Multicultural Literacy Strategies: Combatting Literacy Issues in Stage 1

Matthew Luttringer42442605EDUC373

Platypus Primary School Located in North-

Western Sydney, Eastwood

Predominantly low-average SES Public School

50% English speakers 40% LBOTE (Mandarin

and Indian) 10% EAL (Mandarin

and Indian)

Main Objectives

A: communicate through speaking, listening, reading, writing, viewing and representing

B: use language to shape and make meaning according to purpose, audience and context

Reading and Responding in Stage 1CURRICULUM OUTCOMES

Recognises that there are different kinds of texts when reading and viewing and shows an awareness of purpose, audience and subject matter  (EN1-8B)

Uses basic grammatical features, punctuation conventions and vocabulary appropriate to the type of text when responding to and composing texts (EN1-9B)

ISSUES RAISED In order to recognise

these aspects of texts (purpose, audience, subject matter, grammatical features), students must have access to texts which they can understand LBOTE students may not

understand language Lower SES students may

not have access to texts

Reading and Responding – Strategies and ICT ToolEFFECTIVE STRATEGIES Dialogic Reading (Markose,

Symes & Hellsten, 2011) Promotes understanding of

texts through open questions, discussion prompts, and evaluation of responses

Quia promotes these Reading for pleasure

(Markose, Symes & Hellsten, 2011) Students must be given access

to appropriate texts to promote enjoyment and motivation

QUIA Quiz tool Revision on grammatical

features, syntax, cloze passages

Encourages students to look at the finer features of text, and how the structure of language in any text shapes its meaning

Quizzes can be customised to grade level

Quia Web

Writing and Representing in Stage 1CURRICULUM OUTCOMES

Plans, composes and reviews a small range of simple texts for a variety of purposes on familiar topics for known readers and viewers (EN1-2A)

Composes texts using letters of consistent size and slope and uses digital technologies (EN1-3A)

ISSUES RAISED Composition of text

requires understanding of the effect of language cues EAL and LBOTE students may

not have as good a grasp on language functions in English

Use of digital technologies requires access to a computer, which may be a problem for Low SES students

Writing and Representing – Strategies and ICT ToolEFFECTIVE STRATEGIES Cognitive Language

Development (Bochner & Jones, 2004) Some language features and

cues should be developed with active cognitive effort through explicit teaching

My StoryMaker shows students exactly how a sentence should be written if they wish to display an action or emotion from a character

MY STORYMAKER Colourful, interactive,

engaging site Constructs stories and

images based on the emotions, interactions, and characters students wish to represent

Scaffolded and strongly supporting (e.g. if a student doesn’t know how to say their character is sad, the program shows them how)

MyStoryMaker

Oral Interaction and Presentation in Stage 1CURRICULUM OUTCOMES

Communicates with a range of people in informal and guided activities demonstrating interaction skills and considers how own communication is adjusted in different situations (EN1-1A)

Recognises a range of purposes and audiences for spoken language and recognises organisational patterns and features of predictable spoken texts (EN1-6B)

ISSUES RAISED

Bilingual or EAL students may be able to fulfil these outcomes in their home language, but have more trouble in English (Diaz &Harvey, 2007)

Low SES students may not see relevance of public speaking skills due to occupation of parents

Oral Interaction and Presentation – Strategies and ICT ToolEFFECTIVE STRATEGIES Attempt to assess students on

actual presentation skills rather than perfect use of the language (Welch, 2007)

Provide students with simple vocal tasks for practice, such as answering questions or ‘News’

Focus on teaching structure of response (introduction, opinion, conclusion) rather than perfect grammatical features (Bochner & Jones, 2004) – Voki could be useful

VOKI Interactive and engaging

text-to-speech tool Students can make an

avatar based on the speech they are going to use

Can be used to tell the story of the avatar, or the students own story

Promotes use of structure in oral presentation and allows students to hear verbal cues in speech

Voki

Summary – Strategies for Literacy Learning in Stage 1

STRATEGIES Dialogic Reading and

reading for pleasure (Markose, Symes & Hellsten, 2011)

Cognitive Language Development (Bochner & Jones, 2004)

Appropriate assessment and teaching structural understanding (Welch, 2007) (Bochner & Jones, 2004)

TOOLS Quia Web

Useful customisable quiz activities for practicing language features

My StoryMaker Interactive story publisher

which introduces students to characters and actions

Voki Text-to-speech tool which

allows students to hear verbal cues in speech

ReferencesBochner, S., & Jones, J. (2004). (2nd Ed.) Child Language

Development. Learning to talk. London: Whurr Publishers pp. 3-13

Diaz, C., & Harvey, N. (2007). Other Words, other worlds: Bilingual identities and literacy. In Makin, L., Diaz, C.J., McLachlin, C. Literacies in Childhood: Changing Views, changing practice. Marrickville, NSW: Elsevier.

Markose, S., Symes, C., & Hellsten, M. (in press) ‘In this country education happen at the home’: two families in search of the instruments of appropriation for school success. Language and Intercultural Communication (11), 3, August 2011, 247-267

Welch, A. (2007) Cultural difference and diversity. In R. Connell, C. Campbell, M. Vickers, A. Welch, D. Foley, & N. Bagnall (Eds) Education Change and Society (pp. 155-187) Melbourne, Australia: Oxford University Press.