Questions &AnswersAuthor(s): John J. PikulskiSource: The Reading Teacher, Vol. 42, No. 1, Children's Choices Favorite Books for 1988 (Oct.,1988), p. 76Published by: Wiley on behalf of the International Reading AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20200008 .

Accessed: 28/06/2014 07:43

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

.

Wiley and International Reading Association are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extendaccess to The Reading Teacher.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 91.213.220.163 on Sat, 28 Jun 2014 07:43:24 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

QUESTIONS & ANSWERS

John J. Pikulski

\?m Can you please discuss the term "emergent literacy?" I am a kin

dergarten teacher and I have heard the term several times, but each time it seems to mean something different. Is

it a synonym for reading readiness, or

is it an approach that is to take the

place of readiness? Does it mean that

reading readiness skills and beginning reading skills will no longer be taught in kindergarten? In our school district

the reading supervisor has worked

quite a bit with kindergarten teachers, and we think we have a superior pro gram that teaches skills that get our

children off to a good start in reading. Will this new approach force us to

change what we do ? Is emergent liter

acy just another one of those terms that

will go away in a few years ?

jlV? As with so many terms in read

ing I suspect that you will find various

definitions and conceptualizations of

what "emergent literacy" is. There

fore, my opinions are not likely to be

universally accepted.

First, I think that emergent literacy is not so much an approach as it is a

way of looking at and thinking about how young children acquire func

tional, reliable reading and writing skills. I do not think that the term is a

synonym for the term reading readi

ness, but a substitute?a step forward

in our thinking about the initial acqui sition of reading skills.

In Emergent Literacy (Ablex, 1987), William Teale and Elizabeth Sulzby in

dicate that reading readiness is "a good concept that got applied in a bad way."

While this is in no way meant to abro

gate the outstanding contributions that

many researchers and reading special ists have made under the term readi

ness, problems of emphasis and

interpretation constantly crop up. For example, despite warnings, cor

relations between factors that have some weak relationship to later read

ing success have often been interpreted as having a causal relationship. In the late 1960s and early 1970s kindergar ten programs were dominated by building perceptual and motor "readi ness" skills that were rather weakly correlated with later reading success. It took almost a decade of convincing research to show that such programs did not cause improved reading achievement!

The concept of reading readiness has also been problematic in that too many writers have implied that it is a discrete

point in time in a child's educational career rather than the evolution of a

complex array of attitudes and abili ties. Reading readiness also has often been limited as a concept because it failed to functionally acknowledge the relatedness of the language arts or

communication skills. The term emergent literacy, if care

fully developed and applied, could

help to overcome some of the problems associated with the term reading readi ness. As I hear the term emergent liter

acy being used, it emphasizes that a

young child, from the very earliest

days of his or her development, is de

veloping attitudes and abilities that will contribute to eventual success in

reading. Emergent suggests something that is dynamic and becoming, not a

specific point or period in time, and

literacy stresses the interrelatedness of the language arts. (See Teale and

Sulzby's book for many excellent dis cussions of what emergent literacy is and what can be done to foster it.)

While I do not think that the con

cepts associated with emergent literacy necessarily mean that you would need to modify your kindergarten program to be in harmony with the philosophy of this newer term, there are probably

others who would feel that teaching any reading or reading related skills in

kindergarten would be inappropriate. You indicate that you have spent time

working with your district reading su

pervisor to bring about an excellent

kindergarten program; however, you don't describe it. An excellent kinder

garten program must recognize the

dramatic developmental differences

among children and help all of them

build a positive image of what reading and writing are and the functions that

literacy skills play in the lives of chil

dren and adults. An excellent program of kindergar

ten instruction related to literacy would

provide many opportunities for chil

dren to interact successfully with

print. The use of big books, assisted

reading, read aloud activities, lan

guage experience activities, creative

writing, and a host of other activities can make reading come alive for kin

dergartners and help them to acquire

important skills for later success. I

would also strongly support the inclu sion of appropriate teacher directed in structional activities which will help kindergartners read independently.

Reading terminology comes and

goes so quickly that I have no idea whether emergent literacy will become a well understood term, or one of those

nebulous terms that mean almost any

thing people want it to, or whether it will pass from popularity. I hope, how

ever, that we incorporate into kinder

garten literacy instruction some of the

positive emphases associated with the

term, emphases which themselves are

not at all new, but which can be found in the work of many outstanding read

ing educators whose work has been too

often forgotten because of some "new"

terminology or fad.

If you have questions about the teaching or learning of reading, send them to John

J. Pikulski, Department of Educational Development, University of Delaware, Newark DE 19711, USA.

76 The Reading Teacher October 1988

This content downloaded from 91.213.220.163 on Sat, 28 Jun 2014 07:43:24 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions