Thesis (M.S.)--Missouri State University, 2009. / "May 2009." Includes bibliographical references (leaves 39-42). Also available online.

Research evidence (Donaldson, 1978; Wells, 1985a; Hughes, 1986; Tizard and Hughes, 1984) over the last decade and a half has confirmed the competence of the pre-school child. At school entry Donaldson (1989) writes "... that children are highly active and efficient learners, competent enquirers, eager to understand" (p.36). There is less evidence concerning the extent to which educators harness this astounding pre-disposition to learn. The aims of the research project studied the development of reading in the reception year of school in Part 1 by: 1. assessing the range of literacy development exhibited by 191 children on entry to school; 2. identifying the entry skills that most reliably predict success in reading by the end of the first year of school; and in Part 2 of the study by: 1. considering the extent to which reception teachers facilitate a mastery of literacy by both capitalising on, and teaching to, each pupil's prior knowledge Part 1 of the study In September 1987 and 1988, 191 children were assessed soon after school entry. The different aspects of functioning that were measured were: 1. General maturity and intellectual functioning 2. Literacy related skills 3. Adjustment to school. II At the end of the year in July 1988 and 1989 two aspects of the child's functioning were assessed. 1. General maturity and cognitive functioning 2. Assessment of both written and spoken language. These data were collected over two years. In 1987/88 and 1988/89 thirty-two classes were studied in sixteen primary schools in the Local Education authorities of Oxfordshire, Berkshire, the former Inner London Education Authority and the London Boroughs of Harrow and Haringey. The data were pooled and extensively analysed using both descriptive and parametric statistical techniques. The main findings are: 1. Children arrive at school with a possible range of five years in their functioning regarding literacy related skills and intellectual ability. 2. Pearsons correlations, multiple regression and discriminant analyses confirm that the ability to identify letters of the alphabet and write one's name at school entry are the most powerful predictors of successful reading by the end of the year. This confirms the findings of earlier studies of the importance of these abilities (Tizard et al, 1988; Wells & Raban, 1978). 3. Understanding of the conventions of print, although weaker, has a positive relationship with reading. 4. An explanation of these data is that there is a developmental pathway to fluent reading. The child develops through the emergent literacy phase, with the accretion of an understanding of print and text through to the phase of beginning conventional reading. Progression takes place through the transition phase of whole word processing, Fnth's (1985) logographic stage to the alphabetic stage into conventional reading. Arriving at school able to identify the letters of the alphabet and able to write one's name indicates a more refined processing of print needed for this transition phase. 5. Children who do not adjust to school are four times less likely to be able to read by the end of the year. In Part 2 of the study A sample of reception class teachers was investigated through a postal questionnaire survey. The questionnaire examined: 1. The extent to which reception class teachers are aware of the most predictive entry skills; 2. The ability of reception class teachers to identify the skills in their new school entrants; 3. The use that reception class teachers made in their teaching of reading of the most valuable entry skills with which children arrive at school. Teachers involved with Part 1 of the study were recruited, and an additional group were circulated by the postal questionnaire, in the geographical areas of Oxfordshire, Berkshire, Haringey, Harrow, Lewisham, Westminster, Camden, Hillingdon, Southwark and Greenwich. Sixty-two teachers completed the questionnaire. The main findings from these data showed that: 1. The majority of the reception class teachers surveyed ranked the importance of the entry skills in the reverse order to those found to be most valuable in Part 1 of the study. 2. Reception class teachers use approaches to reading that develop understandings of print and its usefulness. They foster the enjoyment of books. However, they do not appear to value the importance of orthographic awareness in the child's repertoire of strengths at school entry. The teachers are therefore ill-placed to closely match their teaching to the child's existing knowledge. The main recommendations are that this study indicates the necessity for dissemination of these research findings The new school entrant is very competent and due apparently to insufficient awareness of the most crucial entry skills reception class teachers are unable to fully capitalise on the child's prior knowledge. It is vital that initial and in-service teacher education address this gap.

