Digital Story Telling: Lessons for Effective Teaching

Literate Environment

AnalysisHeather McMahillWalden University

Dr. Cindee EastonLiteracy Development PreK-3

April 12

Table of Contents Creating a Literate Environment Getting to know Literacy Learners P-3 Selecting Texts Emergent Reader Texts Beginning Reader Texts Emergent Literacy Learner Lesson Beginning Literacy Learner Lesson Reflection

Creating a Literate Environment

“The literacy-rich environment emphasizes the importance of speaking, reading, and writing in the learning of all students” (The Access Center, 2007)

Teachers should participate in language and literacy activities in all elements of their instruction.

Getting to know Literacy Learners, Pre-3rd Grade

“Developing an in depth understanding of each learner enables teachers to develop and demonstrate greater emotional intelligence in the classroom” (Educational Leadership, 2011).

Getting to know Literacy Learners, Pre-3rd Grade

Assessment guides instruction. “Effective teaching cannot possibly begin until we first discover where children are in their reading development” (Reutzel & Cooter, 2016, p.10).

Effective literacy instruction begins when the teacher understands important information about each student. -Cognitive Assessments- measure literacy skill and

strategies that are mastered by each student. Non-cognitive Assessments, “measure the motivation,

engagement, self-concept, agency, interest, and attitude of each student” (Afflerbach, 2012, p. 171).

Text Selection Every reader brings different skills, background

knowledge, and motivation to the reading performance. It is vital that teachers pay great attention to gradually increasing the complexity of the text that students read and comprehend as they move through each school year.

Quantitative and qualitative factors such as text structure and organization, illustration support, the number of words, and number of high-frequency words make a huge impact on text complexity.

The Literacy Matrix This tool can be used to confirm that you are using a variety of texts in your classroom. When you do this, you can see the distribution of books you have, whether it’s

balanced or not” (Laureate Education 2014).

Linguistic

Semiotic

Narrative Informational

Emergent Reader Text

Beginning Reader Text

Emergent Literacy Learner Lesson

The first part of the lesson includes singing the alphabet because, “learning how the alphabet works is a critical instructional focus for emergent learners” (Rog, 2007, p.4).

I will also informally assess Derrick (pseudo name) to see what he knows about the word ‘home’.

I want to activate Derrick’s background knowledge about animal’s homes while looking through the book Animals A to Z by Iris Zammit. Each page matches each letter of the alphabet to an animal whose name begins with that letter. As we go through the book, I will ask Derrick if he knows where that particular animal lives. I also hope to see that Derrick is able to identify some alphabet letters, especially those in his name.

Emergent Literacy Learner Lesson Continued

Next, I will show Derrick the e-book What Lives Here? By R.K. Burrice and read the title and author aloud to him. I will do a picture walk. “The objective of using a picture walk is to help students develop a framework for how the book is organized to improve their reading comprehension” (Reutzel & Cooter, 2016, p. 380).

I will turn to page four and point out the repetitive phrase. A ____ lives here and explain to Derrick that these words repeat over and over throughout the book. I will have Derrick echo the phrase to me again. One of the strands includes using emergent reading skills such as attempting to recite familiar patterns.

I will show Derrick the title page and encourage him to use his prior knowledge of animal homes to discus what animal might live there based on the picture he sees. I will also ask what it may look like on the inside, and how that home may keep the animal safe.


Before reading the book I will use a graphic organizer. “For younger children, a simple graphic organizer using icons or pictures to accompany the print can be helpful” (Reutzel & Cooter, 2016, p. 386). I will write the vocabulary word animal on a white board and give him picture animal cards to put around the word animal. I will ask Derrick to say the animal name as he sets them down and guess where they may live.

Finally, I will tell Derrick that we are going to find out where animals live as we listen to the ebook. Next, I will shift the responsibility to Derrick. After listening to the story, the application allows students to record themselves reading the story aloud and then listen back. After reading the eBook, I will ask Derrick to explain why homes are important for animals and what else animals need besides a home.


To extend the activity I will encourage Derrick to think of an animal that he likes and draw a picture of it. The paper will have the sentence prompt from the story, A ____ lives here. I will encourage Derrick to write the animals name on the page as best as he can.

After discussing animal homes, I will show Derrick the picture book Animals Home Alone by Loes Riphagen and prompt him to look through the pages and read it to me. Another strand of the standard is using emergent reading skills such as pretending to read a book or making a story up that matches the pictures.

Beginning Literacy Learner Lesson

I will bring my Beanie Baby Decoding Strategy “Eagle Eye” that Cassandra’s (pseudo name) teacher uses in reading groups as well. I will ask her if she knows whom my friend is and what he does to help us read. I will review that Eagles have great vision and my friend “Eagle Eye” reminds us that when we are stuck on a hard word to look at the picture to give us a clue for the difficult word.

