Abstract:
This interactive session explores how teachers might bring together practices and contexts involved in literacy in coherent, effective and engaging classroom programs. This paper examines the importance of articulating underlying beliefs and values about literacy, how it is learned and how it might be best taught. The ebb and flow of classroom life is discussed in the context of classroom organization and instructional cycles that allow for focus on goals at hand while accommodating children's own experiences as key resources for classroom learning. Based on a Social Model of Reading and Writing (Harris, McKenzie, Fitzsimmons & Turbill, 2001, 2003), this presentation will discuss a range of actual classroom examples from middle and upper Primary years, to demonstrate and exemplify effective classroom practices. These practices will be further discussed and workshopped as classroom activities, along with guiding principles for teachers to explore in their own classrooms.