O objetivo desta pesquisa consiste em investigar como os professores de educação infantil compreendem as orientações teóricas e metodológicas fornecidas pela produção bibliográfica voltada para esse nível de ensino sobre os processos de alfabetização e letramento. A dificuldade encontrada pelos professores de educação infantil em justificar teórica e metodologicamente as práticas pedagógicas relacionadas a tais processos, apesar do crescimento da produção bibliográfica sobre a questão, constitui-se no problema desta pesquisa. Esta foi motivada pela necessidade de orientar a elaboração de planejamentos, acompanhar e avaliar o trabalho das alunas-estagiárias do Curso de Pedagogia em instituições de educação infantil e pela inclusão na literatura educacional do conceito de letramento. O recorte temporal final da década de 1970 até 2005 foi estipulado, levando-se em consideração as discussões realizadas nas duas áreas envolvidas. Para a educação infantil, esse período foi marcado por lutas em prol de um atendimento de caráter educativo. Na área da alfabetização e do letramento, buscou-se nesse período explicações para o fracasso de nossas escolas em alfabetizar (ensinar as habilidades necessárias para ler e escrever) e letrar (ensinar a fazer uso competente da leitura e da escrita em diversas práticas sociais). As discussões em ambas as áreas ocorreram simultaneamente e fizeram parte do processo de democratização da educação brasileira. Perseguimos, ao longo desta investigação, o pressuposto segundo o qual há correspondência entre a função conferida à educação infantil e os conceitos de alfabetização e letramento. A relação existente entre essas temáticas ocorre em razão do contexto histórico em que são produzidas. Subsidiados pelos pressupostos da teoria histórico-cultural, entendemos a educação como condição universal do desenvolvimento humano; a escola como instituição responsável por possibilitar a apropriação pelos alunos dos bens culturais produzidos pela humanidade; o professor como responsável pela organização do ensino e pela promoção da aprendizagem e desenvolvimento dos alunos; e a mediação pedagógica dotada de sistematicidade e intencionalidade como condição maior do trabalho docente. Para a consecução desta pesquisa, refletimos sobre os seguintes aspectos: as funções atribuídas à educação infantil brasileira nas últimas três décadas, tomando como referência a legislação educacional brasileira; os conceitos de alfabetização e letramento; a produção bibliográfica voltada para a educação infantil que discute tais conceitos. Tais reflexões fundamentaram a análise das funções conferidas à educação infantil por 14 professoras que atuam em três centros municipais de educação infantil, suas concepções de alfabetização e letramento e sua prática pedagógica. Concluímos ser papel da educação infantil enriquecer o letramento das crianças e estimular sua alfabetização, de acordo com as possibilidades e os limites desse nível de escolaridade. Isso requer reconhecer que tais processos são indissociáveis e interdependentes, porém distintos e que esta é uma condição para sistematizar a prática pedagógica e provê-la de intencionalidade. Essa conclusão nos transportou para a necessidade de reorganizar a formação de professores, viabilizando a apropriação do conteúdo envolvido nesta investigação pelos atuais e pelos futuros professores de educação infantil. / Current research investigates the manner childrens education teachers understand the theoretical and methodological guidelines given in specialized bibliography on readingwriting and literacy processes at this level. Current research deals with the difficulties that childrens education teachers find to justify theoretically and methodologically the pedagogical practices related to such processes in spite of increasing bibliographical production on these issues. Investigation has been motivated by the need to supervise planning, follow up and evaluate the assignments of students-trainees of the Pedagogy Course in children education institutions and by the inclusion of educational literature on the concept of literacy. Taking into consideration discussions in the two fields involved, a time period, namely, the late 1970s up to 2005, was pinpointed. In the case of childrens education, the above mentioned period is highlighted by struggles for educational attendance. During this period, explanations for the failure of Brazilian schools in reading-writing (teaching necessary skills to read and write) and literacy (teaching competent usage of reading and writing within several social practices) were debated. Discussions on the two fields were simultaneous and became part and parcel of the democratization process of Brazilian education. Throughout the investigation a link between the role of childrens education and the reading-writing and literacy concepts has been foregrounded. In fact, the relationship between these themes is based on the historical context in which they are produced. According to the historical and cultural theory adopted, education is a universal condition of human development; the school is an institution accountable for making possible the students appropriation of cultural factors produced by mankind; the teacher is the person responsible for the teaching organization, for the promotion of the students development and learning; pedagogical mediation pervaded by systematization and intentionality as a major condition for teaching. The following aspects were discussed to deepen research: the functions attributed to childrens education in Brazil during the last three decades with Brazilian education legislation as reference; the readingwriting and literacy concepts; the bibliographical production in childrens education that discusses these very concepts. Above discussions foregrounded the analysis of functions given to childrens education by fourteen teachers who worked in three municipal centers for children education, their ideas on reading-writing and literacy and their pedagogical practice. The role of childrens education is the enrichment of childrens reading-writing and the stimulation of literacy according to their possibilities and limits at their own level. It should be acknowledged that these processes are linked and interdependent, albeit distinct. It is, indeed, a condition to systematize pedagogical practice and provide it with intentionality. Results indicate the need for the reorganization of teachers training so that contents involved in present investigation by current and future childrens education teachers may be workable.

