Figure 2
Activities of the Early Literacy Project
| Activity | Description | Purpose |
| Thematic Unit | • Teacher and
students brainstorm, organize, write drafts, read texts,
or interview people to get additional information about a
topic or theme from multiple sources • Students use reading/writing strategies flexibly to develop and communicate their knowledge • Theme is used as basis for selecting expository and narrative texts, and to organize and relate all activities • Reading and writing are continuously connected as students participate in discussions and read for information as a basis for writing, comprehending and responding to texts |
Model learning-to-learn strategies; introduce language, genres, and strategies; model reading/writing processes and connections; provide interrelated and meaningful contexts for acquisition and application of literacy knowledge; conventionalize and develop shared knowledge about the purpose, meaning, and self-regulation of literacy acts |
| Choral Reading | • Teachers
and students chorally read poems, predictable books,
class stories, literature, student-authored texts • Teachers model and teach a number of reading strategies, including predicting, organizing, summarizing, asking questions, rereading, locating information, and clarifying meaning |
Develop word
recognition, phonic skills, context clues, and
voice-print match Provide experience reading whole texts and talking about literature Develop literacy success immediately Develop comprehension and personal response to texts |
| Undisturbed Silent Reading | Students engage in
reading under several conditions: • Reading alone • Reading to an adult or peer • Listening to new story at listening center |
Develop fluency;
Provide practice in preparation for author's chair;
provide experience with varied genres; read texts related
to thematic unit; students ask and answer questions; prepare to make comments about or interpretations of the stories |
| Partner Reading/Writing | • Students
read books or poems; or write stories with partner or
small group • Students listen to taped stories with partner • Students make personal responses to texts, complete story maps, or construct maps with partners that will be shared with whole class |
Work on fluency for author's chair; provide opportunities for students to fluently read and write connected texts; provide opportunities for students to use literacy language and knowledge; develop reading/writing vocabulary and enjoyment of reading |
| Sharing Chair | • Students
share books, poems, or their own personal writing • Students control discourse and support each other • Students ask questions, answer questions and act as informants to peers and teacher |
Promote reading/writing connection; empower students as members of the community; allow students to make public their literacy knowledge and performance and develop shared knowledge; develop students' notions of `community' |
| Morning News | • Students
dictate personal- experience stories for newspaper
publication - group composition of story • Teacher acts as a scribe in recording ideas and as a coach in modeling, guiding and prompting literacy strategies in text composition and comprehension • Students interact with authors to ask questions which elicit information from that author in order to shape and edit the language and content of the news story |
Model and conventionalize writing and self-monitoring strategies; demonstrate writing conventions and skills; provide additional reading and comprehension experiences; make connections between oral and written texts; promote sense of community; empower students; provide meaningful and purposeful contexts for literacy strategies |
| Story Response/Discussion | • Students
read narrative stories and respond to them in various
ways (e.g., sequence or illustrate story events, map
story events or information, summarize story, make
personal response, etc.) • Students work with partners or small groups to develop response |
Promote students' application of literacy strategies; present varied genres to students; promote students' ownership of the discourse about texts; further students' enjoyment of texts; make text structures visible to students |
| Journal Writing | • Students
write entries in a journal • Teachers may assign topic related to thematic unit which requires students to write, or they may ask students to write freely about any self-selected topic • Teacher reads and responds to journal, or asks students to share journal entry in sharing chair |
Promote writing fluency; provide opportunities for students to write varied genres and about personal topics; provide an opportunity for students to write stories that they can share with other members of the classroom during sharing chair; provide specific occasions for students to experience and develop specific writing strategies (e.g., generate written retellings about a narrative or expository text) |
| Author's Center | • Process
writing approach (students plan, organize, gather
information from sources, draft, edit, and publish texts)
• Students write and work collaboratively to brainstorm ideas, gather additional information from texts, write drafts, share drafts, receive questions, and write final draft • Students use literacy and learning-to-learn strategies modeled in thematic center |
Develop sense of community; develop shared knowledge; provide opportunities for students to rehearse literacy strategies; empower students in the appropriation and transformation of strategies |
| Project Read | •
Sound-symbol correspondences are emphasized • Students are taught how to perform phonemic sementation and sound blending in order to read and spell words • Students learn “red words” which represent sight words that are not phonetically regular |
Develop basic skills for recognizing and spelling printed words |