The Importance of Literacy

I found my self relating material from the IRA/NAEYC to class discussions as well as material from other classes. Again, I saw that reading is COMPREHENSION of the text and not just simply decoding words. Also, there was a statement that said as literacy capabilities become stronger, children will begin to read to learn rather than learn to read. Recently my Info Science 330 professor mentioned the same thing. Hearing statements like this multiple times reinforces these ideas. 

I like how Bell and Jarvis branched out into different forms of literacy and breaking away from the traditional forms. While it doesn't seem like the "word wall" would be solely responsible for children's learning, I like the idea of placing children's names with their pictures as well as providing environmental print that corresponds with the first letter of their name. This would be something interesting that I would like to incorporate in my classroom, but as mentioned before, I believe it will take many years of experience to get results like those of  Bell. 

I chose this picture to add today because I like the idea of bringing in real environmental print materials that children can use. These items can be used in a home center in the classroom. Children can make grocery lists with the provided materials or build structures such as this. I like how the students incorporated vegetable cans into their structure and even named it a grocery store. This, to me, shows a connection being made.