Este texto toma a materialidade de dois arquivos existentes, quais sejam: o arquivo do Escrileituras (AE), gerado durante a vigência do Projeto de Ensino, Pesquisa e Extensão Escrileituras: um modo de ler-escrever em meio à vida (2011-2014), e o arquivo das Licenciaturas (AL), proveniente da disciplina Educação contemporânea: currículo, didática e planejamento, Turma A, entre os semestres letivos 2016/1 e 2016/2, que está vinculada ao Departamento de Ensino e Currículo (DEC) da Faculdade de Educação (FACED) da Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS). A partir desses dois arquivos, o texto: a) extrai e agencia as suas matérias; b) opera mediante procedimentos de leitura e escritura; c) cria possibilidades tradutórias vivificadoras dos textos que desembocam na criação de um jogo didático tradutório. Os arquivos são movimentados, desse modo, como suportes gerativos de novos textos, já que sua procedência é sempre da ordem da invenção. Tal condição fornece possibilidades de jogar com as matérias que integram os arquivos para fazer aparecer estratégias de um pensamento tradutório. Jogo é entendido como a vicissitude desse pensamento afetado por forças ativas e, em ato, afirma a necessidade de experimentação, capaz de dar outra vida aos próprios arquivos. Por essa razão, o jogo responde à didática como um plano prático que traduz e transforma textos de partida em textos de chegada, positivando a vontade de educar comprometida com a invenção e a revitalização de arquivos. / This text has taken the materiality of two existing files: the Reading-Writing file (RWF), generated along the Project of Teaching, Research and Extension called Reading-Writing: a way of reading-writing in life (2011-2014), and the Teaching Course file (TCF), which stemmed from the discipline of Contemporary Education: curriculum, didactics and planning, Group A, taught during the first and second terms in 2016, which is linked to the Department of Teaching and Curriculum (DTC) of the Education College (FACED) of the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS). From these files, this text: a) has extracted and connected their matters; b) has acted by means of reading and writing procedures; c) has designed vivifying possibilities of translating the texts that lead to the creation of a didactic translating game. The files have been moved, thus, as supports that generate new texts, since their provenience is always at the invention level. Such condition has provided possibilities of playing with the matters that integrate the files in order to bring up strategies of a translating thought. Game has been understood as a vicissitude of this thought affected by active forces and, in the act, it affirms the need for experimentation, which is able to give a new life to the files themselves. Hence, the game responds to the didactics as a practical plan that translates and transforms source texts into target texts, by affirming the will to educate committed to the invention and revitalization of files.

