Association for the Education of Young Children, pp. 1-12.

This article focusses on another class again (and coincidentally) in Canada, where the teacher, Wood, decided to focus on critical literacy and social justice in a kindergarten setting. Wood argued that critical literacy is not just about reading and writing, but is also about perspectives and ways of thinking, the lived experiences of students, and is a cultural and functional practice. Wood aimed to create critical conversations crossing gender, race, culture, and class, and to help his students think critically about books and the world around them.

Interestingly, Wood’s desire to create these sorts of conversations almost hindered his teaching, as he did not initially see the children’s efforts to keep the playground as a work of social justice because he believed it to be too small. This, of course, was action towards social justice for the children and was especially relevant to them as it affected their everyday lives, a factor I like to emphasise when teaching children.

This article was particularly helpful in showing how books can be used to create discussion about social justice issues, and how writing and drama can be used by children to engage and take part in actions for these issues. The emphasis on social justice within the students’ lives (after the playground incident Wood focused on social justice inside the classroom) was interesting and shows how complex ideas like these can be simplified by making them relevant to children’s everyday experiences.

This all ties in with my original ideas about education and making learning relevant to children’s lives, to educate critical thinkers, and lifelong learners, and to help children see and strive for social justice throughout their lives. 

Week Eleven Readings

Week Eleven’s Theme

Given very young children's development of language and abstraction, how do contextual, multimodal symbols and conventions support their encoding or decoding of the world around them?

This week’s theme is still about literacy and numeracy technicians and children encoding and decoding signs, symbols, and messages around them to create their own meanings and understandings of the world. The two readings I chose this week focus heavily on this idea of signs, and being able to read those signs, and were chosen due to their emphasis on how children decode the signs around themselves.

Reading One

Knight, Linda. (2012). Grotesque Gestures of Sensuous Signs? Rethinking Notions of Apprenticeship in Early Childhood Education. Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 33(1), pp. 101-111.

This reading compared Gilles Deleuze and Lev Vygotsky’s definition and understanding of apprenticeship, in relation to children reading and understanding signs, symbols, and messages, with Knight arguing that the Deleuzian approach is more correct.

In the Deleuzian method, education can be contextualised as a swarm of signs, with Deleuze contending that all things that teach us something will emit signs. In a school or kindergarten-based context these signs range from letters of the alphabet, numbers, and mathematical equations, to gestures, emotions, facial expressions of both peers and teachers, and also schedules, dress codes, instructions, and expected behaviours such as when to sit still and listen and when to eat. For example, at the kindergarten I am placed at, the children cannot start eating their lunch until everybody on that table is seated so this is a sign that they must learn to read.

According to Vygotsky, children’s learning of signs is sequential, ordered, and culturally driven. Once signs are recognised it is like a boundary line has been crossed and a new chapter opens as children move on to the next sign to learn. Learning awakens internal development processes that are only able to operate when children are interacting with people, and in Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development, children learn signs in a linear developmental sequence guided by more experienced and competent peers.

Deleuze, on the other hand, believes that children learn signs in an ever-shifting series of assemblages, that are not guided by age-defined, age-appropriate material offered by more experienced or competent others. Learning signs is also not sequential, with children learning signs at different paces and in different orders, and previously learned signs can be used to further their understandings of newly learned signs and vice versa. Teachers are also apprenticed in this way of thinking as they can learn from their students and use this learning to create better learning opportunities for their students.

Knight also has a particular emphasis on the positive learning we can observe in children’s drawing. Knight argued that far from drawing just being the precursor to other literary stages such as writing (fine motor skills acquisition and character writing development), drawing shows us children’s ability to read and produce their own signs. This is part of children’s encoding process, as they draw a picture that to many adults may look simple but to the drawer it can be telling a complex and detailed story, observation, memory, or fantasy.

Knight emphasised that learning is an assemblage of knowledge, and not everybody is an identical learner, with children (and adults) learning to read the signs and symbols in different ways and orders in a non-controllable, non-sequential, non-organised way. This can be seen in observing children, with some learning signs faster than others, whether in learning letters, numbers and mathematical equations, or gestures, emotions and facial expressions, or even things such as schedules like how the day is ordered or bed times.

From my observations in working with children I agree with Deleuze and Knight in saying that children all learn how to read signs, symbols, and message at different paces and in different orders. For example I have seen children unable to read the signs in the room (such as all other children staying quiet and listening to the adult) during group time and continue to make noises or talk to other children, despite being told that it is inappropriate time and time again. I have seen younger children remember and behave according to schedules and patterns during the day, faster than older children. I believe that children, and adults, are able to further old understandings with new knowledge, and combine new knowledge of signs with old understandings. I don’t believe children can only learn by being taught or assisted by a more competent and experienced learner, and that children have the ability to teach more experienced peers, and educators many things as well. I do agree with both Vygotsky and Delezue in emphasising the importance of social interaction in learning, however, I also believe a great deal of learning can happen by the individual. Sometimes quiet reflection and individual reading or problem solving can do a lot more good than discussion and group thinking, however there is benefits to both types of learning.

Reading Two

Nabuzoka, Dabie & Smith, Peter. (1999). Distinguishing Serious and Playful Fighting by Children with Learning Disabilities and Nondisabled Children. The Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 40(6), pp. 883-890.

This article was a report on a study conducted to examine whether children with learning difficulties could distinguish the differences between serious fighting playful fighting, or rough and tumble play. This article was chosen because this distinction can only be made by reading a number of subtle and various signs and symbols in the actions and expressions of the participants and those around them. Making this distinction is a sign of a literacy technician, as children need to decode the signs around them to make their decision.

This article was good in describing the effects children may face when not being able to read the social cues, and messages that are surrounding them, with it found that children with learning difficulties who may have difficulties reading these cues, and reduced ability to read the non-verbal signs around them are seen to have less positive and more negative descriptions of them by their peers, and are devalued more than children without learning difficulties. Difficulties in reading non-verbal messages, and social cues can lead to children being unaware of what behaviours are appropriate in what situations, from not knowing when to sit and listen, to not knowing when another child is engaging in rough and tumble play, not serious fighting. 

The ability to read social cues, and non-verbal signs is an ability found in the literacy technician, however, numerical aspects can also factor in too. For example in being able to distinguish the difference between playful fighting and real fighting the number of participants was included as a sign. In another example, knowing that 2 is greater than 1 in counting how many warnings a teacher has given you is important in knowing how carefully you must act in the classroom from now on.

Interestingly, the study found that children with learning difficulties could make the distinction between playful fighting and serious fighting. However, children with learning difficulties were found to be able to distinguish the difference later in life than children with no learning difficulties. This, according to the researchers signifies a ‘lag’ in development, or a developmental delay. This somewhat ties in with the Deleuzian theory of children learning to read signs and messages at different stages and levels, with children with learning difficulties or disabilities being an extreme example of this difference.