Understanding the Importance of Reading Aloud for Literacy

EML106 Assessment 3 EXAMPLE Page 1 of 18

PART 1 – UNDERSTANDING THE READ ALOUD The benefit of reading aloud Sociocultural theory emphasises the important function that social interaction in a child’s everyday environments, specifically with more knowledgeable others, plays in supporting their language and literacy development (Nolan & Raban, 2015). A wide range of language and literacy skills, across multiple discourses, are fundamental within these everyday practices, be it enjoying a story before bed, writing a birthday card or reading a notification on your phone. Reading aloud represents an essential foundation for children’s language and literacy development, across the continuum of schooling, but particularly in the early school years (Fellows & Oakley, 2019). The transactional nature of reading, with meaning only being made through interaction with the reader, invites the listener into a conversation with the author (Layne, 2015). Through reading aloud, children from all contexts or skill levels can access and interact with this classroom discourse (Dicataldo et al., 2020; Gee, 2011). During read aloud, teachers, as the more capable others, are scaffolding children into their zone of proximal development, such as demonstrating the use of language for a variety of purposes (e.g. entertain, inform or persuade) to then create opportunities for their students to do the same (Fellows & Oakley, 2019). The importance of quality picture books for all learners Page 2 of 18

The Australian Curriculum outlines children should have a range of opportunities presented to read and listen to high-quality literature ( Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority [ACARA], 2022). Reading aloud from high-quality literature enables teachers to expose children to more complex language features, for example, new syntactical structures or a wider range of vocabulary, during an engaging context (Fellows & Oakley, 2019). Research has shown that children’s early language and literacy skills strongly influence their later reading comprehension and written language abilities, and so these rich language models are significant (Edwards-Groves & Freebody, 2021). Reading aloud exposes less skilled readers to the same engaging texts that skilled readers can access independently, providing valuable oral language development opportunities (Fellows & Oakley, 2019; Hickman & Pollard 2009). This is of greater significance when specifically considering the development of Indigenous and English language learners (Fassler, 2014). Typically, these children may have a greater contrast in their home to school discourse, and a difference in language skills, meaning they cannot independently access the same texts as their peers (Harvey & Myinth, 2014). Without early high-quality language exposure and teaching, these learners are at risk of persisting language difficulties, leading to decreased access or motivation in later schooling (Edwards-Groves & Freebody, 2021; Dicataldo et al., 2020). Literature can also provide context for children to explore morals, values, and cultural norms (Justice et al., 2018). Teachers need to choose texts that help children understand the world around them, build their understanding of their identity or culture and examine broader global contexts that may be different to their own (Fellows & Oakley, 2019) High-quality literature should include texts from a range of cultures to help all children belong, and make connections to their own life and the experience of belonging to different groups ( Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations [DEEWR], 2019). Page 3 of 18

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Read aloud as a practice to support the transition Children experience many social, educational, cultural and physical transitions that occur every day, such as shifting between activities or subjects or moving between year groups each year (Edward-Groves & Freebody 2021). The most significant of these changes in the early years is the shift from before school to school settings. These transitions typically involve changing language and literacy expectations, and often different discourses, such as moving between the primary home discourse and the classroom discourse (Gee, 2011). Reading supports teachers to provide continuity in experiences to enable children to have successful transitions, as emphasised in the Early Years Learning Framework (DEEWR, 2009 pg. 4) and helps bridge the gap for many students between the home and school discourse (Gee, 2011). Transitions in early childhood are enhanced when there are shared language and practices and each child is treated as an individual with unique learning needs (Dockett et al., 2014). Read aloud pedagogy is important in creating this shared language and experience between before school and school settings, with children being familiar with the expectations and routines of being read to by a more knowledgeable other. Reading aloud allows teachers to build on the existing language and literacy practices at home, supporting continuity for all children, but in particular those with diverse linguistic and cultural experiences who may have a harder time reconciling primary and secondary discourse (Fassler, 2014). Page 4 of 18