The goal of the federally-funded Reading First program is to ensure that all students read well by the end of third grade (Georgia Department of Education, 2006). However, Reading First makes few (if any) provisions for writing in its required 135-minute reading block for literacy instruction. Is it possible to teach reading effectively to young children without involving them in writing? The purpose of this naturalistic study was to investigate how the Reading First framework affected the teaching of writing in primary classrooms in one elementary school that received Reading First funding for three years. Using a social constructivist theoretical lens, the researcher explored these issues in the context of a professional learning community—a voluntary teacher study group—focused on writing instruction. Guiding questions were (1) What are primary teachers’ perceptions of the reading-writing connection for students in kindergarten through third grade? (2) How does the context of a school wide Reading First grant affect primary teachers’ perceptions of the reading-writing connection for students in K-3? (3) In what ways does a voluntary teacher study group focused on the reading-writing connection influence primary teachers’ perceptions of the reading-writing connection and their literacy instruction? Fifteen primary teachers participated in the study during a six-month period. Data sources included an open-ended questionnaire, three in-depth interviews with each participant, audiotapes and selective transcription from ten teacher study group sessions, field notes from observations in 12 of the 15 participants’ classrooms, a final focus group interview, and a researcher’s journal. Data were analyzed inductively using the constant comparative method (Glaser & Strauss, 1967). Trustworthiness and rigor were established through methods that ensure credibility, confirmability, dependability, and transferability (Lincoln & Guba, 1985). Findings revealed that the teachers viewed reading and writing as connected processes in literacy instruction. Although the Reading First parameters made them fearful of engaging children in writing during the 135-minute reading block, the teacher study group validated their beliefs and knowledge and empowered them to interweave limited writing activities across the curriculum. Overall, the Reading First requirements prevented teachers from involving children in extensive writing process instruction and writing workshop.

This study aims at finding whether reading about a specific topic/genre affects the writing outcome on the same topic/genre and the general writing performance positively in terms of content, organization, grammar, vocabulary and mechanics. This study was conducted with two upper-intermediate level EFL classes. Both groups were given a sample KPDS and a pre-test of writing at the beginning of the study. For five weeks, one of the groups received extra reading instruction with the usual writing instruction while the other group followed usual writing instruction only. Both groups&rsquo / performance was tested with a writing test at the end of each week and a post-test at the end of the treatment. The analyses of the data collected through these tests indicated that there were not significant differences between the mean scores of the two groups (p&amp / #61502 / 0.05). Hence it was found that the different treatments applied to the groups proved no difference in terms of improving students writing ability.

Este texto toma a materialidade de dois arquivos existentes, quais sejam: o arquivo do Escrileituras (AE), gerado durante a vigência do Projeto de Ensino, Pesquisa e Extensão Escrileituras: um modo de ler-escrever em meio à vida (2011-2014), e o arquivo das Licenciaturas (AL), proveniente da disciplina Educação contemporânea: currículo, didática e planejamento, Turma A, entre os semestres letivos 2016/1 e 2016/2, que está vinculada ao Departamento de Ensino e Currículo (DEC) da Faculdade de Educação (FACED) da Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS). A partir desses dois arquivos, o texto: a) extrai e agencia as suas matérias; b) opera mediante procedimentos de leitura e escritura; c) cria possibilidades tradutórias vivificadoras dos textos que desembocam na criação de um jogo didático tradutório. Os arquivos são movimentados, desse modo, como suportes gerativos de novos textos, já que sua procedência é sempre da ordem da invenção. Tal condição fornece possibilidades de jogar com as matérias que integram os arquivos para fazer aparecer estratégias de um pensamento tradutório. Jogo é entendido como a vicissitude desse pensamento afetado por forças ativas e, em ato, afirma a necessidade de experimentação, capaz de dar outra vida aos próprios arquivos. Por essa razão, o jogo responde à didática como um plano prático que traduz e transforma textos de partida em textos de chegada, positivando a vontade de educar comprometida com a invenção e a revitalização de arquivos. / This text has taken the materiality of two existing files: the Reading-Writing file (RWF), generated along the Project of Teaching, Research and Extension called Reading-Writing: a way of reading-writing in life (2011-2014), and the Teaching Course file (TCF), which stemmed from the discipline of Contemporary Education: curriculum, didactics and planning, Group A, taught during the first and second terms in 2016, which is linked to the Department of Teaching and Curriculum (DTC) of the Education College (FACED) of the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS). From these files, this text: a) has extracted and connected their matters; b) has acted by means of reading and writing procedures; c) has designed vivifying possibilities of translating the texts that lead to the creation of a didactic translating game. The files have been moved, thus, as supports that generate new texts, since their provenience is always at the invention level. Such condition has provided possibilities of playing with the matters that integrate the files in order to bring up strategies of a translating thought. Game has been understood as a vicissitude of this thought affected by active forces and, in the act, it affirms the need for experimentation, which is able to give a new life to the files themselves. Hence, the game responds to the didactics as a practical plan that translates and transforms source texts into target texts, by affirming the will to educate committed to the invention and revitalization of files.

