This past year I've been looking at children's literacy development, especially for the preschooler who is an English language learner. My concern has been that so many states have moved the first grade curriculum to kindergarten. This definitely makes it difficult for children who don't come to school with kindergarten skills. These children now have to somehow get another level of curricula through home environments or maybe through special preschool programs.
I've been interested in preschool classroom instruction for English language learners. I've learned that children who come from low language and low literacy backgrounds can make great gains in literacy development when they're in a classroom that is high in language stimulation and literacy enrichment. The situation is that now we have to find out what the preschool teacher's philosophy concerning classroom instruction. I'm reviewing the Early Language & Literacy Classroom Observation Toolkit, Research Edition. This is a field-tested observation toolkit designed for prekindergarten to third-grade classrooms. The information gathered from the observations/interviews should help administrators, supervisors, and program directors with professional development and comparing classroom teachers' practices. It takes 1 to 1-1/2 hours to complete the three tools. They include the following:
"Literacy Environment Checklist: In 15-20 minutes users examine classroom layout and contents through 24 items that measure availability, content, and diversity of reading, writing, and listening materials."
"Classroom Observation and Teacher Interview: In 20-45 minutes, users observe teachers interacting with children and rate the quality of classroom supports for literacy through 14 observation elements. After the observation is complete, users clarify aspects of it with the 10 minute Teacher Interview."
"The Literacy Activities Rating Scale: In 10 minutes, observers record how many times and for how long nine literacy behaviors occurred in two categories Book Reading and Writing."
A score is given for each of the checklist areas and then totaled for the three sections. There is a User Guide sold separately that gives technical information and instructions for the three parts.
I really like this instrument. The items provide the teacher or administrator an idea of what will be needed to support the classroom with language and literacy. As I reviewed the items and then recalled certain Head Start classrooms I've visited, I remembered those classrooms that had for example, the alphabet displayed, word cards with names, templates for children to form letters, varieties of paper for writing, and varieties of writing tools. I could also recall classrooms that did not have these tools. I'm always saddened when I visit a preschool program and the children's books are stored in boxes in a back room. Sometimes these same classrooms are lacking the materials that will develop children's literacy skills. And sometimes, these classrooms are those that are attempting to serve children who are English language learners. These are the children who need the best instruction from prepared teachers. Maybe we need to learn how to observe classrooms and help children receive literacy environments that will assure their success in school. I hope that we can observe and make recommendations. But more importantly I hope that we can learn to more effectively help teachers serve young English language learners in literacy.
