1.  Jamie Dickerson
 Walden University
 Dr. Cassandra Bosier
 EDUC 6706
 October 23, 2011

2. Getting to Know
Literacy Learners Kindergarten
• Assesses students’ abilities in Readiness
verbal comprehension, Assessment-
listening skills, rhyming, letter Literacy:
identification, and
recognizing beginning A Cognitive
sounds Assessment
• Given to a group of three
students
Kindergarten
• Results showed a clear
achievement gap in the
areas of rhyming and Readiness
beginning sounds
• The results of this assessment Assessment
will help guide my future
lessons in order to meet the
Literacy
educational needs of my
students (Tompkins, 2010)

3. Getting to Know
Literacy Learners Interest
Inventory:
• An interest inventory A Noncognitive
shows special areas of
Assessment
interest for students
(Afflerbach, 2007) Interest in Football:
• Given to a group of only • Football themed lessons
two students • Football themed texts
• Results showed that one • Super Bowl themed
student was interested in lessons and activities
football, with one team in Interest in Music and
particular and the other Puzzles:
was interested in music • Use educational songs
and puzzles daily to increase skills
• These results will help me • Provide puzzles as
choose themes for lessons extension or
and extension activities intervention activities
(Afflerbach, 2007)

4. Getting to Know
Literacy Learners Motivation
Profile:
• Knowing a students’
motivations can contribute A Noncognitive
to increased reading which Assessment
can thus contribute to
elevated reading
achievement (Afflerbach, Now I know of two
2007) students who are
• Given to only one student interested in and
• Results showed that this motivated by
student was motivated by his football. This will be
participation in sports, a major
specifically football component to
• Knowing this allows me to helping them
help this student persevere become successful
even when faced with readers!
challenges

5. Getting to Know MY
Literacy Learners
The assessments that I conducted truly helped me get to
know my students both cognitively and noncognitively. I used
the information gained from the KRA-L as a starting off point.
Knowing my students strengths and weaknesses allowed me
to create lessons that were both engaging and also
necessary for their literacy success (Laureate Education, Inc.,
2011b). Following the noncognitive assessments, I am now
able to select texts with which my students will make
connections. This enables them to become engaged in their
learning thus become more successful readers.

6. Selecting Texts
Illustrations are very important to kindergarten students. They
often use illustrations to expand on their comprehension of
texts. Choosing linguistic texts, texts with illustrations, is
necessary in order to help my students convey the meaning
of the text (Laureate Education, Inc., 2011a).
Learning to appropriately select texts for my students has
changed the way in which I view texts and choose them
for my class. Discovering the emphasis put on informational
texts in future grades, I realized that I must incorporate more
of these into my students’ daily reading time as that is what
they will be expected to use in future years (Laureate
Education, Inc., 2011c).

7.  The interactive perspective is the one used as we
teach students how to read (Laureate Education,
Inc., 2011d).
 The interactive perspective teaches students to be
strategic processors and also metacognitive thinkers.
 The interactive perspective is one that is often
unintentionally incorporated into classrooms. Many
teachers discover that their teaching coincides with
the outline of the interactive perspective.

8. Critical Perspective Response Perspective
 Teaching students how to  Gives students the
judge and evaluate texts opportunity to respond
in order to confirm their personally and emotionally
validity (Laureate to texts (Laureate
Education, Inc., 2011d). Education, Inc., 2011d.).
 Incorporating this  Giving my students time to
perspective into my respond to texts has given
classroom has given my them the chance to feel
students a new outlook on what the characters are
stories and has engaged feeling and make
them in analyzing texts. connections with their lives.

9. With all of these things in mind, what does it all
mean for teachers?
Teachers must become far more engaged and intentional
in their creating and planning of lessons. We must consider
our students’ needs when selecting texts and also when
creating literacy activities. Truly knowing a student, teachers
have the ability to create success in each student’s life. We
must recognize that becoming intentional can mean the
difference between enabling a student to reach his/her
highest potential or disabling that child from becoming
successful.

10. A lot has changed in my class this year. I have always
made it a point to get to know my students’
educational and personal backgrounds and interests.
Now, I am equipped to use what I learn about them to
guide my instruction. I am far more intentional when
selecting texts for daily reading activities. I consider
students’ interests and needs. I am also more
intentionally incorporating the three perspectives into
my class. My students are responding better than I
could have expected and their reading achievement is
increasing drastically.

11. References
Afflerbach, P. (2007). Understanding and using reading assessment, K–12. Newark,
DE: International Reading Association.
Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2011a). Analyzing and selecting
text [Webcast]. The beginning reader PreK-3. Baltimore, MD: Author.
Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2011b). Getting to Know Your
Students. [Webcast]. Baltimore: MD
Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2011c). Informational text in the
early years. [Webcast]. The beginning reader PreK-3. Baltimore, MD: Author.
Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2011d). Perspectives on
literacy learning. [Webcast]. The beginning reader PreK-3. Baltimore, MD:
Author.
Tompkins, G. E. (2010). Literacy for the 21st century: A balanced approach (5th
ed.). Boston: Allyn & Bacon.