Emergent Literacy:

Artifact Description
In an effort to provide ongoing phonemic awareness practice for our young
students, I the letters and sounds that kindergartners were learning on the wall
near where they lined up for various activities. The artifact is a picture of this
wall. Based on the Common Core State Standards RF.K.2d and RF.K.3a, students
play games on the wall with their teacher to maximize learning even during wait
times.

Professional Growth
Teaching emergent literacy can be very challenging. This course showed me the
nuances of emergent reading development and strategies that work in teaching
early reading skills. In my experience with upper level students (grades 3-6) who
struggle with reading, I knew that drill back is necessary to pinpoint just where
the breakdown may have occurred in their early reading skills acquisition. What I
did not feel comfortable with was the sequence in which those skills should have
been acquired. This class was instrumental in my growth as a reading teacher.
During this course I learned that Emergent literacy has many components, and,
that if any of the stages are skipped or not cemented in the childs learning,
reading difficulties often occur. I also became more aware that prior to formal
reading instruction children need to be afforded many opportunities to play with
language orally. For many children, this begins before they ever reach a formal
school setting. For those children with a weaker oral foundation with language
play, early intervention with an emphasis on phonological skills is essential to
closing the gap. This course has helped me to better understand the sequence of
skills young students need, and the various ways that these skills can be assessed. I
have also learned that using a balanced approach of phonemic awareness, explicit
sound-symbol relationship instruction, and reading in leveled text will help
struggling students make greater achievement gains.

Understanding and Application of Standards

INTASC #9 The teacher engages in ongoing professional learning and uses evidence to continually
evaluate his/her practice, particularly the effects of his/her choices and actions on others (learners,
families, other professionals, and the community), and adapts practice to meet the needs of each
learner.
WI# 9 Teachers are able to evaluate themselves. The teacher is a reflective practitioner who
continually evaluates the effects of his or her choices and actions on pupils, parents, professionals in
the learning community and others and who actively seeks out opportunities to grow professionally.

This course has definitely helped me engage in Standard 9 in both INTASC and WI
State Standards. I have become much more reflective about my teaching when it
comes to foundational reading skills, and I have read many more books and
articles on the best instructional practices to help struggling readers who are stuck
in the emergent stage. I have been able to collaborate with colleagues and utilize
their expertise while working with intermediate students who are struggling with
reading and need more explicit instruction in those early skills. The challenge is to
provide instruction and materials that are age appropriate, while still getting at
the skills that students are weak in. This course helped me to do just that.
INTASC # 10 The teacher seeks appropriate leadership roles and opportunities to take responsibility
for student learning, to collaborate with learners, families, colleagues, other school professionals, and
community members to ensure learner growth, and to advance the profession.
WI# 10 Teachers are connected with other teachers and the community. The teacher fosters
relationships with school colleagues, parents, and agencies in the larger community to support pupil
learning and well-being and acts with integrity, fairness and in an ethical manner.

Serving as more of a literacy leader in my current position, I feel that I have

embraced the essence of Standard 10 in both the WI State Standards and the
INTASC standards. I have been able to organize parent work groups and
information sessions, create a newsletter that keeps parents abreast of what their
child is learning each month, and be a resource for both teachers and parents
around early literacy development. Exit surveys after parent meetings indicate
that many parents are hungry for knowledge about reading development, and

activities to use that help their child learn to read in a fun and relaxed home
environment that supports the work going on at school in their classrooms.

Impact on Student Learning

Success in beginning reading is significantly related to phonemic awareness that
develops gradually and in tandem with reading instruction. The students I work
with are developing a greater the phonemic awareness due to more purposeful and
sequential lessons, and they are beginning to be able to process the letter-sound
properties of individual printed words. One of my roles as a literacy leader is to
examine school data around reading. Data from multiple assessments has shown
that our students are moving along an achievement continuum that meets
national benchmarks, but they begin to be less successful as they move through
first and second grade. As a coach, I have worked with my teachers (many of
them new to teaching) to analyze our curriculum and our teaching practices
around foundational skills. What we found was that our curriculum lacked a
sequential and explicit teaching of phonemic awareness and phonics skills. As a
result, we have implemented a more explicit and sequential program and our
students are showing gains. Teachers report that students are more willing to
sound out words, have more strategies to draw upon when they run into difficulty
in their reading, and that students are actually enjoying their reading time and do
not want to shift to other activities, as they had in the past. Environmental print
was increased, and during parent drop in sessions, students are eager to show
their parents what they know. We also instituted Bedtime Buddies to encourage
family literacy. Any students who do not get a chance to read at home nightly
are paired with an older student who can help them read and fill out their logs.
These older students are also seeking books in the library that they can read to
their buddies unaware that they are increasing their own fluency skills at the
same time.