Beginning Literacy Learner Lesson Continued

I will show two vocabulary cards to preview challenging words in our story: over and under.

Next, I will show my literacy learner the Five Finger Retell that she is also familiar with from her shared reading. I will ask her to tell me what the first finger is (characters). We will preview the title and cover page. Who do you think the characters are? (Cat and mouse).


Next, I will Model the purpose for reading, “I want to find out if cat will catch mouse?”.

We will review what sound letter /a/ says and the digraph /ou/ says. Review what the digraph /oo/ says. Student makes Letter sound cards for /ou/ and /oo/ with digraph letters on one side of the card and a picture and/or word with those sounds on the other side.

Cassandra will then do a cold read of Cat and Mouse.Student tells me the characters and setting in the story. Student tells me the problem and solution in the story. Does cat ever catch mouse? Why not? What could cat have done differently to catch mouse? Do you think cat will ever catch mouse? How would you catch him if you were cat?


I will introduce the story Pet Cats and Big Cats as a nonfiction book that is about how pet cats and wild cats are similar and different, using schema from our fiction book. I will ask my literacy learner what she knows about pet cats and wild cats. I will record what she says..

I will set the purpose for reading by modeling “I want to read this book to learn more about how wild cats are similar to pet cats”.

We will review the sight words: go, on, the, cat, sat, play, can, like, up, too, inReview “Stretchy Snake” decoding strategy friend. (Stretch each sound out, and put him back together again).


Using Elkonin Boxes and chips, Cassandra will blend string, grass, cat, and cubs, pet.

We will review the words lions, tigers, leopard, family Day 1: Read aloud story to literacy learner

During reading today, model your thinking on page 35. Describe how pet cats play with the string and wild cats can play with the grass. Describe your thinking of how string and grass is similar because they are both long and can move to make the cats pounce on them. Day 2: Echo read Day 3: Choral ReadDay 4: Shared reading Day 5: Independently read (final read, hot read)

Add what Cassandra learned to what we know about pet cats and wild cats.

Create a Venn diagram for pet cats and wild cats. How are wild cats and pet cats similar?


I will ask Cassandra do you know what the word curious means?

Introduce What? As a story of a curious cat who is tired of eating the same thing for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. I wonder if cat will ever eat something different?

Sight word review: what, ask, said, can, I, have Review the words: what, breakfast, curious,

afternoon, morning, lunch, and dinner. Elkonin boxes and chips with the words: cat, fish,

snack, lunch


Student listens to the eBook on iPad Review “Eagle Eye” and “Stretchy Snake” Student records herself reading the story on the iPad and

listens to herself reading afterward. Do each day for five days. Next, student will take the eBook comprehension quiz, which have five multiple choice comprehension questions. The questions and answers are read aloud to her.

Student re-reads story and does a five-finger retell of the story (characters, setting, problem, and solution).

On day five, listen to the recording from day 1 and day 5. What has changed?

Reflection Some of the similarities and differences between instructional

practices used with emergent and beginning literacy learners are that both learners used phonics and phonemic awareness skills and they thrived off of print-rich environments, My role as an educator in early literacy instruction is to teach the basic skills and to provide rich, meaningful, and engaging learning environments.

Some insights that I gained about emergent and beginning literacy is that all students can grow a strong base for literacy and reading development when they are given the chance to engage in purposeful, significant language and early print activities. The most important take-away is that reading is a progression that develops upon a widespread variety of developing skills and is an on-going process. Each child will progress through each of the stages of reading development at their own rate. With strong foundational skills in place, students can develop and thrive as readers.

Reflection My literacy environment has become more refined

through my learning in this course. I have more of a balance in my genre of books for differentiated reading groups. I have also learned to how to use assessments to guide my instruction more than ever before and use fun, engaging, and effective strategies to teach the skills needed.

My digital story will support others to bring about social change for literacy by teaching basic literacy skills along with critical thinking and researched based practices.

References Afflerbach, P. (2012). Understanding and using reading assessment:

K–12 (2nd ed.). Newark, DE: International Reading Association. The Access Center. (2007). Literacy-rich environments. Retrieved

from http://www.readingrockets.org/article/literacy-rich-environments Laureate Education (Producer). (2014a). Analyzing and selecting

texts [Video file]. Baltimore, MD: Author. Powell, O.K.& Powell, W. (2011). How to teach now. Educational

Leadership. Rog, L. J. (2007). Marvelous minilessons for teaching beginning

writing, K–3. Newark, DE: International Reading Association. Reutzel, D. R., & Cooter, R. B., Jr. (2016). Strategies for reading

assessment and instruction: Helping every child succeed (5th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson.

http://www.readingrockets.org/article/literacy-rich-environments