Este texto toma a materialidade de dois arquivos existentes, quais sejam: o arquivo do Escrileituras (AE), gerado durante a vigência do Projeto de Ensino, Pesquisa e Extensão Escrileituras: um modo de ler-escrever em meio à vida (2011-2014), e o arquivo das Licenciaturas (AL), proveniente da disciplina Educação contemporânea: currículo, didática e planejamento, Turma A, entre os semestres letivos 2016/1 e 2016/2, que está vinculada ao Departamento de Ensino e Currículo (DEC) da Faculdade de Educação (FACED) da Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS). A partir desses dois arquivos, o texto: a) extrai e agencia as suas matérias; b) opera mediante procedimentos de leitura e escritura; c) cria possibilidades tradutórias vivificadoras dos textos que desembocam na criação de um jogo didático tradutório. Os arquivos são movimentados, desse modo, como suportes gerativos de novos textos, já que sua procedência é sempre da ordem da invenção. Tal condição fornece possibilidades de jogar com as matérias que integram os arquivos para fazer aparecer estratégias de um pensamento tradutório. Jogo é entendido como a vicissitude desse pensamento afetado por forças ativas e, em ato, afirma a necessidade de experimentação, capaz de dar outra vida aos próprios arquivos. Por essa razão, o jogo responde à didática como um plano prático que traduz e transforma textos de partida em textos de chegada, positivando a vontade de educar comprometida com a invenção e a revitalização de arquivos. / This text has taken the materiality of two existing files: the Reading-Writing file (RWF), generated along the Project of Teaching, Research and Extension called Reading-Writing: a way of reading-writing in life (2011-2014), and the Teaching Course file (TCF), which stemmed from the discipline of Contemporary Education: curriculum, didactics and planning, Group A, taught during the first and second terms in 2016, which is linked to the Department of Teaching and Curriculum (DTC) of the Education College (FACED) of the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS). From these files, this text: a) has extracted and connected their matters; b) has acted by means of reading and writing procedures; c) has designed vivifying possibilities of translating the texts that lead to the creation of a didactic translating game. The files have been moved, thus, as supports that generate new texts, since their provenience is always at the invention level. Such condition has provided possibilities of playing with the matters that integrate the files in order to bring up strategies of a translating thought. Game has been understood as a vicissitude of this thought affected by active forces and, in the act, it affirms the need for experimentation, which is able to give a new life to the files themselves. Hence, the game responds to the didactics as a practical plan that translates and transforms source texts into target texts, by affirming the will to educate committed to the invention and revitalization of files.

