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Brügelmann, H./ Brinkmann, E. (2011, rev. 2013)
Combining structure and openness in the initial literacy curriculum
A language experience approach for beginning teachers
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"Do we really need another reading and writing scheme?" teachers may ask, when scanning
the folder with the workbooks of the “ABC-Learning Environment”
2
. But this superficial
impression is deceptive: the ABC-LE is not a linear course of instruction, it is conceived as
an open curriculum
3
. The material offers children a set of tasks for independent work.
Side-by-side children can work on different tasks. Corresponding to their respective
levels of development they learn at different pace and each child in its own way. Moreover,
the many tasks are “open” in another sense: they allow children to read and write about
topics that are of personal interest.
This concept responds to the following assumptions about the conditions of literacy
acquisition based on research of the last twenty years
4
:
1 Regarding print school beginners are no "blank slade" when they enter first grade.
Therefore the idea of "introducing" print, letters and words by controlled instruction
becomes problematic.
2 Between children the preschool experience of print differs tremendously, however.
Therefore the idea of starting from the same point and progressing at the same pace
through a graded scheme becomes problematic, too.
3 Mistakes necessarily accompany learning as a process of reiterated construction ("from
invention to convention"). This insight questions the idea of conveying units of knowledge
intact into the heads of children by drill and practice.
4 Learning is not the direct product of teaching; mechanistic models of cause and effect
do not fit the nature of learning as an implicit ordering of experience. Therefore the idea
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Vorfassung: http://www2.agprim.uni-siegen.de/printbrue/brue.bri.language_experience.engl.111124.pdf
2
Brinkmann, E., u. a. (2008ff.): ABC-Lernlandschaft. vpm/ Klett: Stuttgart.
3
cf. for a general outline of this concept Brügelmann (1975) and for a concrete model related to early
literacy Brügelmann (1986).
4
cf. for a detailed account: Brügelmann (1999). Our research heavily relies on the seminal work of Clay
(1982), Ferreiro/ Teberosky (1982), Gentry (1982), Harste et al. (1984) and others working on similar lines in
the 1970s and 1980s.
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of teaching the system bit by bit (practicing words or explaining rules) and storing these
units in the heads of children as a basis for further learning is obsolete.
5 The advantages of direct teaching are restricted to the "playpen" of practiced skills
and to short-term recall
5
. The developmental logic inherent in childrens constructions of
orthographic systems filters what school offers; short term behavioural changes do not
mirror cognitive progress.
6 Language experience as an "open" approach is not to be equated with laissez-faire on
the one hand, or with whole word learning and context guessing on the other. Both,
children and teachers need structures to be built into materials used and into the
organization of activities
6
. Task demands have to correspond to the (psycho)logical
structures of print (cf. our "didactic map", appendix 1). But structures have to support and
not to restrict participation of children.
7 The evidence on effects of open classrooms is promising. Specifically research on the
"writing to read" method supports the potential of a "language experience approach": it
activates the personal experiences and interests of children, it allows for relevant uses of
print from the beginning, it matches the early stage of orthographic development, it
discloses the phonological basis and alphabetical nature of print, and orthographic spelling
does not suffer in the long run.
Many teachers share these assumptions, they do not feel secure enough, however, to let
children go their own way. Therefore, the ABC-LE has been developed as a set of
materials organized within a structure that gives guidance and helps them to keep track of
the progress and difficulties of single children
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.
At a first glance many tasks in the ABC-LE may appear familiar. They have been changed in
important details, however: they offer models and ask for specific activities, but do not
expect blind imitation or simple rote learning. The tasks do not require to memorize
isolated elements. They promote insights and the development of cognitive structures
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.
Just one example: in phonics-centered reading schemes children often are asked to
”synthesize” words that are presented to them letter by letter (or grapheme-wise). Many
5
cf. our comparison of orthographic achievement of East and West German children shortly after the fall of
the wall in Brügelmann (1993).
6
cf. Dorr (2006) for a similar view.
7
cf. for comparable approaches in the U.S. McGee/ Richgels (2006) and in New Zealand Clay (2005),
characteristic for ABC-LL, however, is that materials are provided for children for independent work – at
different levels, in different order, and at their own pace.
8
cf. Brügelmann (1989).
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beginners end up by producing oral and semantic artefacts, since letters are polyvalent.
We agree with the criticism of whole word approaches in that children have to learn to
recode words from letters and letter groups. Thus, we too present words grapheme-wise
creating, however, another context by asking from the beginning: “Which word could grow
out of this letter/ these letters?” For example, <c> can become “cow” and “car”, but also
“child” and “circus”. In the next step we add <h> and it is clear, that “cow”, “car” and
“circus” are out; instead – besides of “child” - words like “choke” and “cheers” are possible.
The task is not a mechanical one as if letters simply add up to words. It is necessary
instead to develop a more comprehensive strategy combining two tactics so to speak:
sounding out letters/ graphemes and activating semantic expectations stimulated by story
context or by the personal vocabulary of spoken language.
At a more general level our “language experience approach
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” implies three principles
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:
- starting from the
individual literacy experience
children bring to school from home and
every-day life and
- offering activities that stimulate
new experiences
with the functions and structures of
print
and expand their competencies in this area
- by documenting and communicating
personal everyday experiences
, e.g. writing stories,
and discovering new worlds by reading about the
experiences of others
.
