Literacy & Learning
Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://hdl.handle.net/11274/15815
Browse
Browsing Literacy & Learning by Author "Allen, Diane"
Now showing 1 - 5 of 5
- Results Per Page
- Sort Options
Item The aesthetic and efferent pedagogical stances and perspectives of high school English teachers during the study of literature(2001-08) Patton, Jo Ann; Griffin, Margaret; Allen, Diane; Zeek, CatherineLouise Rosenblatt's (1978, 1995b) transactional reading theory provided the framework for this qualitative study designed to explore the aesthetic and efferent pedagogical stances and perspectives of 10 high school English teachers during the study of literature. Research was conducted during the spring semester of the 1999–2000 school year in four high schools in a Texas public school district. Three questions guided the study focusing on the aesthetic and efferent stances the teachers manifested during classroom observations, their perspectives reported during interviews, and a comparison between their observed stances and reported perspectives. Two primary sources provided data: transcriptions of classroom observation field notes of each teacher's regular English class and transcriptions of an in-depth audiotaped interview with each teacher. Two secondary sources provided background and corroboration of the primary sources: instructional artifacts and the researcher's journal. Analyses of observation transcripts rendered identification of idea units and the emergence of 8 categories. Idea units in 2 of these categories, Aesthetic and Efferent, were then placed into 2 Aesthetic sub-categories and 10 Efferent sub-categories. Codes, definitions, examples, and explanations were developed for categories and sub-categories. Findings of the teachers' classroom oral communication overwhelmingly indicated the preponderance of an efferent stance within a traditional transmission classroom with limited attention given to an aesthetic stance. Analyses of interview transcripts rendered the teachers' reported aesthetic and efferent perspectives. Teachers discussed and ranked the priority of five dimensions of literary study, and most teachers indicated the aesthetic dimension of literature to be a higher priority than the efferent dimension. Teachers reported having minimal or no awareness of Rosenblatt's transactional reading theory and reader response. Findings from observation and interview transcripts were compared and revealed a distinct contradiction between the teachers' limited aesthetic oral communication in the classroom and their reporting the aesthetic dimension to be a high priority during interviews.Item Emergent readers' and writers' construction of sight words in kindergarten(2005-05) Mott, Rose Anne; Anderson, Nancy L., Ph. D.; Rodriguez, Yvonne; Allen, DianeThis naturalistic inquiry provided a rich description of the complexities involved in learning sight words in a kindergarten classroom setting. The description was in the force of case studies that followed individuals' unique paths to understanding the reading and writing processes. Data were collected on three case studies as they participated in classroom literacy activities. The daily Morning Message event was videotaped over 13 weeks. Case Studies were interviewed following journal writing and classroom reading activities to determine each student's understanding of sight word learning. Data were also collected during the Voyager phonemic awareness program and during center activities. Three distinct phases of word learning were determined as known words were collected for each case study over a timeframe of four months. The collection of words was sorted for mode of use in isolation and in context, and whether used with group support, independently, or in assessment settings. Participants were assessed on three occasions using Clay's (2002) tasks of An Observation Survey of Early Literacy Achievement and a Morning Message Word Test, designed by the researcher to determine if students were able to read and write words and if words were becoming sight words. Descriptions of case studies were analyzed in a cross case analysis that determined the similarities and differences of young learners coming to know sight words. Data revealed changes in behavior with words over three phases. Phases were characterized by exploration with words, confusions along with partial knowledge, and finally, revelations of students knowing what they knew as well as how to learn words. Findings in this study both support and question results of previous studies reported in the literature. Individuals learned differently within the same classroom context. Emergent readers learned by reading and writing in combination and through repetition of words, patterns of language, and familiar contexts. Students learned sight words before knowing sounds of letters. Finally, if words are not applied in continuous text, young learners may have difficulty integrating their learning into the complex system of reading and writing.Item Exploring participation in a first-grade multicultural classroom during two literacy events: The read aloud and the literature dramatization(1998-12) Haag, Claudia Christensen; Griffin, Margaret; Spicola, Rose; Allen, DianeThis study was undertaken to uncover participation patterns during two literacy events, the read aloud and the literature dramatization, in a multicultural first grade classroom. The population included one first-grade teacher, 2 high verbal students, 2 low verbal students, and 2 ESL students. Questions guiding the research were what constituted participation in each event and how participation differed from one event to the other. Data were collected for a 16-week period. Categories and codes were identified for both the read aloud and literature dramatization events. In the analysis, structures of participation were enumerated. Next, read aloud behaviors or the dramatization behaviors were analyzed. Finally, evidence of constructing story knowledge was analyzed. Findings indicated that the teacher was receptive to student turntaking and response, she guided and directed both events through verbal and nonverbal modes, and she