In
the article, Early Literacy: Towards a unified approach for childcare and
school, the author Anders Skriver Jensen discusses the struggle Denmark had
when it scored low in 1994 on an international ranking of children’s reading
skills. Denmark quickly decided that the results were not acceptable and
started taking steps to create a new initiative to improve early literacy. The
initiative allowed teachers and schools to have more freedom in the classroom
but would still hold schools accountable for their results. Another major
aspect of this initiative was to link childcare to education. Making these two
items come together in a cohesive way to support students learning was a very
important goal. Educators and families were concerned that this would be “too
much schooling” so it was decided that they would not focus on testable skills
and school the way that many people think of it, but that they would use a
holistic approach.
A
large focus was placed on teaching in ways that emphasize participation and
looking at how literacy is inscribed in complex sociocultural processes. In
order for this link to work it took dedication and collaboration from childcare
professionals and teachers. One example from the article is of a little boy
named Thomas. Thomas is in a kindergarten class and starts to read a book aloud
during lunchtime with no prompt from the teacher. Half way through the book he
realizes he doesn’t know how to read all of the words. Thomas pauses briefly
but then starts to use multiple strategies to work his way thought the story by
predicting, using the images in the book, and finding words that make sense.
The classroom response is also very important. They laugh when appropriate, nod
their heads, and applaud his reading at the end of the story. Situations like this one where students are
reading in a comfortable environment advances their cognitive development and
supports experimentation and play.
It
is important that students have opportunities like the one explained above. Not
only is it important for them to have the opportunities, but to feel
comfortable enough to actually take advantage of the opportunity. Teachers must
create and environment and community in which children feel comfortable and
support each other’s learning. In Thomas’s example because he was so supported
by his peers it actually increases his abilities because he now has more
confidence about himself as a reader. The article also points out that children
must participate in the construction of the lessons and content. Using
children’s interests so they can see why something matters and make meaning.
Teachers are encouraged to support students and teach them in a way that they
are not scared of mistakes. The initiative discourages the use of worksheets or
literacy that is out of context and doesn’t flow or make sense to the children.
The
overall goal of this initiative is to support childcare professionals and
teachers to create project-based, literacy-rich learning environments where
every child has a fair chance of making a valuable contribution and rich
cultural resources and activities are deployed all while making sure the
environment and classroom culture supports learning by all students. Denmark
claims to value social competencies, all-round personal development over the
pre-set curricula. This initiative does follow all of those things but it does
seem interesting that they gave teachers some room to do things their own way
but are still holding them accountable for scores. Which to me seems as thought
they do still value pre-set curricula in some ways since that is what the
national testing is based on.
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