Esta dissertação busca contribuir para o ensino da língua materna promovendo uma análise linguístico - discursiva organizada em níveis das produções que compõem o corpus investigado. Considerando um universo de 375 produções discentes, propõe-se uma análise de 37 produções textuais de alunos dos Colégios Militares do Rio de Janeiro, Fortaleza, Porto Alegre e Campo Grande, a fim de, com base no aporte teórico que estabelece a interseção da concepção tridimensional do discurso de Fairclough e as regularidades discursivas de Foucault, sejam propostos níveis de letramento da escrita de alunos do 6 ano do Ensino Fundamental. A proposta metodológica deste estudo baseia-se em duas categorias de análise, a saber: uma categoria discursiva e outra gramatical. A primeira, subdividida em intratexto e intertexto, aponta para a construção de sentido e para o posicionamento do aluno como sujeito. A segunda, subdividida em coesão referencial e coesão sequencial, indica a importância dos elementos gramaticais na sustentabilidade e desenvolvimento do texto. Em cada uma dessas categorias foram levantadas regularidades discursivas que, interseccionadas, retratam os diferentes níveis de proficiência leitora e escritora presentes num mesmo grupo, resultantes dos diferentes níveis de letramento, além de indicar para o professor os aspectos linguísticos que precisam ser desenvolvidos numa sala de aula / The objective presented herein was to contribute to the teaching of Portuguese as mother tongue by means of a linguistic-discursive analysis, organized in levels, of the written productions which compose the investigated corpus. Based on the theoretical support which establishes the intersection between Faircloughs three-dimensional conception of discourse and Foucaults discursive regularities, we carry on the analysis of 37 out of a group of 375 written productions of students of the first year of Middle School from the Military Schools of Rio de Janeiro, Fortaleza, Porto Alegre and Campo Grande, in order to outline the literacy levels of those students in writing. The methodological approach considered in this study is based in two categories of analysis: a discursive and a grammatical one. The first, subdivided in intra-text and intertext, points to the building of meaning and to the way the student understands her/himself as the subject of her/his discourse. The second, subdivided in referential cohesion and sequential cohesion, signals out the importance of the grammatical elements in the sustainability and development of the text. In each one of those categories it was possible to observe discursive regularities, regularities which, in an intersection, portray different levels of the reading and writing proficiency presented in the same group, as a result of different literacy levels, besides indicating to the teacher the linguistic aspects which need to be developed in a classroom

Esta dissertação busca contribuir para o ensino da língua materna promovendo uma análise linguístico - discursiva organizada em níveis das produções que compõem o corpus investigado. Considerando um universo de 375 produções discentes, propõe-se uma análise de 37 produções textuais de alunos dos Colégios Militares do Rio de Janeiro, Fortaleza, Porto Alegre e Campo Grande, a fim de, com base no aporte teórico que estabelece a interseção da concepção tridimensional do discurso de Fairclough e as regularidades discursivas de Foucault, sejam propostos níveis de letramento da escrita de alunos do 6 ano do Ensino Fundamental. A proposta metodológica deste estudo baseia-se em duas categorias de análise, a saber: uma categoria discursiva e outra gramatical. A primeira, subdividida em intratexto e intertexto, aponta para a construção de sentido e para o posicionamento do aluno como sujeito. A segunda, subdividida em coesão referencial e coesão sequencial, indica a importância dos elementos gramaticais na sustentabilidade e desenvolvimento do texto. Em cada uma dessas categorias foram levantadas regularidades discursivas que, interseccionadas, retratam os diferentes níveis de proficiência leitora e escritora presentes num mesmo grupo, resultantes dos diferentes níveis de letramento, além de indicar para o professor os aspectos linguísticos que precisam ser desenvolvidos numa sala de aula / The objective presented herein was to contribute to the teaching of Portuguese as mother tongue by means of a linguistic-discursive analysis, organized in levels, of the written productions which compose the investigated corpus. Based on the theoretical support which establishes the intersection between Faircloughs three-dimensional conception of discourse and Foucaults discursive regularities, we carry on the analysis of 37 out of a group of 375 written productions of students of the first year of Middle School from the Military Schools of Rio de Janeiro, Fortaleza, Porto Alegre and Campo Grande, in order to outline the literacy levels of those students in writing. The methodological approach considered in this study is based in two categories of analysis: a discursive and a grammatical one. The first, subdivided in intra-text and intertext, points to the building of meaning and to the way the student understands her/himself as the subject of her/his discourse. The second, subdivided in referential cohesion and sequential cohesion, signals out the importance of the grammatical elements in the sustainability and development of the text. In each one of those categories it was possible to observe discursive regularities, regularities which, in an intersection, portray different levels of the reading and writing proficiency presented in the same group, as a result of different literacy levels, besides indicating to the teacher the linguistic aspects which need to be developed in a classroom