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PART 2 – PICTURE BOOK SELECTION Book Title: Cave Baby Author: Julia Donaldson Illustrator: Emily Gravett Publisher: Macmillan Children’s Books Date: 10th Anniversary edition published 29/09/2020 (Donaldson & Gravett, 2020) Description Cave Baby is another of Julia Donaldson’s imaginative narratives, with text set in the Palaeolithic period and centred around the adventures of Cave Baby, who loves adding to the cave paintings on the wall. Emily Gravett’s dynamic illustrations take readers on an exciting journey as a Page 6 of 18

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hairy mammoth whisks Cave Baby through the night, full of sabre-tooth tigers, leaping hares, laughing hyenas and maybe a mysterious big brown bear. Cave Baby is allowed to paint vivid creations in the mammoth’s cave before being taken back home to dream about his adventure. This book explores early childhood themes of exploring away from the family unit, fear of the unknown and creativity through an engaging and relatable journey. Semiotic resources As is typical of the genre, the creators use a combination of rich multimodal semiotic resources to make meaning throughout the text (Jan & Taylor, 2020). Multimodality is a perspective that acknowledges a reader’s understanding is made through the use of a range of a variety of meaning-making semiotic resources (Callow, 2013) . In this text, examples of this interaction of multiple modes are used to make meaning in relation to developing the changing mood and characterisation. The annotated examples below demonstrate how the interaction of visual, spatial, linguistic and gestural resources engages the reader and enhances the story’s characterisation of the parents as powerful and angry (Callow, 2013). Page 7 of 18

The mood of the story is developed throughout the text to mirror the experience of the main character through the interaction of linguistic, visual and gestural resources (Callow, 2013), as demonstrated in the example below. Page 8 of 18

Visual features such as contrasting colour palettes, size of characters and use of symbolism are used throughout the text to highlight the theme of the child’s fear of the unknown. In addition, movement is depicted throughout the text to mirror the child’s journey through the night with spatial features such as vector lines of the page, eye gaze and the reading path and placement of text (Callow, 2013) as demonstrated below. Page 9 of 18

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Appropriateness of the topic Any book selection in a classroom setting should consider the age, cognitive, emotional and language development and cultural context of the children it is intended for (Fellows & Oakley, 2019). This book’s age-appropriate themes, such as exploring away from the family unit and being Page 10 of 18

afraid of the unknown are likely to match the children’s life experiences at the early primary school age creating opportunities for them to identify with the content. Similarly, the text is accessible to early primary school students with the support of the range of multimodal semiotic resources as discussed above (Callow, 2013; Jan & Taylor, 2020). The text’s pre-historic setting, characters and adventure-based narrative stimulate children’s imagination, capturing their interest and creating authentic opportunities for response and interaction with their teacher and peers in the classroom (Hansen & Broekhuizen, 2021). Overall this allows this text to contribute to the Early Years Learning Framework outcomes, specifically, for children to engage with a range of texts and gain meaning from these (DEERW, 2009). Appropriateness of the textual features Narrative picture books are the most commonly found text within early childhood contexts, being a genre that includes many textural features suited to developing children’s language and literacy skills (Fellows & Oakley, 2019). Cave Baby includes a range of textural features that align with the language development and curriculum outcomes expected in early primary school, including narrative structure, and exploration of a range of grammatical and linguistic features (ARCA, 2022). Being a linear narrative structure, the text includes the common sequential textural features such as orientation, complication and resolution, but with a twist with the initial complication of getting in trouble being added to by a second complication when the child is snatched in the night by the mammoth, providing examples to children to develop their understanding of narratives (Jan & Taylor, 2020). The text includes linguistic features that engage the reader, such as rhyming words, repeated descriptive Page 11 of 18

vocabulary phrases (e.g. big brown bear), use of character dialogue to progress the story and a range of subject-specific vocabulary to prehistoric times (e.g. mammoth, sabre-tooth tiger, cave paintings) (Fellows & Oakley, 2019). Grammatical features such as a range of sentence types (e.g. statements, questions, exclamations) and the use of powerful verbs and verb groups are used to create mood and build relationships in the story to create opportunities for children to understand and begin to use the structures themselves (Jan & Taylor, 2020). Page 12 of 18

