Literacy education through Beginning Literacy: Research and preliminary findings

Author(s):

Rúnar Sigthórsson(presenting / submitting)Halldóra Haraldsdóttir(presenting)Sigríður Margrét Sigurðardóttir

Conference:

ECER 2014

Network:

27. Didactics - Learning and Teaching

Format:

Paper

Session Information

27 SES 03 B, Beginning Literacy : Reading and Writing

Paper Session

Time:

2014-09-02

17:15-18:45

Room:

B016 Anfiteatro

Chair:

Brigitte Gruson

Contribution

A worldwide emphasis on literacy as a means of personal empowerment, social and human development, citizenship, lifelong learning and academic attainment draws attention to the demand for high quality literacy education for all students from their early years of schooling throughout their school career (Eurydice, 2011; UNESCO, n.d.; OECD, 2010).

In Iceland literacy is of particular concern in the wake of the results of recent PISA surveys where the general trend since 2000 has been a decline in reading comprehension of 15 year old students (Halldórsson, Ólafsson, & Björnsson, n.d.). Furthermore a new National Curriculum (Ministry of Education and Culture, 2012), states Literacy as one of six fundamental pillars of education. Research knowledge about literacy education in Icelandic Compulsory schools is sparse, however, but the findings of a recent report written for the Ministry of Education and Culture in 2009 (Leiknisdóttir, Guðmundsdóttir, Björnsdóttir, Jónsdóttir & Jónsson, 2009) indicated that schools continued a long tradition of phonics teaching, where formal teaching of reading was confined mainly to the first years of primary school, and was aimed primarily at decoding, building fluency in reading, and reading comprehension.

Since 2006 compulsory schools in Iceland have been able to implement a literacy education programme, called Beginning Literacy (hereafter BL) (Eggertsdóttir, 2009, 2013) in collaboration with consultants from the Centre of School Development (CSD) at the University of Akureyri. The programme is directed at the first two years of the primary school and is currently in use in some 70 schools in Iceland, about 45% of the all compulsory schools. BL is built on an interactive model of literacy education. It assumes that neither the decoding emphasis of phonics teaching, nor the holistic approach where children are exposed to text in an independent search for meaning, are sufficient by themselves but need to interact (Lipson & Wixson, 1991; Vacca, Vacca, Gove, Burkey, Lenhart & McKeon, 2009). In BL this interaction is achieved by moving students’ learning through a threefold learning cycle: from exposure to authentic literature texts, through a phase of decoding and ‘technical’ work and finally to a phase of reconstruction. Literacy is regarded as a social activity and a braid of reading, understanding, writing and oral expression. Furthermore BL emphasises inclusion where learning needs of all children are met within the class (Tomlinson & Moon, 2013), by means of interdependent collaboration, scaffolding and active learning (Eggertsdóttir, 2009; Soderman, Gregory & McCarty, 2005).

BL is implemented through a two year professional development programme in collaboration with the CSD. Teachers attend courses and workshops, network with teachers from other participating schools, receive coaching from a CSD consultant and a development leader appointed in each school and educated to be an adviser to teachers. Teachers and leaders are provided with various kinds of material. The leaders and the CSD consultants communicate regularly (Eggertsdóttir, 2013).

In 2011 a research project on BL was launched. In light of the paucity of literacy research in Iceland the project has the broad aim to build capacity for literacy research and contribute to the body of knowledge and understanding of literacy education, nationally and internationally. Two more specific aims are to 1) analyse the BL literacy programme and the literacy teaching and learning that takes place within it, in light of the existing body of international literacy research and knowledge of effective literacy teaching, and 2) analyse the professional and school development that operate within the BL schools to understand what makes these developments effective, and how new approaches to literacy education in Iceland, might be introduced, implemented and sustained in future.

Method

In light of the nature of the BL literacy education programme and the above aims of the BL research two main strands are addressed in the study: 1) Professional and school development in the implementation process, and 2) Teaching and learning that takes place within the BL literacy curriculum. The first strand focuses on schools’ internal learning and development conditions emphasised in the implementation process, such as professional development of development leaders, leadership and collaborative culture (Hall & Hord, 2011) and how successfully these have been transformed to support effective implementation, the school’s support and resources allocated to the BL-programme, and plans and actions to sustain positive outcomes. In the second strand the focus is on teaching and learning and teachers’ level of use (Hall & Hord, 2011) of the BL method and its pedagogical characteristics (Eggertsdóttir, 2009). The focus is on teachers’ teaching plans, teaching arrangements and behaviour as the basis for pupils’ experienced curriculum and outcomes in the key areas of literacy, along with their motivation, and competences such as collaboration, autonomy, creativity and metacognition. The research project draws on several sets of data: 1) Existing data from teachers’ and leaders’ evaluation of workshops and consultation from the CSD. 2) Available results from regular screening tests conducted six times in each school over the two implementation years. 3) Case study data from six BL schools. These comprise: a) Field notes from semi-structured observations of teaching, examinations of teaching plans and other written materials from six case study schools, and b) individual interviews with the observed teachers, pupils and parents about the organisation and nature of literacy education in the same schools, individual interviews with the BL leader and head-teacher of each school, and a focus group interview with BL teachers in the school to address professional and school development issues. Furthermore the CSD consultant of each school is interviewed. 4) A questionnaire sent to all BL schools and an equal number of schools that have not taken on the method. This adds up to at least 75% of all compulsory schools in Iceland. The questionnaire addresses similar issues to the case studies to give a broader perspective on the implementation of BL and allow some comparison with non-BL schools.

