Contexts of reading instruction: Implications for literacy skills and kindergarteners¬タル behavioral engagement ¬リニ

This observational study examined kindergarteners’ (n=170) exposure to literacy instruction in their classrooms (n=36), child-by-instruction interactions, and behavioral engagement in relation to literacy skills. Time spent in four instructional contextswas coded according towhomanaged children’s attention (teacher-managed, TM or child-managed, CM), and the content focus (basic skills such as teaching letters and their sounds, or meaning-focused such as discussing a book); children’s behavioral engagement and off-taskbehaviorwere also coded livefive timesover theyear.Word-reading andphonological awareness skillswere assessed in fall and spring. Hierarchical LinearModeling results indicated that kindergarteners with lower initial skills gained more in word-reading, but not phonological awareness, when they were exposed to relatively more time in TM basic skills instruction. In contrast, more time in CM meaningfocused instruction did not interact with initial skills to predict either outcome. Engagement analyses indicated that students were more likely to be off-task in CM than in TM contexts. Children who spent more time off-task during TM contexts had lower spring scores on both outcomes. Discussion explores the implications of this work for both literacy learning and behavioral engagement in the transition year of kindergarten. © 2010 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Learning to read is the principal task of the elementary school years. Many children struggle with this task, and those who fall behind early face an uphill challenge as they proceed through school. Since No Child Left Behind (NCLB) was signed into law in 2002, school accountability policies have heavily targeted elementary reading achievement. Some states responded to NCLB by requiring research-based literacy curricula and teacher practices, mandating minimum amounts of classroom time devoted to reading instruction, and providing targeted instruction for struggling readers early in their school experience. Perhaps as a consequence of these efforts, the 2007 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) showed overall improvement in Grade 4 reading compared to 2005 results (Lee, Grigg, & Donahue, 2007). Yet, reading problems are far from resolved. NAEP gains from 2005 to 2007 occurred in only 18 states; in the other 32 states, no change The Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education is gratefully acknowledged for its fellowship support to the first author through the University of Virginia (R305B060009). This work was also funded by a grant from the National Science Foundation-Developmental and Learning Sciences #0418469 to the second author. The opinions expressed are those of the authors and do not represent views of the U.S. Department of Education or the National Science Foundation. ∗ Corresponding author at: CASTL, University of Virginia, 2200 Old Ivy Road, Charlottesville, VA 22903, United States. Tel.: +1 434 982 6965; fax: +1 434 243 0533. E-mail address: [email protected] (C.C. Ponitz). occurred. Further, over 30% of fourth-graders still do not read at a basic level. Multiple explanations for the discrepancy between policy, instructional mandates, and literacy outcomes are possible. We apply ecological perspectives from research on early literacy acquisition (Connor, Son, Hindman, & Morrison, 2005; Morrison, Bachman, & Connor, 2005). Ecological theorists seek to understand how child and environmental factors separately, and through complex interactions, contribute to development (Cairns & Rodkin, 1998). To learn to read, children must master the oral and written language system that humans use to communicate (Bialystok, 1995). This system includes component skills that vary within children, including vocabulary, syntactic knowledge, phonological awareness, orthographic/alphabet knowledge, insight to the alphabetic principle, and automaticity with written code (Catts, Fey, Zhang, & Tomblin, 1999). A growing base of evidence suggests that most children require deliberate instruction to acquire the component skills involved in reading (Adams, 1994; Foorman, Francis, Fletcher, Schatschneider, &Mehta, 1998; Rayner, Foorman, Perfetti, Pesetsky, & Seidenberg, 2001). Furthermore, researchers have described, with increasing detail and specificity, the environmental (i.e., instructional) experiences associated with literacy competence (Connor, Piasta, et al., 2009; Morrison et al., 2005). The centrality of instruction in reading development turns our attention to the social system of homes, classrooms, and schools in 0885-2006/$ – see front matter © 2010 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.ecresq.2010.10.002 158 C.C. Ponitz, S.E. Rimm-Kaufman / Early Childhood Research Quarterly 26 (2011) 157–168 Table 1 Examples of kindergarten literacy activities using a dimensional approach to instruction. Teacher-managed (TM) Child-managed (CM) Basic skills Teacher leads a rhyming game with children Children complete worksheets where they circle words that start with a specific first letter (e.g., circle the words that start with “B”) Teacher holds up a picture and children name the beginning letter of the noun represented in the picture (e.g., what letter does dog start with?) Children complete a worksheet finding the objects on a page that include a certain sound Teacher leads children in the alphabet song Children complete a hand-writing worksheet Meaning-focused Teacher reads a book with children and asks them to predict what will come next Children look at books silently on their own Teacher explains the meaning of a new vocabulary word Children create illustrations that correspond to a sentence provided by the teacher Teachers lead the children in acting out a story Children write