1. Literacy Environment Analysis
Olivia Bradley
EDUC 6705 The Beginning Reader PK-3
Instructor: Linda Holcomb
February, 2012

2. Getting to Know Literacy
Learners
• As a teacher, it is vital to understand your students,
to be able to provide differentiated instruction for
students that motivates them, and provides
opportunities for them to become better readers.
• Allows the teacher to gain an insight as to how they
feel about reading, and what motivates them to
read.
• Discovering what interests the students enables the
teacher to find books and stories that relate to them,
whereby they can find connections between texts
and themselves.

3. Getting to Know Literacy
Learners cont…
• Afflerbach (2007 p155) states that for students to
be successful readers, they need to be motivated
have a positive attitude, and good self –concept.
• Weak, positive, or negative motivation has an
effect on reading and this is based upon prior
experiences (Afflerbach, 2007).
• The self-concept of a student, contributes to a
student’s achievement, and this means how
students view themselves as readers.
• Attitude is related to both motivation, and self-
concept, and through the Elementary Reading
Survey (McKenna & Kear, 1990) students can
represent their own feelings.

4. Getting to Know Literacy
Learners cont…
• There are two different areas for
assessment (Afflerbach, 2007)
1. Cognitive Assessments
2. Non-Cognitive Assessments

5. Getting to Know Literacy
Learners cont…
1. Cognitive Assessments that I do with my
students:
• DRA II (twice a year)
• Running Records - enables teachers to assess
student’s oral reading to determine their word
identification, fluency, and comprehension (Tompkins,
2010 p86).
• Guided Reading
• Observations & Anecdotal note-taking
2. Non-Cognitive Assessments
• Elementary Reading Attitude Survey (McKenna &
Kear, 1990)
• Motivation to Read Profile (Gambrell, Palmer, Codling
& Mazzoni, 1996)

6. Getting to Know Literacy
Learners cont…
• There are many different ways in which to
collect data that enables me to choose
appropriate texts, that drives instruction,
through understanding their learning profile,
background and culture, for example:
– Show a student 10 different texts and ask them to
say which interests them (Laureate Education
Inc., 2010a), or
– Bring in a bag with 5 items in that describe the
student (Laureate Education Inc., 2010a).

7. Selecting Texts
• Analysing and selecting text is an important area of
literacy that teachers need to take into consideration
when planning for their students.
– Teachers should consider the dimension of difficulty including
how readability is improved, with the repetition of multi-syllabic
words, but singleton words are unique and this makes it more
difficult to read.
– The length of the text, as shorter texts are easier, and longer
texts are harder;
– The structure of the text, whether it is informational,
descriptive, what the cause, effect, problem, and the solution
are;
– The use connective words, or signal words that make
considerate text;
– Poetic structure; and finally
– The size of print.

8. Selecting Texts cont…
• Books can fall into four quadrants (see next
slide) based on narrative, informational,
linguistic, or semiotic (Laureate Education Inc.,
2010b).
• Books that fall into the narrative and semiotic
quadrant are usually easier, whereas books that
fall into the informational and linguistic quadrant
are harder (Laureate Education Inc., 2010b).
• A balance of various texts supports students in a
cognitive and non-cognitive way.

9. Selecting Texts cont…
• Douglas Hartman (Laureate
Education Inc., 2010b)
describes how useful it is to Narrative
Semiotic
use a tool known as the 4 (Pictures)
quadrants of the Literacy
Matrix to choose texts:
– Think of texts on a continuum
from narrative to Linguistic
Informational
informational – look at (words)
genre, features,
– Another dimension to
analysing texts, is to look at
Linguistic (words) or
Semiotic (pictures, icons)
– Take a text and locate it in
one of the quadrants

10. Selecting Texts cont…
• The Internet is becoming a great tool for children to
develop their reading experiences (Castek,
Bevans-Mangelson, & Goldstone, 2006).
• If possible, teachers need to provide these
opportunities to their students, as this is vital for
their participation in the digital world (Castek et al,
2006). Some students do not have access to the
internet at home, and in some cases, parents are
not sure what is appropriate or not.
• I want to provide as many opportunities to my
students as possible for using the resources online.
I have repeatedly used the project by the Screen
Actors Guild Foundation called Storyline
www.storylineonline.net.