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PART 3 – READ ALOUD Link to recording Reflection I have always believed in the value of reading aloud to children, but I had not appreciated the specific features that make a better read aloud performance and how they can engage and transport children into the world of the book (Layne, 2015). There were elements of my performance that I felt more confident in, such as my use of tone, pitch and overall inflection in my voice to create interest and further develop the meaning of the words (Layne, 2015). I also think my use of volume, and word colour enhanced my read aloud performance (Hickman & Pollard-Durodola, 2009). I believe I could improve on my use and variation of pace and use of pauses through reading (Layne, 2015), as I often read at a similar, somewhat fast, pace and feel uncomfortable with large pauses when reading in front of an audience or for a recording. I think my use of phrasing was good in the more rhythmic, rhyming sections of the text and when dialogue was included. However, I feel overall, I could improve on my phrasing for other sections of the text that did not fit this rhythm and work on my transition between these. This experience has shown me there is a definite ‘art’ to the practice of reading aloud in a skilled and engaging way for children. I hope to continue developing my skills and confidence at reading aloud from a variety of texts as I can see now the immense value this teaching practice can bring to any classroom, at any age. Page 13 of 18

PART 4 – READ ALOUD EXPERIENCES Phonological and phonemic awareness Donaldson’s (2020) use of phonological features such as rhyme and alliteration gives opportunities for children to develop their phonological and phonemic awareness as they attend to the spoken text during the read aloud (Hill, 2012). An interactive rhyming based matching task is an example of a learning experience targeted at developing students’ phonological awareness, specifically being able to isolate and match together the ending sound in a word. In this activity, the teacher will give out one card to each child with single syllable words printed from the book that have a matched rhyming pair (e.g. bear/there, not/pot). Children must interact with their peers to find a rhyming partner. You could extend this activity for older students by asking children to generate an additional rhyming word once they have found their pair. The activity provides an engaging experience which includes language elements they already know, such as the meaning of the words from the book. It also provides opportunities to scaffold them into their zone of proximal development, including reading out the printed words, getting them to isolate the end sound and identifying if it sounds the same or different (Exley, 2020). By targeting foundational phonological awareness skills during authentic interactions with their peers, children are well placed for continued development of their skills through primary school (Hill, 2012). Play Page 14 of 18

Cave Baby exposes children to a rich variety of vocabulary including, high modality feeling words (e.g. furious, restless), movement verbs (e.g. lurking, leaping) and subject-specific words for the pre-historic era (e.g. mammoth). To develop children’s knowledge of this vocabulary through play, the suggested learning experience involves creating a ‘cave’ setting in the classroom for the play to take place (e.g. a sheet draped over chairs). Inside there are animals connected to the story and cavemen figurines for children to use to act out scenes from the story or create their own cave adventure. This play provides children with opportunities to expand their vocabulary and practice using it in a naturalistic and engaging setting to maximise their learning potential (Fellows & Oakley, 2019) with scaffolding from more knowledge partners supporting the children to use (Wasik & Jacobi-Vessels, 2017). Play is a central activity for children developing their knowledge and understanding of the world, an idea supported by sociocultural theory (Nolan & Raban, 2015; Wasik & Jacobi-Vessels, 2017). Children’s play should involve imitating the actions and speech of others and acting out situations (Fellows & Oakley, 2019). In this experience, the teacher’s participation in the play as the more capable partner allows for scaffolding of the children’s language development to use a range of vocabulary presented in the text (e.g. The hyena is cackling) through strategies such as open-ended questions and meaningful feedback, during an authentic conversation (Hansen & Broekhuizen, 2021). Draw, talk, write Page 15 of 18

