Norah Colvin

Live Love Laugh Learn … Create the possibilities

Tag: early childhood

  • Searching for purpose in a picture book – Part B

    Searching for purpose in a picture book – Part B

    What is the purpose of picture books? Is their purpose simply to entertain with an interesting story and rhythmical language that is fun to read and recite? Is it simply, as I said in my previous post Searching for meaning in a picture book – Part A, “. . . a special time of togetherness, of bonding; of sharing stories and ideas . . . “ Could the purposes of picture books extend beyond entertainment alone? I think most people would acknowledge that reading picture books to young children has a profound effect upon children’s learning and development. In addition to entertainment, picture books can be used for a multitude of purposes, including:

    • to encourage a love of reading and books
    • to develop vocabulary and knowledge of language (through immersion and engagement rather than direct instruction)
    • to provide a link between the language of home and the language used in the wider community and in education
    • to support children embarking on their own journeys into reading
    • to inspire imaginations
    • to provide opportunities for discussing feelings, emotions, ideas, responses
    • to develop feelings of empathy, identification, recognition, hope
    • to instill an appreciation of art by presentation of a wide variety of styles, mediums and techniques

    I’m sure you can think of many more than I have listed here. But what of knowledge, information and facts?

    yves_guillou_question
    http://www.openclipart.org

    How, and when, do children learn to distinguish fiction from fact, or fact from fiction? At the moment that question is too big for me to even think about answering, but it is a question that I ponder frequently and may return to in future posts.

    ryanlerch_thinkingboy_outline
    http://www.openclipart.org

    Children seem to realise early on that animals don’t really behave like humans and wear clothing.

    mouse dressed up
    http://www.openclipart.org

    They don’t expect their toys to come to life and start talking.

    teddy_bear_and_doll
    http://www.openclipart.org

    They quickly understand, when it is explained to them, that unicorns and dragons are mythical creatures and, to our knowledge, don’t exist.

    toy unicorn
    http://www.openclipart.org
    dragon_on_a_leash
    http://www.openclipart.org

    But what happens when the lines between fact and fiction blur and content, though presented in fiction, has the appearance of being based in fact? For example: The lion is often referred to as “King of the jungle” and appears in that setting in many stories. However, lions don’t live in jungles. According to Buzzle, they live in a variety of habitats and jungle isn’t one of them. You knew that didn’t you? But what about the children? When will children learn that lions are not really kings of the jungle? Do you think it matters if children grow up thinking that lions live in jungles?

    Lion_Cartoon
    http://www.openclipart.org

    What about when animals that don’t co-exist appear in stories together? For example: Penguins often share a storyline alongside polar bears. Does this encourage children to think that penguins and polar bears co-exist? When do adults explain to children that penguins and polar bears live at opposite ends of the planet? At what age do you think children will happen upon that information? Does it matter?

    tauch_pinguin_ocal
    http://www.openclipart.org
    lemmling_Cartoon_polarbear
    http://www.openclipart.org

    What about the way animals are visually portrayed in stories? Must the illustrations be anatomically correct? For example: We all know that spiders have eight legs. Right? If I was to ask you to draw a picture of a spider, how would you do it? Have a go. It will only take a second or two. I can wait.

    whistle
    http://www.openclipart.org

    Now compare your drawing with these:

    spiderswirl2
    http://www.clipart.org
    Little_Miss_Muffet_Spider
    http://www.openclipart.org
    spider
    http://www.openclipart.org

    How did you go?

    While children easily realise that this picture is fictional:

    pet_spider_girl
    http://www.openclipart.org

    They have less success is understanding what is wrong with the previous images. Spiders have eight legs. Those drawings show eight legged furry creatures. The story says they are spiders. That must be what spiders look like. Right? Unfortunately, real spiders look more like this one:

    johnny_automatic_spider
    http://www.openclipart.org

    All eight legs are attached to the cephalothorax, not the abdomen (or even one body part) as shown in most picture books. While I am sure you drew a spider correctly (didn’t you?), most children and many adults draw them more as they are depicted in children’s stories. Is this a problem?

    LOVE_2
    http://www.openclipart.org

    I am not for one moment suggesting that we get rid of fictional picture books and stories. I love them! And as I have said, and will continue to say, many times: they are essential to a child’s learning and development. There is no such thing as too many or too often with picture books. Instead, I would like you to consider the misconceptions that may be developed when the content of picture (and other) books may be misleading, and how we adults should handle that when sharing books with children. One of the books that gets me thinking most about this topic is “The Very Hungry Caterpillar” by Eric Carle.

    The Very Hungry Caterpillar

    As I said in a previous post, it has been published in over 50 languages and more than 33 million copies have been sold worldwide. I am almost certain that you will be familiar with it, and upon that assumption, I have one final task for you in this post. Please share your response to the question in this poll:

    To be continued . . .

    I would love to receive any other comments you would like to share regarding the content in this post.

    I do apologize that I have been unable to get the text and pictures in the layout I desire. I obviously have more investigations to carry out and learning to do.  🙂

    Maybe next time I’ll have it mastered, says she, hopefully!

