Introduction
Learning environment, which support their literacy and language development, are different for every child. Due to these differences in home settings, most children require high standard school and preschool environment and operational basic instructions to provide a successful reading.
The general quality of preschool environment and programs has been established as an essential determinant of optimistic impacts on literacy and language skills. Evaluation of many early childhood curriculums have acknowledged the improved value of high-class environment experiences for preschoolers in poverty, with larger impacts from more concentrated and high-quality programs and particularly some noticeable optimistic effects on language growth.
This paper discusses the study on preschool’s motivating environment which helps in promoting language and literacy development. This study is very vital for teachers and adults who are creating policy, programmatic, and instructional decisions which usually have change on the preschoolers’ language and literacy settings.
Effective reading area
Reading areas for preschoolers must be beneficial for them and most professionals prefer the use of truck tires, mattress tents, and lofts (Sawyer, 2011, p.46). Another essential factor is lighting in the reading environment for this age bracket since they are concentrating more on the words written in their books, and some are starting to understand and read them.
The best example of effective supply of light is use of daylight and positioning the reading area near the windows or doors. In providing an efficient reading area, it is essential to point out the need of preschoolers to understand the situations of things.
Cartoon posters in classrooms should not be encouraged for this age group and realistic posters should be introduced, showing the details of targeted images such as mountains, towns, and earth. Keeping real animals around reading areas for preschoolers are essential especially when learning about animals’ stories. All these methods which should be used when teaching preschoolers are important in bringing them into reality world.
As stated by Sawyer (2011, p.46), traffic patterns are essential in reading areas. Reading areas should have enough space to prevent movement restrictions. Limited space prevent preschoolers, who are often active, to gain access to information or items which they like and important to their learning.
Teachers should encourage preschoolers to respond to one another and if they do not respond to the other children’s questions, direct them to do so through bringing the questions again in a different way. Modify a child response and allow other children to add more responses so that they are also involved in that question.
Certainly, these methods of teaching assist in motivating the children. Introduction of reading materials like toys, dolls, and other items are essential in helping children relate what they have learned to the reality. For instance, after reading about cars and bicycles, place a car or bicycle toy on the table. In most situations, preschoolers would soon begin touching the toys and leafing through the books.
Language environment in preschools
Preschoolers are very curious about what they see in books and they want to know why these things exist. They are able to differentiate between cars, amount, gender, and so forth. Therefore their learning environment or books used in their learning activities should provide these differences. For instance the teacher should provide posters which show different types of animals, birds (through their beaks), cars (through their shapes and sizes), and so forth.
Dramatic play should be enhanced in language environment since it is an essential context for rich language application. Also, professional opportunities and cultural understanding should be applied because they create a better learning environment for preschoolers.
Most studies have proposed that the standards of adult-child communication is necessary and the quantity of cognitively challenging talk which preschool participants undergo is associated with the quantity of time they communicate with adults or teachers (Sawyer, 2011, p.47).
Provided the necessity of adult-child communication, it is upsetting that most children may hardly communicate effectively with their preschool teachers and therefore obtaining minimal or no personal attentions. The newly established quality of learning environment has reported optimistic results on literacy and language development in preschoolers. Keeping the child clean, fed, and safe should not be the only focus on preschool environment since this age group is highly in need of early language motivation and literacy skills.
Beyond language and literacy
Provided the invasive evidence of variations in developing literacy learning and language skills related with linguistic, culture, and class environment, it is inspiring that preschool setting has reported to be advantageous to performance of children on school.
The lengths of time the child spends in preschool environment have been shown to have associations with performances of the child in the next level, second grade. The processes in preschool setting have huge impact on IQ in the early ages of the child and considerable constant effects on performance, socialization, grade retention, and even high school achievements (Sawyer, 2011, p.47).
For example, teachers should encourage and help them in drawing and writing since at this age group they are beginning to draw and write. Even though adults may not understand what the child has drawn or write, these images have certain meaning to them. The effective and motivating environment should be the one where the adults or teachers share experiences, listen, answer and ask questions.
Types of Language Experience
Fingerplays
Preschool fingerplays, music, chants and other literacy experiences would help preschool children to learn ideas and enhance their language skills. They help preschool children to learn some essential concepts like counting and fingerplays help in enhancing movements and hand gestures while singing.
They also support preschoolers to improve their gross motor skills and even so often fine motor skills. Even though they are some common fingerplays, adults or preschool teachers should introduce their own hand movements to songs which they desire their children to perform. These hand movements are important in supporting children to learn rhymes and songs. It also important in winning children attention and killing boredom which children obtain after sitting for a longer time in class (Sawyer, 2011, p.115).
Some of the common examples of fingerplays are “This Little Piggy’ and “Itsy Bitsy Spider,” but adults may generate their own fingerplays. “Weensy Spider” is another example of fingerplay which mimics a spider with its hands and fingers raised. Some types of fingerplays are applied when learning colors, shapes, counting, and alphabet and others emphasize on songs and rhyming.
Allowing preschoolers to rhyme is an essential ability for preschool children to understand and master. Learning rhymes support children master their reading after they reach that scholastic landmark. Some fingerplays are religious themes which are important not only in schools but also used in their homes and religious learning environment.
Poetry
Poems contribute a lot in preschool language program since they are interesting. They always accompany amusing and sometimes sad stories which capture the attention of children. As reading time or story telling sessions are often waited by preschoolers, it will be more important to hard poems since it works in overstating the story or reading hence making the preschoolers to concentrate more. For instance when reading animals’ story, it is important to introduce a poem which relates to these animals.
These poems usually come between the readings or at the start of the reading so that they can kill boredom or mark the beginning of the story. Poetry allows preschoolers to read the story clearly and vividly and the preschoolers who are interested in literacy would be stimulated by reading period and they will eventually like the words and pictures which accompany the story.
Some of the common and effective examples of preschool’s poems are “The Broken Legg’d Man” composed by Shaw and another from Ellis Butler, “The Ballad of a Bachelor.”
Conclusion
From the above discussion, it can be established that motivation environment is very vital for the development of children, preschoolers for this case. Through consideration of the situations of literacy learning usually aid to create suitable and effective environment for preschool children.
The reading environment should be attentively planned to cope with certain age group, thus it is essential to understand the literacy development in preschools and any other age group. Reading environment portrays several messages to children concerning the significance of reading.
It may not be natural for both adults and children to use poems and fingerplays, but they can be created with consideration and practice. They are very effective in bring children attention into class and relating the reality with what the child has learned in class.
References
Sawyer, W. (2011). Growing Up with Literature. Belmont, CA: Cengage Learning.