Collaborate With Children While They Are Learning

         

             Children learn better when they are working with someone else, especially when they are working with more competent partners. By the competent partner here which means someone just a little bit ahead, not too far ahead.  Vygotsky(1978) described it "zone of proximal development(P.87), which means that a child can still try to reach this new level, but at the same time it's not that easy for him to get that step without putting efforts. This type of collaboration can truly improve children's learning ability, and enhance their skills that they want to work on, like writing and reading. I used to work with two brothers, and the older one Zachy was five who was two-year older than his little brother Zayanny. By the time Zachy was five, he could read picture books, and knew how to write simple words. He was a very competent learner in both reading and writing. Zayanny learned from Zach, he followed him everywhere, read the same book as zach did, even he had no idea what the book was about. But after four or five months, I just realized that it was very easy for Zayan to pick up with new words, and sometimes he could even remember the texts out of a picture book that we had read in the circle time. Zanyan always sat next to Zach when his brother was reading, or sometimes, Zach read to Zayan. Besides that, Zayan always point to words on pictures books and asked Zach to explain them. I am sure that the collaborations between these them help Zanyan a lot in his literature learning journey.
          Collaboration is not just among young children, but also the collaboration between adults and young children as well. It's very important for adults to acknowledge young children's improvement with what they are trying to say or write. Give children a sense of recognition and encouragement. "Figuring out what the child is trying to do at a given moment is not easy. often we get it wrong. But our chances of getting it right are never better than in one-on-one collaborative writing events. This child, this moment, this literate act: This supportive partnership." (Lindfors, 2008, P.59)

Children Learn From Where They Are Not Where We Are

               Learning to speak is easier than learning to write and read. Cause we talk everyday, and children hear us, they imitate us and learn to use oral language to express themselves. Some people think children learn how to write after they are familiar with the 26 letters. This is just an misconception. Children can write way early than we think they do. They may don't know how to write the correct letters or words, but they know that written "words" can carry messages that they want to express.
              This morning, when I was working at Hoosier Court, one of the boys in my classroom was writing a letter to his mom. He picked out a piece of blue paper, and said that it was his mom's favorite color, then he scrambled some "words" on it.(some lines and dots) "Mommy will get this letter when she come get me." Even he doesn't know how to write words, but he does know that written language is purposeful and it can convey meanings.

(This is just an image downloaded on line)

        "Children learn from where they are, not from where we are." (Judith Wells Lindfors) Children learn the best when they have the ownership, they can pick their own topics and express in their own ways. Find children's interests and encourage them to write by following the things they like. 

       This was the letter that I got from one of my students when I was working at Montessori. He likes me a lot, and every day during recess time, he would ran out, found me and give me a letter he wrote for me that day. Children use letters to express themselves and they learn how to write when they are interested and they want to express what they want to say. Writing has to be purposeful, it has to be meaningful for children and to help themselves express things.