Expected Outcomes

The findings of this study are not fully developed but this paper will focus on some preliminary findings and conclusions from the case studies. These findings indicate that the adoption of BL has indeed changed the beginning literacy education of those schools from a dominant emphasis on phonics and decoding to a more holistic literacy curriculum where reading, writing and oral expression are intertwined. Teachers express general contentment with the BL and describe more variety of learning tasks and less seatwork with simplified texts and workbooks. There are, however, indications that the two years period of implementation – even though it is well structured and clear about the aims of literacy education – is too short for teachers to acquire high levels of use (cf. Hall & Hord, 2011) and schools to develop sufficiently robust infrastructure of professional learning communities (ibid.) to sustain the necessary change. This also links to concerns raised by consultants, in line with authors such as Fullan (2007) that the preparation to initiate the BL change process needs to be strengthened as well. All the teachers we have observed have reached the level of routine use (Hall & Hord, 2011) where they follow the cycle of BL (see above) but may lack the confidence and competences of higher levels of refinement, integration and renewal (ibid.). An indication of this is that some of the teachers seem to struggle with formative assessment and recording of pupils’ progress and use of assessment data to address the needs of children within the classroom. A related issue is that some teachers do not seem confident with scaffolding, e.g. by assigning tasks to heterogeneous cooperative learning groups or pairs. A lot of the pair and group work takes place homogenous groups which lack the interdependence of cooperative learning.

References

Eggertsdóttir, R. (2013). Starfsþróun og varanlegar breytingar á skólastarfi: Byrjendalæsi í ljósi fræða um starfsþróun [Professional development and sustained change in schools: Beginning Lieracy in light of the professional development literature]. In R. Sigþórsson, R. & G. H. Frímannsson (Eds.). Fagmennska í skólastarfi: Skrifað til heiðurs Trausta Þorsteinssyni [Professionalism in schools: Written in honour of Trausti Þorsteinsson]. Reykjavík: University of Iceland Press & the University of Akureyri. Eggertsdóttir, R. (2009). Beginning Literacy – An interactive approach. In B. Culligan (Ed.) The changing landscapes of literacy: Building best practice, (pp. 279–293). Dublin: Reading Association of Ireland. Eurydice network. (2011). Teaching reading in Europe: Contexts, policies and practices. Brussels: European Commission, doi:10.2797/60196 Fullan, M. (2007). The new meaning of educational change (4th ed.). New York NY: Teachers College Press. Hall, G. E. & Hord, S. H. Implementing change: Patterns, principles and potholes (3rd ed.). Boston MA: Pearson. Halldórsson, A. M., Ólafsson, R. F. &. Björnsson, J. K. (n.d.). Helstu niðurstöður PISA 2012: Læsi nemenda á stærðfræði og náttúrufræði og lesskilningur [Main results of PISA 2012: Students‘ literacy in mathematics and science and reading comprehension]. Reykjavík: National Testing Institute. Leiknisdóttir, A. M., Guðmundsdóttir, H., Björnsdóttir, Á. E., Jónsdóttir H. H., & Jónsson, F. H. (2009). Staða lestrarkennslu í íslenskum grunnskólum [The state of reading instruction in Icelandic compulsory schools]. Without publishing place and publisher. Retrieved from http://brunnur.stjr.is/mrn/utgafufskra/utgafa.nsf/RSSPage.xsp?documentId=4D59A0E31F2C3435002576F00058DD1B&action=openDocument Lipson, M. Y. og Wixson, K. K. (1991). Assessment and instruction of reading disability: An interavtive approach. New York NY: Harper Collins. Ministry of Education, Science and Culture. (2012).The Icelandic national curriculum guide for compulsory school: General section. Retrieved from http://brunnur.stjr.is/mrn/utgafuskra/utgafa.nsf/RSSPage.xsp?documentId=C590D16CBC8439C500257A240030AE7F&action=openDocument OECD. (2010). PISA 2009 Results: Learning to Learn - Student Engagement: Strategies and Practices (Volume III). Paris: OECD. Soderman, A. K., Gregory, K. M. og McCarty, L. T. (2005). Scaffolding emergent literacy: A child – centered approach for preschool through grade 5. (2nd ed.). Boston MA: Pearson UNESCO. (n.d.). Literacy. Retrieved from http://www.unesco.org/new/en/education/themes/education-building-blocks/literacy/ Vacca, J. A. L., Vacca, R. T., Gove, M. K., Burkey, L. C., Lenhart, L. A. and McKeon, C. A. (2009). Reading and learning to read. (7th ed.). Boston MA: Pearson. Tomlinson, A. C. and Moon, T. R. (2013). Assessment and student success in a differentiated classroom. Alexandria VA. ASCD.

Author Information

Rúnar Sigthórsson (presenting / submitting)

University of Akureyri

Education

Akureyri

Halldóra Haraldsdóttir (presenting)

University of Akureyri

Faculty of Education

Akureyri

Sigríður Margrét Sigurðardóttir

University of Akureyri, Iceland

Search the ECER Programme

Search for keywords and phrases in "Text Search"
Restrict in which part of the abstracts to search in "Where to search"
Search for authors and in the respective field.
For planning your conference attendance you may want to use the conference app, which will be issued some weeks before the conference
If you are a session chair, best look up your chairing duties in the conference system (Conftool) or the app.