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College English Composition: Help and Review22 chapters | 311 lessons | 2 flashcard sets
Video: Emergent Literacy: Definition, Theories & Characteristics
Literacy actually begins at a much earlier age than most expect. This video lesson describes a child's beginnings in the world of reading, which is called emergent literacy. 2015-05-27Emergent Literacy: Definition, Theories & Characteristics
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Lesson Transcript
Instructor:
Angela Janovsky
Angela has taught middle and high school English, Business English and Speech for nine years. She has a bachelor's degree in psychology and has earned her teaching license.
Literacy actually begins at a much earlier age than most expect. This video lesson describes a child's beginnings in the world of reading, which is called emergent literacy.
What is Literacy?
There are many skills that are necessary to function in today's world. One such key skill in our society is literacy, which can be thought of as the ability to read and write. Think about it; how far could you get in life without being able to read? You would not even be able to find correct street signs as you walk down the street!
Emergent literacy is the idea that learning literacy actually begins at a very early age, long before official lessons in school. This term is used to describe the knowledge a child has of reading and writing before reaching the age where those skills are taught. Emergent literacy argues that right after birth, children are already in the process of becoming literate.
Characteristics
The key factors that support emergent literacy include how some children come into their school years already familiar with the reading and writing process. These children do not know how to combine letters to make words, but they do know some important things about literacy. For example, most children learn from the modeling of parents reading to them at bedtime. Usually, children easily notice their mom or dad read their bedtime stories from left to right. Later on, when learning to read in school, the child already knows to start at the left of the page.
Secondly, emergent literacy involves learning basic phonemic awareness. Phonemes are units of sound. For instance, 'fr' is a phoneme. It is the first unit of sound in words like 'friend', 'frame', and 'freeze'.
Young children can begin to realize blended sounds require more complex combinations. At such an early age, children do not relate the letters to that specific sound, but they will begin to pick up on acceptable phonemes within reading and writing. 'Fr' is an acceptable phoneme, but something like 'tsw' is not. There is no word in the English language that combines those letters to make one sound. During emergent literacy, children begin to learn the acceptable phonemes to increase their phoneme awareness. This knowledge is very important when they enter school and start to learn to read.
Theories
There are several important beliefs within the idea of emergent literacy. These theories are based on approximate age boundaries of when certain literacy skills develop. The first stage, stage 0 extends from birth to first grade. These first five years of life display emergent literacy. As discussed before, through modeling, children learn that reading occurs from left to right. In addition, young children realize what letters are, even if they cannot differentiate between all 26. Furthermore, most children learn the alphabet and can even write their names.
In kindergarten and pre-K classes, students first start to have official lessons on literacy. They will begin to relate letters to specific sounds. They might even begin to use sight words, like 'stop' from stop signs or other visual stimulation. In the years before first grade, these skills grow and strengthen.
Officially, reading does not begin until the next stage: stage 1. This stage lasts from first to second grade when children learn how to sound out words and translate the letters into blended sounds. Letter recognition is complete and all acceptable phonemes are realized. Once in this stage, the child has left emergent literacy.
A second theory under emergent literacy includes the whole-language approach, which aims to promote the reading environment. This approach includes teaching the underlying goal of understanding the function of reading and not just the actual skill of reading. Thus, this is directly related to emergent literacy. The content is not generally expected to be understood, but the foundation is. For example, young children will realize a parent is reading a recipe in order to know how to cook a meal. The function of that piece of writing is understood, even though the child cannot read it himself.
When a child moves on from emergent literacy, this approach can continue to be used in the classroom. For instance, reading material can be chosen based on how it relates to students' lives or social situations. Even if the material is above grade level difficulty, students can work on sight words and listening and writing skills as a teacher explains the content.
Lesson Summary
To review, emergent literacy claims that a child can begin to learn the skills of literacy right after birth. Before official lessons on reading and writing begin, children acquire the basics of literacy.
One way in which this happens is through the modeling done by parents and other literate individuals. As a mom reads to her daughter, the young child picks up on how reading goes from left to right on the page. Secondly, children develop phonemic awareness at an early age.
Phonemes are units of sound, and a young child will learn through listening to others which phonemes are acceptable in our language. Children might even be able to relate some phonemes to different letters.
Lastly, the theories of emergent literacy describe the first stage, stage 0, as when all these basic skills are developed. In addition to those already discussed, before entering first grade children learn the alphabet and might even be able to write their own name. Some might even begin to recognize common sight words like 'stop'. A second theory is called whole-language approach, which focuses on learning about the function of reading. Children can learn at an early age the purpose of certain pieces of writing.
Overall, in a literate society, children are exposed at a very early age to the skills necessary for learning to read and write.
Learning Outcomes
Once you have completed this lesson, you should be able to:
- Define literacy and phonemes
- Summarize the emergent literacy theory and the whole-language approach
- Describe stage 0 and stage 1 of literacy
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Lesson
2 in chapter 21 of the course:
- Methods for Determining Students' Reading Level 8:51
- Emergent Literacy: Definition, Theories & Characteristics 5:54
-
7:43
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