Pathways to literacy and transitions to school : enabling incorporation and developing awareness of literacy

Abstract

This study examines children’s development and incorporation of literacy expertise across multiple sites and the transitions to school by four Māori preschool children, their whānau (families) and their teachers in Aotearoa/New Zealand. This study is embedded in a Kaupapa Māori framework of understanding and explaining teaching and learning processes across multiple sites of learning for children whose practices reflect ways of being and acting Māori. Descriptions of teaching and learning processes are also explained utilising a co-constructivist theoretical framework. These descriptions and explanations focus on the psychological processes of learning and development that children, whānau and teachers’ engage in their practice. A two phase case study design was employed that examines the teaching and learning processes of literacy across multiple sites. The first phase provides qualitative data that describes and explains how the different sorts of literacy and language activities are coconstructed by whānau and children. The ways by which literacy activities are constructed are inherent in parents ideas about teaching and learning reflected out of their diverse pedagogical practices. The distinct pedagogical practices also highlight the multiple pathways to learning that children developed and experienced in becoming an expert. This study also reported the influence of early educational settings as alternative and multiple contexts by which learning is organised and constructed. The different contexts provided families with specific ideas and practices about the teaching and learning process. The second phase of the study provides descriptions of how children’s literacy expertise was incorporated into classroom literacy and language activities. This phase of the study examines how teachers provided opportunities by which children’s literacy expertise was incorporated into classroom activities. This study reported incidents where incorporation of children’s level of literacy expertise was enhanced while other children’s literacy expertise was discouraged in classroom activities. The significance of the reported differences of incorporation was provided from teacher’s ideas and beliefs about children’s literacy expertise upon entry to school. The study showed how teacher’s ideas reflected the way that they organised and constructed literacy activities. Teacher’s ideas also reflected their awareness of the diversity of children’s literacy expertise. The earlier phase of this study examined the multiple ways and multiple contexts by which children learn and develop literacy expertise. Incorporation of children’s literacy expertise into classroom activities was determined by the degree to which teachers made connections that resonated children’s expertise. This was also determined by teacher’s instructional practices in the context of the classroom environment. The implications of this study make important contributions to pedagogical practices for teachers in classroom environments. The descriptions and explanations reported in this study highlight the complexities of teaching and learning for children of diverse cultural and language communities.