In classrooms throughout Du Page County, children are reading and writing more and may be leaving workbook pages, formal compositions and even reading groups behind.
In some schools, those familiar Bluebirds, Robins and Blackbirds-reading groups organized according to ability-have been pushed out of the nest to make room for a different kind of reading instruction.
The new approach to teaching reading and writing is part of a philosophy on how children learn called whole language.
”In the old approach, we taught the (reading) skills in isolation and we taught them first,” said Penny Silvers, a member of the adjunct faculty at National-Louis University, with campuses in Evanston and Lombard.
”We believed that we had to learn the letters, and the sounds of the letters, and then put the sounds together, and then learn the words, and put the words into sentences” before children could pick up a book and read, said Silvers.
”It was part to whole,” she said of that methodology. All the steps were learned before reading was even attempted, which is the opposite of the whole-language concept that concentrates on the meaning of a story.
Whole-language teachers say, ”Put the book in their (the children`s)
hands and then focus in on the conventions (of language),” said Silvers, a teacher of 30 years, now reading coordinator at Aptakisic-Tripp District 102 in Buffalo Grove.
The whole-language philosophy has its roots in simultaneous education research in Australia, New Zealand and Canada. Its American ”father,”
according to National-Louis Professor Harvey Daniels, is Ken Goodman, a researcher and professor of education at the University of Arizona.
The whole-language philosophy is actually a coalescing of old ideas with a few new ideas, Daniels added. The philosophy assumed a coherent identity under the name of whole language about 10 years ago, although many of the components in whole language, such as literature-based learning, have been around as long as 40 years.
Petina Tarr, curriculum director of Wheaton Unit District 200, calls the old method that taught reading by focusing on specific skills a jigsaw approach.
She points out that a mother does not teach her child the ”b” sound
(”baa, baa, baa”) before allowing the child to learn to say a word, such as bottle.
”He (the baby) talks in whole words, he talks in whole ideas,” Tarr said.
Whole-language teachers believe that reading, and, indeed, learning, is a holistic endeavor. In the case of reading instruction, that means reading and getting the meaning from the story first. Then go back and learn about the conventions of language (such things as plurals, compound words, punctuation) to make understanding complete.
”Even the skills are more interesting when they come from a story that you`ve just enjoyed reading,” said 2nd-grade teacher Julie Frerichs, who piloted the whole-language approach to reading in Bloomingdale District 13 five years ago.
Getting books and more books into the kids` hands is part of whole-language instruction. During the course of the day, students may have a silent reading time when they read a book of their choice. They may read a selection of children`s literature for their reading class. And they may use many different source books from the library for other subject areas.
Whole-language teachers frequently or completely put aside their standard reading textbook, called a basal, meaning teaching from the base or foundation of language. Teachers are turning to children`s literature, both for reading and reading skills lessons.
”Much of what was in the old basal was very contrived. Even if a well-known story (was included) such as `Goldilocks and the Three Bears,` it had been rewritten to use the minimal vocabulary that some reading expert decided kids knew at that point, so it was very sterile,” said Tarr.
Still, the basal textbook has not been abandoned. Even districts using a whole-language approach to teaching reading consider the basal textbook a resource to the teacher. But it is no longer considered the only source for a complete program.
Though no one has figures, it`s believed that most school districts in Du Page use whole-learning concepts in at least some form. School districts that have not embraced whole language as the method of choice for teaching reading still are affected by its principles.
Real literature, use of big books with pages large enough for whole class instruction, and lots of writing-all components of a whole-language program-are incorporated in the traditional curriculum.
Just as literature and all forms of reading are important to a whole-language classroom, so, too, is writing.
”There`s a big dependence between reading and writing,” said Frerichs.
”Improve reading and writing improves.”
A whole-language classroom ”goes back and forth between reading and writing,” said Silvers. The children learn to be better readers from their writing. Conversely, children learn to be better writers from their reading.
But while writing used to mean agonizing over spelling and handwriting, with students using simple sentences or ideas to be sure of using correct punctuation and grammar, now ”putting in the commas,” or correcting for grammar, is the last item dealt with in the process of writing.
Concerns voiced by some parents regarding whole-language instruction are that it overlooks instruction in spelling or phonics. But Daniels of National- Louis disagrees: ”That`s simply not true. Real whole-language teachers have a variety of strategies for helping kids become better spellers, helping kids do word analysis …. They do it in different ways and with different time allocations, but that work still gets done.”
First and foremost in writing is the goal of communication. Children select their own topics and write from their own experiences.
In what is called process writing, students go through stages of writing. They preplan what they want to write about and write a draft. By sharing the draft with classmates, they get feedback on their writing`s strengths and weaknesses: Did their classmates ”get” the purpose of their writing?
The student then revises for meaning, and finally edits for grammar. In reading work to the class, the student is communicating about a topic that is important to him or her and has learned the conventions to make those ideas come across to classmates.
According to Camille Blachowicz of National-Louis University, the process of writing ”stresses that kids don`t just sit down and write something and hand it in.” Students approach writing much as adult writers would. ”It gives kids the idea that writing is a process that involves revision,”
Blachowicz said.
In other ways, the approach to writing has changed in the classroom. Kids are writing more often than they did 10 years ago, Blachowicz said. Students write at least once a day in a whole-language classroom, and probably more. And they are writing in many different forms: response journals, logs, letters, lists, invitations, notes, essays and reports.
And as those traditional Bluebird, Robin and Blackbird reading groups take flight, the whole class may read together, especially in reading a poem or refrain aloud. Or students may read individually, in small groups, in triads or with a partner.
The teacher may estabish informal reading groups to read a particular story and recombine the children differently for another.
Often the teacher will match developmentally beginning readers with average-ability readers, or average-ability readers with high-ability readers. By mixing abilities, each student tries his best, many teachers say.
