Early Literacy & Brain Development

• Providing strong literacy education in the early years leads to better outcomes later.
• Children thrive when they are routinely read to, immersed in rich talk about books, and activities.
• Children with less book exposure face greater learning challenges.
• The brain develops fastest between ages zero and three, making early literacy fostering crucial.

Pam Schiller's Early Brain Development Research

• The brain of a three-year-old is 2.5 times more active than an adult's.
• Brain development depends on the complex interaction of genes and environment.
• Experiences wire the brain, with repetition strengthening the wiring.
• Brain development is nonlinear, and early relationships affect wiring.
• Foundational reading and writing skills from birth to age five strongly relate to later literacy skills.

Key Literacy Skills

• Alphabet knowledge
• Phonological awareness
• Rapid automatic naming of letters, numbers, objects, and colors
• Writing or naming skills
• Phonological memory
• Concepts about print
• Print knowledge
• Reading readiness
• Oral language skills
• Visual processing skills

Reading Begins at Birth (Richard Gentry, 2011)

• Parents should start reading aloud to children at birth to feed the child's brain with language development data.
• Early reading fosters cognitive, social, and emotional development.

Fostering Early Literacy (Bennett-Armistead, Duke, & Moses, 2005)

• Children thrive when immersed in rich language, both oral and written.
• Literacy should be woven throughout the day with repeated exposure to materials and experiences.

Understanding Written Language (Bernstein, 2010)

• Children quickly understand that written language serves multiple purposes.
• Reading to newborns shows them that reading is worthwhile and enjoyable.

Oral Language as the Foundation of Literacy (Elfrieda Hiebert, 1998)

• Oral language is the basis for reading development.
• Oral language development precedes and parallels literacy.
• Both oral and written language are mutually supportive developmental processes.

Oral Language Understandings (Snow, Burns, & Griffin, 1998)

• Reading understandings acquired through oral language include language components such as lexical, syntactic, and interpretive processes.
• Cognitive mechanisms like working memory and conceptual memory (vocabulary, topic knowledge) are also gained.

The Emergent Reader and Writer

• Emergent literacy involves reading and writing experiences before conventional literacy (Teale & Sulzby, 1986).

Emergent Reading

• "Emergent reading" emphasizes the developmental continuum in learning to read, not an all-or-nothing phenomenon from school.
• Emergent reading includes the skills, knowledge, and attitudes that are developmental precursors to conventional reading, supported by the environment.

Components of Emergent Reading

• Vocabulary knowledge
• Decontextualized language skills
• Conventions of print
• Knowledge of letters
• Linguistic awareness
• Phoneme-grapheme correspondence

Characteristics of an Emergent Reader

• Has a healthy appetite for reading but may not yet be able to discern sentences or more complicated words.
• Understands the alphabet and is able to recite most or all of it without visual aid.
• Understands that writing conveys messages through letters, sentences, and paragraphs.
• May attempt to read familiar bedtime stories phonetically.
• Attempts to write or scribble sentences and words.

Stages of Reading Development (Maryanne Wolf)

• Stage 1 (Emerging Reader/Pre-Reader): 6 months to 6 years; progresses from looking at, listening to, and chewing on books to recognizing simple words.
• Stage 2 (Early/Novice Reader): 6-7 years old; understands the relationship between letters, sounds, and the printed word.
• Stage 3 (Transitional/Decoding Reader): 7-9 years old; becomes more adept at sight words, phonics, vocabulary, and comprehension.
• Stage 4 (Fluent Reader): 9-15 years old; switches from learning to read to using reading skills to learn new subject matter.
• Stage 5 (Expert Reader): 16+ years old; transitions to reading diverse materials and viewpoints.

Environments Supporting Emergent Reading

• Home literacy environment includes literacy-related interactions and resources, like shared book reading and exposure to literacy materials.

Socioeconomic Status (SES)

• SES is a strong predictor of performance differences in children starting first grade (Sirin, 2005).
• Differences in SES can affect emergent reading experiences and brain development crucial for skilled reading (Noble et al., 2006).

Emergent Writing

• Emergent writing is when children begin to understand that writing communicates (Mayer, Kelly 2007).

Framework for Emergent Writing Practices

• Conceptual Knowledge → Procedural Knowledge → Generative Knowledge
  • Conceptual Knowledge: Understanding the function of writing, such as conveying ideas, stories, and facts.
  • Procedural Knowledge: Mechanics of letter and word writing, including spelling and gaining alphabet knowledge.
  • Generative Knowledge: Describing children's abilities to write meaningful phrases and sentences (Puranik & Lonigan 2014).

Early Writing Development

• Early writing skills lay the foundation for effective communication, critical thinking, and academic success.
• Writing allows young children to express thoughts, develop fine motor skills, and improve hand-eye coordination.

Stages for Emergent Writing

• Drawing/scribbling or "pre-phonemic" phase
• Letter-like forms and shapes or "early phonemic" phase: Children start recognizing patterns and incorporating forms into drawings.
• Strings of random letters: Children understand that symbols represent letters of the alphabet and convey meaning by stringing letters together.
• Invented/transitional spelling: Child's best attempt at spelling a word; many misspelled words but understandable based on phonetics.
• Conventional writing and spelling: Children begin to spell words correctly, understand sentence formation, and use proper punctuation with correct upper and lowercase letter.