11. Selecting Texts cont…
• Castek et al. (2006) suggest ways in which to use the
Internet for teaching literacy.
– These include using online stories, publishing student work,
participating in virtual book clubs, collaborating on Internet
projects and adding informational websites to study of literacy.
– I already use online stories, however I would like to try to
publish my students writing on the Internet.
• According to Stephens (2008), making good choices for
literacy can be a difficult task for teachers and students,
as there are so many different topics and genres in
children’s books.
• Work by Pappas (Stephens, 2008) show that if teachers
want their students to develop into successful readers and
writers, teachers need to provide, and include
informational texts in their classrooms to provide more
experiences and opportunities.

12. Literacy Lesson: Interactive
Perspective
• According to Almasi (Laureate Education Inc., 2010c),
students need to be strategic processors in order to
become strategic thinkers, and this is alleviated through
teachers choosing the best strategies to be taught to
students for information and fiction text.
• Teachers need to be metacognitive about strategy use to
develop strategic processing:
– Choosing the best and most efficient strategy
– Using different strategies for narrative and
informational texts
– Setting purposes, making predictions, visualizing,
making sense of text

13. Literacy Lesson: Interactive
Perspective Guided Reading
cont…
• Guided reading is an effective instructional strategy
that can be used with students of all levels, to help
improve their reading ability.
• During a guided reading, a small group of students at
the same level of reading, read a book at an
instructional level with the teacher (Tompkins, 2010).
• Each lesson is adapted to meet the needs of individual
students (Tompkins, 2010 p437).
• In planning a guided reading lesson, I use data that I
have collected through a cognitive running record
assessment, and non-cognitive assessments.

14. Literacy Lesson: Interactive
Perspective Guided Reading
cont…
• The group of students need to improve their skill of predicting and
retelling stories in sequence.
• I was able to promote students’ strategic processing and
metacognition through the discussions at the beginning of the
lesson, during the reading, and at the end.
• Accessing students prior knowledge enabled me to have deeper
discussions with the students, and all of the children were able to
relate to the story, either through the idea of Easter, or through their
grandparents.
• One aspect of the lesson, which I found to be extremely beneficial,
was how I wrote down each student’s predictions onto index cards,
which we referred to at the end of the lesson.
• The students appeared to be more engaged in retelling the story
after reading it, and we were able to refer back to their predictions,
which I feel proved to help them in understanding the importance of
predicting, and confirming or revising their predictions.

15. Literacy Lesson: Interactive
Perspective Guided Reading
cont…
• I always write anecdotal notes while listening to the students
reading independently.
• I split the students and send them to different places in the
room, to avoid any distractions from other readers, and it also
enables me to work with those students independently, without
them feeling that they cannot do something
• It is important to remember that decoding and fluency is
important for reading development, and as the levels of books
become more structured with deeper comprehension, this is a
skill that needs to be taught to students.
• We cannot assume that students will automatically be
competent in different comprehension skills. Stahl (2004)
believes that these strategies are important because they
provide access to knowledge; these students are then able to
participate in cognitive strategies and show greater
understanding of texts read.

16. Literacy Lesson: Interactive
Perspective Guided Reading
cont…
• Data gained during the reading, showed that this lesson
needs to be repeated with these three students, using a
different text.
• This was the first lesson, that I asked the students to edit
and revise their predictions while they were reading, and
it is a difficult concept to do at this stage.
• The idea of revising and editing predictions needs to be
modelled during interactive read alouds with accountable
talk.
• The students were not sure of what was expected of
them, and how they should make changes.

17. Literacy Lesson: Critical and
Response Perspectives
• According to Janice Almasi (Laureate Education Inc., 2010d)
students need to examine text from multiple perspectives, and
in order for the students to be able to do this, they need to be
instructed, and have opportunities to observe this being
modelled on a frequent basis.
• Molden (2007) states that part of having critical perspectives on
texts, is to have the ability to analyse all of its areas. It
encourages analytical skills that will equip the students for all
areas of learning.
• Rosenblatt’s (Laureate Education Inc., 2010e) “transactional
theory” is how students can either have an interaction with text
or a transaction with text. Having the ability to transact with
text, means that the students are able to personally and
emotionally respond to text.

