Week 4 Oral Language and Vocabulary Part 1

Thanks for the interesting discussions on your blogs this past week. Just a reminder about trying to avoid parallel posts (by this I mean that one person responds to all of the questions posed and then the next person does the same thing, etc. instead of commenting on or responding to the previous person). While there isn't a minimum number of posts, just responding to 1 person isn't enough.  You should respond to the leader's blog post and then to each other at least once.  This is a discussion. :) Just a reminder as well that the focus of this class is on early literacy so examples need to come from younger children.  If you don't have that experience then you might ask for examples from those that do or make the connection yourself and ask for feed back.

A note about due dates in the syllabus: I have identified due dates for projects in the syllabus only in terms of the week it is due (for example, Assessment Task 1 is due Week 6 which is the week of Feb. 15). There is not a specific day in that week when it is due. I'll be getting on D2L at the end of the week, so as long as it is uploaded by Saturday of that week at 5 pm, I'm happy and you have turned it in on time.  Of course, you can always turn in projects early, or meet with me online to get feedback before it is due.

I have uploaded a link on D2L and in the community to a form for you to fill out about your choices for the exploration and application projects. Please complete that form no later than Feb. 5.  I'll be in touch with each of you via e-mail about your choices.

Rubrics have been uploaded for the Application projects.  I'm working on the ones for the Assessment tasks and the Exploration project, and will let you know when they are up.

Before I introduce the next set of readings, I want to remind you about Assessment Task 1. I have uploaded to D2L the form for you to fill out evaluating the standardized or formal assessment for the aspect you signed up for. You need to have a draft done during Week 5.  You will need to have a virtual group meeting to review each others evaluations. You can do this meeting in a variety of ways.  I can set up an Adobe Connect meeting at the time you decide and can either be part of the discussion or just leave it open and let you meet. I can set up a folder on Google Docs and invite your group members to share and you can each put in your draft.  Then meet online at a particular time and review/make comments on each others drafts.

Remember that this task is about evaluating a standardized or formal test. You don't have to administer it to a child but you can if you would like.  Assessment Task 3 (recording you assessing a child) can be a video of you assessing a child using this assessment OR it can be you assessing a child using one of your informal or formative assessments.

This week's readings are about assessing vocabulary knowledge, explicit teaching, and choosing appropriate words and texts to support vocabulary learning. Before you begin reading (and in your post below), tell me what you know about the gradual release of responsibility model of teaching, the difference between explicit and implicit instruction, and what you know about word difficulty. How do you choose words to teach?

As you read, make a note of the academic vocabulary used in these three chapters. What are key terms and ideas in the chapters? How do the ideas tie to working with children in PreK? in K? in the primary grades? Be sure to use the academic vocabulary you noted as you read in your posts, comments, and responses.


Have a good week.

Week 3 Understanding Language

Congratulations! You have survived your first week of blogging. I have tried to comment on each of your blogs at least once.  I apologize that there is some confusion about requirements and expectations and take full blame for not being more explicit.  I do know that at least one group set up their own expectations for blogging and encourage you all to do so.  Let me re-iterate a few of mine related to class time since I think there may have been some confusion on that as well.

• Spend at least 2.5 hours per week online.  This time could be spent responding to my blog, posting to your blog if you are the group leader for that week, responding to each other on your blog (that is, having an online discussion through your blog comments), or working with your small group online via Google Hangout or Skype or an Adobe Connect meeting that I set up
• Keeping up with readings and assignments
• Responding to the Virtual Check In form --the link  is already uploaded on D2L
• Checking D2L and the Early Literacy Community page regularly for class updates, links etc.

Now to the topic of Week 3--Understanding language which includes the systems of language and language variation. In order to support young children's literacy development, a teacher must first understand about language and how it works. The Kucer chapters will introduce you to the systems of language (or chapter 2 may be a review for you or an expansion of what you already know) as well as discuss language variation.  The S&H chapter discusses the importance of vocabulary knowledge.
Before you begin reading, and in your comments below, answer the following questions:

1. What do you think it means to "know" a word?
2. How would you define "text"?
3. What do you think Kucer means by language variation? 

As you read, think about the following questions: Why should teachers have a good understanding of the systems of language? How and why is it important to supporting young children's development of literacy? How do you respond to language variation in your classroom? Now that you  have read, would you change your answers to questions 1 and 2 above?  How is the content in S&H related to the K chapters? These questions would be good starting points for your discussion this week, but don't have to be the only topics you discuss.  Remember that if you are all reading the same chapters that you don't have to summarize the content which is why I am providing you some questions as starting points for posts.  Please also include your own questions for discussion.

 You will be reading about academic language and academic vocabulary in the readings. This type of language is that used in specific academic settings.  In Literacy Education, we also have academic language and vocabulary that you need to be familiar with.  I'm going to include that language at the end of my posts each week so that you know what academic language and concepts you need to become familiar with and use in your own posts and discussions.  For this week, you need to understand and use the following language from your readings in your discussion:
text, Discourse/discourse, multimodal, pragmatic, semantic, syntactic, genre, morpheme/morphemic, orthographic, graphophonemic, grapheme, academic language/vocabulary/discourse, surface and deep structure, symbol, stance, internal and external context, dialect, contextualized and decontextualized language, extended and fast mapping, onset and rime, root words and affixes, internal and external coherence.

Please don't spend time in the blog defining the terms.  I'll know you understand (or know) them by how you use them in your discussion.  If you want me to weigh in on explaining terms or ideas, be sure to let me know.  I'll be on to read your responses to this blog on Monday evenings and to read your blog posts on Wednesday mornings and Thursday afternoons. Let me know in the blog or e-mail me to get on earlier and I'll respond.

The Link to the virtual check in form is on D2L. Let me know if you have trouble accessing it.  Please complete it by Jan. 28. I'll be checking it at that time.

Have a good week.  I look forward to reading and participating in your discussion and thinking.