Language and Literacy Curriculum, Essay Example

Curriculum Principles

Following the pattern of learning as suggested by the University of the State of New York, every curriculum is expected to take on a differential process by which the students would undergo a holistic form of development whereas reading, writing and speech would be part of the whole activity. With this pattern of learning, it is expected that a better form of improved education would be embraced fully by the students based on the process of learning that best fits their point of development.

Literacy among young students is expected to become a proper foundation of good learning and later on a good basis for good citizenship. As such a language curriculum is essential for developing literate individuals within society. This curriculum has been designed to expose students to opportunities where they can acquire the knowledge and skill that is required to realize this objective through development of phonemic awareness. The curriculum’s main objective is to help students develop characteristics of successful phonemic awareness. Students who grow to realize success in this endeavor will depict the following characteristics;

• Communication; the ability to view, listen, read, speak, represent and write confidently and effectively(University of the State of New York, 1996).
• Connections; create significant connection between their experiences with the external world, texts and other people.
• Critical thinking; develop critical thinking skills at an early age
• Ideology; understand that any kind of text usually promotes a give idea which has to be identified, questioned, considered and evaluated
• Culture; understand the role and impact of language within culture.
• Interaction; be able to effectively use language to interact and create meaningful relationships with individuals within the community so as to realize active participation within community and personal growth.
• Understand that importance of language learning in enhancing life and reflective processes.

This curriculum has been developed based on four pillars of learning literacy; (1) Oral Communication, (2) Reading, (3) Writing, and (4) Media Literacy (University of the State of New York, 1996). The four pillar of learning and literacy are usually interdependent, as well as complementary to each other. Activities have to be planned and designed to improve the strengths of all four pillars while adhering to the NYS Learning Standards for English Language Arts.

Curriculum Expectations

Students are expected to be assessed and evaluated on their ability to attain, exhibit and apply concepts and principle taught in class. This will be achieved through a number of activities, for which there is a prescribed set of expectations drawing the benchmark for evaluation and assessment. The curriculum is defined by two sets of expectations.

• Overall Expectations – These define the general language skills that students are anticipated to exhibit by the end of the grade. This language curriculum has been developed to increase the complexity of the tasks that they perform as well as the texts that they use in the classroom. This is set to o develop their knowledge and language skills that are linked to the overall expectations of each pillar of learning and literacy.
• Specific Expectations – These define in detail the skill and knowledge levels that are expected by the end of the grade. The specific expectations depicts progress in knowledge and learning skills through the complexity of the expectation, the examples provided and possible accompanying teacher prompts

Curriculum Pillars

• Oral Communication

Oral communication is the foundation of developing literacy and the skills required for learning and critical thinking. With the help of good listening and speaking skills, discourse on phonemic awareness allows students to execute a number of functions that are critical for social interaction. These include;

• communicating information
• exploring and understanding concepts and ideas
• recognizing and developing solutions to problems
• organizing knowledge and experience
• clarifying and expressing their opinions, thoughts and feelings

Students will be exposed to frequent opportunities to discuss and talk about a number of subjects including school, personal interests and likes, society and recent affairs. The language program will expose children to numerous platforms for oral activities that will engage students in brain storming, discussions for problem solving, presentations for debating and/or defending concepts and ideas and providing critique for their fellow student’s work.

Overall Expectations

Students are expected to;

• Listen in order to effectively understand and provide appropriate feedback in different situations.
• Effectively communicate to different audiences by appropriately using phonemic speaking skills and strategies
• Assess and identify the inherent phonemic listening and speaking strengths and weaknesses, as well as the strategies that were most useful in situations that required oral communication.(Developmentally Appropriate Practice, 2009)

The curriculum identifies the need to take into consideration the underlying and evident variances in the conventions and norms employed in phonemic oral communication by the different cultures that may be represented in the classroom. It also identifies that even though oral communication skills are usually the first skills to be developed by students, developing reading and writing skills considerably improves the ability to understand and effectively use oral language.