18. Literacy Lesson: Critical and
Response Perspectives
• It is important for students to be interactive, critical, and responsive during
reading as this will allow them to have a better understanding and give
opportunities for deeper discussions about texts that engage them and
give them a purpose for reading.
• Students need to be critical thinkers about the author, and think about
what they author was thinking when they wrote the story and what they
are trying to tell us in their story (Laureate Education Inc., 2010e).
• According to Tompkins (2010 p439), interactive read-alouds enhance
students comprehension by engaging them before, during and after the
reading. Students prior knowledge is activated and they interact during
the lesson.
• I use think-pair-share during interactive read-alouds, which allow for
conversations between peers as thinking partners. These partnerships
are based upon mixed ability and personality. I give students an
opportunity to share either his or her view or their partners view to the
class, and this does not interrupt the story.

19. Literacy Lesson: Critical and
Response Perspectives
• The purpose of this interactive read-aloud with accountable
talk, was to help students to start thinking about why
authors write specific stories and what they were thinking,
and how we can learn from stories.
• Although the students enjoyed the story and understood the
basics of what the author was trying to tell us, they had
difficulty in thinking in a critical way about what the author
had written.
• They made quite good predictions about the story, and they
were able to engage in what I would call the top layer of the
story. At the end of the story, when I asked students what is
the moral of the story, there was only one student who was
able to relate it to a personal experience.

20. Literacy Lesson: Critical and
Response Perspectives
• Students need to learn to have a concept of care, this
includes care for oneself, care for others, and care for the
world (Durand, Howell, Schumacher, & Sutton, 2008).
• Teachers need to search for texts that have multiple
perspectives (Durand et al. 2008), to encourage this
thinking.
• The way in which books are read to students have a huge
impression on students, and interactive read-alouds give
students and opportunity to think more about the text
(Durand et al. 2008).

21. Feedback from Colleagues and Family
Members
• What insights did you gain about literacy and literacy
instruction from viewing this presentation?
• How might the information presented change your
literacy practices and/or your literacy interactions with
students?
• In what ways can I support you in the literacy
development of your students or children?
• How might you support me in my work with students or
your children?
• What questions do you have?

22. References
• Afflerbach, P. (2007). Understanding and using reading assessment, K-12.
Newark, DE: International Reading Association
• Castek, J., Bevans-Mangelson, J., & Goldstone, B. (2006). Reading Adventures
online: Five ways to introduce the new literacies of the Internet through children’s
literature. Reading Teacher, 59(7), 714-728. Retrieved from Education Research
Complete: Accession Number: 20430347
• Durand, C., Howell, R., Schumacher, L.A., & Sutton, J. (2008). Using interactive
read-alouds and reader response to shape students’ concept of care. Illinois
Reading Council Journal, 36(1), 22-29. Retrieved from Education Research
Complete. Accession Number 29731090.
• Gambrell, L.B., Palmer, B. M., Codling, R. M., & Mazzoni, S. A. (1996).
Assessing motivation to read. The Reading Teacher, 49(7), 518-533. Retrieved
from the Education Research Complete, Accession Number: 9606160778
• Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2010a). Getting to know your
students [DVD]. The Beginning Reader, PreK-3. Baltimore: Author
• Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2010b). Analyzing and Selecting
Texts [DVD]. The Beginning Reader. Baltimore: Author.
• Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2010c). Interactive Perspective:
Strategic Processing [DVD]. The Beginning Reader. Baltimore: Author.

23. References
• Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2010d). Critical Perspective.
[DVD]. The Beginning Reader. Baltimore: Author.
• Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2010e). Response Perspective.
[DVD]. The Beginning Reader. Baltimore: Author.
• McKenna, M.C., & Kear, D.J. (1990). Measuring attitude toward reading: A new
tool for teachers. The Reading Teacher, 43(9), 626-639. Retrieved from the
Education Research Complete, Accession Number: 11080456
• Molden, K., (2007). Critical literacy, the right answer for the reading classroom:
Strategies to move beyond comprehension for reading improvement. Reading
Improvement, 44(1), 50-56. Retrieved from Education Research Complete:
Accession Number: 24954486
• Stahl, K. A. D. (2004). Proof, practice, and promise: Comprehension strategy
instruction in the primary grades. Reading Teacher, 57(7), 598-608
• Stephens, K.E. (2008). A quick guide to selecting great informational books for
young children. Reading Teacher, 61(6), 488-490. Retrieved from Education
Research Complete Accession Number: 31195717
• Tompkins, G. E. (2010). Literacy for the 21st century: A balanced approach (5th
ed.). Boston: Allyn & Bacon