2.6 Reviews of Research Dissertations:
2.6.1 Active learning: Strategies that help first graders Transition and build literacy skills Kacey J. Weber
“Active learning, compared to passive learning, may help to promote engagement, motivation, socialization skills, and grade-level readiness in first grade students that did not have the benefit of attending Kindergarten. “Active learning can be defined as anything that involves students doing things and thinking about what they are doing” (Auster and Wylie, 2006). This type of hands-on effective learning can be done without changing the curriculum, standards, or materials in a traditional style classroom (Jenson, 2005). Students, particularly emergent learners and students from low-economic backgrounds, often benefit little from passive learning involving constant lecturing, worksheets, and repetitive assessments based on memorization or typical selective response. According to the National Survey of Student Engagement, active learning and high levels of student engagement through hands-on activities resulted in an increase in learning and retention of grade level reading material (Amburgh, Devlin, Kirwin, and Qualters, 2007).”
“Active learning is seen as an effective approach to teaching children because it involves a deep level of connecting with the material at hand. The direct interaction that comes with active learning strategies may help young students adjust to an educational setting. According to Ueckert
Chapter nine is Building Blocks really helped me take a step back and look at the way we did things in the daycare/preschool I currently work at. There are many areas that we need to modify in our learning environment that promotes literacy. The children rarely ever get the chance to engage in literacy activities and the amount of supplies and books are not enough for the children. The checklist of important elements for supporting early literacy can be a helpful tool to use in a classroom to make sure students are getting every opportunity to build on their literacy skills.
It is said that Kindergarten is the new first grade, and first grade is the new third grade. At the rate we are going now, parents aren’t going to be able to keep up to teach or help their children with their homework. Around twenty-four percent of mothers and twenty-five percent of fathers in 2015 have
Reading First initiative provides proven methods of insurances and scientific based research that help guide children to learn to read. Reading First provides assistance
“The kidsREAD classes are kept to small groups of less than 30 children, with volunteers managing and facilitating the session” (Law, Chia, 2015). The classes are held on the weekends once a week. The leaders will read a few stories to the whole group, then it breaks apart into smaller groups to do literacy activities. This program would be need based and students who really needed the instruction would get it. This program provides a way to get students to read outside of school and makes it more enjoyable.
There is a shift to focus on literacy over all else, even at the preschool age level, where it may not be as developmentally appropriate (Tobin et al., 2009, p.183). A relatable example of this is when the American preschool teacher at St. Timothy’s stated, “We have to explain, justify out approach more than we used to: Cutting with a scissors and playing with Play-doh teach fine motor control, which will help with holding a pen” (Tobin, 2009, p. 167) Another teacher was taking pictures of children doing activities to prove that learning was taking place (Tobin et al., 2009, p.164). This pressure to keep records and justify, was an instance that I very much related to while reading.
This article shows this goal by advocating for greater parent-teacher involvement to influence student success. This shows how teachers are willing to work with parents and families to help influence a student to succeed.
This goal was also shown in Erin E. Adkins’ project “Literacy-Supportive Environments”. This paper shows this goal by explaining how teachers can set up literacy supportive environments for children.
The belief that active participation leads to improved learning is still true in today’s educational systems. Guided notes support active participation by keeping students actively involved in the learning process. Since students are
One instructional practice will enhance the classroom is giving the students participation with the classroom. John Dougherty talks about how letting the students participate in establishing the classroom rules in his article Classroom Management and the Middle School Philosophy. He further elaborates to say that it contributes to increased compliance, lower numbers of violations, and greater academic success. This could be as simple as asking the students how they believe they learn best like Brodhagen discussed in This We Believe… and now we must act. It is discussed that since these adolescent learners have participated in a numerous amount of education already that they will be able to give a teacher an understanding of how they successfully
4. Not only with reading, but other aspects of learning it is IMPORTANT to engage in activities you expect your students to.
5. When we as teachers don’t get children excited about reading we are creating adults who don’t read. It is a huge responsibility.
It is not only helping children develop pre-literacy skills, problem solving skills and concentration, but also generating social learning experiences, and helping children to express
Differentiation, with respect to instruction, means tailoring it to meet individual needs of the students. Teachers can differentiate content, process, products, or the learning environment, the use of ongoing assessment and flexible grouping makes this a successful approach to instruction. Teachers differentiate the four classroom elements based on student readiness, interest, or learning profile. (Tomlinson 2000).
Differentiated instruction can be known as an organizing framework in teaching and learning which calls for a major restructuring in the classroom and syllabus, if done in the proper way, its benefits will transgress the costs.
It is a viable tool for addressing the maximum participation of the child and can be a catalyst to ensure effective learning.
Effective teachers use an array of teaching strategies because there is no single, universal approach that suits all situations. Different strategies used in different combinations with different groupings of students will improve learning outcomes. Some strategies are better suited to teaching skills and fields of knowledge than others. Some strategies are better suited to certain student backgrounds, learning styles and
Feedback is a significant element in determination of education quality as well as in effective learning where it portrays the learning outcomes for students and the successes for the tutors. There are many aspects that concern educationists with regards to feedback but the relationship between perspectives of learning as well as teaching and feedback stands as the most important among them. Feedback should be conveyed in different modes in a learning environment but whatever mode chosen creates room for dialogue between the tutor and students. Therefore, it is only through feedback that the student engagement relationship with the feedback as well as the tutors’ perceptions of learning, teaching and assessment that such successes can be established.
Teachers can also learn about a childs’ experience and offer help and attention. Literacy is very important in every aspect of a person’s life, a teacher in the foundation phase should emphasize this and help their skills and literacies develop