elicited response in constructing story knowledge. The teacher showed more director talk, was more explicit with directives, and guided through her participation as an actor and a critic in the dramatizations. Eliciting response to construct story knowledge was higher in the dramatization for one area, negotiates story but was higher in the other two categories, analyzes story and links/connects story, in the read aloud event. All 6 subjects had an increase in verbal participation in the literature dramatization behaviors compared to the read aloud because of the expansion in dramatization behaviors to include director, critic, and actor participations. Under constructing story knowledge, talk surrounding all three categories (negotiating story, analyzing story features, and linking or connecting the story) was frequent and deliberate in the read aloud event. In the dramatization event, the only category to have high participation rates was negotiating story, where students were asked to recall or improvise lines. The read aloud event allowed for talk surrounding constructing story knowledge, providing the foundation for the dramatization scripts that were collaboratively negotiated with the teacher. In literature dramatizations, all students, but especially the ESL students, were allowed a wider array of participation opportunities, and during the one analyzed event, both ESL students increased their quantity and quality of participation.Item The journey of Latina English language learners from elementary to middle school(2000-05) Hajek, Eloise; Griffin, Margaret; Flores-Duenas, Leila; Allen, DianeThis study analyzed the discourse of 7 Latina English Language Learners as they transitioned from elementary to middle school. Specifically, the research focused on the girls as they moved from a small, self-contained English as a Second Language classroom in an elementary school to a large middle school with multiple classes and teachers and reduced language support. The fieldwork for this study included meeting with the 7 study participants in focus group meetings and one-on-one interviews in the spring of their sixth-grade year as they prepared to leave elementary school and, then, in the fall and spring of their seventh grade at their new middle school. Primary data included fieldnotes from classroom observations, transcripts from audiotapes of meetings and interviews, and documents and artifacts collected during the study. All of the fieldnotes and transcripts were coded and analyzed. From the analysis of this discourse, two themes emerged which provided a framework for understanding the transition from elementary to middle school. The first theme was about the relationships between the girls and teachers or other significant adults. Their discourse revealed that they established a strong and positive relationship with their sixth-grade teacher that was based on connections that they made through caring words and acts, through sharing humor and stories about one's past, through successfully negotiating issues that enhanced trust and confidence, through a sensitivity to cultural and language issues, and through sharing time in after-school activities. They did not develop this kind of relationship with teachers or other significant adults after they moved to middle school. The second theme was about their meta-awareness of the teaching and learning process. Their discourse revealed that they were keen observers of classroom teaching strategies and their teachers' classroom behaviors, both of which they found to be particularly problematic in seventh grade. Their discourse revealed an acute awareness of the state accountability exams in sixth grade matched in intensity by their focus and concern with grades in seventh grade. Finally, their active reflection on themselves as learners provided a picture of girls trying to successfully make their way through a complex and sometimes perilous transition.Item A study of kindergarten students' phonological awareness development as measured by their writing(2001-12) Hardy, Joyce E.; Zeek, Cathy; Askew, Billie; Allen, Diane; Wickstrom, CarolThis study examined the phonological awareness development of individual kindergarten students over a 12 week period as measured by their writing. Some ways in which phonological awareness is developed in authentic kindergarten classroom settings were also discovered. Individual kindergarten students' test performances using Clay's (1993) Letter Identification, Hearing and Recording Sounds in Words, and Writing vocabulary tasks and individual kindergarten students' classroom writing samples were used to assess changes across time during this study. Classroom practices that help develop phonological awareness were identified through teacher and principal interviews, teacher conversations, and kindergarten classroom observations. No instructional interventions resulted because of this study; the researcher only observed what already was taking place in these classrooms. Two teachers' morning (AM) and afternoon (PM) kindergarten classes from two elementary campuses in one north central Texas public school district participated. The AM and PM participants from the classes of one teacher were identified as Group 1 (n = 20), and the AM and PM participants from the classes of the other teacher were identified as Group 2 ( n = 18). Statistical analysis revealed a significant increase in the mean scores in all tasks with each test period for both Groups 1 and 2. Analysis of students' classroom writing samples at 4-week intervals revealed an increase in phonological awareness knowledge throughout the study. The classroom practices of Group 1 and Group 2 teachers revealed that each teacher provided many opportunities for phonological awareness development in authentic kinds of social interactions within the classroom. Both teachers worked in the students' zones of proximal development scaffolding learning and encouraging writing development. This study supports that students' writing can be used as a window into phonological awareness knowledge. Additionally, through writing using invented spelling, kindergarten students can develop phonological awareness skills.