  • “I love the mountains”

    More than 30 years ago I had the extreme good fortune of being at Brown bear brown beara literacy teachers’ conference at which Bill Martin Jr. (author of “Brown Bear, Brown Bear”) was speaking. What a memorable occasion it was.

    At the moment I can recall no other speakers, but I have never forgotten the captivatingly melodic and sonorous voice of Bill and the power of his message.

    Bill inspired his audience as he spoke about coming to reading later than most, at about the age of twenty, by teaching himself to read through his love of poetry. He attributed this love to being read to daily as a child. His delight in and playfulness with language was obvious as his voice danced through his stories, poems and songs to the accompaniment of his rich lilting laughter.

    He demonstrated, through audience participation, the joy of learning through song and the importance of the sounds and rhythms of language. Having fun and playing with language provides much joy for adults and children alike.

    In the days of overhead projectors, long before the now familiar electronic slideshows, Bill displayed a simple song “I love the mountains” on the screen. In an instant he had the audience rollicking in their seats, singing along with the words on the screen, and following the rhythmic lead of his voice without any other accompaniment. The energy created by this spontaneous engagement of the audience was electrifying. How could anyone not wish to participate? I quickly noted the words and tried desperately to commit the tune to memory. (I have since found out that this is a traditional camping song but, since I am not a camper, it was unfamiliar to me at the time though it may have been known by other members of the audience.)

    image courtesy of openclipart.org
    image courtesy of openclipart.org

    Every year since then, I have shared that song with my children.

    At the beginning of year one, in their 2nd or 3rd week of school, long before many of them could read or write very much at all, I would write the words on a chart and have them singing along, sharing through me, Bill Martin’s joy of song and language.

    One title in the "Sounds of Language" series
    One title in the “Sounds of Language” series

    Then, as soon as they were masters of the tune, we would engage in another of Bill’s suggested activities, “transforming sentences”. As Bill recommended, they were “taking an author’s structure and hanging their own thoughts on it.” (Sounds of Language, 1972)

    We changed Bill’s choice of “loves” for our own, and wrote our own collective song, which we sang repeatedly and with great gusto. Although the original did include a rhyme, we didn’t concern ourselves with that at this stage. We just concentrated on sharing our loves in a song such as this one:

    I love chocolate

    While they were having fun with language, the children were also learning a subtle and unstated lesson about how powerful a tool for communication self-expression through language, both oral and written, could be.

    The children’s suggestions for things they loved were many more than the lines of one collective song would allow, so there was nothing else to do but write one of their own. Which they did. They had already seen how easy it was. They knew the rhythm.  They had the basic sentence structure. All they had to do was substitute their own thoughts and make the song their own.

    How wonderful it was to hear the children singing their own lyrics as they wrote them, ensuring that the words telling of their loves fitted the rhythm of the song. The children delighted in sharing their songs with each other and with anyone else who would listen. At the end of the day they took them home to share with their parents as a special gift of themselves for Valentine’s Day.

    While my children did not have the benefit of Bill’s magical voice, or even a tuneful model from me, they delighted in his song. You can share a version (without Bill’s voice, or mine) by clicking here.

    Why not create your own songs, and support your children to create theirs, using this song model. You’ve seen how easy and joyful it can be. A song to sing about things you love is a little “happiness pill” that can be taken daily with no known side effects.

    I invite you to share your own versions here for us all to enjoy.

    Bill Martin Jr. wrote in Sounds of Language (1972):

    “As children gain skill in using their ears to guide their eyes in reading, they have a qualitatively different reading experience. Consider the young child who has frequently heard his teacher read “Ten Little Indians.” Once a child has these sounds clearly and solidly in his ear, he has little difficulty reading this old rhyme in its printed form. Once his ears begin telling him what his eyes are seeing, he approaches the reading with confidence and expectation. And when he comes to his teacher and exultingly declares,

    I know that word, Miss Barber! That word is “little!”

    she has evidence that he is relating sight and sound in reading.”

    What a joy and honour it is, as an early childhood teacher (including parent) to share a child’s journey into independent and joyful reading and writing.

    Nor and Bec readingwriting

    Robert 2

    It was a sad day when Bill Martin Jr. passed away on August 11, 2004, but his legacy lives on in the hearts of many readers, both young and old, whose lives have been touched by his love of language, and who may have indeed stepped across the threshold into reading through one of his many wonderful books.

    Click on the title to listen to Bill singing another fabulous song “I am Freedom’s Child” and his message for democracy: what another great song to start each day!

    I will have more about Bill Martin Jr. and his legacy in future posts.

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  • What you don’t know . . .

    One of my favourite quotes is that of Manuel in the BBC television series Fawlty Towers: “I know nothing.” I love quoting this but, just like Manuel, I too am learning. And what a wonderful gift it is to be able to learn.

    Recently I read a post This time it’s personal by Tony Burkinshaw on his blog.

    He explained unconscious incompetence in the following way: “A total ignorance of just how much you don’t yet know for the simple reason that you don’t yet know enough to recognise that you don’t yet know what you don’t yet know.”