Reading

Effective phonemic reading is an integral facet of developing learning and critical thinking in students. This curriculum advances development of knowledge skills that are integral in developing reading skills. Standards of identifying an effective reader include the ability comprehend the concepts and ideas that are communicated in text and even further effectively apply these ideas in new contexts (Moon & Reifel, 2008). Students will be exposed to a wide variety of tests to enable them apply a number of comprehension strategies as they execute reading tasks. Students will also be exposed to a wide variety of material and text that depicts the different uses of writing. This will enable students develop scope and depth in their vocabulary. It will also allow students to be accustomed to the different conventions of writing.

The curriculum will also expose students to platforms where they will read phonemic material for different purposes, including and not limited to reading for class credit as well as for leisure and fun outside the class. The curriculum has been designed to provide a well-balanced reading program which is characterized by reading activities that allow students to discover new and interesting information, enrich themselves, discover themselves and have fun. These reading activities are essential in developing reading habits and attitudes towards reading at an early age.

The reading activities will employ a number of strategies before, during and after each activity.

• Students will identify the purpose of a given phonemic reading before reading a text.
• Student may use cueing systems during the phonemic reading exercise
• Students will employ phonemic comprehension strategies such as predicting, drawing inferences, monitoring and summarizing during the reading exercises.
• Students will analyze, synthesize, evaluate and employ other critical thinking strategies and devices after the each phonemic reading exercise.

Overall Expectations:

• Read and exhibit a comprehension of the phonemic information within the text and construct meaning.
• Identify the different feature, forms and stylistic elements employed within the phonemic text and how it affects communication of the meaning derived from the text
• Read fluently by employing cueing systems
• Assess and identify the inherent reading strengths and weaknesses, as well as the strategies that were most useful in situations that required phonemic oral communication.

Writing

Writing enables a student discover themselves by developing critical thinking skills so as to effectively articulate their ideas. This curriculum will expose students to different phonemic writing tasks that will defined by the purpose and the audience for the task. Students will be provided with platforms that will allow them to produce interesting and original writing that will be determined by the capacity to develop critical thinking. This pillar is particularly complemented and dependent on a student’s reading skills.

Overall Expectations

• Create, collect and organize phonemic information and ideas to write for a given audience and/or purpose.
• Employ effective phonemic stylistic elements, literary and informational forms to effectively draft and revise their own writing.
• Correct, refine and effectively present phonemic written work by employing editing proofreading and publishing strategies and skills
• Assess and identify the inherent phonemic writing and speaking strengths and weaknesses, as well as the strategies that were most useful in situations that required writing.

Parent Involvement and Follow Up

The phonemic activity tasks will involve parents through the inclusion of homework based tasks that will require the parents’ involvement and approval. Parents will have access to class phonemic reading material that will depict the progress of students as per the topics discussed in class as well as the skills that students are expected to have required. The parent will complete a short report which the student will bring for assessment to the instructor. This part of the curriculum would best provide the teachers and the parents the connection they need in order to know what the students need especially in improving the way they learn and the way they grasp the lessons presented to them in class as well as to how they would be able to make definite insistence on how they could apply such lessons outside the classrooms and into their homes and in casual engagements with peers and others in the society as well.

Final Remarks

 Based on the presentations and indications made in this document, it could be analyzed how good application of learning principles actually provide learners with a holistic approach to better educational engagement, one that basically enhances a better sense of what is assumed as good studying habit. This approach to learning is expected to improve the behavioral pattern that best provide a more definite sense on how one embraces the lessons presented to him in class depending on how well he is able to understand the basics of such learning courses which directly serves as an applicable sense of personal development aiding the student to become a better individual who is literate and capable of embracing personal progress. In this presentation, it has been pointed out that holistic activities involving the assistance that could be provided by the school and the parents serves as a solid foundation for progress that each individual needs to recognize.

References

Barrett-Mynes, J. (2010). Supporting Struggling Readers: Using Interactive Read-Alouds and Graphic Organizers. Voices of Practitioners, 5(2), 1-12.

Developmentally Appropriate Practice. (2009). Developmentally Appropriate Practice and Intetionality Big Ideas. New York: DAP.

Moon, K., & Reifel, S. (2008). Play and Literacy Learning in a Diverse Language Pre-kindergarten Classroom. Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood, 9(1), 49-65. Retrieved April 20, 2015, from http://www.imaginationplayground.com/images/content/2/9/2986/Play-and-Literacy-Learning.pdf

University of the State of New York. (1996). Learning Standards for English Language Arts. Albany, N.Y.: University of the State of New York.