Hidden Literacies: Children Learning at Home and at School - Softcover

Voss, Margaret M.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0435088904 ISBN 13: 9780435088903

Publisher: Heinemann, 1996

Synopsis

This work asserts that children learn some of their most powerful literacies - literacies that can remain unknown and unacknowledged - far from their teacher's eyes. The author provides a window into children's home lives and learnings, uncovering multiple literacies to be valued in their own right, which can become additional tools in developing print literacy. The author tells the stories of three fourth-grade children and shows how they interact and learn in their homes and describes their teacher's efforts to tap into their varied literacies in school. Influenced by Howard Gardner's theory of multiple intelligences and Denny Taylor's research on family literacy, Voss shows how familial influences on children lead them to develop particular strengths, and she describes the features of home learning that teachers should understand and consider. She suggests the concept of literacy be broadened to include more than print - media literacy, consumer literacy, and especially interactive and mechanical literacy - so that the multiple literacies children acquire might be seen and valued. The book's final chapter acknowledges the difficulties of translating knowledge into practice and suggests ways to begin.

About this title

About the Authors

Margaret M. Voss, currently a fifth-grade teacher in Marblehead, Massachusetts, has also been a writing specialist, educational consultant, college teacher. She holds a Ph.D. in reading and writing instruction from the University of New Hampshire, where she taught graduate and undergraduate courses and studied with Donald Graves and Jane Hansen. Her articles have appeared in Language Arts and Reading/Writing Newsletter, and she has published chapters in several Heinemann books. Voss was a finalist for 1996 Massachusetts Teacher of the Year.

Donald H. Graves was a pioneer in literacy education who ultimately revolutionized the way that writing is taught in the United States and around the world. The research study he began in the 1970s at the Atkins Academy, a rural New Hampshire elementary school, would transform writing instruction and launch a new kind of resource: professional books for educators. His bestselling book, Writing: Teachers and Children at Work, challenged teachers to let children's needs and interests, not mandates, guide instruction. For the first time, young children became engaged as writers--not just students learning to write. As they were guided to make the decisions writers make in an authentic writing process, they raised our beliefs about what young writers were capable of.

Don Graves was a teacher, principal, Education Director, and Co-Director of an urban teacher preparation program. He was Professor Emeritus at the University of New Hampshire .

Heinemann proudly published Don's many other titles including A Fresh Look at Writing; A Sea of Faces; The Energy to Teach; Teaching Day By Day; and Inside Writing (coauthored with Penny Kittle). Children Want to Write: Don Graves and the Revolution in Children's Writing, edited by Thomas Newkirk and Penny Kittle, pairs Don's most important writings with recovered video from his classrooms, creating a vivid and surprising portrait of the man still referred to as "the Don."

NCTE's Donald H. Graves Award for Excellence in the Teaching of Writing is given annually to deserving educators who have shown exemplary understanding and insight on student improvement in writing.

For additional information about Don Graves, see:

• Where It All Started by Tom Newkirk
• A True Friend & a Good Writer by Nancie Atwell
• The Teacher as Learner: The Research of Donald Graves by Mary Ellen Giacobbe

Edition details

• Publisher: Heinemann
• Publication date: 1996
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0435088904
• ISBN 13: 9780435088903
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 220