I am currently placed in a Kindergarten classroom in Lansing. The students have been working hard at really understanding letter identification and letter sounds. The students read a lot of short stories in the classroom and each week have a short booklet to take home and read about a different letter. When not working in literacy centers the children are primarily learning literacy through worksheets and journals. After doing the readings for this week I have discovered that the talking in my classroom are more guided by the teacher rather than response-centered talk. The teacher uses more recitation talk where students are expected to restate facts and information about stories that are read to them. I feel that the students in my classroom could benefit from response-centered talk focuses more on discovery and constructing a new understanding of literature. Many students in my classroom have a good grasp on the literacy skills they are being taught but those who are struggling seem to keep falling further and further behind. These students may be having difficult because they cannot make meaningful connections to their prior knowledge or even to current concepts they are learning. Response-centered talk may help students to explore these connections and construct a deeper understanding of the literacy skills and concepts they are being taught.
I feel that there are a few students in my classroom who could really benefit from some extra help in literature. In particular, these students need help learning all their letter names and sounds. It would be best if they could have some one-on-one help or even small group help during literacy centers because without knowing these basic skills these students are getting lost as the class moves onto new skills like spelling, using punctuation, and writing sentences. These students also seem to have low self-confidence when it comes to literacy, but maybe with the extra help and some positive reinforcement one could change their attitudes about literacy. In the future I hope to be given the chance to work with those students who are struggling with literacy and try and help them to become successful in learning basic literacy skills and concepts.
2 comments:
Sarah, I am excited to continue to read your posts about your Kindergarten students because I am in Kindergarten too. It will be interesting to read about the similarities and differences of our students in different school districts. I work in the Waverly School District so I already see a great difference between the Waverly kindergarteners and the Bath kindergarteners.
-Liz
Also, I find that in my classroom a lot of the talking is done by the teacher as well rather than response-talk. I believe its because of the grade-level we are placed in. Response-centered talk is possible I believe, for a limited amount of time, but I think it would work more to the students' benefit in grades older than kindergarten. I would be interested in trying it out in my classroom though and seeing if I prove myself wrong!
-Liz
Post a Comment