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The text contains a range of grammatical structures typical of narratives that provides a strong model for children as they develop their emergent language and literacy skills (Jan & Taylor, 2020). To develop students’ understanding and construction of narrative, morphological and syntax features (e.g. the use of past participle verbs), the learning experience gets students to draw their own cave paintings within blank cardboard boxes to mimic a cave like the baby in the story. Students are encouraged to talk within their groups about their various drawings. Children can create and briefly summarise their drawings within their current skills. They are then supported by the teacher as the more knowledge other to use narrative syntax structure from the book, including the use of present participle verbs to describe their drawing (e.g. The tiger’s lurking there), and to write one of these sentences on their cave drawing. There is a richness to the multimodal expression of draw-talk-write activities and the strong relationship between children’s narrative development and their drawing process is well known (Coates & Coates, 2006), This activity helps to engage children in shared discussion and bridge potential differences in discourse, particularly when including an adult to model, reinforce and scaffold children’s language and literacy development (Coates & Coates, 2006; Gee, 2011). Digital technologies From the foundation onwards, the Australian Curriculum (ACARA, 2022) asks teachers to include digital technologies in the classroom to allow students to demonstrate their digital literacy skills to search, organise and present data in creative ways (Kervin et al., 2019). A digital technologies-based learning experience asks children to search for different pictures or videos of cave art, as seen in the text, and collect a range of Page 16 of 18

examples with different colours, shapes, sizes and animals. Children will use these examples to create a slideshow for students to inform their peers about the different types of cave art they have found. This gives children to opportunity to develop their pragmatic language, using their oral and written language for a range of purposes with integrated development of their digital literacy (Nuemann & Merchant, 2022). For example, using their language to question when searching for media and then using their language to inform or educate their peers during the slideshow. The teacher as the more knowledgeable other can scaffold children’s language for these distinct purposes and engage children in shared sustained thinking linked to Cave Baby’s cave art creations (Nolan & Raban, 2015). Using digital resources to support children’s development of multiliteracies creates authentic opportunities for children to use language and teachers to use development strategies, such as open-ended questions (Paatsch & Nolan, 2019), to practice their language for distinct purposes (Anstey & Bull, 2018). Storytelling Through the medium of storytelling, this text provides teachers with opportunities to highlight and develop students’ syntactic language skills, particularly through its use of narrative story structures, which may not be normally provided in everyday conversation (Bromley, 2019). Children’s storytelling is improved when they are can watch and hear more knowledgeable others telling stories (storytelling ref). This learning experience involves providing several key props from the story (e.g. paintbrush and pot) and some large visual posters of the various settings (e.g. forest, grassland, cave). Children are encouraged to retell the story to their peers, creating their own adventures through the forest, or endings to Page 17 of 18

the story. The teacher provides scaffolding to children to include narrative sequence of orientation, complication and resolution, and associated sentence structures using sentence starters (Jan & Taylor, 2020). This activity is designed to give space to listen to students in a meaningful way, whilst facilitating their knowledge about oral language and literacy structures (Bromley, 2019). Providing this storytelling opportunity in the normal rhythm of the classroom gives opportunities to bridge the gap between children’s primary and secondary discourse, as children using their oral language to add their ideas in valued everyday interactions can create a sense of belonging, regardless of cultural context (Fellows & Oakley, 2019; Gee 2011). Page 18 of 18

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Reference list Anstey, M., & Bull, G. (2018). Foundations of multiliteracies: Reading, writing and talking in the 21st century . Taylor & Francis Group. Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA). (2022). Foundation to year 10 curriculum: Language for interaction. https://v9.australiancurriculum.edu.au/f-10-curriculum/learning-areas/english/ Bromley, T. (2019). Enhancing children’s oral language and literacy development through storytelling in an early years classroom. Practical Literacy: The Early and Primary Years , 24 (1), 6-8. Callow, J. (2013). The shape of text to come . Primary English Teaching Association Australia. Chen, J., Justice, L., Tambyraja, S., & Sawyer, B. (2020). Exploring the mechanism through which peer effects operate in preschool classrooms to influence language growth. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 53, 1-10. Coates, E., & Coates, A. (2006) Young children talking and drawing. International Journal of Early Years Education, 14(3), 221-241. Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations (DEEWR) (2009). Belonging, Being and Becoming: The Early Years Learning Framework for Australia . Commonwealth of Australia. Dicataldo, R., Florit, E., & Roch, M. (2020). Fostering broad oral language skills in preschoolers from low SES background. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 17 (12), 4495. Page 19 of 18