A language experience approach in this sense is highly demanding for teachers because of
the openness and variability required. Over the past 25 years we therefore have
developed different types of support for them
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. The ABC-LE contains a differentiated
set of tasks within the framework of the ABC-LE which is based on a four-pillar-model (cf.
appendix 4) including:
- free writing of personal stories, initially by invented spelling
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that is “translated” and
complemented by the teacher in “book spelling”;
9
In the German speaking countries the LEA does
not
rely on a whole word reading (“look and say”) concept,
but starts from free writing with invented spellings introducing children into phoneme-grapheme-
correspondences from the beginning.
10
cf. for earlier conceptions of the LEA the seminal publications by Sylvia Ashton-Warner (1963) and Paolo
Freire (1972).
11
cf. the “Box of Activities for Literacy Classrooms” (Brinkmann/ Brügelmann 2010) containing 164 index
cards with ideas that are organized within eight areas of learning of a “didactic map” (cf. appendix 1).
12
cf. for the positive effects of invented spellings Adams (1980, 387):
“the process of invented spelling is
essentially a process of phonics…The evidence that invented spelling activity simultaneously develops
phonemic awareness and promotes understanding of the alphabetic principal is extremely promising
” and for
more details the contributions to Henderson/ Beers (1980), Clarke (1988), McBride-Chang (1998),
Brügelmann (1999), Richgels (2001; 2007); cf. for more comprehensive overviews: Anderson et al. (1985),
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- independent reading of individually selected books (e.g. easy to read texts
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) that is
stimulated by the teacher reading more demanding books to them and exchanging
different views on the text;
- systematic introduction of elements such as grapheme-phoneme correspondences and
basic methods of work such as using a spelling table for writing or the above mentioned
strategy for sounding out words;
- collecting, clustering and practicing frequent words as well as those with common
orthographic patterns in a pre-structured “Language Researcher” booklet
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.
The set of materials contains carefully considered software for independent work with
the computer, e.g. the “Speaking Table of Letters and Sounds” (cf. appendix 2) enabling
children to construct unknown words during the alphabetic phase
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and the “Workshop for
Building a Sight Vocabulary” supporting children at the beginning of the orthographic
stage to acquire and remember high-frequency words.
As a complement to the ABC-LL, together with Bartnitzky et al. (2006) we have developed
tasks that support children in working independently to gain basic insights or training
specific skills – and at the same time help the teacher to keep track of individual progress.
Strategy change rather than increasing correctness at the surface level is the basic
criterion for this kind of observation.
Teachers experienced in open teaching can use modules like these to enrich their didactic
repertoire. The ABC-LE does cover, however, all areas of competence important for initial
readers and writers. In this respect the materials can provide the basic medium for grade
1, if a teacher plans to adopt an open approach for the first time.
In classes, where instruction is based on a traditional primer the use of selected materials
may help to open up small spaces, at least, for more independent learning. This makes
sense only, however, if the teacher takes seriously the didactic information and
methodical commentaries, such as the observation aids at the end of the booklets, for
Adams (1990); Stahl et al. (1990); Ehri/ Roberts (2006); Torgersen et al. (2006). The research reported in
these overviews provides additional evidence that a phonics orientation from the beginning is helpful, it does
not require graded schemes, however.
13
…as offered, for example, by Balhorn et al. (2010) with their “Rainbow Box of Booklets” graded in five
stages of increasing difficulty.
14
cf. Brinkmann et al. (2009).
15
cf. the stage models of Beers/ Henderson (1977), Frith (1985), Bear et al. (2008) for example, and more
generally for the importance of invented spellings the literature quoted in note 11.
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example, and if s/he concedes to the children some freedom to choose tasks and to
develop individual solutions.
The specific potential of the ABC-LE would be wasted, if teachers simply tried to
integrate tasks and materials in their familiar framework of teaching in a small steps at
equal pace for all. They would miss the core idea of the approach using the materials
offered simply as a quarry, without trying to understand the intentions of the authors and
giving some choice of the tasks to the children. This is not always easy as is reflected in
the evaluation of the ABC-LE. Nevertheless, teachers increasingly felt secure to give
autonomy to children, as they saw their children working successfully on their own.
The ABC-LE offers teachers a great chance to open spaces for children to independently
master basic skills of reading and writing without them being afraid that the children miss
important experiences for successful learning in the area. Taking seriously the language
experience approach implies to accept,
• that children have NOT to work through the materials in the same pace,
• that they NOT are given tasks in the same order (page by page),
• that that reading and writing attempts do NOT have to be correct from the beginning,
but are seen as gradual acquisition of the conventions of reading and writing
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.
It is therefore a pedagogical attitude, the distinguishes the ABC-LE from more
standardized reading and writing programmes - not merely a different method. On the
other hand, the materials provided offer structure to both teachers and children and give
security that often is missed in other versions of the LEA.
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Appendix 1: Didactic Map of the Learning Landscape of Initial Reading and Writing
Appendix 2: Lena’s individual PC-version of the “Speaking Table of Letters and Sounds”
(children select from the range of pictures with the same beginning sound the one they
find most helpful; words can be pronounced by clicking on the corresponding picture)
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Appendix 3: Stages of Development in Reading and Writing (cf. for more differentiated
stage models Bear et al. 2008 and Ehri 2005, for example).
Appendix 4: “Four Pillars” of a Rich Learning Environment
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