    This got me thinking about knowledge and learning and about some of the subtle ways in which our attitude to knowledge and learning is manipulated.

    When I was a teenager, my brother wrote for me in my autograph book: “What you don’t know won’t do you any good either.”

    My father was not impressed and stated quite emphatically, “What you don’t know won’t do you any harm.”

    I think he subscribed to the same philosophy as many of my teachers: “Ignorance is bliss.”

    I mentioned in my article To school or not to school, a belief that the natural curiosity and eagerness to learn I’d had as a young child had been somewhat diminished during childhood by the attitudes of others around me. That’s not to say that they didn’t want me to do well in school, for they did, and always encouraged me and supported me to do my best; but it was my best at what the teachers told me to do and what the teachers told me to learn.

    Ready for school - year 2
    Ready for school – year 2

    Knowledge is power; and one of the easiest ways to suppress and maintain power over others is to keep them ignorant.

    While I am certain that my own willingness to be manipulated and need for acceptance also contributed, an encouragement of curiosity and active inquiry would have had the opposite and more positive effect. I am sure there are others who may not have bent so willingly under pressure and whose natural love of learning flourished despite it or even in response to it. But I know there are many more who bent and failed to rebound and are now trapped by their “unconscious incompetence” in an unassailable comfort zone; not knowing what they don’t know, for “Ignorance is bliss”.

    I am one of the lucky ones for, while I know a lot about some things, I know that there are things that I don’t know, and lots of them! Rather than make me a conscious incompetent, it makes me a willing learner, and passionate about ensuring the flames of curiosity and love of learning are maintained in others.

    Throughout their childhoods, I encouraged my children to question everything, including me, for I wanted them to arrive at their own understandings and did not want their thinking to be restricted the way mine had been.

    For many of you, a love of learning and an ability to acquire knowledge may have been a constant throughout your life. I ask then, that you do not dismiss those who don’t have the advantage of your information and your education. Many do not know what they do not know and they can’t even begin to imagine the questions they could start asking to ignite their learning. If they have had their natural curiosity suppressed and their wills broken, been convinced that submission and conformity were the way to being “good”, and willingly entered the cage and threw away the key; instead of judgment, derision and laughter, what they need is to be shown the open doorway … shown what they don’t know so they too, can start asking questions and filling in the gaps in their knowledge to regain power over their own lives.

    The saying “A little knowledge is a dangerous thing” is very true.

    How many times have you heard someone bemoan, “I wish I knew then what I know now”?

    What can you do to encourage a love of learning or pique someone’s interest today?

    How has your attitude to learning been influenced by the attitudes of others?

  • Enhance learning potential – talk and read daily

    Reports in the media this week asserted that parents are not making the time to read to their children on a regular basis. They also stated that children are beginning school unable to talk.

    So what’s new and why does it matter?

    Beckii readingSimilar allegations have been made for decades and it is saddening to see that the situation persists despite the increased volume of good quality children’s books being readily available at affordable prices and the torrent of information available in easily accessible media, including information about the importance of talking with and reading to children.

    Children who start school with a love of reading and learning have an enormous advantage over those who don’t.

    Robert 2Teachers of children in their first years of schooling are easily able to identify the children who have been talked with and read to in their before school years. These children display a broader general knowledge, a larger vocabulary and fluency with language, a comfortable familiarity with books and an expectation of enjoyment with learning.

    Children whose before school years have been bereft of meaningful conversations with adults and lacking in regular and frequent incursions into books, generally present with limited general knowledge, restricted vocabulary, little expectation that books will provide joy and diminished interest in or incentive for learning.

    Why then are parents not making the time to talk with and read to their children?

    Busy schedules and work commitments make it seem as if there is just not enough time to fit in talking and reading to children every day. But how much time does it take to do that?

    Simple changes in routine can open up new avenues for communication without requiring an extra commitment of time.

    reading Spot

    Here are just two suggestions for easily adding a talk and a book to the daily schedule without requiring any more time.

    Sit a child on a stool beside you and chat about the day’s events while preparing the evening meal.

    Beckii on stoolThis simple activity requires no further expenditure of time but greatly enhances the child’s communication skills and the parent-child relationship as well. Vocabulary is extended to include words that name and describe foods and the actions that are used in the preparation. Enlisting their help further boosts their sense of self and independence and may encourage a greater willingness to try a wider variety of foods.

    The promise of a story at bedtime can help to make the transition from a busy day to a restful night easier and more enjoyable.

    Reading magicA short time is all it takes to share the joy of a story.  In her book Reading Magic Mem Fox recommends 10 minutes of reading to children every day. Ten minutes of story time gives far more pleasure to both child and parent than ten minutes fraught with coaxing and struggling. Snuggling up in bed for a special quiet story time with a parent eases the child into relaxation and a slowing down in preparation for sleep.

    In addition to strengthening the child-parent bond, a love of books and an enjoyment of language and story is being nurtured; a love that can be maintained throughout one’s life.

    Nor and Bec reading

    How do you fit talking and reading into your busy schedule?