Dockett, S., Perry, B., Dunlop, A-W., Einarsdottir, J., Garpelin, A., Graue, B., Harrison, L., Lam, M. S., Mackenzie, N., Margetts, K., Murray, E., Perry, R., Peters, S., Petriwskyj, A., & Turunen, T. (2014). Continuity of learning: a resource to support effective transition to school and school age care. Department of Education . Donaldson, J. & Gravett, E. (2020). Cave Baby. Macmillan Children’s Books. Edwards-Groves, C., & Freebody, P. (2021). Literacy's changing morphologies: Trajectories, classroom exchanges and the evolution of literacy demands over the school years. The Australian Journal of Language and Literacy , 44 (2), 76-89. Exley, B. (2020). “P is for Pterodactyl” and other considerations for the intelligent phonics teacher. Practical Literacy: The Early and Primary Years , 25(2), 4–5. Fassler, R. (2014). ‘Let’s Talk about the Books’: The Complexity of Book Discussions in a Multilingual Preschool Classroom. Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood , 15(2), 136–151. Fellowes, J., & Oakley, G. (2019). Language, literacy and early childhood education 3e ebook . Oxford University Press. Gee, J. (2011). Social linguistics and literacies: Ideology in discourses (4th ed.). Taylor & Francis. Hansen, J. E., & Broekhuizen, M. L. (2021). Quality of the Language-Learning Environment and Vocabulary Development in Early Childhood. Scandinavian Journal of Educational Research , 65(2), 302-317. Harvey, N., & Myint, H. (2014). Our Language is like Food: Can Children Feed on Home Languages to Thrive, Belong and Achieve in Early Childhood Education and Care? Australasian Journal of Early Childhood , 39(2), 42–50. Page 20 of 18

Hickman, P., & Pollard-Durodola, S. (2009). Dynamic read-aloud strategies for English learners: Building language and literacy in the primary grades. International Reading Association. Hill, S. (2012). Developing early literacy: assessment and teaching 2 nd edition. Curtain Publishing. Jan, L. W., & Taylor, S. (2020). Write ways . Oxford University Press Australia & New Zealand. Justice, L, Jiang, H., & Strasser, K. (2018). The linguistic environment of preschool classrooms: What dimensions support children’s language growth? Early Childhood Research Quarterly , 42, 79–92. Kervin, L., Danby, S., & Mantei, J. (2019) A cautionary tale: digital resources in literacy classrooms. Learning, Media and Technology , 44:4, 443- 456 Layne, S. (2015). In defense of read-aloud: Sustaining best practice . Stenhouse Publishers. Neumann, M., Merchant, G. (2022). “That’s a Big Bad Wolf!”: Learning through Teacher-Child Talk During Shared Reading of a Story Book App. Journal of Early Childhood Education, 50, 515–525 Nolan, A., & Raban, B. (2015). Socio-cultural theorists and practical implications. In Theories into practice: Understanding and rethinking our work with young children and the EYLF. (pp. 29-40) Essential Resources Educational Publishers Ltd. Paatsch, L., Scull, J., & Nolan, A. (2019). Patterns of teacher talk and children's responses: The influence on young children's oral language. Australian Journal of Language and Literacy , 42(2), 73-86. Page 21 of 18

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Wasik, B., Jacobi-Vessels, J. (2017). Word Play: Scaffolding Language Development Through Child-Directed Play. Journal of Early Childhood Education, 4 5, 769–776. Page 22 of 18

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EML106 A3 EXAMPLE (HD) (2)

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