in “journals” about their experiences which children learn to read (Coyne, Kame’enui, & Simmons, 2001). Most work has used parentand teacher-reported practices or has targeted the amount and type of instruction in classroom contexts to predict children’s literacy outcomes (Connor et al., 2005; Sénèchal, 2006; Wasik, Bond, & Hindman, 2006). For example, an emerging base of both observational and experimental research shows that the optimal approach to literacy instruction depends upon children’s baseline language and/or literacy abilities (Connor, Morrison, & Katch, 2004; Connor, Morrison, & Slominski, 2006; Connor, Piasta, et al., 2009; Juel &Minden-Cupp, 2000). Yet children are not passive recipients of various instructional experiences but rather, are active participants in the learning process (Greenwood, Horton, & Utley, 2002). The present study examines children’s behavioral engagement in four contexts of literacy instruction, and contributions to emergent word-reading and phonological skill improvement during kindergarten, a developmentally challenging transition year (Pianta, Cox, & Snow, 2007). 1. Dimensions of literacy instruction Like others, we use a multi-dimensional approach to conceptualize and measure reading instruction (Connor, Morrison, et al., 2009). The first of two dimensions – basic skills versus meaningfocused – pertains to the content of what is being taught. 1.1. Basic skills versus meaning-focused instruction Basic skills instruction focuses explicitly on the skills that underliefluentword-reading suchas rhyming, segmenting, andmatching letters to sounds (i.e., the alphabetic principle). Instruction in phonological skills seems particularly important for later reading proficiency, especially for childrenat risk forpoor literacyoutcomes (Juel, 1988; Rayner et al., 2001). Observational and experimental studies have shown that first graderswith low initial word-reading skills improvemore when teachers provide direct, explicit instruction in basic decoding, such as helping children to recognize letters and the sounds in letters and words (Connor, Morrison, & Katch, 2004; Connor, Piasta, et al., 2009; Juel & Minden-Cupp, 2000). In contrast, meaning-focused activities explicitly target skills such as listening and reading comprehension, problem-solving through text, and extracting meaning from what is read. In an advantaged preschool sample, Connor et al. (2006) found that preschoolers with strong initial word-reading (i.e., alphabet knowledge, word recognition) gained more in word-reading skill when they spent relatively more time in teacher-managed activities where comprehension and meaning-making was the goal (e.g., teacher-led book-readings). Note that this dimension varies according to its explicit focus (Connor, Morrison, et al., 2009). In other words, it is possible for students to learn new vocabulary during a rhyming exercise, and they may learn about sound-symbol correspondence as they read for understanding (Olson, Wise, Forsberg, Sameroff, & Haith, 1996). In the present study, however, the basic skills or meaning-focused distinction is based on the explicit (versus implicit) focus of observed instructional activity. 1.2. Teacher-managed versus child-managed instruction The second dimension of instruction designates who manages children’s attention—the teacher or the child. In teacher-managed (TM) instruction, the teacher focuses the child’s attention on the target activity, such as in whole-class discussion or individualized tutoring. In contrast, child-managed (CM) instruction occurs when students themselves focus their own attention and are responsible for carrying out an activity. Examples include looking at books in the library corner or completing worksheets independently. This distinction differs from the commonly used terms of teacherand child-directed, which pertain to who selected the activity, regardless of how instruction is actually delivered (Stipek et al., 1998). Because of our interest in kindergarteners’ attention and participation, we use the teacherversus child-managed distinction to highlight activities that are initiated and sustained by the teacher or the child. Taken together, the two dimensions – basic skills or meaningfocused, and teacheror child-managed instruction – create four possible instructional contexts with regard to literacy: (1) TM basic skills (2) TM meaning-focused, (3) CM basic skills, and (4) CM meaning-focused. Examples of kindergarten literacy activities within these four contexts are shown in Table 1. 1.3. Links among dimensions of literacy instruction and word-reading in early childhood The dimensional approach to reading instruction has been used to explain how instruction relates to literacy outcomes at multiple grade levels, including preschool (where children would be considered pre-readers or emergent readers), first grade (with some readers and some non-readers), and third grade (where most children would be considered readers but with varying levels of comprehension) (Connor, Morrison, & Katch, 2004; Connor, Morrison,&Petrella, 2004;Connor et al., 2006). Theseobservational andexperimental studies suggest that literacy instructional dimensions interact with child characteristics to predict achievement. In general, spendingmore time in CMmeaning-focused contexts predicts fall-spring improvement for children who have a sturdy base ofword-reading skill (Connor,Morrison,&Katch, 2004). Thismakes sense because students who already identify letters and decode new words can rely on that knowledge even when basic skills are not an explicit focus of instruction, as in sustained silent reading (SSR) or shared story-book reading. In contrast, research has shown that greater exposure to TM basic skills instruction predicts improvement for students with weaker initial word-reading skills (Connor, Morrison, & Katch, 2004; Juel & Minden-Cupp, 2000).